By eight o’clock, they’d finished their tally and were eating cornbread, sowbelly, and beans. Nelson Story said, “They got thirty head. Jackson, Petty, Thompson, and Ratcliff stay with the herd: everybody else saddle a fresh mount.”
Ratcliff roped a horse anyway. “They busted my Dutch oven.”
Tracks beelined for Pumpkin Butte. Bright sun, warm day, purple sagebrush, and chalky alkali.
“What if we’re riding into a thousand indians?”
“Be a thousand sorry indians,” Nelson Story snapped. “Unless they got cash for my beeves.”
At noon they watered their horses at a brackish spring cows had muddied not long before. They drank from canteens and ate Ratcliff’s cornbread.
“Wonder what Petty and the boys are eatin’,” George Dow said. “Might be they’re rootin’ through the nigger’s stores.”
Ratcliff smiled. “They’re cowboys, so naturally they’re dumb. Even a cowboy ain’t that dumb.”
The riders smelled the woodsmoke before they saw it. Smoke haze shimmered above a rise and at Story’s gesture they dismounted. Two stayed as horse holders while the others climbed through bristly sagebrush, stooped low, moving in silent dashes. They belly-crawled the last fifty yards to the top.
A dozen Lakota sat around the fire, eating one of Nelson Story’s beeves, reliving the excitement of the night before. They wore hunting garb, not the elaborate finery of a war party, and likely had stumbled on the herd by accident. The indian perched cross-legged on the partially skinned beef was doing most of the talking.
The talker was gesturing with a marrow bone and Ratcliff drew a bead on his chest. When Nelson Story fired, Ratcliff’s man flipped backward as if he’d been clubbed with a singletree.
Indians scattered and dove for cover, but the Remingtons barked and dirt spouted and men fell and one warrior charged until bullets punched his chest and lifeblood stained his vest. His bow dropped and he fell on his face in the alkali.
When the firing stopped, the silence rang in Ratcliff’s ears. He swallowed.
Nelson Story dispatched the wounded. One dying man’s heels drummed, another man voided his bowels.
“I’d hoped I was quit of this work,” Shillaber said.
“Yes,” Ratcliff said.
“You were a soldier.”
“Edward Ratcliff, Sergeant Major, 38th United States Colored Troops.”
“Top, there were three reasons the Federals whipped us: Abe Lincoln, Jesus Christ, and you niggers.”
Ratcliff took that as an apology.
Skinning knife in hand, George Dow bent over the warrior who’d rushed them. Dow pulled back the scalp lock, stabbed a gap into the flesh of the forehead, pushed his fingers between skin and skull, and jerked the scalp free. He hung it from his belt.
Through the afternoon they chivvied the cattle and indian ponies toward the herd. One calf had a broken leg, so Ratcliff shot it and saved its organs for Son-of-a-Bitch Stew.
The Frenchy’s camp was upstream from their bedground. His scalped skull gleamed like a bloody bowl. Iron wheel rims and wagon bows remained of his burned wagon, and his horses lay dead in their traces.
“Frenchy wasn’t lyin’ about him bein’ a boy,” Ratcliff said.
Tommy Thompson said, “Was a boy. Poor kid was too young to use it for anything but pissin’.”
They dug graves deep enough so wolves wouldn’t dig them up.
The next day they hit Fort Reno, which was a low stockade, a few tents, and a cemetery. Its captain wondered if anybody at Fort Laramie had mentioned reinforcements. They left Bill Petty and Jack Blascomb there with the army surgeon.
In the next three days they found graves at Soldier Creek and Crazy Woman Creek. It snowed and the earth was dusted white.
Fort Phil Kearny’s seventeen acres were inside a pole stockade. Blanket indians came begging until they saw the scalp dangling from George Dow’s belt.
George laughed. “Probably a friend of theirs.”
“They look like they wouldn’t mind eatin’ some hundred-dollar beeves,” Story said. “You fellows stay with the herd. Ratcliff, come with me.”
Thirty cavalry horses stood ready-saddled just inside the gate. Though the horse brasses were polished, the animals were gaunt and dispirited.
“You fellows expecting trouble?” Story asked.
“Wouldn’t be the first time.” A corporal pointed at a steep, bare hill to the south. “Signalmen on Pilot Knob tell us what redskins are doin’.” He pointed north. “Redskins on Lodge Trail Ridge signal them what we’s doin’. Ain’t a louse stirs don’t somebody squeal on him.”
Headquarters was an unpainted, single-story building facing a wide gravel walk where two shirtless soldiers were adzing a pine log into a flagpole. From a lookout platform atop headquarters, a sentry kept his spyglass trained on Lodge Trail Ridge.
“Get on down to the sutler’s,” Story told Ratcliff. “See what you can find out.”
The pine steps Story mounted were so new-sawn they still oozed pitch. Like the horses at the gate, the sentry was polished but tired. “Colonel’s inside doin’ paperwork,” he said. “Colonel Carrington never met no paper he couldn’t whup.”
The small man at the big desk had a beard, high forehead, and colonel’s shoulder boards.
“Name’s Story,” Nelson said. “I come from Texas.”
The Colonel’s pen scratched. He dipped fresh ink and scratched some more.
“You got a few indians hereabout,” Nelson Story noted.
The pen poised like a heron stalking fish. “Have you news of the Lakota?”
“We was hit south of Fort Reno. Two men wounded and they took some beeves. We got ’em back.”
“How many cows are you trailing?”
“Thousand, near enough.”
“I see.” He wiped the nib on the cloth reserved for that purpose, before laying the pen in its tray. He blotted his report and slipped it into the top drawer. He extended his small cold hand. “Henry Carrington. I’m in command.”
“Looks like they got you surrounded.”
The Colonel gave him a sharp look. “Reinforcements are due.”
“I never saw so much indian sign.”
“They cannot take this fort. They cannot prevail against our howitzers.” He unlocked a tin chest for two small glasses. “I neglect my hospitality, sir.” The whiskey decanter was full and remained near full after he poured.
Nelson Story rested his glass on his knee. “Obliged,” he said. “I’ll want to get up the Montana Road before snow flies.”
“How many in your party?”
“Twenty-three top hands, every one armed with new Remington rolling blocks. We can get off five bullets to one for a Springfield and drop a buffalo at a thousand yards.”
Carrington steepled his hands. “Mr. Story, because of the indian danger, no parties can proceed up the Montana Road without forty armed men. You will have to wait for the next train to make up your party.”
“Colonel, there weren’t no train in front of us and far as I know, there ain’t any train coming behind. We’re the last this season. My men are crack shots, ex-soldiers to a man, and if the indians come at us, they’ll surely wish they hadn’t.”
RATCLIFF SAT ON A BARREL in the post sutler’s. A Crow indian hunkered silently against the wall, Colonel Carrington’s old negro servant lifted his coattails to the potbellied stove, a graybeard wearing a slouch hat of considerable age but no distinction occupied the only rocker. “My friend here”—the graybeard indicated the Crow—“says Brulés hit you on the Powder.”
Ratcliff said, “News travels fast.”
The graybeard said he was Jim Bridger, army scout. He asked how many Brulés. “I’ve heard ten, I’ve heard fifty.”
“We killed ten. I thought we got them all.”
“You’re lucky one got away with the news. Reputation for orneriness could save your hair. Colonel buyin’ your beef?”
Ratcliff said Story expect
ed a good price in Virginia City.
Bridger cackled. “Son, it’s many and many a mile twixt here and Virginia City.”
“Many a mile from Texas too,” Ratcliff replied. “Indians killed a Frenchy; Pommerlau and his boy. Cut ’em up bad.”
“Them Frenchy traders never did think nothin’ of sellin’ guns to the Lakota. Lakota figure a mutilated enemy can’t hurt ’em when they are passing through Shadowland.”
“Reinforcements come soon,” the Colonel’s elderly black servant announced. “Colonel Carrington glad. Not glad ’bout their officer.”
“I hear it’ll be Captain Fetterman,” Bridger said.
“You hear plenty,” Ratcliff said.
Bridger shrugged. “I draw officer’s pay, but I don’t got to drill and I don’t got to clean my quarters and I don’t got to salute. All I got to do is hear plenty. I hear Red Cloud been talkin’ to the Crows, bringin’ gifts, bein’ polite, and I think, my that’s surprisin’ on account of how Red Cloud has counted coup on a passel of Crow warriors and most times a Lakota runs into a Crow, gonna be one or t’other killed. And I hear the Arapaho, who was peaceful until General Conner attacked their winter camp and killed twenty or thirty of ’em, the Arapaho, they’re steamed up and talkin’ to Red Cloud too. My friend Black Dog”—he indicated the mute indian—“he says the Northern Cheyenne are signed up. I hear this Captain Fetterman was brave in the War. I hear Fetterman thinks by rights he should outrank Colonel Carrington. I hear this Fetterman’s said, ‘Give me eighty regular soldiers and I’ll ride through the entire Sioux Nation.’ I do hope he didn’t say no such damn thing, but if he did, I hope he don’t say it when he gets where they’re at.”
Nelson Story marched into the sutler’s and snapped, “Ratcliff, let’s ride.”
Ratcliff put down his drink. “First, I got to buy me a Dutch oven,” he said.
WHEN STORY GATHERED his crew, he said, “Colonel Carrington says he can’t spare any graze near the fort. We’ll camp on Rock Creek. ”
“Boss, if indians hit us, these soldier boys might as well be in Fort Laramie.”
“Colonel offered to buy our beeves. Appears indians have run off most of theirs.”
Ben Shillaber smiled. “I’ll wager he offered top dollar.”
“Ten bucks a head.”
Ben Shillaber whistled. “Yankees are such a generous people.”
Three miles north of the fort on the banks of Rock Creek, they erected a cottonwood corral. “If I’d have wanted to be a carpenter I’d have stayed in Texas,” Tommy Thompson complained. “Damned if I don’t hate fellin’ trees.”
RATCLIFF BAKED DRIED apple pies that night, Sheep Shearer’s Delight and Dirty George the next. Shillaber shot an elk and Ratcliff was tenderizing steaks with the butt of his revolver when the soldiers arrived. Their mustachioed lieutenant chuckled at the flimsy corral. “I suppose that will keep the Lakota at bay?”
“Might slow ’em long enough so we can shoot ’em,” Ratcliff said. “Mr. Story’s with the cows.”
“Immigrants on the Montana Road depend on us for protection. Story has a duty to sell us provisions.”
“You’re doin’ a fine job protectin’, yes, sir,” Ratcliff said.
The lieutenant offered Nelson Story the same ten dollars a head and added the unsurprising news that no wagon train was expected anytime soon. When the lieutenant leaned forward, his saddle creaked satisfaction. “Damned if I don’t smell snow in the air.”
Story’s eyes were stone.
Shillaber found indian sign all around them and everybody saw indian mirrors flashing from the ridges. Twice they heard distant gunshots.
They grazed their animals by day but brought them into the corrals at dusk. Three days and half a night passed before the indians struck.
Except for hat and boots, Ratcliff slept fully dressed and at the first screeching, he grabbed his Remington and rolled out of the cookwagon. The night was indifferently lit by a half moon, the darkness punctuated by conical muzzle blasts. Running hard, Ratcliff dodged through swirling, panicked horses. The corral rail caught Ratcliff in the midsection and he gagged and his eyes swam as he sucked for air. Two warriors raced past full-tilt and an arrow snapped past his ear as he fired into the near horse’s gut and the horse stumbled and its rider dropped his bow. Ratcliff fumbled for another cartridge, but he’d left his cartridge pouch behind. Nelson Story was yelling. Ratcliff hobbled back to the cookwagon for his boots and bullets. He’d whacked into something in the darkness and torn a toenail off.
The shooting stopped; men came out of the darkness to stand around the cold cookfire. “I hit one of the bastards,” George Dow said. “I swear I did.”
“I shot a horse,” Ratcliff said.
“One, two, three, four . . .” Story counted his sentries. “Where’s Reid?”
There were snow flurries in the air next morning when they found the missing man.
“Wouldn’t have thought they had time to do all that.” George Dow turned aside to vomit.
“Get a shovel,” Shillaber said.
Nelson Story recited the Twenty-third Psalm over Reid’s grave. He replaced his hat. “We’re thirty days from Virginia City and winter’s comin’. There’ll be no more immigrant trains and I’ve come too far to sell my beeves for ten damn dollars.”
Ratcliff’s foot hurt.
“We can go on without the army or wait here until we’re snowed in. We go on, I imagine we’ll fight some indians. Those who want to go on to Montana, put their hands in the air.”
“Jesus H. Christ, that’s . . . why, that’s plumb crazy.” George Dow pushed both hands behind his back lest they suddenly develop minds of their own.
Ratcliff’s hand went in the air by itself, just got lighter and lighter until it was floating like a hot-air balloon. Ratcliff was surprised; he always thought his hand had better sense. Excepting George Dow, nobody else’s hand had good sense either.
George Dow said, “Mr. Story, you’re plumb crazy. How many miles to Virginia City? Three-fifty?”
“Closer to four,” Story said.
“Christ, Red Cloud’s got him an army of prime warriors out there, and ain’t one of them wouldn’t like to fall upon a thousand beeves and a hundred prime horses and twenty-three scalps, theirs for the takin’. When we was fightin’ Johnny Reb and Johnny had you surrounded and outnumbered, you waved a white flag and surrendered. Them Lakota don’t let you surrender. Mr. Story, they slice a man’s privates like the nigger slices a ham.”
“We’ll ride at night, hole up at daybreak. We can’t have no cookfires. Ratcliff?”
Ratcliff enumerated, “Got pies and cold biscuits, Son-of-a-Bitch in a sack, jerky, cold sowbelly and beans, and a couple gallons of Rainy Day Stew. You boys won’t like cold grub, but there’ll be plenty of it.”
“Shillaber, you and Tommy take hold of George. Lash him across his horse. I don’t want him blabbin’ to the fort.”
That occasioned a tussle, but George Dow was trussed hand and foot and hung across his saddle like a sack of grain.
THEY RODE ALL NIGHT. Next morning, Nelson Story untied George and said he could ride back to Fort Phil Kearny if he had a mind to, but George didn’t want to travel alone. He rubbed his hands to bring back the circulation and, when he thought nobody was watching, flung his Brulé scalp into the sagebrush.
By the waning moon, they passed east of the massive Bighorns. It was easy to lose sight of the dim wagon ruts and afterward Ratcliff would have nightmares of traversing steep coulees with horsemen roped to his cookwagon to keep it from toppling over while his pans jangled and banged loud enough to be heard for miles.
Ratcliff thought he was a dead man who hadn’t had occasion to lie down—a thought which buoyed rather than depressed him. He didn’t owe debts to anyone and no man owed him. In this wide world, no man or woman would shed a tear to hear of his passing. He had had friends, wives, some kids. He hadn’t loved any of them. Might be he was one of those fellows who coul
dn’t love anybody. Ratcliff was learning that a dead man can admit things a living man can’t.
His Remington was at his side, his cartridge pouch under the seat. He was wrapped in his heavy buffalo coat, his reins clamped inside his buffalo mittens. Since any patch of shadow might be an indian, he ignored the shadows. In the cold air, his mules’ breath lifted like locomotive plumes.
He wondered when a dying man stopped feeling pain. He wondered how long Reid had hurt, whether Pommerlau’s boy—Jacob? Joseph?—had felt the knife when it slashed his penis. He remembered a lifetime ago on the plantation. It was November—butchering time. Two great white sows hung on tripods above the scalding water. Two others had been killed and their life’s blood was draining into pans when Master rode up. “Don’t kill that last sow. We’ll want her for breeding.”
When the sows had been crammed into the shambles they’d squealed—like hogs always do at anything unfamiliar—but they fell quiet after the first one was killed.
Ratcliff and another boy dragged the pardoned sow out of the shambles by her heels and instead of the knife’s hot bite at her throat, she was turned loose. She tottered like she was sick and they had to help her stand. As she stumbled off a child could have caught her.
Maybe that sow had died with her mates, her soul separated and roaming the ether. Maybe that sow’s soul couldn’t reinhabit her body.
Ratcliff’s soul perched on his shoulders; not too heavy, companionable as a pet raven.
His eyes were sharper than usual and the night air was cold and clear as a mountain stream. Fog billows hid the base of the Bighorns.
On this leg of the Montana Road, most immigrant trains watered at the South Fork of the Tongue River, but near dawn, Nelson Story brought his outfit off the ridgetops into a dry bowl an hour shy of water. He set half the men around the perimeter and told the others to catch some sleep.
Ratcliff put out cold biscuits and sowbelly. No fire. No coffee. “I’d like sugar in my coffee this morning,” Shillaber said.