by Judd Cole
“She won’t say boo to a goose since that night. She’s stubborn and mule-headed just like her mother was. You want the straight, soldier? You or your men kill that Indian, hear? You kill that Indian, I’ll by God make sure she marries you. Because, man to man, here’s the way it is. Now don’t mistake my meaning, we’re in this thing together. But the plain truth is, I got a daughter that kisses redskins. And you are in love with a woman that’s partial to a savage over you. We’re both made fools of here. That Cheyenne is humiliating the pair of us.”
Riley, peeking down over a bale of new hay, watched Carlson’s smooth-shaven face set itself in hard, determined lines.
“I’ll kill that red bastard, all right,” he said, anger and jealousy clear in his tone.
One of the privates on work detail returned and the two men drifted out, still talking. Riley climbed back down from the loft and tried to order his confused thoughts. It was too late to place a message in the fork of the cottonwood for the Cheyennes. And Corey’s place was an hour and a half’s ride, the Hanchon spread at least an hour, two hours both ways.
The regimental parade was coming up in less than an hour. Harding was in love with the pomp and regulation and would never excuse him or any on-duty officer from leading his platoon through the drills. Any attempt to leave the fort now would draw suspicion, maybe even get him followed—thrown in the stockade, if Carlson got wind of it.
No. His best hope was to go through with the parade, turn his men over to the platoon sergeant immediately afterward, and then ride hard to the Hanchons with this new word, avoiding the sentry on Thompson’s Bluff. He’d have to hope the raid was planned for some time late enough to permit establishing defenses.
Otherwise, the Hanchons were finished—if they survived with their lives. As for the Cheyennes, their fate was even clearer. They had no middle ground. They would either kill or be killed.
“So that’s the long and the short of it, boys,” said John Hanchon. “These aren’t wranglers you’ll be going up against, they’re frontier hardcases used to cold-blooded killing. I can’t rightly ask you to fight without telling you that. And I don’t blame any man that walks out that door right now.”
John Hanchon finished speaking and Touch the Sky felt a pall of awkward silence fall over the front parlor. The room was filled by an odd assemblage. The four remaining wranglers and Wade McKenna, their boots crusted with dried mud from recent rains, stood nervously twisting their hats around in their hands. Tom Riley, still in uniform, stood slightly apart from them. On the far side of the room another little group was formed by Corey Robinson, Touch the Sky, and Little Horse. Sarah, over her loud protests, had been sent into Bighorn Falls to stay with Holly Miller, the seamstress.
Riley had ridden first to Corey’s place, then dispatched the redhead to the Cheyennes’ camp with the news. Little Horse had been reluctant to enter a lodge with so many whites. But he’d agreed when Touch the Sky said this paleface council was important. He listened carefully now while his friend interpreted the important bits of information. The wranglers occasionally aimed a curious glance toward them. The Cheyennes, however, carefully avoided any eye contact with them.
A hand named ’Braska Jones scratched his ear. Then he said, “I didn’t sign on for no shootin’ war. You’re a good man, Mr. Hanchon, and that’s God’s own truth. I’ve put up with my share o’ fightin’. But this tonight, this is gettin’ down to the nut-cuttin’. I got family back in Omaha. I’ll have to throw in my hand.”
“Fair enough,” said Hanchon. “You’ve been a good worker. I’ll pay you off when we finish up here. Anybody else?”
“Ain’t no mix of mine what ’Braska does,” said Wade McKenna. “But young Riley here ain’t from these parts neither, yet he’s willing to put at ’em! The rest of us live in this valley. We’ve put down stakes and aim to stay. This ain’t just your fight. Hell, I got plans for my own spread. We let Steele drive you under, none of us will be safe.”
The other three hands nodded their approval of McKenna’s words.
“All right then,” said Hanchon. “It’s settled. We don’t know exactly when they’re hitting us, just that it’ll be well after dark. That means we go over the plan one time now and then just hunker down and wait. This is where I let a soldier take over.”
Riley said, “There’s nine of us total, counting me and Corey. Steele’s regular hands will be busy rounding up and driving the horses. The shooting will be left to about a dozen mercenaries riding for Steele, and four soldiers who plan to attack the house and yard. I doubt if Steele himself will be riding.
“Me, John Hanchon, and you wranglers will ring the main herd behind cover. I’ll direct fire. We’ll be outnumbered, but they’ll be riding in the open and expecting only a sleepy line rider or two to be out there. Shoot for their horses first so they’ll be unable to cut out any mustangs.”
Riley looked at Touch the Sky. They had already briefly discussed what the Cheyennes would do.
“These two are going to have the tough job,” said Riley. “First of all, they’ll be watching at Steele’s spread when the riders head out. Then they’ll get back to give us the word when and where the fight’s coming to us. After that, they come back here and defend the house because the soldiers plan to attack right after the fight starts out in the pastures.”
Riley turned to Corey. The youth had insisted on joining either the bunch in the pasture or the Cheyennes up at the house. But Riley had convinced him to perform a more important task.
“You, Corey, will ride back to the Steele spread. After Steele’s men ride out, you’re going to take that pole corral apart. If they do heist any mustangs, well make damn good and sure they got no place to put them. But watch out for any sentries while you’re working.”
Corey nodded.
“Everybody straight on the plan?” said John Hanchon.
McKenna and the hands nodded.
“Clean and check your weapons,” said Riley. “There’ll be a full moon, so stay covered down as much as possible. And remember, a rustler is useless on his feet. Shooting a horse is as good as shooting the man.”
“I thank you all again,” said Hanchon. “May God have mercy on all of us. It’s going to be a hard fight.”
“Brother,” said Little Horse when the two Cheyennes were alone in the moonlit yard. “We are warriors and we cannot avoid this fight. But we have not dressed nor painted, we have made no sacrifice to the Arrows. And our sister has gone to her resting place in the west, leaving the sky to Uncle Moon.”
Touch the Sky nodded, understanding. A Cheyenne was seldom considered a coward if he refused to fight after dark or without painting, so important were these things.
“We must try hard to avoid the kill,” he said.
He glanced around the yard and the surrounding outbuildings, then considered the best possible approaches for attack. The most direct route from Fort Bates would be from the wagon track to the north. But the Bluecoat attackers would want to throw suspicion off the fort. Meaning the most probable direction of attack would be from the rim of the valley, down the long slope behind the house.
“Before we ride to spy on the white dogs,” said Touch the Sky, “I will speak with my father. I think we should prepare more traps for our enemies.”
But this talk of spying made him think again of something else. Something he had been worried about since hearing the tall, thin paleface named Winslow insist he’d seen two Indians peeking into that copse while he talked with Kristen.
He glanced carefully around, searching the blue-black twilight.
Little Horse saw him. “Still you fear the tribe has sent spies?”
Touch the Sky nodded. Little Horse too glanced carefully around. “I hope you are wrong, brother,” he said. “Tonight we face a powerful enemy. We may die. If we have been declared enemies of our tribe, we cannot make the journey to the Land of Ghosts. We will be doomed to wander in the Forest of Tears alone forever.”
“Then
brother,” said Touch the Sky, “let us make preparations, not words, for clearly we had better not die!”
Chapter Fifteen
Their preparations near the house complete, the two Cheyennes rode out together toward the Steele spread while the fat moon crept toward his zenith.
They stopped briefly at their hidden shelter on the hogback to prepare their weapons. Both Indians were silent now, absorbed in the silent task of preparing themselves for battle. They scooped clay out of the soil near the seep spring and darkened their exposed skin.
They were able to keep an eye on the house and main yard while they made these preparations. The first confirmation of the raid was the number of horses in the corral, many of which would normally have been stalled for the night by now. Steele’s wranglers and Winslow’s bunch, mostly keeping to themselves, stood in small groups smoking or checking their weapons.
The two Cheyennes crept downridge, moving even closer. Several times the door to the house swung open, and men would turn to look. Finally, when the two Cheyennes began to wonder if the strike was on after all, Hiram Steele stepped out into the buttery moonlight.
He nodded once, and Abe Winslow’s rusted-hinge voice shouted out, “Grab leather, boys!”
The Cheyenne warriors quickly returned and untethered their ponies. Hugging the tree line, keeping a constant eye on the riders below, Touch the Sky and Little Horse tracked the marauders as they set out, riding two abreast strung out in pairs fifty feet apart—almost twenty men strong, a good-sized cavalry squad. But almost half of them were wranglers used to hard drinking and fistfights, not killing, Touch the Sky reminded himself.
Still, that left at least a dozen paid killers against Riley’s force of six. Thus the Cheyennes wanted to learn more than just the exact time of attack— they needed to learn the approach route so the defenders could get in the best position. The initial moments of attack were the most important, Black Elk had reminded them constantly.
They held their ponies to a matching trot only until they were sure they knew the route—not down from the rim of the valley, but up from the coulees and defiles toward the main mustang herd in its summer pasture. The defenders would need to concentrate their fire at the open wall of the natural pen, through the coulee which approached it.
Once sure of this, the two red brothers nudged their ponies hard, pushing them recklessly but trusting them now after several sleeps of light duty. By now they had learned the swiftest routes through the valley. Soon they were well ahead of their enemy, long black locks streaming behind them as they urged their mounts even harder across open stretches of bottomland.
Touch the Sky quickly gave the word to his father and Tom Riley. Then, knowing time was stretching thin, the two Cheyennes raced toward the house. They hobbled their horses in protective thickets and moved into position, each kneeling behind sturdy young cedars behind the house. The trees grew near the bottom of the long slope leading down from the rimrock above.
This time they didn’t have long to wait. The first rifle shots from the coulee told them the defenders had surprised Steele’s riders. Soon a gun battle raged in earnest.
But the Cheyennes concentrated on the slope, where the silhouettes of four riders had just appeared at the crest.
Carlson was easy to recognize on the big chestnut Riley had told them about. All four riders wore civilian clothes. They fanned out slightly as they descended the slope, picking up speed until their mounts’ hooves were hollow, rapid drumbeats.
When they were more than halfway down the slope, closing rapidly on the hidden Cheyennes, Touch the Sky snorted like a horse clearing its nose after a good drink. Little Horse snorted back, signaling that he was ready.
The riders bent low over their pommels, savagely spurring their mounts. The thundering grew louder. The Cheyennes could now make out divots of soil and grass flying as the strong cavalry horses tore up the ground.
At the last possible moment, when it seemed the riders were about to pass them, Touch the Sky jerked taut the rope stretched along the ground between his cedar and Little Horse’s. With the rope lifted about three feet above the ground, he rapidly snubbed it around the cedar a few times to secure it.
One of the three dragoons rode a roan stallion. It hit the rope hard in mid-stride and tumbled forward fast, the rider’s left arm snapping in two places when he landed on it. Moments later the panicked horse, struggling to regain its feet, planted a hoof square on the rider’s chest and caved in his ribs as it righted itself and bolted back up the slope.
A ginger mustang carrying a second dragoon also went down, but less forcefully. Though the soldier was uninjured, his rifle was still in his saddle scabbard. The sight of his companion’s crushed chest sent him fleeing in the direction of his mustang.
Carlson’s fleet-footed chestnut and the remaining dragoon’s powerful little Sioux-broken paint managed to leap at the last possible instant, clearing the rope. Intent on their mission, neither man slowed to check on their downed companions.
Carlson swerved toward the house, the mounted infantryman toward the bunkhouse. Both clutched rags soaked in kerosene and wrapped around sticks. The dragoon reached the bunkhouse first, halted his mount outside the door, slammed it open with a powerful thrust of his boot. The next moment he struck a sulphur match and the torch was ablaze. He flipped it inside the bunkhouse and headed toward the outlying stable, pulling another makeshift brand from his saddle pannier.
But Little Horse had raced into the yard behind the dragoon, staying out of sight. As the soldier, intent on lighting his second torch, slowed to burn the stable, Little Horse raced inside the bunkhouse and threw a mattress over the flaming brand.
He headed for the stable even as the dragoon raced about the yard with a third flaming torch, igniting hayricks. Hanchon had already told them not to worry about saving hay, just buildings.
It was Touch the Sky’s job to deal with Seth Carlson. So far neither Carlson nor the dragoon was aware of the presence of the Cheyennes. With two hayricks flaming high, lighting up the house and yard like bright afternoon sun, they were slow to notice that the bunkhouse and stables were not engulfed in flames.
Carlson had reined in his horse before the house and lighted his torch. His arm was cocked back to throw it when two powerful hands gripped his left leg and jerked his foot from the stirrup. His right foot jerked free too, and a moment later he lay on his back in the dirt, the torch sputtering out.
The chestnut, spooked by the increasing flames in the yard and the sudden loss of its master, side-jumped hard and knocked Touch the Sky down before he could leap on Carlson. The officer was up on his knees, clawing his service pistol from its stiff leather holster, before Touch the Sky shook his head clear.
Carlson aimed, the Cheyenne leaped, the pistol spat fire as Touch the Sky slammed into him and bowled him over again.
They rolled once, twice, again in the dirt, grappling viciously. By the time Touch the Sky rolled on top of his opponent, there was a bright red crease of blood where the bullet had grazed the hollow just above his left hip.
The two archenemies fought like snarling wolves, ripping each other’s skin, gouging eyes, even biting. The flames from the burning hayricks leaped and danced high into the sky all around them, casting eerie shadows as they fought.
So far Little Horse had managed to save all but the hayricks and one minor storage shack. Intent on defeating the dragoon without drawing blood, Little Horse was at first unaware that his companion was struggling for his life in the dirt.
Touch the Sky had strength and agility over the Bluecoat officer. But the pony soldier was heavier and had practiced the European style of wrestling while at West Point. Now he performed a deft little flip with his legs tensed, neatly tossing Touch the Sky aside.
Carlson’s service Colt lay in the dirt several feet away, its primer cap spent. But now, as Touch the Sky scrambled after him again, the officer dipped a hand inside his tunic and came back out with a short-barreled .50-c
aliber hideout gun.
There was no time. Now he must either draw blood or die. But Touch the Sky was still resolved against killing at night, unpainted and unblessed by the Medicine Arrows.
Even as Carlson straightened his arm to fire, Touch the Sky snatched the knife from his sheath and flipped it at Carlson in one smooth, fluid movement. There was a sound like cloth ripping as the lethally honed blade sliced neatly into the wrist of the hand clutching the hideout gun.
The gun discharged its only slug, harmlessly sending it two feet over Touch the Sky’s head. Carlson cried out in pain and clutched his wounded arm, too shocked to pull the knife back out. Touch the Sky picked up the service revolver and flung it far out into the yard.
“I am a better man than you, paleface!” said Touch the Sky. “Do you see that? You live now because I let you, white dog! The day is coming when we will meet on the true field of battle. And then your hair will dangle from my clout!”
Carlson yanked the knife free, almost fainting at the pain, and dropped it in the dirt. His wrist spuming blood, he turned quickly away and raced for his horse.
The yard was brilliantly lighted now as the hayricks crackled and sparked, shooting huge tongues of flame. But the house and main buildings were untouched, and this fact had drawn Abe Winslow’s attention from the battle up at the pasture.
Things had fared badly for the attackers. They had been caught by surprise and several of his men were down, several more trapped. Steele’s wranglers, spooked by all the flying lead, had taken to the hills or were crouched nearby in hiding. It was part of Steele’s contingency plan that, should Winslow see that the house was not burning, he would ride down and do the deed Carlson had failed to do. Now, with lead flying thicker than trail dust, he was glad to get the hell out of there.
By now, between the noise of the flaming hayricks and the nickering horses in the main corral, Winslow was able to enter the yard unnoticed. Thus it was that, approaching Touch the Sky from behind, he saw the Indian defeat Carlson and send the officer packing.
