by Lauran Paine
WAGON TRAIN WEST
LAURAN PAINE
Copyright © 2016 by Lauran Paine Jr.
E-book published in 2018 by Blackstone Publishing
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Trade e-book ISBN 978-1-4708-6089-9
Library e-book ISBN 978-1-4708-6088-2
Fiction / Westerns
CIP data for this book is available from the Library of Congress
Blackstone Publishing
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Chapter One
With the wind sighing like a lost thing, low against the tall spring grass, there was no other sound. In a vastness of space and a vacuum of silence there was no movement for a long while, then, when movement came, it was a horse impatiently bobbing his head.
Just that quick fretting motion and no more. The shifting pattern made by the hugging wind through the grass was like the gray, passing shadow of a giant stalking southward.
In all that immense, gigantic wilderness, there was little to mark the passage of man. The giant, buttressed mountains far off were splashed over with the sun’s bold strokes. The landfall that ran out to meet a vaguely hazed horizon was vast beyond reckoning. Yet the only thing that moved in all this was simply the impatience of a horse.
Slowly, sitting there alone on a jagged crusting of rock, the Dakota’s head moved just the smallest bit. Motionless in the dawn light of the forest’s fringe was the warrior sentinel. Back where the new warmth made soft shadows was his horse.
The moon still hung white and sharp in the pinkening sky, and the gray color of first dawn was gone. The Eagle’s Nest was a gleaming tower of blood under the reddening light and, north of the warrior, Stone Face loomed, dark and brooding like the face of God. The little spring wind whipped raw at his body, a speck in the vastness. There was only eternal time, poised and hushed, and a silent cry vivid in the warrior’s mind like flaming triumph. Wagon train!
As still as Stone Face, as brooding and inward and majestic, the big man of war moved his head again a fraction, following the course of a lone horseman. He watched with glistening wet, black eyes the solitary figure, no larger than an ant, riding slowly, tiredly back toward the wagon circle from a scout up the gently rolling land north of where the emigrants had made their nightly bivouac. The warrior rose up slowly from the rock and turned a little to watch the white man swing over to the circle of huge, clumsy wagons. Looking farther out, northward, he knew other spies like himself were there, watching. The Dakotas had been following this wagon train for two days now. From a dozen places of concealment they kept a silent, grim watch.
The white people were holding to a swale of land that wound its way between craggy upthrusts and smooth mountains whose ageless faces loomed immense in the soft glow. They were trespassing across Indian country. It was Dakota Indian country at that; the domain of powerful and warlike stalwarts the whites called the Sioux.
This was 1864. The entire breadth of the plains was afire. No man was safe, be he white, Dakota, Northern Cheyenne, half-breed, or emigrant passing through, tooling his big wagon westward toward the setting sun. The Civil War, far off in the white man’s country, had drained away the soldiers. The Plains Indians were embarked upon the last and final effort they would make to throw back the tide of empire. There was no peace anywhere, and the black-gray mountains of this grimly silent land echoed with the screams of the aroused ozuye we’ tawatas—the men of war—the Dakota and Northern Cheyenne fighting warriors.
And down in the rough circle of the wagons, where the smell of animals was strong and the faces of people were pinched tight with tension, drawn like the warhead of an Indian drum, Kit Butler swung off his horse and gazed from level blue eyes at the turmoil of men walking, women cooking the morning meal, and children in a fecundity of hushed irresolution, wandering everywhere. One hundred sixty people—seventy-seven were men. His lean body stood beside the tired horse. A small boy came and took the reins and led the animal away.
He stood so still that Lige Turner, poking at a sickly fire, stopped what he was doing to look at him. But for the low breeze that rippled Kit’s blond hair, he would have looked like a carving. His slimness, with its aura of indefatigable strength, was projected vividly against the massiveness of the old, scarred wagons. His waist was circled by a brass-studded cartridge belt from which carelessly hung a Colt Dragoon pistol. He held a carbine, butt down, with his right hand, showing the easy familiarity of a man who had never been out of reach of guns. His face was deeply etched from experiences blasted out of a stark existence, and yet he wasn’t more than twenty-five or thirty years of age. His chest was broad and deep, his belly ribbed with tawny muscle, and something about him set him apart from the drabness of the people who had hired him and Lige to pilot them across the Indian country—something wild and savage and brutal, like the land, and hushed and inward, too.
Lige, who had seen the expression many times, watched the play of brooding gravity over the sharply chiseled, bronzed face. It was like a far-off storm first appearing over the rim of the horizon, spreading lowering shadows threateningly downward, over the lower portion of Kit’s face. He sighed and poked glumly at the snapping little flames of a breakfast fire.
He recalled their rough existence back at Independence, on the Missouri, with a mountain man’s nostalgia. Those were the days when men stood on their own feet or were carried out by them. The fur trade was gone, thanks to Europe’s importation of new styles based on silk and chintz and whatnot. The trappers were scattered or piloting people like these—emigrants with long beards, subdued homespun clothing, and unwieldy, inaccurate guns. Many a night he and Kit Butler had squatted at an Indian powwow and gorged on half-cooked buffalo hump, had joined in the violent and unrestrained dancing, had drunk the Dakotas and Arapahoes, the Rees and Cheyennes and Shoshones under the table, then laid down among them and slept like babes.
Not anymore. A few whites of mountain man caliber had been all right—even welcomed among them. This was different. These psalm-singing emigrants who came now killed game without need, fired forests to clear paths for their wagons, and burned off prairie grass to make it hard for Indian horses to graze near the trails. Times had changed.
Shaking his head, Lige looked around again and called softly, “Kit, come eat.” He watched the scout move toward him and sighed again. Kit used the same long, springing stride as though he still wore moccasins instead of the foot-killing cowhide boots. The same blunt jaw, set like the prow of a ship jutted out to meet life head-on. “Well, what did you find?”
Kit dropped down and folded his legs. He gazed into the fire with his sharp look and shrugged. “What you’d expect, I reckon.”
“Indians?”
“Indian sign. Dakotas. They’ve been trailing us for a couple of days.”
“Many of the devils?”
“Enough,” Kit said succinctly. “We’re pretty deep into their country now.”
Lige hung a limp piece of red meat between two forked sticks and held the morsel over the fire, turning it from time to time with a solemn watchfulness. “Northern Cheyennes with ’em?”
“Doesn’t look like it. Looks to me like just Dakotas … but a big band of them. Maybe a hundred.”
Lige swore softly and turned the meat. The smell rose and swirled around them when the breeze came warmly. “We’re in for a skittle then, I’d say. Do these wasichus know it?”
Kit shook his head. “Na
w, what the hell … they send out five or six men and ride all over the tracks. They sit on their horses, shading their cussed eyes, and look out over the country. It’s funny.”
“It would be,” Lige agreed, “if it wasn’t so danged pathetic.”
Kit took the meat Lige offered and started to eat. “You can tell them ten times in a row to look down … that Indian signs are on the ground, not ten miles away, but they wouldn’t know a Dakota moccasin print from a buffalo’s track.” He chewed slowly. “Funny thing about these people. They expect to see Indians charging in a big band, like soldiers, straight at them.”
Lige began cooking another piece of meat. “I know,” he said dryly. “Hell, in the old days they wouldn’t have lasted a week out here.”
Kit raised his glance and watched a big, thick man with a black spade beard approaching. He spoke softly to Lige. “Here comes Powers.”
Lige tested his meat without heeding the wagon boss who gazed down at them from his broad, flat face with small, cold eyes. He squatted heavily, grunting like a sow.
“Well, what’d you find?”
“Indians,” Kit said. “Dakotas. Looks like a pretty big band. I figure they’ve got us surrounded by now.”
“Indians!” Powers said explosively, derisively. “I haven’t seen one since we come out of Independence. Everybody talks Indians. It’s like a disease with you fellers.”
Lige began to eat. He chewed his meat with short, savage strokes and his eyes were unpleasant. But he said nothing and looked steadily at the trodden earth across the cooking fire from where they sat.
Kit watched the big emigrant’s face work with scorn in a wry and thoughtful way. “Might be at that,” he said calmly. “Tell you what, Powers.” He lifted an arm and pointed toward the towering cliff south, where the big Dakota had been earlier. “Send one of your boys over to the base of that hill and have him look around for moccasin tracks. If he doesn’t find some, I’ll finish scouting for you to Fort Collins without any pay.”
Lige looked up, shocked. At thirty-five, he looked fifty the way the morning sun caught his face and shone off it. Powers’ eyes misted for a second of indecision, then they cleared and he struck his leg. “You heard, Turner. You’re witness.” He got up ponderously and stalked away without a word. Lige gulped his last mouthful and looked pained. Kit smiled in the wolf-fierce way he had.
“He’ll have to pay me, don’t worry. I made that circuit before daybreak. There’s one on top of the hill, up there by the forest’s edge. I found where he walked around leading his horse, hunting for a trail up.”
Lige swung and squinted at the abrupt, craggy rampart, then his glance fell to where several emigrant men were standing beside a reckless-eyed youth on a big sorrel horse. He grunted and squirmed to watch. “They’re sending out that redheaded hellion, the one that’s always hunting a fight.”
Kit watched the rider wind his way out of the wagon circle and make steadily toward the cliff. His eyes were slitted speculatively. There was no reason to think the Dakota was still up there except that, in the gray light hours before, he hadn’t found any tracks coming down. He waited.
The rumor of his wager with the wagon boss went around. People talked and watched. “Well,” Kit said, “it gets their minds off hardship anyway.”
“Hardship?” Lige snorted. “They don’t know what hardship is. Look at them wagons. By God, they even carry water casks with ’em. There’s not a one that’s ever gone two days with his tongue thickening. Hardship! Owgh!”
“They think they’re suffering now,” Kit said, watching the rider grow small. There was a hard, bright edge to his words. “They’ll find out before we get to Fort Collins, I think. Those Dakotas’ll hit us one of these dawns. They aren’t trailing us for company.”
“Where d’you reckon they picked us up?”
“Hard to say now, Lige. Thirty wagons throw up one hell of a dust banner this time of the year. Anyway, they’re all on the warpath now, from Mexico to Canada. They’ll have scouts out all over the cussed country. You know how it is in the spring. They need horses to replace the ones that’ve starved, and they’re hungry and restless, like wolves. This is going to be a bad year. The sign is out already.”
Lige sucked his teeth in suppressed anxiety. The wages Kit had bet were important to them. He tugged his old hat low over his eyes and watched the rider approach the cliff. People were standing as if they were rooted. Even children watched, not understanding perhaps, but catching some of the contagion from their elders.
Then the redheaded emigrant dismounted and walked, leading his horse. He was clearly following a track of some kind. A soft murmur went up from the watching people. Lige looked over at Kit with a relieved, hard smile. “You should’ve bet Powers for money,” he said. He was still looking at Kit’s dark profile when the rending shout went up from the watchers. With an oath, he swung for another look, Kit’s growl rumbling close by as the younger man sprang up, clawed at his rifle, and began to trot toward the southernmost wagon.
Lige followed, wondering, feeling the way his stomach tightened into a knot of gristle. The emigrants were motionless and only the horror in their cries made a second look necessary. Kit elbowed through them, twisting and hurrying. Lige trailed in his wake.
The drama was ending when Kit could see without the impairment of hats and heads. The redheaded boy was being held close beside the racing horse of a brilliantly arrayed Dakota man of war. His feet threshed in a crazy dance, and the Indian had him powerfully by the hair. He was scalping the white man without slowing his horse, dragging him so that dust arose in their wake. Then, with a contemptuous movement, the Dakota flung the body aside and let out a yell that carried as clear as the wail of a bull elk down to the wagon train. He was holding aloft a fiery tuft of hair. The sun shone brilliantly off it.
Kit didn’t wait. He fought his way clear of the press of sickened people and raced for his horse. Lige was less than ten feet behind him. There was only the delay to bridle. Bareback, they raced neck and neck toward the big Dakota. With a swift sign language gesture of contempt, he lowered his trophy and sped easily away from the pursuit.
Kit slowed his horse and rode at a jolting trot where the redheaded emigrant lay. He was dead. The warrior’s last knifing slash had split his gullet from ear to ear. Lige stayed on his horse, steady eyed and watchful, while Kit kneeled by the body. Neither of them spoke for a moment, then Kit stood up, dusted his knees, and looked after the Dakota. He was gone. Kit turned toward the wagon circle and gazed for a long time at it, then he stooped, hefted the body, tossed it across his horse, and leaped up behind it. Still in silence, they turned back. The emigrants were moving frantically. Kit watched their senseless activity with an inward darkness of the spirit.
“Maybe they’ll believe now, Lige.”
“Hell of a way to find out,” Lige said dourly. “Still, if it had to be someone, I reckon this one’s the best. He was a cussed bully anyway.”
“They don’t look at things like that, Lige. Any white man, even a worthless one, is better’n fifty Indians to them.”
“Owgh!” Lige was watching the streaming people coming afoot out to meet them. “Now’d be the time for the bucks to raise the yell. Look at ’em. I’ll bet they’re not twenty left inside the circle.”
Kit shrugged. “We’re in for bad trouble with this batch, I know. Too late to go back … they wouldn’t anyway, with Powers as their leader … and hell to pay if we go ahead. In Shoshone country this would be bad enough, but here, with Dakotas around us, we’re likely not to get even to Fort Collins.”
Their horses were engulfed in a torrent of upturned, horrified faces. Hands clawed at the dead man’s body. Kit released his hold and watched the way the scalpless man was whisked away amid the first discordant notes of wailing. Someone rapped his knee with a hard fist. It was Powers. The man’s face was shiny with sweat and ugly.
>
“I want to talk to you.”
“Come on, then,” Kit said, riding through the people, back toward the breakfast that had been interrupted. Lige took the horses and left Kit with the wagon boss. They squatted where the dying fire was. Powers looked dogged and gray under his flat-brimmed hat with its sweat-marked, low crown.
“I don’t like the looks of it, Butler. They must be trailing us like coyotes. That was a terrible thing. The people’ll be hard to handle now. They were scairt enough before.”
“You weren’t?” Kit said flatly.
Powers flagged impatiently with one big hand. “I was, maybe, and didn’t know it. It’s the danged Indian talk all the time. A man gets so full of it he’s like to burst.”
Kit didn’t help Powers. He sat there without speaking, looking past the wagon boss, where the emigrants were talking in groups; the women were crowding around one wagon where a gray-faced man stood like stone, unseeing, looking past them all, and where the sounds of anguish came whimperingly from within the big canvas top.
He thought of how this same black-bearded man had come swaggering into the little camp he and Lige had made back on the Missouri, a few miles below Independence, seeking scouts in a lofty, patronizing way. He hadn’t liked Powers then and didn’t like him now. He sat in the warmth, waiting for the wagon boss to go on speaking, refusing to help him with word or gesture even though he understood well enough the sudden fear that was growing, haunting the emigrant leader.
“Well,” Powers said finally, looking up at Kit. “What shall we do?”
“You’re the wagon boss, not me.”
“I’m asking for your suggestions.”
Kit was watching the emigrant men congregate around the stony-eyed father of the redheaded youth. He could tell a lot from the way they stood, clutching their guns with white knuckled fists and speaking in low, vibrant tones. He shrugged. “Make soldiers out of those people. Live like the Indians live. They’ve found out from hundreds of years in this country that there’s only one way to survive. Make fighters of your men and workers of your women.”
