The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection

by George MacDonald Fraser

  Still, it was quite a relief. Paternal piety’s all very well, but it would have been a damned nuisance if he’d taken me up. I’d meant what I’d said, mind you, about starting him right and seeing him get on, but now he was gone and I could look at the thing cold, it was just as well. He’d probably have been a tricky, troublesome beggar, and Elspeth would have asked the most awkward questions, and once he’d cut his braids and put on a decent suit, the likeness would have been there for all the world … quite. I came all over of a sweat at the thought. Yes, undoubtedly it was just as well. Yet sometimes I hear that laugh still, and see that splendid figure on the ridge, arms raised, and I can feel such a pang for that son.

  But life ain’t a bed of roses, and you must just pluck the thorns out of your rump and get on.

  I was in cheery fettle next day as I rode over the last winding miles of hill trail into Deadwood town. It was a regular antheap all the way in, with the miners crawling over the tree-clad slopes, and the ceaseless thump of picks and scrape of shovels and ring of axes, and ramshackle huts and shanties and sluice-boxes everywhere, with dirty bearded fellows in slouch hats and galluses cussing and burrowing, and claim signs all along – Sweetheart Mine, Crossbone Diggings, Damyereyes Gulch, and the like.

  The town itself was bedlam; it was only four months old then, and wasn’t much but a single street of log and frame buildings running the whole winding length of that narrow ravine, which can’t have been more than a couple of furlongs wide from one steep forest slope to the other. But they’d lost no time: already they had a mayor and corporation, and a Grand Central Hotel, and a bath-house and stores and theatres and saloons and gaming-houses and dance-halls with clerks and barbers and harlots and shopmen and traders and drink enough to float a ship, and everyone beavering away like billy-o and doing a roaring trade. “Boom!” they called it, and just to see it sent your spirits sky-high, it was so busy and jolly and full of fun, for everyone was riding high and spending free and about to make a fortune.

  As I rode through the dust of the bustling street, the music was tinkling in the honky-tonks, the stores and saloons were full, the roughs and tarts chaffed at the swing-doors, and the sober citizens hurried by rosy with prosperity and optimism. They say you couldn’t get a seat in the church of a Sunday, either, and “Greenland’s Icy Mountains” and “Oh, Susanna!” were sung with toleration and good will next door to each other, and now and then somebody got shot, but in the main everyone was happy.80

  There wasn’t a dollar in sight, though – just gold-dust. It changed hands in little pokes; even at the bars they were paying for drinks with pinches, and there wasn’t a counter or barrel-head in town without its scales and weights. Dust bought everything, and I had none, or a dollar either; I strode into the hotel and slapped down the gold hunter which the Minneconju had turned his nose up at, and the burly Teuton behind the desk looked at it, and me in my beard and buckskins, and sniffed suspiciously.

  “Vare you git dat, den?”

  Taking me for a road agent, you see, so I pointed out the inscription and assured him in my best Pall Mall drawl that I was the party referred to. He mumped a bit, but grudgingly allowed me thirty dollars on it, and I signed the register and ten minutes later was sound asleep in a hot tub, and all the grime and aches oozed away from me, and with them the turbulent memories of the Far West and Mrs Candy’s patched eye, and Jacket and his braves, and the stinking stuffiness of the tipi, and Walking Blanket Woman with her knife at my cords, and the horrible bloody riot on that yellow hillside … copper bodies bounding up the slope … screams and shots and flash of steel … the rattler in the grass … Custer tossing me the Bulldog … “’allo, then, Colonel. Long way from ’Orse Guards” … the sorrel bounding beneath me … that painted face under the buffalo-cap … “Lie still, whatever happens!” … the grave and handsome face splitting into its crooked grin … “How d’ye do – Papa?” … his hand in mine … Frank … Frank …

  I woke up in the cold water, shivering, while someone pounded on the door and shouted was I going to stay in there the whole damned night?

  A good steak put me to rights, and I was sitting bone-tired and content in their noisy dining-parlour, debating whether to buy a brandy at their crazy prices, and thinking happily that I’d be back in Philadelphia with Elspeth before the week was out, when someone swung my gold hunter on its chain before my eyes, and I stared up at a man I hadn’t seen in ten years. Tall chap in a broadcloth coat and fancy weskit, long hair and even longer moustaches carefully combed, smiling down at me while he swung the watch; he burst out laughing as I jumped up and pumped his hand, and then we roared and exclaimed and slapped each other on the back and called for drink, and then we sat down and grinned at each other across the table.

  “Well, Harry, my boy!” cries he. “And what the eternal hell are you doing here! I thought you were dead or in England or in jail!”

  “Well, James,” says I, “you weren’t far wrong on the first two counts, but I ain’t been in jail lately.”

  “I’ll be damned!” he beamed, and pushed over the watch. “I just saw our good mine host fretting over this at the counter, wondering if it was brass after all, and when I took a squint – why, there it was ‘Sir Harry Flashman’ as ever was!” He slapped the table. “Old fellow, you look just fine!”

  “So do you, and see how you like it! Here, though – he gave me thirty dollars on this watch, you know.”

  “Thirty? Why, the goddam German vulture pried fifty out of me! Say, I’ll just have his fat hide for that—”

  “Sit down, James,” says I. “I’ll send you a hundred for it when I get back east.”

  “You’re going east? Why, you’ve just arrived! And where the hell have you been, and how are you, and what’s your news, and damn your eyes, and so’s your old man, and have a drink!” So we drank, and he swore again, laughing, and said I was a sight for sore eyes, and what the blazes brought me to Deadwood?

  “It’s a long, long story,” says I, and he cried, well, we had all night, hadn’t we, and shouted to the waiter for a full bottle, and keep ’em coming. “No, by thunder, we’ll have champagne!” cries he. “If I’m drinking with a baronet, I want the best!”

  “I’m not a baronet, I’m a knight.”

  “That’s right, I forgot. A knight of the water closet – all right, the goddam bath!” roars he. “A long, dark, dirty knight! Now then – fire away!”

  So I talked, and we drank, and I talked, and we drank, and I talked – because for some reason I was perfectly ready to tell the whole thing, from the beginning, when I’d knocked Bryant downstairs at Cleeve, to the moment when I rode into Deadwood. Deuced indiscreet, probably, but I was careless with content, and he was an old friend and a good egg, and I felt the better for the telling. He whistled and guffawed and exclaimed here and there, but mostly he just sat quiet, with those strangely melancholy eyes watching me, and the waiters kept it coming into the small hours, and steered other patrons clear of us, and roused the cook to bring us ham and eggs at four in the morning – nothing too good, you see, for Wild Bill Hickok and his guest.

  When I’d done, he sat and stared and shook his head. “Flashy,” says he, “I heard a few, but that beats all. I’d say you were the goddamnedst liar, but … here, let’s see your head.” He peered at the newly-healed wound on my scalp, and swore again. “Holy smoke, that’s an Arapaho haircut, sure enough! Your own boy? By damn, that’s thorough! That’s … hell, I don’t know what! And you were with Custer – no fooling? – in that massacre?”

  “Don’t spread it about,” I begged. “I want to go home, nice and easy, and no questions, and have a good long rest. So forget it – and what are you doing, anyhow? Last I heard, you were in the theatre, with Cody.”

  So he told me what he’d been up to – on the stage, and here and there, a little peace-officering, a little gambling, drifting a good deal. But now he was married, with a wife back east, and he was in Deadwood to make a pile so that they c
ould settle down. Mining or gambling, I asked, and he grinned ruefully and pulled back his coat, and I saw the two long repeaters reversed in the silk sash at his waist.

  “If the cards don’t start running smarter – and unless I can rustle up enough energy to try the diggings – I’ll most likely have to put on a badge again.”

  Well, that was money for nothing, to him. He was the finest and fastest shot with a revolver I’ve ever seen (though I’d have paid money to see him from a safe distance against Jack Sebastian Moran). He wouldn’t have to do a stroke as marshal; his name was enough. But he didn’t look too content at the prospect; studying him, I saw he’d put on a touch of puffy weight over the years, and wondered if booze and loafing were closing in. He confessed that his eyes weren’t what they had been, and he was ready to call it a day if he could take a small pile east from Deadwood.81

  “I’ll give it a few more weeks,” says he, “and make tracks before fall. Hey, Tom, what’s the date?” The waiter said it was August first if we were still in last night, but August second if we reckoned it was this morning. By jove, another couple of months and Elspeth would notice there was someone missing; I asked the waiter when the stage left for Cheyenne.

  “You’re not going out today?” grumbles Hickok. “Hell’s bells, we haven’t but had a drink yet! What’s your hurry?” He wagged a finger. “You’ve been racketing around too much, that’s your trouble; you’re plumb excited and can’t settle. Now, what you need is a good sleep, and a mighty breakfast in the evening, and then get tighter’n Dick’s hat-band, and there’s the crackiest couple of little gals at the Bella Union, and we’ll peel the roof off of this town—”

  “And your father a clergyman, too,” says I. “I’m sorry, James, but I’m all set. Look, why not come down to Cheyenne with me, and we’ll ring the firebells before I catch the train east?”

  But he wouldn’t have it, the lazy devil, and we strolled out on to the porch of the hotel to look at the stars and see that the drunks were lying straight in the gutters. It was just coming to dawn, and I was dead beat.

  “Too late to go to bed now,” says Hickok.

  I snatched a few hours’ sleep, though, and piled down to the stage office just in time to catch the southbound. There was the usual crowd of roustabouts and loafers and boys to see the little coach pull out, piled high with boxes and bundles. There were only three other inside passengers, an elderly couple and a sleek little whisky drummer in check pants and mutton-chops; they were already in their places, and the driver was bawling: “All aboard! All aboard for Custer City, Camp Robinson, Laramie, an’ Chey-enne!” as I ran down the side street, with the kids whooping encouragement, and scrambled in. We set off north, and the little drummer explained that we would circle the block and then head south out of town.

  “Goods to pick up at Finnegan’s and Number Ten,” he explained; we took on a case of his samples at Finnegan’s, and rolled down the broad main street, which was busy with wagons and riders, to the Number Ten Saloon. Hickok had said it was a haunt of his; sure enough, he was taking a breather on the boardwalk as we pulled up; he had his coat off and his two guns in full view.

  “Still time to come along, James!” I cried from the window, but he shook his head as he came across to shake hands.

  “I’ve got Skipper Massey inside there,” says he, “and I’m going to bluff, raise and call him from Hell to Houston – I beg your pardon, ma’am. Forgive my thoughtless speech,” he added, raising his hat to the old lady. Very particular that way, was J. B. Hickok.

  Much good it did her, for now the driver discovered a lynch-pin sprung, and his language poisoned the air. A boy was sent scurrying for a replacement and a hammer, and Hickok winked at me and called, “Don’t take any wooden nickels, Flashy,” as he sauntered back into the Number Ten. The driver thrust a crimson face in at the window, saying just ten minutes, folks, and we’ll be on our way, and we sat patiently in the Deadwood stage watching the world go by.

  “Beg pardon, sir,” says the whisky drummer, leaning forward. “Did I detect a British accent?”

  I said coolly that I believed it was.

  “Well, that’s delightful, sir!” He raised his tile and extended a paw. “Charmed to make your acquaintance, indeed! My name is Hoskins, sir, at your service …” He rummaged and thrust a card at me. “Traveller in fine wines, cordials, leecures, and high-class spirits.” He beamed, and I thought, oh God, please let him get off at Custer City; it was hot, and I was dog-tired, and wanted peace.

  “May I say welcome, sir, to the Great American West? Ah, you’ve been here before. Well, I trust your present trip is as enjoyable as the previous one.”

  (The seventh packet of the Flashman Papers ends here, without further comment or elaboration from its author, on August 2, 1876, the day on which Wild Bill Hickok was shot dead in the Number Ten Saloon, Deadwood.)

  * * *

  c See Appendix B: The Battle of the Little Bighorn.

  d See Appendix A: The Mysterious Lives of Frank Grouard (1850–1905).

  APPENDIX I:

  The Mysterious Lives of Frank Grouard (1850–1905)

  The most remarkable thing about Flashman’s claim to be the father of Frank Grouard Standing Bear, the famous scout and mysterious figure of the American West, is how well it fits the known facts. That he should have had a son by Cleonie, and that son should have grown up among Indians, is in no way surprising, given the circumstances of Flashman’s relations with Cleonie. Their child was not unique in this way; half-breed children raised as tribesmen were common enough (Custer himself is supposed to have had a son by a Cheyenne woman, although in the light of Custer’s character this may be thought unlikely). Nor was it unknown for a man to be able to pass equally well as Indian or white; apart from Flashman himself, there are plenty of witnesses to testify that Frank Grouard did it, with a success that still baffles historians as much as it did his contemporaries. Or one might cite the case of James Beckworth, the mulatto who became an Indian chief, returned to the white side of the frontier, and then took to the wilds again.

  However, to Grouard. There is no doubt that he scouted for Crook in the 1876 campaign, and was regarded as the best frontiersman with the American Army. But who exactly he was, or where he came from, was less certain, and the subject of much controversy. Some thought he was white, others that he was Indian; another theory was that he was half-Indian, half-Negro (which is interesting); yet another that he was the son of a French Creole (more interesting still). Grouard himself, after having refused many offers from journalists for his life-story, and having lost all his records in a fire at his home, finally dictated his story entirely from memory in 1891, to a newspaperman named de Barthe. It was a most curious tale.

  Grouard said he was born at Paumotu, in the Friendly Islands, in 1850, the son of an American Mormon missionary and a Polynesian woman, that he was brought to the US when he was two, lived with a family named Pratt in Utah, and ran away at 15. He became a teamster and mail-carrier, and was captured by Sioux in 1869. He was so dark that the Indians took him for one of themselves, and spared him; the name of Standing Bear was given him by Sitting Bull personally, because Grouard had been wearing a bearskin coat when captured. He was with the Sioux for six years, was a special favourite of Sitting Bull’s, and knew Crazy Horse well. He became, naturally, fluent in Siouxan.

  In the spring of 1875, Grouard decided to leave the Sioux. He came in to the Red Cloud Agency and (his own words) “stayed until the commissioners came to make the Black Hills treaty”. He does not say that he went to Washington with Spotted Tail, but there is no reason why he should not have done so. After the failure of the treaty, he was sent as an ambassador on behalf of the whites to Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, who rejected peace offers (and there are those who say they did this at Grouard’s suggestion, and that his loyalties lay with the Sioux). In any event, Grouard says that he returned to the Red Cloud Agency, decided to become white, and enlisted with Crook. This he certai
nly did, and scouted for him in the March campaign on the Powder, and later on the Rosebud; it is worth noting that one of his fellow-scouts at this time became suspicious, and told Crook he suspected Grouard of plotting to lead the command to destruction.

  So much for Grouard’s own story thus far. His movements as a scout for Crook are sometimes well-documented, at other times not so. After the Rosebud battle (June 17) he appears to have been in and out of Crook’s camp; he was certainly not with Crook on June 25 (the day of Little Bighorn) or for two days thereafter. When he did return to Crook it was with the news of Custer’s disaster. For the next few weeks Grouard’s movements are accounted for, but towards the end of July he fades away again.

  Now, all this fits exactly with Flashman – but there is more. According to de Barthe, Grouard’s biographer, a story was current that Grouard had joined in the attack on Custer’s force at Little Bighorn, but not with the intention of defeating Custer; on the contrary, Grouard had supposedly been trying to lure the Sioux to destruction against what he hoped was a superior American force, but the plan miscarried and the Sioux won.

  At this point the imagination begins to reel slightly – but it is interesting that a rumour was going about that Frank Grouard, scout to Crook, had fought with the Indians at Little Bighorn.

  On balance, Flashman’s story of Grouard’s early life is more plausible than the one Grouard told himself to de Barthe, and all the mystery and confusion surrounding Grouard in the ’76 campaign go to support Flashman rather than not. After ’76, Grouard scouted in government service, and Bourke and Finerty, reliable sources, agree with Crook that as a woodsman he stood alone. But no one was ever sure what to believe about him; the Dictionary of American Biography notes of his life-story that it is “fact … liberally intermixed with highly-wrought fiction”.