Lieutenant Deuel shifted his solemn gaze from Cletus to Alex. “Sit down. I’m Lieutenant Deuel. Mr. Slaughter has made some serious charges against all of you.”
Clay introduced himself and the rest of them then said, “We’ve got charges of our own, sir.” Clay saluted as was proper, officer to officer, even if one of those officers was long separated from the service. “I’m Clay McClellen, formerly a major in the Union Army. We came in to get this cleared up.”
Alex should have saluted, too, maybe. He was afraid the lieutenant would take it as an offense considering he was a deserter. Except maybe if he didn’t salute the lieutenant would take it as an offense. Unable to decide, Alex remained still. He’d never been very good at military things.
“You speak as if deserting one’s post is something easily resolved, Mr. McClellen. I assure you it’s not.”
Someone had lined up five chairs in a painfully neat row across the desk from the lieutenant. Cletus sat down hard on the one farthest to the left and scooted it back a few inches.
The lieutenant flinched like the misaligned chair created a disorder he found unbearable. Slaughter didn’t notice, but Alex did and resolved not to scoot under any circumstances. He’d known men like the lieutenant and the oddest things could set them off.
Cletus leaned back in his chair, dirty and grizzled with his sparse beard.
Alex’s efforts to clean up, hoping to look like a respectable citizen, seemed dishonest next to Cletus’s grime. He’d hoped that would make the lieutenant trust him, but somehow now, to Alex, it seemed like he’d put on a false front while Cletus was presenting himself as a hardworking, decent man. The lieutenant might be partial to cleanliness, but surely no one would pronounce a sentence higher or lower based on a man’s clothing.
Clay caught Alex’s eye and jerked his thumb at the chair farthest to the right. Beth, with a bandage still on her head, sat next to Alex. Sophie sat by Beth. Clay, with his arm in a sling, took the chair beside Cletus.
The lieutenant was young. Younger than Alex in fact. He had a baby face that didn’t look capable of growing whiskers. How did such a young man come to be in charge of a fort? But then, despite its size, Fort Union wasn’t much of a fort these days.
“Now”—Lieutenant Deuel folded his arms on the desk in front of him and nearly stabbed Alex to death with those gray eyes—“Mr. Slaughter accuses you of shooting him, taking him prisoner, and assisting an army deserter.”
Clay stood. “We defended—”
“Sit back down.” Deuel talked over top of Clay and raised his hand to ask for silence. “I didn’t ask you. And I know some of that is a lie. It is obvious to me that you’ve been injured.”
Clay sat back down.
“Mr. Slaughter would have me believe he was just defending himself when he shot you and your daughter, Mr. McClellen, but no woman would shoot at a man, so seeing a bullet wound on you, Mrs. Buchanan”—Deuel looked at Beth—“puts a lie to at least part of his charges.”
“That woman—” Cletus stood and stormed toward the young officer.
Both soldiers behind Deuel stepped forward.
“Stop or I’ll have you removed and locked up, Mr. Slaughter.” For his youth, the lieutenant had considerable power in his voice.
Though he was fuming, fists clenched tight as his jaw, Cletus sat back down. He made Alex think of a snapping, snarling wolf.
“Now, what I see here is a deserter.” The lieutenant turned those cold eyes on Alex and the little bits of hope he’d nurtured faded. “What was your rank, Dr. Buchanan?”
“I was a captain.”
The lieutenant arched his brows.
Alex felt his collar tighten, wondering if the man would feel some satisfaction in ruling against a man who’d outranked him.
“Well, Captain Buchanan, as you know, the punishment for desertion can be execution.”
Lieutenant Deuel watched him with sharp eyes.
Alex couldn’t quite control a gulp. “Yes, I’m aware of that. I’ve come in to face whatever punishment you deem necessary.”
One of the men behind Deuel caught Alex’s eye and gave his head a tiny, frantic shake. Alex ignored the man.
Deuel nodded. “I will take the fact that you came in on your own into consideration. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’ve confessed and it won’t require any trial to find you guilty.”
Alex wanted to protest but he fought the impulse. “I am guilty, Lieutenant Deuel.”
The soldiers standing at attention exchanged looks. One of them rolled his eyes.
“However, there’s more than that. If what Mr. Slaughter is telling me is true, then the group with you has committed crimes.”
The lieutenant’s eyes skimmed down the row, running past Beth, Sophie, and Clay.
Alex’s stomach twisted at what he saw in those eyes. Then he looked closer at the lieutenant. There was something—
“I’d like to respond to that, lieutenant.” Clay spoke politely but with that same authority that seemed to be part of him, but more apparent here in military surrounding.
“I’m sure you would, Major McClellen. But right now it’s my turn, and the only speaking you’ll be doing is to answer my questions.”
Clay’s jaw tensed but he nodded. “Yes, sir.”
Lieutenant Deuel definitely had a hostile attitude toward Alex and he was extending that to the McClellens. But then based on the soldiers behind the lieutenant and the way the man was treating Slaughter, it was possible the guy was hostile to everyone.
“Now, how long ago did you desert, captain?” Deuel laced the military rank with venom.
“I served with Colonel Miles out of Fort Dodge. I—let’s see—” Alex had done his best to forget the details, which left him only with vague haunting memories of blood and death. “It was the summer, or autumn maybe, of 1874. I—I rode with the supply wagons Colonel Miles sent under the command of Captain Lyman to Camp Supply in Indian Territory. I was supposed to restock bandages and make sure Colonel Miles’s new camp on the Red River had whatever I thought necessary. We fought a battle with the Kiowas and Comanches on that trip that lasted—I can’t remember how long—days. We were surrounded.” Alex rubbed his head wishing he could wipe away the nightmare.
He felt his vision widening as the room faded and the rifle fire cut through day and night.
“There was a terrible rainstorm.” He could feel the mud everywhere, hear the report of guns. Horses wounded and screaming in pain. Men dead and dying. He smelled the blood, even in the downpour. “There were around a hundred men and only ten or so armed. Captain Lyman had us dig in, but the Indians had us under siege and they meant to keep after us until we were all dead.”
Fingernails sunk into his arm and he pulled himself back to see Beth leaning toward him. He looked in her eyes and they steadied him.
“Give us strength.” He heard her whispering, her lips barely moving. Strength. She asked God for enough strength for both of them.
He asked for strength, too, as he tried to remember what happened after that siege.
“We—we got out. Someone came. Then I had to tend the men hurt in the Battle of Buffalo Wallow. They’d just been brought in when we were rescued. Those men had barely been given a week to heal, and we had wounded from the battle near Camp Supply. Some of them were still terribly wounded when a new battle broke out in Palo Duro Canyon. The colonel ordered me to the site. I told him—” Alex looked up into the lieutenant’s eyes. “I—I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t face more death. I had men still trying to decide which side of the Pearly Gates they were going to end up on right there in camp and I was shaky. My hands wouldn’t quit shaking and I—I hadn’t slept since the siege. I had nightmares if I even dozed off. I was barely able to keep up with the job I had there. But the colonel said they needed me and I had to go.”
Alex remembered refusing, maybe begging. It was all a blur. “In Palo Duro, it was Colonel MacKenzie’s Fourth Cavalry that took on Iron Shir
t and his Cheyenne, and there were Comanches and Kiowas there, too. The cavalry captured a whole village. There were a thousand or more people in that village. Most of the women and children were fine, but a few were hurt. I tried to see to them, but I was ordered to tend the cavalry first. Women and children suffered and died while I bandaged scratches.”
Alex ran a shaking hand deep into his hair. “And there were a thousand horses. We slaughtered them to keep them from the Indians. I heard the shots where they were killed and the screaming of the horses. And the wounded kept coming. I saw them fall on the battlefield and I went to them, trying to bring them back behind infantry lines. Then I—I was hit. Shrapnel from somewhere. It wasn’t a bullet wound, I don’t think. The scars on my back don’t look like bullets. I didn’t even know I’d been hit until later. But I was tending a man …” Alex’s voice faded as he saw that man dying under his hands, trying to put himself back together, and the blood and entrails dangling from Alex’s doctor’s bag.
Alex dragged himself back to the quiet room. “Death everywhere.”
Give me strength, Lord. Give me strength.
“I ran. Or I suppose I ran. I don’t remember it very well. Someone told me later I’d been shot and that man did what doctoring he could. I don’t know where I was. Far from the battlefield by then. I don’t know if it was hours or days or weeks later.” Alex looked up. “I did it, sir. I cracked under pressure and ran like a coward and never went back. I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t be a doctor. I couldn’t have any more blood on my hands. And the army wouldn’t let me stop.”
“So you were shot in the back while you were running away?” The lieutenant sounded as merciless as that battle.
“No, sir, I don’t think so. I think it was from our own side. Maybe a ricochet. Like I said, I didn’t even know I’d been wounded until later. I had to wade out into that battlefield to help the men who were down. I was ahead of our troops. It was our own cavalry weapons. It happens in war. It’s madness.”
Trying to bring himself fully back to the room, Alex found Beth, holding his hand in a viselike grip that hurt now that he was aware of it. He reached with his free hand and caught hold of her, two of his hands entwined with one of hers. “Beth honey, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry you found yourself bound to a coward.”
Her grip eased. She’d been using the pain of her grip to drag him back to the present.
Alex wondered how much of his cowardice had shown in this room.
“You were with Colonel MacKenzie at Palo Duro?” Deuel asked, his voice sounding tight, strained. His face flushed red.
“Yes, sir, I was.” Alex’s heart sped up at the rage boiling out of the lieutenant.
“My brother was with the company on that supply train. He’d been mending, but after Palo Duro, he had no medical care. He died a few days after Palo Duro.” Deuel’s words landed like stones on Alex’s already battered conscience.
Another person died because of him. How many had he failed before he’d run away? How many after?
Beth’s grip on his hand tightened.
Alex swallowed, but it felt like something hard and unmovable had lodged in his throat.
“My brother died for want of your medical attention.”
Silence held firm in the room. If Alex had a chance when he’d entered the room, that chance had just died as surely as the lieutenant’s brother.
“I find you guilty, Captain Buchanan.” The lieutenant’s fist slammed on the desk with the force of final judgment. Without taking his burning eyes off Alex, Deuel said, “I’ll decide your punishment by the end of the day. If I have my way, you’ll be facing a firing squad with the sunrise, doctor.”
Lieutenant Deuel’s words hit as hard as the shrapnel that had been the final blow to Alex on that long ago day.
“No.” Beth threw her arms around Alex. “You can’t do this.”
Alex pulled her tight against him and felt her hot tears brush against his face as he held her.
“Lock him up,” the lieutenant shouted.
Someone grabbed Alex’s arm and he let go of Beth.
She clung to his neck, crying.
“It’s all right, Beth. Don’t cry. Don’t waste your heart on me.”
“And lock the rest of them up, too.” The lieutenant snapped his fingers as if he held the power of life and death over all of them and delighted in using his power—and abusing it. “All of them. Slaughter and all three of the McClellens.”
“Th–the women, too, Lieutendant Deuel—sir?” The man holding Alex’s arm stuttered, and Alex saw a surprising amount of fear in the young man’s face. Not the respect and obedience expected toward a superior officer, but cold, trembling fear.
“Yes, the women, too. And you carry out those orders without further question, private, or I might just throw you in with them when I line the lot of them up in the morning.”
“What?” Alex erupted.
Beth gasped.
“Calm,” the private whispered to Alex. “Obey him.”
The private pulled Alex so they were headed for the door. With their backs turned to the lieutenant, he whispered, “He won’t do it. At least he don’t mean it about the McClellens being shot.”
Both men holding Alex nearly dragged him out of the office. He looked and caught Beth’s eye.
She’d risen to her feet and now looked anxiously after him.
He needed Beth. In the second their eyes held, he realized that, yes, Beth had stayed by his side during his doctoring, but she’d been close every moment.
He thought of that first night in Clay’s bunkhouse. The first time he’d tried to sleep after Beth stormed into his life and forced him to use his healing skills. The nightmares had come when Beth was gone.
He’d never spent another night alone. Nor another day. It wasn’t just during medical treatment that he was one wrong thought away from sinking into his nightmares. It was all the time.
Knowing he was going to be locked away from her twisted inside of him, unlocking his nightmares. Blood, horses screaming. “No! Beth!” He heard himself shout but wasn’t sure if he spoke the words aloud or if the cry came only on the inside.
He wrenched away, but the soldiers had too firm of a grip on him. They dragged Alex out, and the door slapped shut behind him.
They were in a small outer office, with a soldier sitting with his hands clutched together at a secretary’s desk. “What’d he do now?” the lieutenant’s aide asked.
“He ordered this man executed,” the private said.
Alex fought to listen, fought to understand the words being spoken.
“Get a wire off to the nearest fort with a commanding officer who outranks him,” the private said. “Do it quick before he can stop you.”
That made no sense. Alex shook his head and heard the bullets whizzing past.
The man behind the desk dashed out of the room. Alex’s two escorts followed.
“My wife. I need Beth.” Alex hated the sound of his voice. Desperate, cowardly, broken.
God, I’m broken. You heal the brokenhearted. Help me, Lord Jesus Christ. Give me strength.
Once they were outside, the men said, “He’s crazy.”
Jerking his head up, Alex hated it that they knew. “I’m crazy?” He needed to beg them to forgive him, beg the men he’d killed to forgive him. Beg Beth. Beg her parents. Beg everyone to forgive him.
“Not you, Doc. We mean the lieutenant. He’s crazy on the subject of his brother. And it’s gone straight to his head bein’ in charge of this fort. He’s been throwing around any orders he can think of since afore the dust settled on the colonel’s trail. We’ll do somethin’, Doc. We can stop this.”
“Stop this?” Alex only barely understood what they were saying, but he struggled to keep his nightmares at bay.
“And that Cletus Slaughter, the colonel hates him. He’s brought in more deserters draped over his saddle than any other man in the West. Decent men who’d just had enough or had trouble a
t home. War can break a man, Doc. You’re not the first. I ain’t seen much fightin’.”
The man escorting Alex was younger, but he had the weathered skin of a frontier soldier. Kind eyes, but smart, like he’d seen a lot of hard living. But he’d let it make him wise instead of broken.
“But I’ve seen a bit of it. And I think—I think …” The man fell silent and the silence drew Alex, helped him get a better grip on the here and now and pull him out of the past. “I think many’s the man who—to break—to reach a breakin’ point and walk away—well, sir, I think that might be a kind of courage some of us never find.”
Shaking his head, Alex said, “No. I ran. I was a coward. Men died.”
“A lot of men ran. They don’t deserve to be shot in the back by the likes of Slaughter. He’s been makin’ good money with the army’s rewards. If the colonel was here, I’m not sayin’ he wouldn’t punish you, but this is crazy, crazy. Not even a proper military trial. And to threaten your family, who brought you in. Two of ’em shot. The lieutenant’s mad as a cornered he-coon when it comes to his brother. If you’d have been brought in for somethin’ else, he might’a just let you walk right out. That ain’t justice. Not to my mind.”
The men hustled Alex down the long row of buildings until they came to one with bars on the windows. They took him inside and had him inside a cell with the doors clanging shut before he could comprehend all they’d said.
“What about my wife?” He turned, the panic that Beth could be hurt by this insanity making him desperate. Even more desperate than his separation from her.
God, please, please, please, give me strength.
“We’ll try to fix it, Doc. If nothing else, we’ll break you out tonight and hide you somewhere until the colonel comes back.”
Shaking his head, Alex said, “That’s insubordination. Maybe even treason to aid an arrested deserter. I can’t let you commit a crime to protect me.” Alex was now possibly going to escape from prison? The only clear thought that came to his muddled head was to wonder what the punishment was for that stacked on top of being a deserter?
“We’ll see that your family is treated right, Doc.” One of the men opened the door to leave Alex alone in the cell.
Sophie's Daughters Trilogy Page 27
