Let Joseph be tricking them, he prayed. The meeting when he found me was wakan, and the dream afterward told me I would be his kola, and he mine, till the end of our lives.
“The wagon down in the wash belongs to you?” Cutright inquired.
“I’m the present owner, yes.”
Cutright’s cocked eye glowed as he inclined his head in a skeptical way. “Not quite the same thing.”
Once more Joseph didn’t answer.
“Your friend there. The Indian—”
“Call him what he is, please,” Joseph asked quietly. “An Oglala Sioux. His name is Kola. It means special friend.”
“Peculiar traveling companion for a white man.”
Joseph shrugged again. “I found him on the prairie up north of the Platte. He’d fancied the wife of one of the leaders of an akicita society in his tribe. I’ve learned Sioux don’t normally take offense when their wives crawl into the blankets with another man. They just throw the woman out of the tipi and cut off her braids—oh, and once in a while her nose—and that’s the divorce. To do much more would give the woman more importance than she deserves. Apparently women don’t count for much among the Sioux. Did you know they’re even sent to live in special lodges when they bleed once a month? According to Kola, the men believe a woman in her cycle poisons a man’s medicine and weapons.”
Joseph drank a little coffee. “But as I say, most times a husband takes small notice of infidelity. To do otherwise would be like making a fuss over a dog pissing on the tipi. But there are exceptions to everything. Sweet Summer’s husband was an exception. He not only divorced her—he waylaid Kola and thrashed him half to death. I came across him and nursed him back to good health. A dream told him we should ride and hunt together. Kola says the Sioux put great stock in dreams.”
“Well,” the man with the earring growled, “hope he ain’t had too many dreams about sellin’ off the buffla to the railroad. Those dreams are at five fathoms now, and don’t you forget it.”
Cutright frowned. “You needn’t act so sour, Darlington. Mr. Kingston’s being sensible about his state of affairs.” To Joseph: “He ran the engine room on a Federal cruiser during the war. He’s accustomed to bossing men around. But he isn’t accustomed to the courtesies of the plains. Nor is Timmy there. Timmy’s my wife’s nephew. These days a man running cattle only gets the kind of help he can afford.”
Joseph perked up. “Cattle?” He reached down to scratch his right calf. The bearded Cutright shifted his hand toward his bolstered revolver, but Joseph’s smile reassured him. “Just a louse.”
He kept on scratching the right side of his calf. “Damn, they’re pesky! You were running cattle?”
“Fifty head.” Cutright nodded, relaxing again. “The most I could lay my hands on. Seems everyone in Texas is scrambling for longhorns to drive north. The restaurants and butcher shops back east want all the beef they can get.”
“I don’t see any sign of a herd—”
“No, you don’t.” Cutright looked glum. “I lost them about fifty miles south. They’d gone too long without drinking, and we came across some damn alkali water. I got my leader, an expensive steer named Crump, started exactly right. If my luck had held, he’d have stampeded them all right past the stuff. But he broke a leg and they went for the water before we could stop them.”
“The alkali water poisoned them?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Kingston, all but one. We’ve butchered and eaten it since. I should have brought more men with me, but times are hard. Rather than go home empty-handed, I’ll now be able to make a little money selling the buffalo to the railroad. It’s better than nothing.”
“But it’s also stealing.”
Both Darlington and Cutright scowled. “You’re not going to get contentious, are you, Mr. Kingston?” the latter asked. “I’ve a wife and brood of six back home. They’re depending on me. A moment ago, you seemed sensible about the realities of the situation.”
“I recognize the realities,” Joseph agreed. “I’m just disappointed in a former Confederate officer’s doing such a thing.”
“Told you.” The indifferent blinking of Cutright’s good eye put a furrow on Joseph’s forehead. “Hard times.”
Joseph finally appeared to agree. One more weary shrug only heightened Kola’s confusion. Had he been wrong about the skinning knife? If so, he was more determined than ever to abandon his cowardly companion the moment the gray-coated fellow and the others moved on.
Just then—unexpectedly—Joseph turned to glance at him. In the guttering light of the fire his dark eyes were oddly intense.
Kola pursed his lips, frowned, trying to signify he didn’t understand whatever Joseph wanted to communicate. Joseph gave up. He turned to Cutright again. “Wonder if I might have leave to stand?”
Cutright chuckled. “Lice still troubling you?”
“Too much coffee’s troubling me.” He poked a finger into his trousers above his groin. “I’ll just step over there.” He bobbed his head toward Kola and the starry dark behind him.
“All right,” Cutright said “Slowly, though.”
He edged back the overcoat so he could reach the butt of his revolver. Six inches to the right of his knee lay the confiscated Laidley-Whitney. Loaded, as Kola recalled.
Smiling, Joseph rose, faced left, took a step, winced, and stopped directly behind the shivering boy wearing the bandana. “Damn!” Joseph cried again, crouching, and slapping his right calf as if another louse had attacked.
Cutright reached for his revolver but checked his hand when he heard the whack of Joseph’s palm. He understood why Joseph had moved suddenly.
Seated directly between Joseph and Cutright, the boy started to turn. Joseph didn’t straighten. His right hand dropped to his boot.
Cutright shouted, “Damn you, what—? Timmy, your gun!”
The Texas boy juggled the coffee cup from which he’d been sipping and made an ineffectual grab at his holster. Joseph moved with astonishing speed, slipping the skinning knife out of his boot and slashing a six-inch gash in the boy’s gun arm with a single continuous stroke.
The boy shrieked and flopped forward, eyes glazing. The contents of the cup splattered the fire and started it hissing and smoking.
“Goddamn deceiving son of a bitch!” Cutright screamed, the same instant Joseph yelled Kola’s name.
The cry and the jerk of Joseph’s head was signal enough. Overjoyed, Kola ran, leaped, and landed on the white named Darlington. He grappled for Darlington’s drawn revolver. Joseph had already launched himself straight across the smoking fire, falling on Cutright with no concern for his feet being in the scorching coals.
The impact jarred Cutright. The revolver in his right hand thundered. Joseph jerked his head aside, just in time to keep from being killed.
Darlington’s revolver exploded. Kola felt a rush of air near his shoulder as the bullet spent itself in the dark. Darlington was no match for Kola’s strength and renewed faith. Kola clawed Darlington’s face with one hand, dug the nails of his other into Darlington’s wrist, and the revolver was loose.
Kola threw it away and jumped up. He stomped on Darlington’s stomach. The man retched and grabbed his belly, rolling from side to side. Panting, Kola swung around.
Joseph had gotten Cutright’s revolver out of his hand. He was standing with his left boot on the Texan’s chest.
Cutright’s hands were raised. The palms shone with sweat. Grimy fingers quivered. His good eye focused on the revolver Joseph was aiming down at him.
“Lord, Kingston, please don’t—”
“Don’t do what you planned to do to us?” Joseph’s mouth was so thin, it appeared to be no more than a slit. “You don’t think I believed your story about letting us go? You said you have a family near Fort Worth. And you’ll want to do business up this way again, I presume. You wouldn’t want Kola and me turning up to cite you for theft. You were going to kill us before you left.”
Cutright’s popeyed
silence was confession enough. Kola crouched quickly beside the writhing Darlington. But there was no danger. The man was in pain, talking incoherently, and starting to weep.
Joseph remained with one boot on Cutright’s chest.
“You’re not going to shoot me—?” Cutright breathed. Kola burst out laughing. The Texan sounded like a man beseeching the holy spirits. “You gave up too quickly! You—you don’t have the sand.”
Joseph’s smile was chilly. “I led you on, Major. You thought I didn’t have the sand. That was your error and my advantage.”
“You are the one from Fort Worth,” Cutright wheezed. “Got to be.”
“The two-hundred-dollar bounty would have been a nice extra profit for you.”
“I swear, I didn’t plan—”
“Shit. You murdered your commanding officer. Why should I expect better treatment?”
Joseph steadied the revolver and blew a hole between Cutright’s eyes.
iv
Before Cutright’s body had stopped its violent jerking, Joseph flung the revolver away. He picked up the Laidley-Whitney and motioned Kola back. From across the cook fire, he aimed at the screaming Darlington, who flopped over on his stomach and frantically started to crawl.
The buffalo gun boomed. Darlington skidded three feet forward, an immense hole torn through the clothing covering his backbone. Even Kola, who was accustomed to blood, averted his head.
Joseph laid the buffalo rifle beside Cutright’s revolver. He sighed.
“Dishonorable men deserve to be treated in kind. Kola?”
The Sioux turned, momentarily frightened at the sight of his companion standing on the other side of the fire. Joseph resembled some demon risen from swirling smoke and tiny, licking flames.
Truly, Kola thought, this is a warrior to be feared more than any Sioux chieftain. He is so feared, his own kind offer money for his body. This is a great warrior indeed.
Kola couldn’t tell whether his companion was saddened by what had occurred, or took pleasure from it. One moment Joseph’s expression led Kola to believe the young white man had enjoyed killing the thieves. Then Kola thought he detected regret, or at least uncertainty, as Joseph looked at the moaning boy lying on his side with his head close to the embers. The boy’s hair was smoldering.
“Pull the boy out before he burns to death. That hair stinks to hell.”
Kola hurried to obey.
“Sit him up,” Joseph instructed. “Slap him some.”
Joseph watched impassively as Kola propped the boy up and smacked his face several times. Groggy with pain, the boy finally opened his eyes. He recognized Joseph and Kola, then saw the bodies of his uncle and Darlington.
“Oh, my Lord!” He sounded sick as he seized his blood-soaked arm.
“No complaints,” Joseph said. “You took your chances when you threw in with those two. You’d have stood by while they shot us. Probably even pulled a trigger yourself. Stand up.”
Aghast, the boy exclaimed, “I’m bleeding to death!”
“Maybe. Maybe not. You’ll find out after you’ve walked twenty or thirty miles.”
“I can’t walk!”
Joseph shrugged. “Your choice. Pitch me the knife, Kola.”
“No, no, I’ll go.” The boy weaved to his feet.
“South,” Joseph instructed. “If I ever see you north of the Republican River, you’ll be dead for sure.”
Red seeped between the fingers with which the boy clutched his arm. He glanced at Cutright again, then blazed, “You damn murderer! You could have left him alive!”
“Impossible.”
“How can you kill like that?”
“I had excellent training, directed by Mr. Jefferson Davis. After you kill one or two, the others come easy. Now you better get out of here before I change my mind.”
“I’ll remember your name, Kingston. Swear to God. I’ll remember it to the hour I die.”
Joseph laughed. “Save yourself the trouble. By the time you’re planted, I’ll have had a peck of names.”
“Someone’ll find you.”
“Someone will find you, stone-cold stiff, if you don’t start walking.”
“I need food and water.”
“No.”
“At least a bandage!”
“All you get from me is a chance to save your conniving hide. That’s more than you deserve. Now walk!”
The boy started off, wincing with every laborious step.
“Wrong way!” Joseph barked. “That’s south.”
Like a sleepwalker, the boy stumbled in an erratic half-circle and lurched in the right direction. Joseph watched until he was lost on the dark prairie.
Joseph jerked off his low-crowned hat and busily fanned himself, drying sweat that shone like grease on his forehead. The white man’s next remark was intended to be conversational but had a strained quality.
“Now we can go ahead and take the buffalo up to the railroad. We’re also three horses to the good. I’d call it a passable day’s work.”
Saying that, he turned away. But not before he astonished Kola with a sad, almost grief-stricken glance. With his back toward the Sioux, he added, “A man should know better than to do a dishonorable thing like stealing another man’s kill. He should know better!”
There was no regret in the last few words. Only anger.
Kola overcame the piercing fright produced by Joseph’s unexpected ferocity. He realized again that he would never understand the man’s unfathomable nature. But outwardly—ah, outwardly, Joseph was a kola of whom he could be eternally proud.
He let his awe and pride drive a yell of joy out of his throat. He circled the fire, stood over Cutright’s body, and raised his clout, exposing his genitals to the dead man’s staring eyes—his people’s ultimate insult to a vanquished and contemptible enemy.
Joseph walked back to his coffee cup and picked it up. Before drinking he said in a casual way, “We don’t need to waste time disposing of them. The turkey buzzards will do it in a day or two. Besides, they don’t deserve decent burial.”
He tossed his head back and drank. A spurt of fire in the thinning smoke reddened the streak of white hair that began at his hairline over his left brow and tapered to a point at the back of his head.
Book Four
Hell-on-Wheels
Chapter I
The Cheyenne
i
MICHAEL BOYLE HAD SELDOM experienced the kind of consuming fright he felt during those first moments when he stood rooted on the summit of the low hill, trying to decide whether to run and attempt to warn the railhead. It was worse than the fear he’d suffered charging enemy lines with the Irish Brigade. At least with the Brigade, there had been others around him sharing the peril.
He was most conscious of the weapons arrayed against him. The short hunting bows. The quivers bristling with arrows. The knives. The war hatchets with shafts wrapped in bright red cloth and metal heads, not stone.
The knife blades and hatchet heads meant the weapons were trade goods, factory made. The Cheyenne—if that was indeed what they were—had either bargained for them at forts or stolen them in raids.
He saw no revolvers or rifles. But he understood Plains Indians owned few of those. Firearms which the Indians did manage to acquire were carefully guarded and used only on hunts or important forays against enemy tribes. It was a small, hopeful sign.
He licked at sweat on his upper lip. The warriors remained motionless, watching. The feathers in their sunlit black hair bobbed in the breeze.
The Indian holding Ruffin—the one with the immense bare belly—kept staring too. A hint of a smile appeared on the man’s thick-lipped mouth. But the eight-foot bow lance was rock steady. If Michael responded wrongly, or acted precipitously, the iron head would pierce Ruffin’s throat in an instant.
One by one, other details registered. On all the calico ponies, plaited horsehair was looped and knotted around the lower jaws to create both bit and bridle from a single long
strand. Quirts held by muscular hands rested against naked thighs. The quirts resembled miniature whips—three thongs of rawhide attached to a carved round of wood heavy enough to deal a man a crippling blow.
About two-thirds of the Indians rode bareback. The rest, including Fatbelly, had hide saddles, little more than beaded pads. The leader’s gear also included a blanket under the saddle, beaded bright yellow and red. Fringes hung from each corner of the square.
The big-bellied Indian bore scars on his shoulders and had pendulous breasts. The scars were in pairs. Michael recalled hearing a Paddy describe rituals in which Plains Indians pledged their lives to the protection of their people—and the annihilation of their foes—and shed blood in self-mortification as proof of their intent. The scars as well as the leader’s air of authority said he was the one with whom Michael had to deal.
Weary of Michael’s hesitation, Fatbelly gigged the lance head deeper into Tom Ruffin’s neck. A line of blood trickled. Ruffin’s legs thrashed. Above the clasping hand, the boy’s eyes pleaded with Michael.
Fatbelly raised his eyebrows. His forehead creased like a wrinkled hide. The lift of the brows asked an unmistakable question: What will you do?
ii
Michael had no idea—except that he’d decided not to run and abandon Ruffin. In a voice as steady as he could manage, he asked, “Do you talk English?”
Half a dozen of the braves—all in their twenties—snickered and whispered among themselves. One let out a low but frightening whoop, then spat over the ears of his pony. The fat-bellied Indian whipped the lance to the right, then thrust it over his head. The young men laughing at Michael fell silent. The smirks disappeared.
Fatbelly grinned in a disarmingly friendly way. Michael wasn’t deceived. It would be foolish to trust the Indian—or regard him as a weakling because of his age, or his flabby breasts and stomach. The rest of him looked hard. The act of raising the lance had tightened huge muscles in his upper arm.
The Indian’s smile grew wider, revealing brown gums studded with broken teeth. He nodded in a vigorous way.