by Mike Blakely
He nodded and turned his mount back toward camp, bearing the wounded woman across the prairie on the travois. I ran afoot to the village and went straight to Kills Something’s lodge. There, my adopted brother was busy gathering reports from the riders who had ascended to different high places to view the action upstream. When he saw me, his eyes widened in surprise and he summoned me forward.
“My brother,” he said. “What has happened to you?”
“I was captured and beaten by the bluecoats, but I told them nothing.” I paused to gasp for breath. “I escaped and rode ahead of the soldiers to warn Little Bluff’s camp. Only a few Kiowa warriors were killed, and some people wounded. The bluecoats have not had enough. They will try to attack your camp next, my brother.”
“How many bluecoats?”
“Only three hundred, and seventy-five Utes.” I did not mention the supply train, miles upstream. Secretly, I wanted Kit to have an escape route if he proved wise enough to take it. Had I mentioned the supply train, Kills Something would have sent a party to slaughter the guard there, capture Kit’s provender, and cut off his retreat. Kills Something’s village and the others downstream numbered over one thousand lodges, and I knew we could mount almost three thousand warriors, including the Kiowas and Kiowa-Apaches who had already been run out of their village, and a band of Arapahos who had taken refuge here to escape the troubles in Colorado. Kit would be lucky to get out at all, but I wanted to leave him some kind of hope. In spite of everything that had happened, I still held his friendship dear.
Kills Something nodded and thought for a moment, as the leaders of the warrior societies waited for his decisions. “We have no time for a council of war,” he said, “but we have time to put on our paint and headdresses and catch our best war ponies. Crier, tell the first-year men of the Little Horses society to join the Kiowas and go to meet the enemy. They must go afoot, hiding in the grass or the timber along the creek. They must shoot well and hold the soldiers back until the rest of us can get mounted. Then we will teach these bluecoats not to invade our country. Go!”
The warriors dispersed with a general battle cry that echoed off the bluffs in the cold morning air.
Kills Something looked at me, and summoned me closer with a gesture of his chin. “What else must I know, my brother?”
“Their leader is Little Chief.”
He frowned a little, then let his expression turn to an anxious grin. I supposed this was either because he admired my loyalty to him over Kit, or because he wanted to face the great white warrior Little Chief in battle. Perhaps a bit of both.
“What else? Horses? Guns?”
“Half the bluecoats are mounted. They will come first. Then the foot soldiers. They are all well armed with rifles.”
“Our warriors are also well armed. And our horses rested. Theirs will be tired.”
“Yes, but the Utes have already captured the best Kiowa ponies. And my brother, you must listen. They have big guns coming up from behind. The thunder guns that roll on wheels like a wagon. The guns that shoot twice.” The Indians referred to the howitzers this way because the cannon would shoot the shell, then the shell would explode on impact—shooting twice.
“How many thunder guns?”
I held up two fingers. “The big guns make much noise and they shoot far, but they are slow to load and to turn and to aim. Against good Comanche riders, they will do little harm. We must tell our warriors to ride hard and keep moving. Any one bunch of braves that gathers in a group will become a target.”
He put his hand on my shoulder and shook me, as if gauging my resolve. “You look like an antelope that has been run by coyotes, then ripped apart by their teeth.”
“I am not wounded. The blood is not mine. I have time to bathe in the creek and put on my war paint. Then I will be good again.”
Three miles away, the clarion note of the U.S. Army bugle signaled the advance and I knew Kit’s forces would move forward to take Adobe Walls. There would be little resistance from the Comanche snipers, who would let them have the ruins of the fort. But they must hold Adobe Creek at all cost. “They are coming now,” I said.
Little Bluff nodded, a grim visage shadowing his face like a war cloud. His wife stepped from the lodge with his shield, and handed it to him, followed by his quiver and bow case, which he strapped on his back. Lastly, she gave him a Henry repeating rifle and a cartridge belt laden with ammunition. He looked up at the cloudless sky. “It is a good day for a battle.”
I left Kills Something and went to my lodge to gather my weapons, my Comanche clothing, some pemmican, and a pouch of black war paint made from animal lard and charcoal. Leaving my lodge, I headed toward my favorite bathing pool on Adobe Creek. I began at a trot, but then felt so utterly exhausted that I had to slow to a walk. I began to doubt my ability to participate in the coming battle. This filled me with shame, and I knew I had to summon new energy.
Reaching the pool, I stripped myself of my white man’s clothing and stood in the cool November air. I raised my eyes to the heavens and lifted my palms to the sky. I knew the spirits would disapprove should I pray on my knees like a white man. The Great Mystery scorned a man who would grovel and kneel. I was exhausted, but I could still stand. I prayed to the spirits of the winds, the storms, and the flaming stars to lend me strength for one more day. I began to yearn for the cold embrace of the clear waters, and the next thing I knew, I was falling into the pool, though I didn’t recall making the decision to dive in.
The water hit me like a cymbal crash, though I knew Vivaldi had written none into his piece. Spirits had slipped into the orchestra. Presto. Allegro. And the composition lapsed into “Autumn.” Der Herbst. Concerto no. 3 in F Major. I remained submerged until my lungs burned, then I surfaced like an otter, shaking the water from my hair as I felt the energy seep back into my pores. I rubbed the blood from my skin, then clawed my way out of the pool. I stood in the sunshine to put on my moccasins and breechclout.
Many sounds accompanied the orchestra between my ears. From the Comanche camp came shouts and hoofbeats, from the Kiowa camp came the distant victory cries of the Ute scouts and the soldiers. Occasional gunshots and bugle signals punctuated the general din as enemies took potshots at one another across the Adobe Walls prairie. When my face had dried, I opened my paint pouch and colored the left half of my face black. This was my own design; a reflection of my “moon medicine.” It represented the half-moon—the phase that granted me my greatest powers. Next, I donned my weapons—bow and arrow, and a revolver with a cartridge belt—and picked up my war bridle.
I walked quickly to the horse herd, which had been moved closer to camp so that the warriors could choose their mounts. Well over one thousand animals milled about as Comanche men looked for favored war ponies. I caught the first horse that would let me within reach, looped my war bridle around his lower jaw, and sprang onto his back. From the back of this horse I was able to move through the herd until I spotted Castchorn. When I rode to his side and spoke to him, he made no objection to my slipping off the pony I had caught, and onto his back. Once mounted on Buffalo Getter, I felt ready to ride to the battle front. Mounting this good horse only made me remember how the soldiers had killed All Horse, and I became angry and eager for vengeance.
I rode westward at a trot and slipped through the timber of Adobe Creek until I could see the ruins of the old fort through the branches. At first glimpse, I saw a number of U.S. cavalry horses corralled within Adobe Walls. The cavalrymen had dismounted and scattered, lying in the tall grass. Thus deployed as skirmishers, they were firing randomly at distant enemy figures—Kiowas and Comanches who were also creeping about in the grass, they, too, seeking clear shots at the foe. Just outside Adobe Walls, I recognized an officer looking through a telescope. It was Major McCleave of the First California Cavalry. I did not know him well, but I had met him once in Santa Fe.
Now, from my left, I heard a war whoop and saw some fifty Comanches riding hard toward the walls,
making a charge on Major McCleave’s position. He began shouting orders, urging his men to reload and hold their fire until the Indians came within range. The major tucked his telescope under his belt and drew his revolver. The Comanches thundered forward, scattering as they flew. Riding nearer, each warrior slipped to the right side of his mount, clinging to his galloping steed with a left leg thrown over the rump and a right arm thrust through a loop under the pony’s neck. As though this were not a difficult enough feat of horsemanship, each warrior armed with bow and arrows drew his bowstring from this precarious position. The riders with rifles and revolvers had an easier time of cocking their weapons in preparation to shoot.
McCleave shouted the order to fire just as arrows began to fly. One Indian pony fell, shot through with a rifle ball. The rider rolled through the grass, but sprang instantly to run to safety. Two Comanches peeled quickly back to their unhorsed comrade and, riding one to either side, grabbed him by the arms as he ran and lifted him to the back of one of the rescuers’ ponies. Bullets cut the grass all around the three escaping men, but failed to connect. The charge thus thwarted by the soldiers, the Indians galloped away to regroup in the timber. It seemed to me that the soldiers had failed to account for the speed at which the Indians rode, and had missed all but one horse. As far as I could tell, the Indian arrows had also failed to draw enemy blood. But this was only the first charge.
A far-off bugle call drew my attention toward the west, and I noticed a number of soldiers galloping from the Kiowa village toward Adobe Walls to reinforce Major McCleave. I watched them approach until I recognized Colonel Kit Carson himself leading the reinforcements. Far behind Kit’s column, I saw the two gun carriages of the howitzer battery, and all the ammunition-laden mules and soldiers attached thereto.
Those mountain howitzers did not include caissons and limber carriages like most artillery. All the ammunition was carried on pack mules, and the gun carriages themselves could be dismantled and packed on a mule in minutes should trails too rough for wheels be encountered. Perhaps Kit should have ordered his howitzers broken down for this run, because the two cannon had come upon an obstacle in the form of a little ravine that knifed across the prairie. Though not very deep, the cutbanks of the ravine seemed specially designed by Mother Earth to obstruct the progress of axled wheels. A travois, I mused, would have had no trouble scooting up the bank, though I didn’t suppose a howitzer would have proven of much service from a pony drag. The ill-designed carriage wheels under the howitzers spanned a narrow breadth, and they tended to fall over sideways quite easily. I watched with some amusement as mules strained against their harnesses and men afoot struggled to turn spoked wheels up the vertical dirt bank.
Another Comanche battle cry rose from the timber, and a second charge sped toward the Adobe Walls, timed to beat Kit’s reinforcements there. Castchorn and I could wait no longer. I wanted to get a closer look at the action, so I added my war whoop to the effort and sprang forward from the timber. I galloped past a couple of Kiowas still hidden in the grass and rode to a spot on the prairie where I knew I would join the charge from the left. I drew my revolver and felt Castchorn reach top speed, my hair whipping in the air, still wet from my bath in the creek. As the Comanche assault neared, I turned to my right, joining the other riders, falling into place third in line. The riders slipped to the sides of their mounts, and I did the same as white puffs of rifle smoke began to appear. I heard a bullet sizzle through blades of grass under my head and I cocked my revolver. I didn’t intend to shoot any of the soldiers, some of whom I had served with at Valverde and Fort Stanton, but I rode close enough to fire a shot into Adobe Walls, just for the fun of seeing the dirt rain down on Major McCleave.
Suddenly, the horse in front of me took a bullet and stumbled, spilling the rider. I raised myself upright on Castchorn and angled him toward the fallen rider. The warrior was shaken, trying to rise from his knees. He was facing me, so he saw me coming, and raised his right hand. I tucked my pistol under my belt and grabbed my mount’s mane with my left hand, extending my right hand downward. Castchorn and I had practiced this rescue maneuver hundreds of times, and he knew to ride close to the man, to change the lead of his gait so that he could push off with his front right foot when the extra weight pulled him right, and to time the meeting so that his feet were planted when I pulled the man aboard. Bullets hissed around us as our hands met and I leaned hard to the left as the warrior did his best to leap upward. Then the warrior was astraddle behind me as if by magic, and I had scarcely slowed from a full gallop. The men at Adobe Walls actually cheered me for the rescue as I bore my fellow attacker out of rifle range to the timber along Adobe Creek.
Castchorn exhaled great blasts of air from his nostrils as the warrior slipped down to his feet.
“You are Plenty Man?” he said.
“Huh,” I answered. I saw that he was younger than me, but had a battle scar above one eye.
“I will tell the story of how you came to help me in the council lodge when my turn comes to speak.”
“You mean if you survive the day,” I answered, smiling.
“Yes. I am going back to the herd for another pony. I will charge the bluecoats again.”
“What is your name?”
“Battle Axe.” He pulled a shined and sharpened hatchet from his breechclout belt. “The one I carry is the one that struck me here.” He pointed to his scar, then touched a scalp he wore on his belt. “The scalp I carry is from the Pawnee warrior who owned the axe before me.”
“May your spirit-protectors watch you closely the rest of the day, brother.”
“And yours,” he said, turning away to trot back toward the village and the herd.
I reined in Buffalo Getter upstream, letting him blow as we walked through the relative safety of the timber. To my left I could hear and catch glimpses of another desperate charge on the soldiers, but the answering gunfire doubled that of the last charge, and I knew the company of cavalry Kit had led to Adobe Walls had arrived and joined the action. I was anxious to make another charge, for the exhilaration of galloping through the enemy gunfire had electrified me with dangerously addictive thrills. But before I charged the soldiers again, I felt compelled to get a closer peek at the workings of Kit’s command inside old Adobe Walls.
Forty-Nine
I knew every bend in the creek and every rise in the prairie floor of this sheltered canyon. I knew it almost right down to every tree and rock and weed. I could drift like a wildcat along the fringes of the battle scene, undetected. Indeed, in my peculiar heightened state of alertness brought on by the odd combination of fatigue and excitement, I felt as if I had shifted my very being into the form of a specter. All the things Burnt Belly had tried to teach me about the spirit world became lucid. Castchorn and I could blend our colors with those of the natural world around us. From the corner of your eye, you might catch a glimpse of us moving, but when you looked right at us, we would vanish, like a spotted trout in a clear stream. I had become invisible.
I rode up Adobe Creek to a point where a slight rise in the prairie concealed the dash that I made to the west, where I gained the base of the bluffs. Here, enough brush grew to hide my approach as long as I rode with my head pressed down against my buckskin’s neck. Springs at the base of the bluffs fed grass and bushes that stood tall enough to obliterate my outline. The blades of grass and seed heads waved in the breeze, gathering my horse and me, passing us along unseen, blade by blade. We assumed the colors of dried bluestem, naked branches, and rocky dirt slopes. I felt that not even a wary deer would have noticed us.
I rode around the bend of the bluff to the timber and underbrush of Bent’s Creek. Here, I dismounted and tied Buffalo Getter. I slipped silently down the stream on foot to the place where the timber came closest to Adobe Walls. I peeked just far enough through the trees to get a glimpse. All around the ruins of the old fort, soldiers swarmed as the dismounted cavalry continued to hold off charges by the Indians. The mounted assa
ults by Comanche riders had become larger and bolder, and had begun to claim casualties among the bluecoats. Soldiers were carrying or dragging a few wounded comrades to a makeshift hospital the surgeon had established in the southeast corner of the old fort, where the walls provided protection. The horses were crowded against the north wall where they, too, were shielded from Indian gunshots.
I eased to the edge of the timber to take a broader view of the prairie, and I spotted Kit and some of his officers on the small hill that rose like a buffalo hump in the prairie about a hundred yards north of the ruins. This hill was only about thirty feet higher than the rest of the prairie, but the elevation provided a fine view of the field. I had often stood or sat upon that hill myself, in times of peace, looking over the beauty of the remote canyon. Now, I dropped to the ground and crawled through the grass, wanting a still closer look at what had become Kit’s headquarters on the little knoll.
As I inched along, I heard the rattle of gun carriages and, within seconds, the artillery teams were galloping by me to join Kit on the knoll. The gun carriages passed so near that the ground shook under me; behind them came the panting gunners running along on foot. Still, I felt no fear of being seen, for I had become a spirit stalker. Crawling close enough to hear voices, I stopped to raise my head higher so I could peek through the tops of the stalks. I saw Lieutenant Pettis marching up the slope from his guns, where he had dismounted.
“Lieutenant Pettis reporting for duty, sir,” he said.
“Pettis,” Kit said, pointing to the timber along Adobe Creek, where another Indian charge was taking shape. “Throw a few shell into that crowd over there.”
“Yes, sir!”
Pettis trotted back down the slope to his battery at the base of the knoll and began shouting orders: “Unhitch those guns! Action right!” He waited impatiently for the artillerymen to unhitch and turn the mountain howitzers. “Load with shell. Load!”
