Trial at Fort Keogh

by Charles G. West

  After the night passed with no threat to the ranch or the cattle, half the crew retired to the bunkhouse to get a few hours of sleep before relieving the others. Clint and Ben took the first rest break since it was the second night they had not had the opportunity to sleep. It was almost noon when Clint crawled out of his blanket, ready to ride again after eating some stew that Milt Futch had thrown together. He was saddling a rested Sam when a cavalry troop, already assembled, arrived on their way back to the Powder River.

  B Troop, led by Captain Thomas Rodgers, rode into the ranch and came to a halt by the creek behind the barn. Numbering fifty troopers, some thirty men short of the standard cavalry troop, they dismounted to water their horses. Clint suspected the reason their line of march took them by the Double-V-Bar was to pick up a guide to help them retrace the route that Lieutenant Landry had taken the night before. He wasn’t really surprised that Justin couldn’t remember the way. After all, it was at night, and the country was rough between here and the Powder.

  Clint walked out to meet the captain, leading his horse. There were two lieutenants talking to Rodgers. One of them was Justin Landry. He turned to greet Clint when he saw him approaching. “Mr. Cooper.”

  “Lieutenant,” Clint returned, then nodded to Rodgers and waited for him to get down to the business he was certain he was about.

  “Mr. Cooper,” the captain began, “Lieutenant Landry said you told him that you weren’t interested in signing on as a guide again. I’m hoping you will change your mind. I could sure use your help in finding that party of Sioux.”

  “Like I told the lieutenant,” Clint said, “that camp was on the Powder, right where Mizpah Creek joins it. So all you have to do is head in that direction till you run into the river.” He pointed toward a line of hills to the southeast.

  Rodgers smiled patiently. “I believe you, but there’s some awfully rugged bluffs and blind draws between here and that river. According to what Lieutenant Landry tells me, you and your partner led them straight through without a turnaround in the dark. So you could shorten the time we might take to get on those hostiles’ trail. How about it? If you’re worried about your place here, I doubt there’s any danger this close in to the fort, and the sooner we find those Indians, the better it will be for all the ranches.”

  Clint shrugged. The captain was probably right. The raiding party was not likely to strike when the fort was so near, especially since they had been discovered by Landry’s patrol, and they no longer had the element of surprise in their favor. He had no particular desire to ride scout for the captain, but he couldn’t think of any reason not to go. Finally he said, “I’ll go with you. Let me go tell my boss and pack a few things in my saddlebags, and I’ll be ready to ride.”

  “Good man,” Rodgers said.

  Clint glanced at Justin, whose attention had been focused on the house for most of the time since the column arrived. He knew who the lieutenant was hoping to see, but there was no sign of Hope outside the house. Feeling a slight irritation from the thought, Clint stepped up into the saddle and pointed the bay toward the ranch house.

  Rena opened the kitchen door when he knocked and held it open as he walked in. “I need to talk to Mr. Valentine,” Clint said to her. She nodded and went to fetch him.

  She returned in less than a minute. “Mr. Valentine coming,” she said, then without asking, went to the cupboard to get Clint a cup. He took the cup of coffee from her with a nod of thanks. The stoic Crow woman was always partial toward him. He was aware of it and appreciated it, although he was puzzled by it. As soon as Valentine walked in, she left the kitchen and went to the smokehouse.

  “What is it, Clint?” Valentine asked when he came in, having just then looked out the window to see a troop of cavalry down near the barn. Clint told him about the captain’s request. Valentine thought it over for a few moments before deciding. “What’s your feeling on it?” he asked. “You think they really need you? Hell, if they can’t find the Powder River by themselves, they ought not leave the fort.”

  Clint laughed. “I reckon not. What the captain’s after is to save some time gettin’ there. He’s hopin’ I could keep him from backtrackin’ and gettin’ turned around in some of those ravines. I reckon I could go with ’em—help ’em out a little. I don’t care one way or the other—whatever you say.”

  “Well, I guess it’s in our best interest to help the army all we can, so go ahead and scout for them, but you be damn careful. You and Ben have already been in one scrape with those hostiles. Are you wanting Ben to go with you this time?”

  “No, sir,” Clint replied, “not this time. I don’t see any reason for both of us to be gone.”

  “All right,” Valentine said. “I’ll get back to going over my figures.” He left to return to his account books as Rena came back in from the smokehouse. She was holding a cloth with slices from a salt-cured ham in one hand and a butcher knife in the other.

  Clint put his empty cup on the dry sink and said, “Thanks for the coffee.” He started to leave then, but she stopped him.

  “Wait,” she said. “I fix you some food.” He realized then that the ham was for him. He stood there while she sliced some leftover biscuits and stuck the ham in them, knowing the salty, rock-hard meat would not spoil for some time.

  He had planned to go to the bunkhouse to get some jerky and coffee to take with him. But what mystified him was how she knew he was going with the soldiers. He had to ask.

  “How’d you know I was gonna need some food?”

  She almost smiled in reply and turned away to resume her chores, leaving him mystified. He thought he could count on one hand the number of times he had actually seen her smile.

  His hand was on the doorknob when Hope suddenly appeared.

  “Clint, wait,” she said. He paused, surprised by the note of concern in her voice. “Outside,” she said, and passed by him as he held the door for her. She reached back and closed the door behind them when they were on the step. “You’re going with those soldiers, aren’t you?” He nodded, confused by her apparent concern. She had never expressed concern for his safety before. “If you catch up with those Indians, there’s going to be some dangerous fighting.” The expression on her young face told him that she was reluctant to expose her fears. Suddenly he felt his heart leap when he realized that she was on the verge of expressing something that she had kept secret, something that he could only dream about before this moment. He looked down to meet her gaze, so intense. “I’m afraid this mission you’re going on will be very dangerous. I want you to promise me something.” He nodded. “Will you promise?” she insisted.

  “I will,” he said. “I promise.”

  “I knew I could count on you. I can always count on you. I want you to take care of Justin. Bring him back safely. He talks so bravely, but he hasn’t had time to gain any experience in warfare, and I’m afraid he’ll do something foolish, just to show his bravery.”

  He felt as if he had taken an arrow in his chest. From the pinnacle of a dream come true, his hopes had suddenly been dashed upon the rocks of dire disappointment. He fought to hide the blow to his heart, and tried to feign a smile.

  “Why, sure,” he finally managed, “I’ll keep an eye on him for you. As best I can,” he added. “I better go now—don’t wanna keep the army waitin’.”

  Chapter 4

  It was hard to keep his mind on anything but the short conversation he had just had with Hope. But luckily it took very little concentration to lead the cavalry column through the series of game trails he had traveled before. And since there was no thought of danger before they approached the Powder River, he found it difficult to release the resentment he felt for Justin Landry. He turned it over and over in his mind, and finally decided that he could not blame Justin for his feelings for Hope. Justin was not guilty of trying to damage Clint’s chances with Hope. He was merely attracted to a charming
young lady who had no apparent claims upon her.

  By the time the column reached the banks of the Powder, Clint had rationalized to himself that Hope would have the prospects of a much better future as the wife of a career army officer. Far better than what he could ever offer. He told himself that that was best for Hope, so it was best for him, too. But it was hard to adopt that attitude. He was glad when it came time to focus his mind on trying to find the trail left by the sizable party of hostile Sioux.

  He never considered himself an expert tracker, fair maybe, but it wasn’t hard to read tracks as obvious as the ones the Sioux war party had left. It was easy to read the story of their flight. They had followed the six-man patrol from the site of the fight with the five hostiles, but lost the trail when he and Ben had left the river and led the patrol into the hills. Though the tracks were easily seen in the light of day, the Sioux had missed them in the dark.

  “Well,” he told Captain Rodgers, “you can see here where they turned back toward their camp at the fork. I doubt they’re still there today, but it wouldn’t hurt for me to ride on up the river to make sure before you march your column up there.”

  “That sounds like a good idea to me,” Rodgers said. “I’ll hold back until I hear a signal from you that it’s all clear.” He paused, and then asked, “How will you signal?”

  “I’ll just ride on back and wave you on,” Clint said. “If you see me comin’ back at a gallop, with a bunch of arrows in my backside, you’d best find some cover and get ready to fight.”

  * * *

  As he had anticipated, the camp near the fork had been abandoned. Examining the ashes of a couple of campfires, he figured they had been gone from there since early morning. The question to be answered was which way they went from there. It wasn’t difficult to find the tracks of many horses leading into the water, which was what he expected. His guess was that the hostiles would head farther east to increase the distance between themselves and Fort Keogh.

  He crossed over to the other side of the river to confirm his hunch. However, when he got there, he found the tracks of the war party headed back to the north, following the river toward its confluence with the Yellowstone. For some reason, they had chosen to ride down the other side of the river. He realized at once that this was not good news. There was a small settlement at that confluence, consisting of a trading post, a barn, and a couple of log dwellings. The last time Clint was there, a young couple from Omaha had just completed one of the cabins. That had been in the summer. At the time, he remembered Ben commenting to him that he sure hoped they knew how hard the winters were up in this part of the territory. Clint tried to remember their names, but he could not. Zack Bristol owned the trading post, scratching out a living with a few trappers and cutting wood to sell to the steamboats that came up the Yellowstone.

  As he pictured the little settlement in his mind, it was hard for Clint to imagine it would grow into the town that Zack was hoping for. That picture was replaced with one of the settlement with a party of sixty-some-odd savage warriors bearing down on it. Wasting no more time, he started back the way he had just come, following the tracks left by the Sioux war party on the east side of the river.

  When he arrived at a sandy flat across the river from the resting column of soldiers, Clint yelled to Captain Rodgers to get his men mounted and to cross over to that side. “What did you find?” Rodgers yelled back before giving the order.

  “They’re headin’ back north, toward the Yellowstone,” Clint said. “And if they don’t head off in some other direction before they get there, Zack Bristol’s tradin’ post is gonna catch hell.”

  Realizing the urgency then, Rodgers got his men in the saddle at once and forded the river. When he pulled up beside him, Clint said, “It’s every bit of thirty miles from here to Zack’s place. I don’t know if we can get there in time to help him. These horses have already done a day’s work. I expect they’ll play out before morning if we try to push ’em on tonight.”

  “I expect you’re right,” Rodgers said. “We’ll push on as far as we can tonight.” He paused while he looked up at the sky and squinted at the faint yellow ball hiding above the heavy overcast sky. “We’ve barely got a couple of hours of light left before dark, so we’d better use them to cover as much distance as possible.”

  “I reckon that’s about as much as you can do,” Clint said. “I’ll ride on up ahead to make sure you don’t run up on somebody fixin’ to ambush you.” He wheeled the bay and loped away. “You won’t have any trouble followin’ the tracks,” he called back over his shoulder.

  Rodgers pushed the tired mounts as hard as he thought reasonable, having the troopers dismount for short periods to walk and lead the horses. Finally, when darkness set in in earnest, he called a halt to the march. Much to Clint’s disappointment, the hostiles had not veered from their course following the river. He didn’t hold out much hope for the unsuspecting folks at Zack’s store.

  * * *

  Morning brought light snow flurries and colder temperatures, made even colder by wind gusts that swept across the Powder River Valley. Captain Rodgers ordered the column under way with no time allowed for breakfast fires, planning to wait until it was time to rest the horses. In view of the fact that there were people in danger from the raiding party, he felt it was his responsibility to get to the Yellowstone as soon as he possibly could. There was no grumbling among his men, as they all understood the peril for the handful of settlers at Zack Bristol’s trading post.

  After conferring with Clint, who told him they were probably about an hour away from the Yellowstone, Rodgers decided to stop right where they were for a short time to make sure the horses were rested. He would have pushed on to the river, but he decided it was a good idea to arrive with horses fresh enough to give chase, if the circumstances dictated it. Of equal importance, he felt his men would be better prepared to fight if they had some food and a little hot coffee in their bellies. Soon several small fires were flickering with a group of troopers gathered around each one, vying for a space to heat a metal cup.

  The breakfast stop was no longer than the captain deemed sufficient to rest his horses, and the troop was mounted and on its way again, with Clint out ahead. They had not ridden for more than half an hour when Clint spotted the smoke. Drifting almost horizontally as the brisk wind swept it along the underside of the dark clouds, it presented an ominous message that the soldiers were too late.

  That message was confirmed when B Troop reached the clearing where the Powder spilled into the Yellowstone to discover the smoking ruins of all the structures that had stood there. Zack’s store, his barn, and the remains of three small cabins had all been reduced to piles of charred logs, some still not quite out. A cold, eerie silence hung over the river valley, as the column of cavalry filed down into the clearing, with nothing but the sound of the horses to break the pall of death hanging over the ashes.

  The mutilated bodies of Zack and his Crow wife were found outside the charred timbers of his store. Pieces of cloth, empty candle cartons, pots and pans, and other items that had been on Zack’s shelves were scattered about the yard. Clint was more concerned with merchandise that he did not see. He knew that Zack carried a good supply of cartridges of several calibers, so the hostiles were more than likely well supplied now.

  The bodies of the three families who had built the cabins were found near the ruins of their homes, evidence that they had tried to hold off the raiders until forced to flee their burning cabins. Captain Rodgers walked over to stand beside Clint as he stirred the ashes at the corner of the trading post.

  “What do you think?” he asked, his voice grim with the helpless feeling of arriving too late to prevent the massacre. “Can you tell how long ago they were here?”

  “No, sir, I can’t,” Clint said. “If I had to guess, I’d say they set fire to these buildin’s last night sometime, but I expect they most likely ca
mped right here, and left this mornin’. I can take a better guess after I look around a little bit.”

  “Make it as quick as you can,” Rodgers said. “I want to run these murderers to ground.” He turned away then and ordered, “Lieutenant Landry, take a squad of men and dig some graves for these poor folks.”

  “Yes, sir,” Justin responded, a queasy look upon his face. He wasn’t surprised that he got the job of digging graves since he was junior in grade to George Sawyer, the other lieutenant with the troop.

  When Rodgers moved on, Sawyer hung back to needle Justin. “Make sure you dig those graves to regulation, mister.”

  “You go to hell,” Justin replied as Sawyer rode away, laughing.

  Clint could well imagine Justin’s reaction to seeing such savage mutilation for the first time. He didn’t blame him. It was his first time as well, and it left him with a sick feeling of anger and revolt. He went at once to search for tracks that would tell him where the war party had gone once they finished their grisly business here. A quick scout around the area soon revealed tracks that started to follow the Yellowstone eastward.

  Spotting a pile of droppings, he examined the manure closely and determined that the Indians had not been gone from there for more than a couple of hours. He took that information back to Rodgers and, with the realization that they weren’t that far behind the war party, the captain ordered his troop to mount and prepare to ride.

  “Lieutenant Landry,” he yelled. “You and your squad stay here and finish digging those graves. Catch up to us as soon as you can.”

  Sorry, Hope, Clint thought. I can’t keep my eye on him when he ain’t with me. He nudged his horse and started out before the troopers.

  * * *

  Captain Rodgers pushed his column hard, determined to overtake the raiders before they endangered more innocent victims. The Indians seemed to be in no hurry, and Clint found them late in the afternoon, already going into camp. Though it surprised him that they were stopping this early in the day, he soon saw the reason for it as he watched them from the top of a long ridge. The Indians had happened upon a herd of antelope and had taken advantage of the find to supply themselves with meat.