Winchester 1886

by William W. Johnstone

  He wouldn’t hurt anybody—not likely—unless Lieutenant Troy Henderson kept pushing. Then, there would be trouble.

  And death. Plenty of death.

  O’Donnell felt a shiver run up his spine. He hadn’t felt anything like that since ’65 when he had first seen the elephant. He’d been riding with the blue at Sailor’s Creek in Virginia, just a few days and a few miles before General Lee had met General Grant to call things quits at Appomattox Court House. That would’ve been his luck, he remembered thinking, to get killed that close to the end of the war.

  A similar thought pressed through his consciousness. He planned on retiring in three months.

  “Sergeant Major!” Lieutenant Henderson barked.

  Turning, O’Donnell listened to the lieutenant. At least, he tried to.

  “You sure that Apache is heading this way?”

  O’Donnell’s head moved up and down. “He crossed the river, sir. He’s been making his way this direction for some time.” He pointed toward the rising pieces of chalk off in the distance.

  In the fading light, Monument Rocks did look eerily like enlarged tombstones.

  “No reason he’d stop now.”

  “No reason he’d continue, either, Sergeant.” Lieutenant Henderson reached into his saddlebag and drew out a bottle of whiskey. He drank greedily and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.

  Yes, sir. Sergeant Major Sean O’Donnell had to admit that a kid like Troy Henderson would find himself promoted to general the way he hit that bottle.

  “You said he was bound for Arizona, Sergeant.” Henderson corked the bottle, but instead of returning it to his saddlebag, slipped it inside his tunic. “Might I remind you—again—that we have been heading northwest for quite a while.”

  “That’s right, sir.”

  O’Donnell thought for a moment, then added with a grin, “Maybe his compass is broke.”

  That got a roar of laughter and approval from the boys, and a reddening face and scowl from Troy Henderson.

  “Let’s ride!” the lieutenant barked.

  Gripping the reins steady, O’Donnell kept his horse from following the lieutenant’s bay. “I’m not so sure I’d do that, sir.”

  Henderson reined in, turned around, glaring. “And why not?”

  O’Donnell pointed by tilting his head and hat toward the chalk fortresses. “My guess, sir, is that that boy’s lying in those rocks. Waiting.”

  “If he wanted to ambush us, Sergeant Major, he could have done that a day or more ago and saved us and our mounts saddle sores.”

  “Where, sir?”

  “Where . . . what?”

  O’Donnell didn’t bother looking at the lieutenant anymore. He studied the rocks, hoping to see the sinking sunlight reflect off that barrel he knew had to be sighting down on the boys right about now. “Where would he ambush us, sir?” Again, he gestured toward the landmarks that jutted out of the plains. “Here he has cover. Plenty of it.”

  In what was going on thirty years, Sean O’Donnell had seen a lot of riding in the cavalry, most of it—practically all of it since the end of the Rebellion—in the west. Most of it on what folks back east called the Great American Desert.

  “We are twelve men, Sergeant. He is a boy in his teens.”

  “He’s an Apache, Lieutenant,” O’Donnell reminded his commanding officer.

  “Correct you are, Sergeant Major. He is an Apache. And we are soldiers. And as I told that tin-horn gambler and cowardly marshal, I will not be responsible for another Wounded Knee. The last Indian uprising won’t be cited in history books with historians pointing their yellow fingers at me.”

  O’Donnell kept looking, staring. He could feel fear, not just sweat, running down his spine. He wet his lips. He didn’t agree with Lieutenant Henderson on many points. First, he didn’t think that deputy marshal was a coward. Not by a long shot. And Wounded Knee wasn’t on his mind. “I’m thinking more of the Fetterman massacre.”

  “How’s that, Sergeant?”

  O’Donnell almost grinned. “Little bit before your time, sir.”

  Over in Wyoming, shortly after the War of the Rebellion, an Army officer named Fetterman had disobeyed orders and led something like eighty men to death at the hands of the Sioux Indians.

  “I don’t see nothin’,” Andy Preston said.

  “I don’t, either. That’s what troubles me.” O’Donnell made one final plea. “Sun’ll be down directly, Lieutenant. We can camp here. Got this big rock for shelter. Protect our horses.” He nodded toward the next growth of pyramids. “That’s four hundred yards we’d have to cross.”

  “Sergeant Major,” the lieutenant snapped, “I fear that you are becoming yellow—this close to your retirement. There is nothing out there to stop the United States Army except for a snot-nosed—”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Sean O’Donnell ducked in the saddle, feeling and tasting the blood that had splattered all over his face. He tried to spit it out, but his mouth immediately went drier than a lime burner’s hat. More out of instinct than anything else, he ducked in the saddle, reached for the Springfield .45-70 in the saddle boot, and heard the roar and echo of the rifle shot that had torn Lieutenant Troy Henderson practically in two.

  Behind him came the screams, curses, and shouts of men. Horses reared. O’Donnell had trouble keeping his own mount under control, staying in the saddle.

  Another shot roared. A horse screamed. Fell.

  The rifle was in O’Donnell’s hands, and he was thumbing back the hammer, trying to look, trying to find the smoke that would give away the Apache’s location.

  “Sergeant!” one of the men cried. Almost whimpering.

  “Behind that butte!” O’Donnell roared.

  A hundred yards away. Two of the soldiers were afoot, their horses loping toward the east, unlikely to stop until they ran themselves to death or reached the stables at Fort Riley. Another horse lay dead, its rider trying to kick himself free.

  “Lie still!” O’Donnell told him. Through the dust, he saw another trooper catapult from his saddle, landing in the dirt, kicking up white sand and dust, with a sickening thud. Moments later, the report of the rifle reached O’Donnell’s ears.

  “Behind the butte!” O’Donnell yelled again. He had the Springfield against his shoulder, sweeping the barrel left to right, trying to train on something, an impossible task seeing how his skittish gelding kept stepping one way, then the other, nervous from the smell of blood and death.

  Somewhere, the Winchester ’86 stolen by the Apache boy once known as John York, spat again.

  O’Donnell’s horse was falling, but not from the bullet. That round had slammed into the head of the trooper—Martini was fresh off the boat and train from Sicily, could hardly speak a word of English—who had been pinned underneath the horse. He had managed to get free from the dead horse, stand, and get the back of his head blown off. Because he didn’t listen to O’Donnell’s orders to lie still.

  No, because he didn’t understand. Because Sean O’Donnell didn’t speak Italian.

  He triggered a shot just as the gelding stepped into a prairie dog hole. Then he was going over the horse’s neck, hitting the ground, hearing the big dun climb to its feet, scurry off after the other riderless mounts.

  He dug himself into the sand, would have dug his way clear to China if he could. A bullet slammed into the ground inches from his face, peppering his forehead and cheeks with grit.

  The Springfield, hot to the touch, smoke snaking from the barrel, came up to him, and he worked the breech, had to pry the brass casing out of the chamber and slam in another cartridge.

  “Sergeant!” It was Andy Preston.

  O’Donnell rolled onto his back, watching the trooper who had served in his platoon for ten years spurring a black gelding straight for him. With a curse, Sergeant Major Sean O’Donnell raised his hand, trying to wave the trooper off, trying to get him to follow the rest of the boys back behind that butte.

  The .50-calib
er cannon ripped another round, but Preston kept riding, jerking hard on the reins, sliding the black to a stop. Preston lowered his hand, but O’Donnell was standing, turning, firing, and barking an order. “Get back behind that rock,” he snapped. “I’m borrowing your horse.”

  “What the—”

  He didn’t have time to argue and grabbed Preston’s proffered hand, jerking the unsuspecting soldier out of the saddle. An instant later, Sean O’Donnell held the reins to the black, and his left foot found the stirrup. As he swung into the saddle, he barked an order at Andy Preston. “Run like the devil. While that Apache buck reloads!”

  He raked the black’s sides with his spurs, and took off, leaning low in the saddle, almost over the gelding’s neck. Moving north and east, he angled toward a series of buttes and arches.

  O’Donnell made one mistake. He looked at the body of Second Lieutenant Troy Henderson, mouth open, never to finish the sentence, the curse, whatever it had been the green pup was trying to say, and eyes staring sightlessly at the sky darkening with the setting sun.

  Deftly, Yuyutsu fingered the long brass cartridges into the loading gate of the smoking, hot-to-the-touch rifle. Most of the bluecoats, those not lying on the ground dead or dying, had made it behind the slanted butte. A few others were running or riding, kicking up dust.

  He muttered a favorite curse among the indaaligande, and brought the big Winchester up, cocked it, jumping to the other side of the hole in the chalk monument. The barrel of the .50-caliber rifle followed the black-faced rider on the black horse.

  He was the man. The honorable one. The pale eyes who had managed to follow the trail. Leading horse and rider with the barrel, Yuyutsu waited, squeezed the trigger, and felt the curved stock kick savagely against his shoulder, which throbbed from all the shooting and killing he had already done.

  His eyes and nostrils rebelled from the smoke and the punishment the Winchester dished out. Blinking, he looked through the opening and saw that he had missed.

  Maybe he should have shot one of the men running. Killed another bluecoat coward. But there would have been little honor in that.

  He jacked another shell into the Winchester. Jerked the trigger, flinching even before he fired. He knew the gun would cause more pain on his throbbing shoulder.

  Another miss. Horse and rider had reached the safety of the odd shaped chalk monument behind him. Yuyutsu swore a white man’s curse again, turned, and tried to find an easier target.

  A bullet spanged off the rock over his head. Not close. Probably even a scratch shot, but one of the bluecoats had seen his smoke. Knew where he was. He pulled himself inside, feeling his heart pound against his chest, blinking away the sweat.

  He made himself stand, waited, and then jumped across the opening. Another rifle roared from the soldiers far away, but he did not even hear the bullet strike. Those soldiers were not great marksmen, and at four or five hundred yards away, posed no threat.

  The one he must kill was over behind the rocks.

  When he reached the edge of the tall monument, he looked across the open flatness toward the other chalky series of rocks.

  To the southeast, he saw the one that resembled the ruins of an adobe hut, like the corner of a building a pale eyes might have built in Arizona. Beyond that, rose a finger, dark underneath, white at the top. There was an opening, and then a large rock, longer, but not as high as either the adobe ruins or the finger. That one reminded him of one of the old prairie schooners that once traveled across the country, bringing more and more pale eyes into the lands once owned and ruled by Indians.

  And behind that rock?

  He didn’t know. Maybe more buttes and smaller arches. Maybe nothing. Maybe the pyramids ended there, or another rock did not rise from the plains for a hundred or more yards. But Yuyutsu knew one thing. Somewhere behind those chalk formations waited the pale eyes soldier. He would have to kill him. Maybe steal his horse. Then he could either try to kill the other bluecoats or ride away to fight some other day.

  To get there, he would have to cross fifty yards of flats. Not an easy shot for those troopers way off hiding, cowering, behind that slanting tower. But an easy kill for the bluecoat waiting for him.

  Turning, Yuyutsu found the sun almost slipping behind the series of monuments off to the west. He would have to kill that bluecoat in a hurry, for he was still an Apache—no matter what the School Mothers and School Fathers had tried to beat into him at Carlisle in Pennsylvania—and Apaches did not like to fight at night.

  He raised the barrel of the Winchester, thumb on the hammer, and cursed himself again. How many cartridges had he left in the sand by the window in the rock? How many shots had he fired since he had reloaded? What a fool.

  Again, he wet his lips. The pale eyes behind those rocks was smart and patient. He knew that the first to move would often become the first to die. He was almost like an Apache. Yuyutsu knew he could no longer wait. Wait and the sun would set. He was not going to run away from a fight, anymore.

  Besides, his feet hurt. He needed a horse. Food. And more rounds for the big rifle in his arms.

  He leaped over the lower rocks, and ran, not even looking off toward the soldiers. A rifle roared, far off, but no bullet neared him. Another shot came, or maybe it was the first gun’s echo. Either way, he kept running, kept studying the darkening rocks.

  A third shot came, but missed, before Yuyutsu was safe behind the rock, slipping into the corner, looking through the opening, and carefully listening.

  He waited until his breathing came back under control. Had to wipe his clammy hands on the chalky rocks. He slid along the side of the rock until he neared the opening. Waited. Listened. Looked.

  At last, he jumped through the narrow entrance, landed in sand, spit out dirt, came to his knees. Something sounded behind him, and he spun, falling back, bringing the rifle barrel up.

  The shape came to him. He touched the trigger, then quickly released all pressure on it.

  The horse stood still, sweaty and breathing hard. It pawed the earth with its forefeet. Otherwise, it did not move, and barely even considered Yuyutsu.

  Shadows began lengthening, casting darkness all around him. He came to his knees, and considered the finger of rock just behind the dark horse. He even looked up, to the top of the finger, as if any pale eyes could have scaled that. Again, he wet his lips, and looked down the back of the wagon-shaped rock, but all he could make out were darkened shadows.

  Suddenly, he felt cool. Night would be there directly. He moved toward the wagon-shaped rock, but quickly stopped and looked back at the horse. Instantly, he was heading straight for the worn-out animal. He slowed, speaking in quiet hushes as he approached the bluecoat’s horse. He found its neck, rubbed one hand on the damp hide, and turned around, looking back toward the wagon-shaped rock.

  His hand gripped the canvas strap of the canteen and jerked it up, pulled out the cork with his teeth, and brought the container to his lips.

  The water was tepid, brackish, tasted of iron, and there wasn’t much left, but he emptied it, dropped the canteen, and looked again at the rock butte.

  He heard the footsteps.

  Letting out a war cry, Yuyutsu scrambled toward the opening, sliding to a stop, bringing the Winchester to his shoulder. He saw a dark shape, but knew that shape had to be the soldier. The gun roared. He grunted. Jacked another round into the Winchester.

  Somehow, the bluecoat had managed to dive behind the rock where Yuyutsu had perfected his ambush. Yet there was no cover there. The Winchester roared again.

  The bluecoat kept running. Yuyutsu saw chalk and dirt and shrapnel of rocks fly from where the .50-caliber slug had slammed into the rock above the pale eyes’ head. Again, the Winchester sang out, just as the bluecoat had reached the opening. He was diving, the pale eyes with the dark beard, and stretching out through the opening.

  Yuyutsu’s ears rang from the roar of the rifle, but he felt—he was almost certain—that he heard the man cry out
before he disappeared through the door in the rock. He thought, though surely it was his imagination, he saw blood splatter against the crumbling white rock, now gold from the setting sun.

  Yuyutsu fed another bullet into the rifle, and began hurrying to the rocks, to finish off that pale eyes tracker.

  He had managed to make it only halfway, when a lead slug whistled past his ear. Another clipped the sand in front of him.

  Whirling, he dropped to a knee and cursed his own stupidity, his deafness. So focused on catching and killing the one bluecoat, he had forgotten about the others. He had dismissed them, figuring they would be hiding behind that rock way off in the distance.

  But they were all worthy opponents, solid warriors.

  They had come, not on horses, but walking—marching bravely—crossing the flats, leaving themselves open to be gunned down by an Apache with a repeating rifle. And they had surprised him. He fired. Saw all of the soldiers either flatten into prone positions or drop to a knee. Guns roared, and Yuyutsu had no other choice but to stay where he was. To make his stand in the opening and be cut down like a dog and die.

  Or run.

  He made it back to the rocks, but not before a .45-70 slug slammed through his right leg, breaking the bone in his thigh, and making him scream like a newborn baby, wailing in pain, in misery.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  O’Donnell sat up, grunting, grimacing, gripping his right side. His left hand came away sticky with blood, and he whispered a curse. Unsnapping the flap on his holster, he pulled out the Remington revolver.

  The silhouettes appeared, and he brought up the big .44, trying to keep his right hand steady. The left hand had returned to his side, making a feeble effort to stanch the flow of blood.

  “Sarge . . .” one of the shades whispered.

  Sergeant Major Sean O’Donnell mouthed a prayer of thanks as he lowered the revolver. “You get him, Andy?”