Good Person watched without expression. Johnny tried to squirm away, but the man jerked him by the hair and threw him to the ground. He pulled his war club from a leather thong at his waist. He raised it high and struck Johnny hard across the shoulder. Johnny screamed and crawled toward the hideout.
“He’s bringing them toward us,” Ryker whispered in horror.
“We’ve got to help him,” Sven whispered. “They’ll kill him.”
But they could not stop the forces already in motion. The Indian laughed and pointed to Johnny crawling toward a fallen tree. He placed an arrow on his bowstring and took aim. He took aim and shot an arrow into Johnny’s foot. Johnny screamed but kept crawling away, the arrow showing on both sides of his foot.
The bowman took aim. He shot Johnny in the other foot. The men spoke laughingly to each other, mocking Johnny’s tears while setting more arrows.
The next arrow zinged into Johnny’s buttock. Then another into the other buttock. The men congratulated each other. Johnny crawled faster, pulling himself by his elbows to get out of range of the deadly arrows. His screams had stopped, but he grunted in pain with every inch forward.
The Indians threw down their bows and drew hunting knives. They walked toward Johnny, still crawling away from them. One grabbed Johnny’s leg and dragged him over the rough ground toward the cook fire. He grabbed a protruding arrow and wrenched it free as Johnny screamed in pain.
“Help me!” Johnny screamed. “Why don’t you do something?”
Ryker pulled Sven closer and pressed his brother’s face into his chest. “Don’t watch,” he whispered. “Pray. It will be over soon.”
But it wasn’t.
CHAPTER 35
* * *
Johnny’s screams continued for what seemed like an eternity, while Good Woman calmly sliced chickens into the stew pot. The Indians tormented poor Johnny like Katt played with captured mice.
Little Dog returned to the camp. He watched without expression as the braves tortured poor Johnny. Little Dog soon joined the men, kicking and striking the helpless boy and dropping burning coals onto his face and chest.
“I told you we should have left right away,” Sven whispered. “Now it’s too late.”
“Devils,” Hannibal said. “I’d like to get my hands on them for one minute.” His voice quivered, and he clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white.
“Can’t you do something?” Ryker said.
“I have one bullet left,” Hannibal said. “I might kill Johnny and end his misery, but the shot would draw them to us.”
“Do it,” Sven whispered. “I can’t stand to see him suffer.”
“He’s as good as dead already,” Hannibal said. “Throwing our lives away will not change a thing.”
The men danced around the fire waving Johnny’s bloody scalp, but they danced without enthusiasm. One reached into the pot and pulled out a piece of chicken, far from cooked, and gnawed the bone.
“He’s still alive,” Sven whispered. He had pulled away from Ryker’s chest and was looking toward his friend’s body. “I saw Johnny’s foot move.”
Ryker heard a groan. Johnny wasn’t dead.
Both men ate and belched loudly. Johnny groaned again, and one of the Indians calmly walked over and stabbed him in the chest with his hunting knife.
The groans stopped.
The man walked purposefully toward them, as if he had heard them speak and knew they hid in the dead trees. Sven flinched, and Ryker steeled himself for the worst. Maybe the woman had betrayed them after all. The man tucked his knife back in his loin cloth and relieved himself directly in front of their hiding place, urine splattering through the leaves onto their faces and hands.
Ryker stayed still as a stone, holding Sven close, feeling his little brother’s trembling body. Hannibal’s raspy breathing sounded in his ears. The smell and touch of urine sickened him, but Ryker did not dare raise his hands to wipe his face.
The Indian turned to leave, and Hannibal reached to wipe his face, bumping one of the branches. It didn’t move a lot, just enough to cause the dead leaves to shudder. Hannibal turned white as death.
The Indian brave paused and looked toward the hideout. He pulled his knife.
He directed a question toward Good Person, who shrugged her shoulders as if to say she didn’t know. The man came toward the tangled mess of downed trees. Ryker held his breath. Sven held his knife in one hand and a sharp stick in the other. It was over. They would be discovered and killed as poor Johnny had been killed.
The warrior poked around the edge of the deadfalls. He lifted a fallen tree. In another moment they would be exposed. Sven reached out and jabbed his stick into the yellow jacket nest.
Angry insects swarmed toward the place where the fallen tree had been moved and attacked the warrior with a hundred vicious stingers.
“Aieee!” the man cried out. The yellow jackets bit his face and neck. “Aieee!” He charged toward Whiskey Creek. “Aieee!” He dived into the water.
The other brave kept his distance but made fun of his comrade when he came up, spouting water like a giant fish. The man said something to Good Person, and Ryker thought they were making another trade.
The man twisted water from his long hair. Then both men gathered their weapons, and Johnny’s scalp, and walked toward Good Person’s canoe.
“Oh no,” Hannibal muttered. “They’re taking her canoe.”
Good Person protested loudly. The men shrugged and answered in calm tones. One brave pointed to the clothing lying by the tipi as if that were enough payment. Good Person pointed toward Johnny’s body, screeching her protest as the men crawled into the canoe and paddled toward the fort. She called after them, but they kept paddling without a backward glance.
Hannibal let out a whispered string of cuss words that would send Mama running for the soap to wash out his mouth. “The canoe,” he said. “Why did they have to take her canoe?”
CHAPTER 36
* * *
Good Person lifted the tipi flap and called Klara and Elsa by their Indian names. Klara limped out of the tipi while rubbing a sore spot on her hip from the beating she had received. The woman clucked and fussed over both Klara and Elsa, tenderly treating Klara’s wounds with mud and cool water. She led Klara to a shady place and brought her a dish of food.
Klara stared at Johnny’s body with blank eyes, holding her dish without eating. The woman smiled into Klara’s face, patting her cheek and urging her to eat. The woman fetched a blanket from the tipi and covered Johnny’s body with a clucking sound. Then she gently nudged the food toward Klara’s mouth.
“She only treated her that way to keep her away from the Sioux,” Hannibal said. “She’s adopted the girls.”
“I don’t care,” Sven said. “She can’t have them. She traded Johnny to the bad Indians without lifting a finger to save him.”
“She promised to take care of the girls,” Hannibal said. “And she did.” He sat up, stretching his limbs before him after being cooped up so long. The sun dipped down the western sky, and Ryker judged it to be mid-afternoon. “We might have a chance for the three of us to sneak into the fort.” He waited a long moment. “Better chance without the girls.”
Hannibal was right. It would be safer and easier without the girls along. Good Person would care for them, but Ryker knew what his parents would think about leaving them behind, even in the woman’s care. And the thought of his sisters being raised by those who had killed their father, stolen their mother, and brutally murdered Johnny and the Tingvolds sickened him.
One thing was certain. They had to find a way to safety. If they remained where they were, they would meet the same fate as Johnny. Losing the canoe meant their bad situation had turned even worse.
Sven cried himself to sleep. From time to time he called out, and Ryker felt ashamed for all the times he had been mean to his brother. He was such a good boy, and now he had lost his father and mother, wandered the prairies, escaped from
the Indians, and witnessed his friend’s murder. Sven showed more sense than Ryker when it came to surviving. His smart thinking in poking a stick into the yellow jacket nest had saved their bacon. Johnny might be alive if they had left when Sven wanted to leave.
But there was no guarantee any of them would be alive if they had left when Sven first asked. It was bad luck the Indian woman chose this stretch of Whiskey Creek for a campsite. Bad luck was bad luck.
Ryker went over it in his mind again and again, trying to make sense of what had happened. He had been in school, reading Uncle Tom’s Cabin, dreading the harvest. Then he was in charge, fleeing across the prairie, trying to fetch help for Mama. The brutal scenes he had witnessed flashed repeatedly when he least expected them. Mrs. Tingvold’s eggs spilled from her apron as she fell forward. Mr. Tingvold’s expression showed disbelief when the Sioux rode toward him with raised clubs. Papa’s admonition to find Mama echoed in his thoughts. The brutality and senselessness of it made old troubles seem very small.
While Sven slept, Ryker and Hannibal plotted their escape. A hollow log lay to the side of the bank. They would wait until dark, snatch the girls, and put Klara and Elsa inside the hollow log. They would steal the bandanna handkerchief and gag Elsa’s mouth. There was no other way to keep her quiet. Ryker, Sven, and Hannibal must swim alongside to guide the log to the fort. It would be better if Sven could also be inside the log, but Ryker doubted the opening would hold him. Sven could not swim but could hang onto the log for safety. Ryker had learned how to swim in Dodge County but did not consider himself a strong swimmer. He would feel safer with a log close by.
“What if we are spotted?” Hannibal said. “The Indians on the river, and the soldiers at the fort. Either might shoot us.”
Ryker shook his head. “I don’t know. We can only try. Maybe it will be foggy like this morning.”
They looked out the peephole and scanned the short section of sky visible from their hideout. Gray clouds peppered the sky like the dapples on Bestemor’s old mare. A cold north wind rippled the water of Whiskey Creek, sending dried leaves and small twigs sailing toward Fort Abercrombie.
“We’ll drift down Whiskey Creek until it flows into the Red River,” Hannibal said. “Then we’ll paddle to the tunnel and crawl into the fort.”
Intermittent sounds of fighting came from the fort. Sven slept, though fitfully. Poor Klara busied with chores. When she finished one task, the woman immediately found another. Hannibal assured him that all girls worked around the Indian camps, and it didn’t mean that Klara was a slave like Johnny had been.
By the time the sun dipped low in the western horizon, Klara had worked her way next to the hideout. She kept gathering hazelnuts but spoke to them in a low tone as she did. Klara’s face was blistered with sunburn, and bug bites peppered her bruised arms and neck. She drooped with fatigue.
“Don’t you dare leave us behind,” Klara said in a fierce voice. “I hate Good Person for what she did to Johnny.”
“She saved your life,” Ryker said. “And she feeds Elsa.” Elsa nursed alongside the Indian baby. From time to time, Elsa giggled and played with the baby. “She’s not all bad.”
“I’m afraid.” Klara looked over her shoulder. “Did you see poor Johnny? They would have killed me for sure if the woman hadn’t pushed me into the tipi.”
Ryker hesitated before he spoke. He was in charge. He had to make sure his sister knew the score. “If something happens to us,” Ryker said, “if we are taken by Indians or something else terrible”—he took a breath and spoke the hard truth—“then you and Elsa must live with Good Person and do whatever she asks of you.”
“I won’t,” Klara said. “I’ll never.”
“You will,” Ryker said. “She’s Mama’s friend. She is your only hope for survival if something happens to us.” A blue heron landed on Whiskey Creek with a flurry of graceful wings and paddling feet. “Wait for the soldiers to rescue you. Tell them about Mama being taken and Papa killed. Teach Elsa her American name. The farm belongs to our family. You know that Martin will come home after the war. Maybe you can return to it someday, even without us.”
“You promised to take us along,” Klara said. She sobbed so pathetically that Ryker wanted to take her into his arms, but he couldn’t. “Don’t leave us.”
“Be brave,” Ryker said. “We’re leaving as soon as it’s dark. The woman thinks we’re leaving you behind.” He told her their plan to hide her and Elsa in the hollow log and paddle to Fort Abercrombie.
“I’m scared,” Klara sniffled.
“We’re all scared,” Hannibal said. “We’ll be all right.”
“Klara, you have to remember this,” Ryker said. “If something goes wrong, remember your Indian name and the name of your Indian mother. Your best bet is to return to her.”
The woman called Klara to the tipi.
A wispy fog swirled over the water. An early autumn tang chilled the air, and the night sounded with crickets and calling owls. The fragrance of burning wood and chicken stew filled their nostrils. The Indian boys returned from standing guard. The woman motioned them to leave the hideout and come to the fire. Ryker and Sven left Hannibal in the thicket.
Good Person first gave food to her boys and then shooed them off to the tipi, probably for bed. Then she doled out small portions to Sven and Ryker. When the boys finished, she handed a smaller portion to Klara.
“What did Johnny do wrong?” Klara whispered as she sat next to her brothers by the fire.
“Nothing,” Ryker said. “She’s helping us because Mama was kind to her. She felt no obligation to help Johnny.”
Elsa toddled over to the fire, and the woman motioned for Klara to tend her sister. Elsa babbled and giggled. Elsa thrived since having regular milk. Maybe there would be another wet nurse at Fort Abercrombie.
Good Person kept glancing up and down Whiskey Creek as if expecting company. Clearly she was saving the food for someone else. It was almost dark, and a layer of fog settled over the water. Ryker caught Sven’s eye and nodded.
“Soon as we get a chance,” Ryker said in a whisper. “Klara, be ready to grab Elsa and run. Leave everything behind.”
The Indian baby sounded from the tipi. When the woman tended him, Ryker filched a piece of meat from the stew pot, ran back, and handed it to Hannibal through the peephole.
“Come, Hannibal,” Ryker said. “It’s now or never.”
CHAPTER 37
* * *
Klara scooped Elsa into her arms and headed toward the hollow log. Ryker snatched the red bandanna handkerchief. Hannibal ran from the hideout, stuffing food into his mouth as he came. Ryker tied the bandanna around Elsa’s mouth and stuffed her into the log. She squealed in protest, but Klara crawled in after her, making shushing noises to comfort her baby sister. Sven, with a final glance toward his friend’s body, hurried to help Ryker drag the log into the water. It was heavier than Ryker had expected, and Ryker was grateful for Hannibal’s extra muscle power.
Hannibal shoved his pistol into Klara’s hands. “Keep this dry,” he said. “Remember, there’s only one shot. Use it if it comes to that.”
The frigid shock of Whiskey Creek made Ryker’s teeth chatter. They pushed out into the middle of the stream, holding onto the log with one hand and paddling with the other. He looked to make sure Sven was holding onto the log. Sven gripped the stub of a branch. He was kicking and paddling for all he was worth.
As they rounded the first bend, Ryker heard one of the Indian boys sound the alarm. It was too late. They were out of sight and on their way to Fort Abercrombie.
“Sven,” Hannibal whispered. “No need to wear yourself out. Just hang on.”
The fog thickened. From time to time Ryker’s feet touched the bottom of the creek bed. He used this opportunity to push with his legs and move toward the middle of the stream again, letting the current pull them in the right direction. Drums sounded ahead and grew louder with each bend of Whiskey Creek.
“
Ryker,” Klara said through a knothole in the side of the log. “What’s happening?”
“Be quiet,” Ryker whispered. “Voices carry over the water.”
They drifted around another sharp bend. Campfires glowed through the fog. Drums pounded relentlessly. Ryker pushed harder, forgetting his fatigue, wanting only to get away from this dangerous area of Whiskey Creek. They were almost to the next bend when screeching cries sounded through the night. A break in the fog revealed a huge fire surrounded by dancing Sioux.
Ryker bumped his shins on the creek bed, and the hair on his neck stood up in terror. Elsa mumbled through her gag.
“We’re too shallow,” Hannibal whispered. “Push out into the middle of the stream.”
They managed to maneuver the log into deeper water, and Ryker counted heads to make sure they were still together. Ryker touched Hannibal’s arm across from him on the other side of the log. The air felt colder than the water. He pushed his arm under the water.
“Klara,” he whispered through the knothole. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Klara said with chattering teeth.
“Sven,” Ryker whispered. Whoops and hollers sounded from the dancers. Maybe Sven had not heard him above the noise. “Sven,” he said a little louder.
Nothing.
“Where is he?” Ryker said. Panic rose in his throat. His brother did not know how to swim. He should have tied him to the log somehow, or kept him close enough to keep an eye on him.
“I don’t see him,” Hannibal whispered.
The fog thickened until they could not see their hands in front of their faces. “Sven,” Ryker said again. He and Hannibal felt along both edges of the log. “Sven.”
“I’m here,” a small, choking voice sounded far away. “Help.”
Hannibal swam toward the voice and returned with a near-drowned Sven in tow.
“Climb onto the log,” Hannibal whispered. “You’re done in.”
Escape to Fort Abercrombie Page 18
