Deadville

by Robert F. Jones

  Or had he?

  The brother to whom I now said:

  “Not merely peace, Brother. Love.”

  He smiled his hard, dark smile and stepped forward. We embraced.

  I stepped back, cool again.

  “Where’s Jaime?” I asked him.

  “Right here,” my son said.

  He was standing on a boulder to our right, the Allen & Wheelock resting butt-down on his hip.

  At that angle, in that mountain light, he looked six feet tall. He was tanned by the journey, brown as an Apache, all of the baby fat burned off his face. His sombrero was tilted back on his brow just like Owen’s; he, too, was puffing a cigarillo.

  A hard face, like his uncle’s.

  My son the bandido.

  Then Owen saw Pine Leaf. She stared at him. His eyes slipped out of focus for a moment, and he removed the cigarillo from his lips.

  “Válgame Dios!” they both said at once. “I thought you were dead!”

  Jaime jumped from his rock.

  Plover ran to him and hugged him, already asking a thousand questions.

  Gwen slid from her horse and hugged the little dog.

  Esme began to squirm on Plover’s back; she wanted to join the fun.

  “Let’s postpone this joyous family reunion,” Jim said, still watching the river where it coursed down from the great, cruel peaks. “We’ve got about ten minutes to get ready.”

  “Ready for what?” Plover asked.

  Jim looked at her, sad, I guess, but serious.

  “The battle of our lives,” he said.

  CHAPTER X

  THERE WERE THREE possible defensive positions at the mine. The stamp mill was the strongest. Built of stone and about forty feet high, it would provide covering fire to the crossings of both the Buenaventura and Garnet Creek. The Grovans had fired it, burning out the interior and collapsing the roof, but Owen had already removed some rocks from the walls to create rifle slits. It was close to the water, so a prolonged siege couldn’t drive the stamp mill’s defenders out by means of thirst.

  The supervisor’s house was also stone-built and had windows in all four walls which riflemen could fire from. The roof was made of slate, or anyway a thin stone slab that resembled it, so it could not be set ablaze by fire arrows. It had no independent supply of water, but Owen and Jaime had lugged kegs of creekwater down to the house from the unpolluted springs up the mountain from the mine.

  The stone wall that surrounded the burnt-out cabins of the prisoners was the most vulnerable position. There were no parapets atop the six-foot-high wall, no rifle platform behind the wall, and any man firing from the top could easily be picked off by a marksman a hundred or two hundred yards away, even from cover on the rocky shore across the Buenaventura.

  “Still,” Jim said, “we’d better put one gun in there just to deny the damned thing to Dade and Smoke. If they get some guns in there, they could have us in a crossfire, or use the place to stage sorties on either the stamp mill or the house.”

  We were all standing in the open near the stamp mill. Pine Leaf was watching upriver for the first sign of the attacking force. The river was roaring now, brown and full of fast-moving junk.

  “I’ve got a surprise for them in the prison yard if they do,” Owen said.

  “What?”

  “I mined the compound with gunpowder. If we can get a bunch of them inside, I’ll light it off. I’ve rigged a long fuse from the house. And don’t worry; it’s waterproof.”

  “Then we’ll have to lure them into the compound,” Jim said. “Have a rifleman out there when they show up, let him fire a few times to draw their attention to the place; then when they move in on it the gunner can dash to the house. Once they’re inside the compound, Bang!”

  “I’ll do it,” Jaime said.

  “No, you won’t,” said his mother.

  “It’s got to be someone who can keep cool under fire,” I said. “I’ll g°”

  “Nothing but heroes in this little Alamo,” Owen said. “I’d volunteer myself, except that I’d be more valuable here, to set off the charges.”

  “Spy?” Jim said.

  “I’ll take the compound,” the Shawnee said.

  I looked upriver, past Pine Leaf. Whole trees were coming down on the spate. I saw a drowned elk rolling over and over through the rapids.

  “All right,” Jim said. “Let’s have two guns in the stamp mill: Dillon and Jaime. Owen, Pine Leaf, and me in the house. Spy will fall back to the house when we’ve got them coming to the compound. Later he could go out and reinforce you two in the stamp mill if it’s necessary.”

  “What about me?” Plover said. “I can shoot. I can shoot straight.

  So can Gwen. With light charges, anyway. And she can reload if you’ll show her how on those Colts of yours.”

  “You and the girls will stay with us in the house,” Jim said. “Reloading mainly, but shooting if and when necessary. If things get too hot in the stamp mill, Dill and Jaime can fall back here. Let’s arrange a signal so you can let us know when you’ll be coming back. That way we can cover you.”

  Owen went over to his saddlebags and pulled out a red shirt. He handed it to me. “Tie this on a stick and wave it when you’re planning to retreat,” he said. “Then give us a couple of minutes to start laying down fire.”

  “All of this makes for a good defense,” Spy said. “But can’t we do something to them? Hit them some way? Otherwise it’s just going to be one long, hard siege. Smoke’s an Indian. He’ll cut his losses and ride out of here if his people start getting chewed up, just like the Sioux did in that second big fight with the Rees years ago, back east in Dakota. But Dade won’t quit.”

  “Let’s get a look at them before we make any plans for sorties or counterattacks,” Jim said. “See how many men they’ve got. Look for openings.”

  Owen laughed.

  “What?” Jim said.

  “I’ve got another surprise in store for Don Lafcadio Dade.”

  He stood there smiling, smug. Maybe just a little bit mad. “Where’s the rest of that gunpowder?” I asked him.

  Before he could answer, Pine Leaf said, “Here they come.”

  A STRAGGLING GANG of riders had appeared around the upriver bend. The first of them were already picking their way across the ford. Twenty feet out the horses had to swim. They came angling downstream toward us. The rest of the band hit the water—a good three dozen men, mainly Missourians and Mexicans, but Old Smoke’s outfit mixed in with them. I could see Dade’s red hair and beard flashing in the sunlight.

  “Let’s get to our positions,” Jim said. “They’ll be here in five minutes.”

  “Is there any food in the stamp mill, in case we need it?” I asked.

  “I’ll get some jerky and beans to you before Dade arrives,” Jim said.

  Jaime and I ran for the mill while the others scattered to their posts. I had two powder horns and plenty of bullets in the pouch. “Do you have enough ammunition?” I asked my son.

  “There’s spare powder and ball cached in the stamp mill,” he said. “Owen was thinking ahead even before you showed up.”

  We went in and barred the heavy oak door. It was dark and dank. The reek of stale wood ash and brimstone hung in the air. Sunlight speared through a charred hole in the roof and a few small windows. A wooden ladder led up to the scaffolding that circled the interior of the mill and gave access to our firing positions. Far overhead in the darkness I could see the heavy drop hammer poised at the top of its cycle, waiting for a quarter-turn of the camshaft to release it. A wooden bar held the cam in place. We scaled the ladder and looked out the upstream windows.

  Dade’s little army had forded the river. Riders were moving down toward us at a walk, still far out of rifle range. The carcass of the drowned elk had cleared the rapids and was drifting downstream in the slack water, abreast of the approaching riders. I scanned the horsemen, looking for Ed Chambers. I couldn’t spot him. Where the hell was he? What wa
s he up to?

  I went around the scaffold to the opposite window. Spy was standing by the gate of the prison yard, a rifle at the ready. It was Beckwourth’s ring-lever Colt. He must have lent it to Spy at the last minute to give the impression of a larger force entrenched in the prison compound. With the Colt, Spy could bang off eight shots without reloading.

  No sign of Chambers.

  “They’re charging,” Jaime said from across the way. I ran over.

  It was Old Smoke’s boys, coming fast across the gravel. They were painted for war, reds and blacks and yellows and whites, and screaming like eagles. I could see Dade standing on a boulder with a spyglass to his eye. His hair and beard blazed red in the sunlight.

  Smoke led the charge. I held him in my sights, fired when he was 100 yards out, and missed. I heard the bang of Jaime’s rifle beside me. A Cheyenne pony stumbled and fell. Then Beckwourth and Owen opened up from the house. Two more Indians fell. Jaime had already reloaded as I reseated my ramrod. He was fast. He fired again at the same time I did. We both hit Old Smoke’s horse. It fell into the shallows of Garnet Creek, spilling the Cheyenne into the water. Bullets smacked into the stones of the stamp mill. Dade’s men had moved forward with the assault. I saw Smoke running back up the beach. Jaime chased him with a futile shot.

  The attack collapsed. The Indians retreated to the main body.

  But now they were much closer, maybe 200 yards away, huddled behind drift logs and rocks, popping away at us.

  During the lull that followed, Plover and Gwen raced over to the stamp mill carrying a bundle of food and extra ammunition for us.

  “How’s it going?” I asked her.

  “Jim says fine. Kill a couple more Cheyennes and Old Smoke will call it quits.”

  “Let’s hope so. But there’d still be twenty of Dade’s gang to deal with.”

  “Keep a strong heart,” she said. “Owen is making some small bombs, gunpowder, and buckshot in empty tin cans we found. They’ll have short fuses. They won’t do much damage, he says, but maybe they’ll scare the Indians off anyway. Dade’s men, too, if we’re lucky. I’ll send Gwen over with some for you when they’re ready.”

  She kissed me and they ran back, dodging and bending low to present more difficult targets to the distant rifles. A stitchwork of bullets dusted their path.

  “WHAT ARE THEY doing now?” Jaime said.

  I looked upstream. Dade’s men were sewing greased buffalo hides to oval frames of riverside willow.

  “Making bull boats,” I said. “They’ll cross the river out of range and try to outflank us, send at least part of their strength downstream, land down below, and attack from both sides. Good. That’ll split their force and put the landing party in range of Spy and the repeater.”

  “And Owen’s gunpowder,” Jaime said.

  There were two hours of daylight left when the boats pushed off. Five of them, with three men in each. Dade was in the lead boat. The pilots poled the bull boats across the current. We shot and may have holed one or two of them, but they all reached the far side of the Buenaventura without sinking. They swept on downstream with the current, and we saw them angle in toward our shore just below the prison compound. The river was still running strong. I noticed that the carcass of the drowned elk had drifted down to a gravel bar just below the stamp mill. It was within easy reach of us if we ran short of food and needed fresh meat. I figured that when it got dark I’d go down there and butcher it, take a haunch and the loins at least.

  Just then the door of the supervisor’s house opened and I saw Gwen emerge, lugging a heavy, lumpy sack. Owen’s bombs.

  I trotted back down the ladder, unbarred the door, and swung it wide. She was grinning, happy to be of help, part of this glorious battle.

  Then the world changed.

  A huge, wet, dark Indian burst from the water immediately behind the beached elk, rifle in hand, and sprinted across the gravel, coming up fast toward Gwen.

  Ed Chambers. …

  “Gwennie, go back!” I yelled.

  She looked back and saw him too late, dropped her bundle, and ran full speed toward me. Chambers was right behind her.

  The big Delaware grabbed her up in midstride, spun around, and angled toward the cliff face, heading for the entrance to the mine.

  “Spy!” I shouted. But he’d seen it already. He had the ring-lever Colt to his shoulder but must have realized that it couldn’t throw straight enough for a safe shot. He ran out in pursuit of Chambers, leaving the prison compound unguarded. He looked over at me where I stood at the mill door, threw the Colt rifle toward the house, then drew his knife. Chambers was still ten yards ahead of him.

  They disappeared only a few steps apart, into the black abyss of the mine shaft.

  At that moment the Cheyennes charged again toward Garnet Creek and the landing force opened fire. Bullets whanged through the windows, richocheted from the walls. …

  “I’m hit,” Jaime said. He fell from the scaffold, his rifle clattering down with him.

  Blood streamed from the top of his chest.

  There was nothing for it. I pulled him to his feet and we made for the safety of the house.

  Our neat little battle plan was fraying fast.

  CHAPTER XI

  DARKNESS FELL, BLACK as the pit until a three-quarter moon crept over the Encantadas to the east. Its cold, pale light illumined a desperate scene. Old Smoke’s men held the stamp mill, Dade’s the prison compound. They were holding their fire, sniping only occasionally, waiting for us to make a move. They’d have us in a crossfire if we tried to make a break for it. One of the Cheyennes had sneaked in and stolen the horses and mules anyway. So how could we escape? In the supervisor’s house we didn’t know what to do. Jim and Plover had bandaged Jaime’s wound. The bullet had shattered his collarbone but passed clean through the muscles of his left shoulder. It hadn’t hit any major arteries, thank God. The boy was out of action, still groggy with the laudanum Jim had given him while Plover treated the entry and exit wounds. We’d built up a fire, heated a steel ramrod red-hot, and passed it through the bullethole to cauterize the wound. Then she went to work with her catgut and needle. He’d be hurting pretty bad when the drug wore off. There was no more laudanum. Perhaps he could still shoot, a revolver at least, with his uninjured right arm. But at what?

  We’d heard nothing from the mine since Spy and Chambers entered it. No shots. Just silence. I was for going in there. Owen said no.

  “There are too many tunnels,” Owen said. “Go in and you’ll only get lost. Spy is still stalking him. We’ve got to trust his stealth. I’m sure we’d have heard something from someone if a conclusion had been reached.”

  “Is Gwen all right, though?” That was my main concern. Chambers might have cut her throat already and Spy’s, too, for all we knew.

  “How the hell do I know?” Owen snapped. “You should never have brought her along. Plover should never have let her go over to the mill with those half-assed bombs of mine.”

  Plover got up and walked impatiently around the room.

  “Why don’t you blow up the compound?” I said. “Let’s at least get rid of Dade and the men with him. See what this god-almighty explosion of yours can do for us.”

  “We tried just before you came in with Jaime,” Beckwourth said. He was standing at the window, to one side, watching both the mill and the compound wall in case of an attack. “Owen’s fuse fizzled. That rain must have got it wet despite his waterproofing.”

  “What’s the other surprise you were talking about?” I asked Owen.

  “I’ve planted charges in the mine and on the cliff above it,” he said. “I can blow the whole infernal thing to hell and gone.”

  “If the fuse ain’t wet.”

  “It’ll be dry inside the mine if I can get there.”

  “But now Spy and Gwen are inside,” Plover said. “I won’t let you do it.”

  Owen turned away. Did he want to blow the place anyway?

  “
Enough of this bickering, children,” Jim said. “I’m sure Chambers won’t kill Gwen, not yet anyway. He’s holding her hostage. I know the man. He had a wife and three kids in the Taos pueblo. He’s mean, sure, but he’s no child killer.”

  Unless he’s gone crazy with sorrow, I thought. Vengeance is strange medicine.

  “No,” Jim continued, “what we have to do now is what Spy said just before Dade and Smoke showed up. Find a way to hit them so it hurts. Go on the attack.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “There are only five or six Cheyennes in the stamp mill,” he said.

  “At most a dozen of Dade’s boys in the compound. How many of those grenades do we have left?”

  “Half a dozen,” Owen said.

  I said, “And there’s that bundle of them Gwen dropped when Chambers jumped her. It’s still lying near the mill. I saw it just before dark.”

  “All right then, here’s the plan.”

  After moonset, Pine Leaf was to put the sneak on the mill, crawling over there under cover of darkness. She’d recover the grenades Gwen had dropped. Then at first light she would light the fuses one by one and throw the bombs into the mill through one of the windows.

  Meanwhile Jim, Owen, and I would slip around to the far side of the compound. When Owen, and I were in position near the back gate, Jim would go over the wall into the midst of Dade’s boys. “I’ve done it before,” he said. “In early ’33, the year you fellows came west, we had a war party of Blackfeet forted up in a similar situation. There were about thirty of them holding a rock-rimmed bastion down on the lower Bighorn. It was a huge mass of granite, forming a natural wall in front that ranged from six feet high to about twenty-five feet, nearly perpendicular all the way around. They were safe as bugs in there, sniping away at us. Every time we tried to storm the place they beat us back. Our losses were getting way too high. Long Hair, the old Grow chief, wanted to quit. ‘Our marrow bones are broken,’ he said. ‘We cannot drive them from the fort without sacrificing too many men. Warriors, retreat!’ ”