by T C Donivan
Zenobia shrugged. “What can one do when it is their own flesh and blood?”
The revelation shocked me. “Does he know?” I asked.
“I’ve told him in as many words, but he doesn’t listen to anything he doesn’t want to hear. Why would he think his father and mother would willingly send him so far away from home in the care of someone he barely knows?” Zenobia sighed and took the drinking gourd from Spencer.
By now others of the tribe were stirring. Women had begun to clear away the bones of the feast and men sat before their lodges lazily mending bow strings and sharpening knives. Some of the more rambunctious children were already playing at games.
“What were they about, Running Wolf and his friends?” Spencer asked.
Zenobia looked nervous. “I can’t say.”
Tree Owl gazed off at the empty vista into which the visitors had vanished. “They attacked the caravan you traveled with last night to steal livestock, but the white people fought them off.”
“Was anyone injured?” I asked becoming alarmed.
“They killed an old man and a woman,” Tree Owl said.
“Who were they?” I asked, my innards quaking.
Tree Owl shrugged. “The old man’s scalp was no good, his hair was all gone they said. But he showed us the woman’s. It was long and black and curly.”
Chapter 13 - Retribution
Spencer and I, accompanied by Tree Owl and Mozart, struck out for the immigrant camp as fast as we could saddle our ponies. Sebastian and his party declined to join us, preferring to follow a band of Sioux in pursuit of feathered prey along a marshy bank of the Platte. My annoyance at them was monumental, but as they were under no moral obligation to help either us, or the erstwhile pioneers, I held my temper to maintain the fellowship, such as it was.
We rode like the wind all that day and found the wagon train just as the sun was falling into the western horizon. They were still camped in the hollow where Running Wolf and his cowardly band had attacked them the previous night. Guns bristled at the ramparts and a cry went up as we approached. I called out a greeting and they pulled down a barricade between the wagons.
All eyes were upon us as we rode into the square. One by one, the terrified immigrants came out of their hiding. An unholy pall hung over the camp. Two dirt mounds in the center of the wagon square gave solemn evidence of the crime that had been committed. My eyes scanned the survivors searching for Rachel, but could not find her. Kingfish emerged from the crowd, rifle in hand.
“What do you bastards want with us? More blood?” He asked.
I ignored his provocation, “We heard about the raid and came as quickly as we could. Is Rachel all right?”
“Was her momma and daddy killed,” Kingfish told us.
I felt equal parts relief at her survival and horror at her loss. I began to dismount with the intention to find her and offer my solace, but Kingfish leveled his rifle at my chest and I stayed atop Elijah, one leg half over the saddle.
“How did you know about the raid?” He asked.
“Running Wolf came back to the Sioux camp late last night. When he told us what he’d done, Tree Owl ran him off and we came as fast as we could,” I explained.
The story did not mollify Kingfish, only turned his ugly face more cloudy. “You knew about it and let them come on to try and kill us.”
“You’re twisting what I said. We knew nothing about it until Running Wolf came back,” I replied.
“You turncoat cowards,” he said, spitting out the words. He turned to the assembled men of the company. “Take their guns!” He ordered.
The other immigrants crowded in. To fight back was inconceivable as these people had been our companions. They overwhelmed us, pulling us from our horses and confiscating our weapons. I struggled some, but gave it up after one of the louts cracked me in the ribs with a musket butt. Tree Owl was stoic. A slight, sardonic grin warped the corners of Spencer’s mouth. Mozart was silent as always. They tied our hands and waltzed the four of us around to the center of the wagon square. Kingfish summoned all the company to attend. I noticed Rachel and Sosanna among them. I tried catching her eye, but she avoided looking at me.
“We have a trial to hold!” Kingfish announced.
“What are you talking about? We’ve done nothing!” I argued.
Kingfish pushed his hairy face into mine, his stinking breath like the fumes of a charnel house. “You shut your trap until it’s your turn, or I’ll knock your teeth out,” he warned. He marched off, preening like the lord of the manor. “We need twelve good men to stand a jury. I’ll sit as judge,” he said.
The twelve were chosen, it being slim pickings as their original number had been reduced by one and another self-empanelled as judge. As such, two lads of no more than sixteen were recruited to round out the makeshift court. Kingfish put a rocking chair beside the fire and sat his large backside in it, arranging the men and boys in a semi-circle around us. The scene was ludicrous in the extreme.
“What are the rules of this hearing? May we bear witness in defense of ourselves?” Spencer asked politely.
Kingfish considered the motion, rubbing his bearded chin. “I reckon.”
“What are the charges?” Spencer asked.
Kingfish glared at him from beneath his thick brow. “Old man Hanisch and his wife was killed and scalped last night. It was mighty bloody business. A dozen savages rode into the camp, screaming blue murder. They grabbed Mr. Hanisch right off and split his skull with a club, then took the Missus with the intent, no doubt, to abuse her at their leisure. Luckily, I stepped in. When they saw I intended to fight, they ripped her hair off while she was still screaming, then slit her throat like a hog at the slaughter. Mrs. MacLamore was shot through her arm with an arrow and we had two oxen killed. You admit you were among the murdering redskins last night. What do you have to say for yourself before we pronounce sentence?”
Spencer was as calm as a Boston lawyer, “As my friend, Mr. Donegal, stated, we were neither present at the attack, nor privy to its planning.”
Kingfish looked confused. “Is that all you got?”
“You are correct, that is our defense,” he answered.
A murmur rose up among the crowd and the jurors deliberated. One of them stepped forward with an observation, “It was dark, but we know they were Indians, not white men.”
Another spoke up pointing his finger at Tree Owl, “That one is a red nigger just like the ones killed them Jews.”
“He was with us all night, I can vouch for that,” I answered.
Kingfish cut me off. “Your word ain’t worth nothing. They’s all liars. I say we hang them now.”
Many in the crowd nodded their approval, but there were dissenting voices. Jason Smith, a man we’d shared some wild game with, came to our defense, “We haven’t the authority to execute these men. They’ve never played me or anyone else here wrong.”
An argument broke out. Rachel Hanisch stepped into the glow of the campfire. She looked careworn and sick, dark rings around her hollow eyes. I could not imagine the day and night she had lived through. The throng hushed as she spoke. Her voice was soft as butter.
“It is my family has been injured. I say it is our right to pass judgment.” She pointed at me. “It was this one brought the Indians to our camp. In my country, it would make him as guilty as the murderers.”
I was stunned at her words. “Rachel, I meant no harm. It was an outlaw band of one Ogallala and some marauding Shoshones. We came back to help you. Doesn’t that prove our intentions?”
The people crowded in close to hear her reply. “I say, kill them all.”
I felt the blood rush from my head at the terrible verdict. Our lone defender, Smith, tried to object, but he was shouted down. I looked to little Sosanna, but she was cowed by the ravening throng.
“Guilty!” Kingfish called out with glee.
A blood lust overtook the mob, the women as well as the men. Death was in their eyes, gleaming
back at us like the demented fires of hell. Some of the children pelted us with stones. Tree Owl began to chant his death song. Spencer interrupted the melee, his patrician voice commanding them.
“And how do you mean to carry out your sentence?” He paused for a moment to let the question sink in before going on, “Hanging is the preferred method, but there is no tree within a hundred miles that would service us.” This observation put a bit of a damper on their enthusiasm. “Will you form a firing squad then? Or better yet, save your powder and musket balls, they’re precious. Why don’t you butcher us like sheep with your kitchen knives?”
This threw the camp into bedlam. The two dozen men and women began to argue even more vociferously than before among themselves until they were deadlocked; some actually agreeing that stabbing us was the best solution, while others now pleaded for leniency. Having achieved his desired effect, Spencer went for the closer.
“Odd, that’s it’s the Jew cast sentence. Perhaps she’d prefer to crucify us.” With that incendiary remark, the camp fell into dead silence, all eyes upon Rachel.
“They only kilt the Jews. Maybe it was them they was after,” one of them whispered. Another agreed. I could feel the mood shift, the focus of their wrath shifting subtly to Rachel and Sosanna who clung to her sister’s skirts like a child.
“Turn us loose,” Spencer ordered quietly.
Our friend Smith took the opportunity to undo our ropes. “Not the Indian,” someone said.
“He’s done you no harm,” Spencer intoned.
The terrible verdict they had cast upon us was forgotten and even Tree Owl was freed. Smith helped us retrieve our weapons while the immigrants crowded around Rachel and Sosanna. Logic dictated we escape the society of lunatics we had fallen into before they changed their minds, but I determined not to abandon Rachel even after she had condemned me.
“What are we going to do?” I asked.
“We must see how this comes out,” Spencer said as if he were attending a play at a theater.
“Damned Jews, they’re always the cause of it,” One of the jurors told Kingfish.
The wagon master scratched his head, an unmistakable craving in his eyes as he watched Rachel. “They are,” he agreed.
Spencer took center stage. “I say you cast them out as Pharaoh did Moses. Let them wander in the desert for forty years,” he told them.
“I lost an ox! How am I going to get to Oregon?” A flat headed dirt farmer from Missouri asked.
“Make them pay a tribute,” Spencer said.
Heads nodded in agreement. “Two ox was lost. The Jews got four. Them that lost ox, take one apiece,” Kingfish announced as if he were Solomon rendering judgment.
“What about my wife? She had an arrow in her arm. What if she dies?” The husband of the injured woman asked.
“Take their goods!” Someone shouted.
With that, the rush was on. The mob made a dash for the Hanisch wagon and fell upon it like wolves a wounded doe. In short order, the wagon was plundered, everything including the canvas top and water barrel being pillaged. A fight broke out over a fine old hand carved clock which resulted in the ancient time piece being shattered along with a farmer’s nose which gushed copious amounts of blood. Once their orgiastic frenzy had been sated, most of the immigrants retreated to their wagons. A few of the men remained at the periphery of the square, casting evil looks at the Hanisch sisters. Despite his enthusiasm, Kingfish had not taken part in the pogrom. He turned to us dumbly, seeming befuddled by the turn of events. Evil was in the air.
Spencer nodded at the two surviving Hanisches. “If you’ll help us Captain, we’d best get them away from here. You don’t want their fate on your head. Help us hitch up what’s left of their wagon.”
Kingfish assented. Rachel held her trembling sister as we pulled together what we could for them. Kingfish gave us a bag of stale biscuits and a canteen of water. A lame ox that would not last a day was offered in place of the fine brace of four that had been stolen. We harnessed it to the wagon and loaded the girls into the battered conveyance. Spencer, looking happy as a clam, sat upon the bench to drive the unwieldy beast. Sosanna wept as we pulled away from the camp.
The night air was exquisitely cool and fresh and the stars were shining brightly overhead. As the lights of the immigrant camp slowly disappeared, I felt as if I had escaped some preordained disaster. After a while, Mozart climbed off his pony and joined Sosanna in the back of the wagon. He pulled out his flute and played a soft tune that echoed the breeze. The girl snuggled close, seeming hypnotized by him. Rachel climbed on the bench beside Spencer. I watched in amazement as she laid her head on his shoulder. Witchcraft I thought. Tree Owl rode beside me. He began to sing a sweet, melodic tune in celebration of the night and our deliverance from the murderous immigrants.
Chapter 14 – Fort Laramie
We arrived some time later at Fort Laramie or Fort John as it was still known in those days. Outside its fortified walls, an army of Arapahoe, Cheyenne, Sioux, immigrants and European trappers were bivouacked. The place was akin to the Tower of Babel with its multitude of languages and ethnicities. Inside, traders plied their wares like shopkeepers in the markets of ancient Byzantium.
The month was September and the last of the immigrant caravans were departing from the fort before the early snows came. The local trappers were gathering for their annual rendezvous to sell their year’s pelts. Kentucky whisky vied with glass beads and steel Bowie Knives as barter for beaver pelts and fox hides. The braying of jackasses and drunken brawling was incessant from morning till night with no let up until dawn, when it began all over again.
The fort itself consisted of four adobe walls with two watchtowers and a blockhouse of apartments, offices and shops. John Jacob Astor’s American Fur Company had purchased the station from William Sublette of the famous Sublette Brothers three years earlier. The proprietors were an unfriendly bunch who guarded their gates like a spinster her virtue, carefully scrutinizing all newcomers before entry was allowed for fear of hostile Indians, or raiders. The place was a merging point of trails that led to California, Oregon and Mormon Utah to the west. It lay in a lush crescent of the North Platte and Laramie Rivers with the steep foothills of the Rockies visible above its walls.
We had taken the Hanisches to the Sioux camp after our escape from the vigilantes and procured horses for Rachel and Sosanna by trading the sickly ox and broken down wagon. The natives had quickly disassembled the Conestoga and made use of its timber and iron and slaughtered the beast of burden for food.
Sebastian and his crew had tired of the local color and were ready to move on as well. Tree Owl took leave of his relatives and accompanied us, serving as our hunter and guide. Storms had dogged us, turning the wagon trail to ankle deep mud, slowing our progress, but we had still arrived well ahead of Kingfish’s caravan, whom I cursed daily in a most un-Christian-like manner.
We secured a room for the Hanisch girls in the fort, which was no easy feat as square footage with a solid roof overhead was at a premium. Still, Spencer had as always, worked his charms and found not only shelter, but rough furnishings for the orphaned sisters as well. Having set them up in such grand, frontier style, I had supposed our job was done and we would continue westward before the snows came and the mountain passes became blocked, but as always, Spencer had surprised me.
Rachel had little time for me, bearing a grudge, not only for our night of connubial bliss, but for the murder of her parents for which she blamed me, perhaps rightfully so. Oddly enough, I felt no burden of conscience, rather pique at her continued punitive treatment of me. She had, however, warmed to considerably to Spencer, the two of them becoming nearly inseparable in the days since her rescue from the immigrant mob. While the two of them cavorted like young lovers, I had become restless and feared being caught at the fort for the winter. Sebastian and the others were planning to leave at the end of the week and I was considering joining them whether Spencer came or not. Californ
ia with its warm weather and blue ocean beckoned and I longed to see it.
I lured Spencer away from the girl finally, with the enticement to sketch the local scenery, my actual motive being to bring him to his senses. The day was sunny and bright with the faintest hint of fall in the air. We sat astride our horses, Elijah and Blue just outside the south wall of the fort observing the multi-ethnic horde.
“What do you intend to do with the Hanisches?” I asked.
“They were going to Oregon, so I suppose we’d best see them to their destination,” Spencer said.
I could not bear the thought of accompanying the disapproving Rachel across the Rockies and the months it would entail. When I did not immediately reply, he turned the full force of his attention on me.
“Doesn’t that suit you? I thought you wanted to be near Rachel? Weren’t you in love with her once upon a time?”
“I was, but she’s beat it out of me,” I said.
I would have sworn Spencer jeered at me, but in reality no sound escaped his lips, the corner of his mouth betraying the barest hint of derision. “They would interfere with our adventure, wouldn’t they? So what would you have done if Rachel had not rejected you?”
“I don’t know. I would have married her, I suppose. I would have taken her to San Francisco.”
“She forgives you,” Spencer said.
“What?”
“Rachel, she’s forgiven you for what you did. I convinced her to live and let live. We must all get along if we’re going to be friends.”
I was unimpressed by the news, my ardor for the girl having passed when she set the lynch mob on me. “Really, I suppose that’s good. I wouldn’t want to be enemies with her all my life. After all, I meant her no harm. The unholy pact to bed her was your idea,” I said.
“Yes, but you did not turn me down,” he answered.
“I would have married her,” I said again.
Spencer’s lip curled. “You got what you wanted, but you had no idea what to do next did you?”