This Scorched Earth

by William Gear

  “He is taking them home,” Doc replied. “And heaven help me, half the time I even think I see them myself these days.”

  “A’hee! He carries the souls of the dead to the white man’s land of the dead? Their Seana?”

  At mention of the word, the Cheyenne muttered uneasily among themselves.

  Vehoc said something to Little Wolf, who whispered under his breath. The other riders backed their horses away, making more room between them and the wagon where Butler perched. The fingering of medicine bundles was more fervent, their efforts to avoid Butler’s attention even more apparent.

  “When I was little,” Vehoc said, “a black robe came to our camp to talk about Jesus. We had an old hohnokha who called the rains and thunder. The black robe raised his book, called our hohnokha a devil, and shouted at him. That night lightning struck the black robe’s camp and killed him dead. Only fools laugh at Ma’heono.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The four sacred Powers. The spirit beings.” He gestured in a wide loop that didn’t include Butler. “They are all around. All that lives. Buffalo, grass, birds, the deer and antelope. The mice and grasshoppers. The flowing of the river. You white men know so little, yet here you are, filling our land.”

  Doc used his probe, located the bullet where it had stopped between the liver and diaphragm. With his straight forceps he reached into the wound and grasped the bullet, easing it out.

  “Looks like a .36 caliber. From the scraped rifling, it was a revolver shot.” He extended the bullet and dropped it into Oak Skin’s hand. “You can give it to Red Legs as a remembrance.”

  Doc sponged up some of the blood, tied off a bleeder, and carefully began to suture the wound closed. “Make Red Legs drink all the water he can hold. Tell that to Little Wolf there. I don’t want Red Legs walking or riding, so when he has to piss, tell him to just let it go. Do you understand?”

  Little Wolf asked something. Vehoc translated, “Is he going to live?”

  Doc tied his last knot, fixing his gaze on Oak Skin’s. “I think so. The only thing I can’t help is if the wound infects. Indian medicine or white, that’s up to the wounded man to beat. He has damage to his liver, but it will heal if you don’t let him move for a moon or so. But if he gets bumped hard, or falls, it could break the wound open, and he’ll bleed to death. Do you understand?”

  Vehoc made a sign with his hands, saying, “Reckon so.”

  Doc smiled thinly, aware that the evening light was fading. “Can you find him a Cheyenne medicine man? A healer? Someone who can bathe him in smoke, feed him herbs. Maybe hold a sweat?”

  “Maybe so.”

  “It would help his healing.” Doc tapped the side of his head. “Up here. In the soul. You need to do this as quickly as you can.”

  Vehoc stood, turned to Little Wolf, and spoke hurriedly.

  “Haahe,” Little Wolf said. Then he asked something else as he made a fist-knocking hand sign that meant to kill.

  Fear gripped Doc’s spine with icy hands.

  Vehoc made a sign that Doc thought meant no, and added something else. Then he made a slight gesture of the head toward Butler, as if indicating him without indicating him, and said something about the hohnohka.

  Vehoc turned to Doc, a grim smile on his lips. “We are Hotame’taneo. Dog Soldiers. Unlike whites we are men of honor who will not harm a hohnohka. Tell your holy man that we offer prayers in honor of his journey to carry his dead to the white man’s Seana. Because you serve him, we give him your life.”

  With that he backed carefully away, turned, and leaped onto his horse. The warrior holding the lead rope handed it to Little Wolf. The leader glared his hatred at Doc, but studiously ignored Butler as he led the travois forward.

  Within minutes the last of them disappeared into the growing gloom of evening.

  Doc sank onto his surgeon’s chest, his heart hammering like a sledge on an anvil.

  “At ease, gentlemen,” Butler called to his men. “Surrounded and outnumbered as they were, they wouldn’t have dared to try anything. Not against Company A. We had them boxed the entire time.”

  65

  October 5, 1865

  Sarah stood in the cold wind, arms crossed, and stared westward at the road. Little more than a rut in the overgrazed grass, it vanished into the growing darkness. Only a hint of light lay behind the low clouds to mark where the sun had set on the southwestern horizon.

  She tried to ignore the sound of shovels grating in the hard ground, the rasping curses of the soldiers, or to think of the remains of the two men who would soon be laid under the High Plains sod.

  Just at dusk their convoy of two stages and a detachment of cavalry had pulled into Willow Spring station to find the horses missing, and not a soul in sight. The two herders—the ones the soldiers were now burying—had been spread-eagled on the ground in front of the dugout. Dugout? Little more than a hole in the ground actually. Both men had been naked, each with his severed penis and testicles protruding from his bloody, open mouth. The tongues—cut out to make room for the genitals—had been stuffed into slits cut into their crotches, as though obscene vaginas were giving birth. The men’s scalped skulls had been split to expose the brains. As a final indignity, the Indians had piled poles ripped from the corral over their stomachs and set them on fire.

  This is a damned and terrible country. Why the hell did we ever come here?

  Worse. Seeing those mutilated and tortured men opened a door she’d wanted forever closed. It was as if she could hear the hinges creaking as she peered through a slit and saw Dewley’s body lying there on that narrow ledge. She was rising, the knife in her hand dripping crimson, Dewley’s severed genitals limp, warm, and squishy in her bloody hand.

  God, Sarah, don’t.

  Even the bitter wind was savage as it gusted at her, bringing smells of grass, old manure, and the threat of frost.

  The journey west had proven a great deal more arduous than Sarah had anticipated. The youthful enthusiasm with which she and Bret had left Atchison, Kansas, had rapidly dwindled. First had come the rude realization that riding inside a Concord coach was akin to being the target of a sparring pugilist. Suspended only on thick leather straps, she’d been jostled, bounced, banged, and slammed around the inside. On occasion the jolt was severe enough to send her airborne to land in her fellow travelers’ laps if she were lucky, or to smack into the window frames were she not.

  She hadn’t been this battered and sore since she’d escaped from Dewley’s camp.

  The trip had rapidly devolved into a contest of physical endurance. The food had been reasonable—if not outstanding—in the home stations on the eastern leg. But after Junction City, it had declined to rancid bacon boiled in a pot of beans with the occasional venison or buffalo steak.

  Sarah had marked their progress by the station names: Ellsworth, Buffalo Creek, Fossil Creek, Downer, Henshaw’s Springs, and finally Camp Pond Creek. Here their Concord coach had been held up for a day to await the coach traveling a day behind them. For the two days prior, the eastbound coaches had failed to arrive. A sure sign of trouble.

  Their driver, a bandy-legged man named Mapleton, had stared warily about, then scratched his bearded chin. “Won’t bother me a bit to hole up here until Rep Barker’s coach ketches up. And having them twenty so’jers along? That gives us nigh on forty guns. Jest hope y’all can shoot.”

  The arrival at Willow Spring had proven everyone’s worst fears.

  “What do you think?” Bret asked, stepping up beside her to stare out at the darkening grasslands.

  “Wondering if we were fools, Bret.” She rubbed her hands on the back of her arms. “You’ve heard the same stories I have from the eastbound coaches. And if you have any doubts just step over yonder and look what’s left of those two boys they’re burying.”

  “All of life’s a gamble,” he told her softly. “But if you’re that scared, we can turn back.”

  She took a deep breath, fought a shiver from
the chill. “I can shoot straighter than most men. Like Mapleton says, we’ve got forty guns.” She chuckled nervously. “Funny what life comes down to sometimes, isn’t it?”

  She could feel the danger out there in the dark, smell it on the biting west wind. And what if the damned Sioux did manage to surround the coach, disable it? There’d be one hell of a fight. She’d save her last shot for herself. What did she have to live for anyway?

  The band of gold on her ring finger still felt odd. Back in Atchison she had asked, “What are people going to think, Bret? A man and a woman traveling together? I say we act like we’re married.”

  He had studied her through those liquid brown eyes. “It would make things easier. I have a ring, something I won someplace. No idea if it will fit.”

  She fingered the gold band as she considered the darkening Kansas night. All of her childhood dreams of marriage to a prominent gentleman and a grand house? Her fine dresses? The servants? The elegant parties she had intended to host? Well, here she was in the middle of dark and bloody Kansas, faking marriage to a rootless gambler.

  God had to be laughing until His guts ached.

  The wind flipped her hair back and pressed her skirt against her long legs. “I’d swear, Bret, I can almost feel them out there. I grew up with Indians. Cherokee, Choctaw, and some Chickasaw. But, seeing those men…”

  Images flashed behind her eyes, cold fear clutching at her. As if in an instant she was back on the cliff, bending down as Dewley screamed.

  She shivered, only to be reassured when Bret pulled her against him. “It was … I was…” She swallowed hard. “That’s what Billy did. What I did when I cut Dewley apart. I didn’t burn them alive. But I was back. Seeing it all again.” She looked at him, adding, “I’m no damn different than a savage Indian, Bret.”

  “I’ve been wondering if this was the right decision. It sounded so easy. Eight days and we’d be in Denver. Able to start over. I didn’t know we’d be walking right into a war.”

  “This is worse than Yankees and Rebels. The Sioux and Cheyenne want us dead, and we want them dead. Ain’t gonna be no surrender. Won’t be like the Cherokee, dispossessed by that lying cheat Andrew Jackson. This is blood and pain and death to the last.”

  “Cooler heads may well prevail in the end. Not all—”

  “You and your Yankee Boston mind don’t understand, Bret.” She paused, guts gone hollow. “But I do. I lived it.”

  Another gust of wind rocked her; Bret stood so as to shield her with the flap of his coat. “We’ll be all right now, Mrs. Anderson.”

  “I just have a premonition, Bret. That’s all.”

  “Claiming future sight now, Mrs. Anderson?”

  She glanced up at him, imagining more than seeing his smile in the darkness. “You’re enjoying that, aren’t you?”

  He paused for a moment. “I know it’s a sham, Sarah. But if you could ever feel comfortable with me, trust me enough, I would make it real.”

  She stepped away from him, turning to study him in the darkness. “Bret, I’m not sure I could ever…”

  “I don’t need your body, my dear. Men and women have made marriages without carnal relations. They have loved each other dearly for the enjoyment they took in simply sharing each other’s company.”

  For a moment she couldn’t breathe, then forced herself to fill her lungs. The mere act of doing so seemed to break the spell. “Bret, you need to find some fine and decent woman, one who can fulfill a man’s needs. Give you children, build a home. You don’t want a ruin like me.”

  He laughed softly, shivering as the cold wind ate into him. “A decent woman? We’re both ruins in our own ways. I’m a disgraced gambler, a deserter, and murderer. Just where, my dear, do you see some decent and upright young virgin swooning into my arms? Let alone setting up hearth and home, and later explaining to the cherubic fruit of my loins, ‘Oh, be good, little ones! Papa is due any moment with his take from the saloons!’”

  “Bret, you’re impossible.”

  “No, my love. We both are.”

  “What of your … needs?” She cocked her head, staring up at him. “I spent my days watching Paw slip away, always on the prowl. Since he shared a bed with Maw, it wasn’t as if he had no outlet. For you, on the other hand, it would be a necessity.”

  “You sound sharp when you say it.”

  “I shouldn’t.” She shrugged. “What a hypocritical wretch I am. I’m spoiled goods. But were we married, I wouldn’t want you between some stranger’s legs. What’s the old story about the dog in the manger?”

  He lifted her chin with a finger, staring down at her in the darkness. “Do you trust me?”

  “Up to a point. Sometimes you don’t have the good sense a—”

  He bent down and kissed her. His lips weren’t on hers for more than two seconds, conforming, loving, and then he straightened.

  “By God,” he whispered as he walked back toward the coach. “I’ve wanted to do that for months.”

  She stood, fingering her lips, unsure if she were staggered by the wind, or the aftereffects.

  66

  December 1, 1865

  Charlie Deveroux stood resplendent in his black broadcloth suit. Yellow lamplight filled his parlor, casting its soft light on his guests—and upon his resplendent Martha where she stood in her white muslin wedding dress. Occupying the place of honor beside the fireplace, she held a crystal glass of champagne in her delicate and white-gloved hand. Outside the window the night was black, the pattering of rain barely audible over the happy conversation filling the parlor.

  The neck of the champagne bottle clinked as Hank Abrams poured another measure of fizzing champagne into Charlie’s glass.

  Phil Seymore, the Austin mayor’s right-hand man, leaned close, a satisfied smile on his lips. “Mr. Deveroux, I’m afraid I shall have to make my apologies and take my leave. It was a most becoming wedding. And, while the mayor was unable to attend, again, I assure you that he sends you and Mrs. Deveroux his fondest regards and best wishes for your happiness.”

  Charlie inclined his head graciously. “I just hope that I have been of service, sir.”

  Seymore’s smile was a fleeting thing. “Texas will change under Reconstruction. Hamilton and Throckmorton are going to ease it back into the Union. But until then it falls upon those among us with insight to quell the violence and restore the peace. You have made the right choice. The information you’ve provided has allowed us to run down most of the worst of the lot.”

  “What about Billy Hancock?”

  With a tilt of the head, Seymore indicated that Charlie should follow him out into the foyer. There he turned, sipped his champagne, and said, “You were right. His scout, Danny Goodman, showed up at that whorehouse outside San Marco two nights ago. Everywhere Billy Hancock goes, he sends Goodman in first. I thought I’d hear today that they’d either captured or killed him.”

  “That would have been the perfect wedding present.” Charlie thoughtfully smoothed his mustache. “I want that five-thousand-dollar reward for fingering Captain Loomis’s killer.”

  Seymore watched him through narrowed eyes. “How’d you know he’d be headed for Magdelena’s?”

  “He’s developed a thing for Mexican whores.” Charlie grinned. “Besides, I was supposed to meet him there. He expected me to pay him two hundred dollars for killing Antonio Guzman over in Bandera.”

  “Why?”

  “Why what, sir?”

  “What do you hope to gain from betraying all of your old comrades in arms?” Seymore crossed his arms, gaze intent.

  “Look around, friend. I have a house, a wife, and new associates.” He fought a smile. “There is a new political structure in Texas. The Yankees are here to stay. You all are going to need a man like me. One who can attend to the less savory parts of running a government.”

  “And Billy Hancock?”

  “Phil, I got to tell you, Billy Hancock scares the shit out of me. Men kill for lots of reasons: passio
n, lust, greed, revenge. Billy? He lives for the hunt. Killing fills his heart with a tingling fever. The way he tells it, the devil comes alive inside him.” He paused. “That’s why I told you to send ten men to ambush him.”

  “I sent five.”

  Charlie stiffened, his heart skipping. “Jesus jumping Jehoshaphat! You may have killed us all.”

  “Dear Lord, Charlie. He’s just a single malicious young man. The five I sent are good. Ex-Rangers. All salt, sand, and tanned leather. They’ve taken down Comanche raiders, Mexican bandits, and some of the nastiest men this state’s ever seen. If they can’t take one young—”

  “Billy says he’s possessed by the devil himself.”

  “If he’s not already tied crosswise over a horse with bullet holes through his heart and head, the devil better start looking for someone else to possess, because Billy Hancock’s going to be swinging from the gallows within the week.”

  “How soon are you going to know if your men got him?”

  “Might be someone waiting at the governor’s office now.” He glanced toward the front door. “Assuming the storm hasn’t washed out the bridges between here and San Marco.”

  “You send me word, Phil. I don’t care if it’s the middle of the night.”

  Phil gave him an incredulous look as lightning flashed outside the window and, a second later, the bang shook the house. “Tonight? It’s your wedding night, man. I’ll send someone in the morning, late. You have other things to enjoy.”

  Clapping Charlie on the shoulder, Phil Seymore retrieved his coat and hat from the rack in the hall. Donning them, he graced Charlie with a farewell grin, then opened the door and stepped out into the storm.

  “You better be goddamned right about this, Phil.”

  Charlie hesitated in the parlor doorway. Martha gave him a beaming smile where she stood talking to Clarissa Foxland, wife of a prominent Austin attorney. The other guests were enjoying the drink and conversation.