Blevins, almost beside himself with the anxiety of having gotten himself in this position, had little patience with the question. “What the hell can we do? I’ve already lost eight men.”
“Well, we can’t stay here. He’s not gonna let us out of this trap.”
“What do you suggest?” There was a decided edge of sarcasm in Blevins’ tone.
“What about behind us?” Thad looked around until he spotted Little Hawk, he and Cross Bear lying flat against the side of the ravine. “Little Hawk!” The Crow scout looked in his direction. “What’s at the end of this ravine?” From the blank look he received, he realized the Indian did not understand his question. “Out, is there any way out back there?” He pointed behind him.
Little Hawk glanced back in the direction pointed out and then shook his head vigorously. “No way,” he confirmed.
“That may be,” Blevins said. “But we can’t stay here and we can’t move as long as he’s sitting up there.”
Thad looked up toward the ridges on both sides of them. “It’ll be dark in another hour. We’ll just have to stay put until dark and then make a run for it.”
“On foot?”
“Someone’s gonna have to slip out and round up the horses.” He paused to think about the situation. It wasn’t going to be that simple. “When it’s dark, we can make our way to the mouth of this pass on foot. Then a couple of volunteers can slip out and find the horses. If we’re lucky, we should find them not far off.”
“If we’re not, we’ve got a long walk back.” Blevins sighed. “I don’t reckon we have much choice.”
* * *
There was a moon but it would be some time before it was high enough to light the floor of the tiny canyon where H Troop lay pinned down. When he decided it was dark enough to chance it, Captain Blevins had the orders to move out whispered from man to man along with the unnecessary precaution to keep silent. Moving as quietly as a full troop could, their number now reduced by eight souls, they made their way cautiously back the way they had come hours before. In the darkness, Blevins and Thad stopped to check on the bodies of the dead. There was nothing they could do for them now but Blevins made a silent promise to return for them as soon as he could.
As they moved slowly through the blackness of the canyon, all eyes darted back and forth along the steep walls, expecting to see a muzzle flash at any moment. All was silent except for the soft padding of their boots in the dust, punctuated occasionally by someone stumbling on a rock and someone else instantly admonishing the guilty party in a harsh whisper.
Above them, and closer down the side of the hill now that darkness had set in, Black Eagle listened. He could no longer see the floor of the canyon but his keen hearing confirmed his suspicions that the soldiers were moving. He smiled because he knew where they were going, to try to get to their horses.
It took the better part of an hour to walk back to the entrance to the canyon and, although they expected it every step of the way, there was no attack from above. Blevins directed his troop to take up a defensive position in a shallow coulee to wait for the horses.
Once they were dug in, Thad immediately spoke up. “I’ll go look for the horses.”
Blevins retorted at once. “No, Thad, you stay here. We’ll send the scouts out after them. They’ll be better at it than you anyway.” He signaled Little Hawk and Cross Bear. They listened while he explained to them what he wanted them to do. Just as with any of his troopers, he made it clear that he was not ordering them to do it because of the danger, but he was asking them to volunteer. Neither of them was short of courage and they quickly agreed to find the horses and bring them back. They disappeared into the darkness.
Blevins set sentries out on the perimeter of his position and prepared to defend it. The sobering thought struck him that he had taken up a defensive position to protect against attack by one lone Indian—one hostile—against a whole cavalry troop. He wondered what an army investigative committee would make of it if such action should ever be deemed necessary. Thoughts of that nature brought about a distinct discomfort to Linus Blevins. He had already lost eight men and all his horses to that one lone Indian and without a single return shot from his troop. There were bound to be questions asked. One thing for certain, he could not afford to take more casualties.
A movement caught his eye and he turned to see Thad Anderson pacing from one side of the coulee to the other. Blevins stared for a long moment at the impatient young lieutenant. Damn, he thought, I wish to hell he’d stayed back in camp. I’ve already lost eight men and he’s volunteering to go out after the horses. It had already become apparent to Blevins that there had been a change in Thad Anderson, a form of recklessness that defied common sense. Dammit, that’s why I sent the scouts out to find the horses—he almost said it aloud—I can’t afford to lose any more men.
There was nothing to do now but wait. Blevins settled back and tried to make himself comfortable against the hard side of the coulee. An hour passed. A heavy silence descended on the narrow coulee, broken only by an occasional murmur of a whispered exchange between the men. The moon, having just reached the top of the ridge behind them, outlined dark patterns across the entrance to the pass. Suddenly the silence was shattered by the terrifying shriek of a savage war cry, echoing far out in the darkness. The eerie refrain was repeated over and over for several minutes to be replaced again by the deathly silence.
Every man was alert now, straining to see out into the darkness, their weapons ready. Thad moved up and sat down beside Blevins. He, like the others, stared into the shadows, trying to see some movement . . . anything. After a moment he spoke. “What do you think? Was that Cheyenne or Crow?”
“Who can say? I can’t tell one war whoop from another. We’ll just have to wait.”
Thad didn’t want to wait. “Why don’t I take a couple of men and go out and see what happened?”
Blevins’ patience was sorely strained as it was. “Jesus, Thad, why are you in such an all-fired hurry to get yourself—and my men—killed? Just sit there and wait.”
In another half hour, the moon cleared the ridge behind them and all at once the shallow coulee and the bluffs around it were bathed in bright moonlight. Blevins looked around nervously. Every man stood out in sharp detail. His perimeter guards were totally exposed. He shouted to the sentries to retreat to the protection of the coulee. In answer, a rifle shot rang out and one of the sentries tumbled as he ran, rolled over once, and lay still. One of the other lookouts ran to his aid and was cut down by a second shot.
“Stand fast!” Blevins screamed as another man raised up from his dug-in position in the coulee, preparing to go to his fallen comrades. “Leave them! We can’t help them now.” He was horrified by the loss of two more of his command. He was facing the nightmare of losing his entire troop to one man.
“Linus, they may not be dead. We’ve got to get them back here.”
Blevins looked at Thad. “Leave them, I said.”
Thad hesitated for only a moment. “Like hell I will.” Without another word, he crawled up over the edge of the coulee and ran the thirty yards across open ground to the two bodies, ignoring the command to come back.
Running as hard as he could, he hit the dirt, rolling and sliding to a stop beside the stricken troopers. He found one of the men still alive. “Carver’s dead,” the man groaned, “and I fear I’m dying.”
“No you’re not. Where are you hit?”
“In the gut.”
A bullet thudded into the dead body beside them, followed immediately by the crack of a rifle. “Come on, soldier, let’s get the hell out of here.” With the wounded man’s help, Thad hefted him up on his shoulder and started back to the coulee, half walking, half running. Two more shots kicked up dirt beside him as he struggled with his burden before a ragged volley from the gully poured a hail of lead toward the muzzle flash spotted halfway up the ridge. The Indian sniper was quieted for a moment, long enough for Thad to make his way back.
Two troopers rushed to help Thad lay the wounded man down in the bottom of the coulee. Captain Blevins stood over him, anxiously watching them lay him out.
“How is he?” Blevins asked.
“He’s gut shot, bad,” one of the men replied.
The wounded man groaned with the agony caused by his rough rescue. He looked up at Thad, his words difficult and halting. “Thank you, Sir.”
Thad reached over and squeezed his hand. “You’ll be all right, soldier. You just rest easy now.”
“I ’preciate what you done, Sir. I didn’t want to die out there.” He groaned again and then seemed to relax. In another minute he was dead.
Blevins shook his head, slowly turned away and returned to his position near the head of the gully. Thad followed him. “Now what?” he asked.
Blevins stared vacantly at the young lieutenant. “I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.”
“Linus, we’ve got to do something.”
Blevins flared in anger. “If you’ve got a suggestion, I’d be more than happy to hear it. We can’t move without taking casualties. What do you suggest? Should we just climb out of here and march out and see how many of us are left by the time we get out of his rifle range?”
Thad ignored his sarcasm. “No, I guess we can’t do that,” he said, his voice calm. “Where was his muzzle flash?”
“There,” Blevins said, pointing to a general area, halfway up the side of the ridge.
Thad studied the ridge, still deep in shadows. After a few moments he stated, “I’m going after the son of a bitch.” Without waiting for approval, he got up and picked up his rifle, a Winchester he had personally paid for.
Blevins stood up. “That’s crazy. You can’t go after that savage.” When Thad ignored him and turned to leave, he followed along behind him to the edge of the coulee. “Dammit, Thad, I’m in command of this troop and I’m ordering you to stay here.”
Thad turned back to face him. “I’m not in your troop. You don’t command me. I’m just an observer.”
“Well, dammit, stay here and observe!”
Thad smiled. “I can observe better up there. Don’t worry so much, Linus. I’ll be back.”
“At least wait till the scouts get back.”
“The scouts ain’t coming back.” He sprinted across the bright moonlit clearing and disappeared into the deep shadows. No shot rang out even though his flight was observed by the cold steady eyes on the ridge above him.
CHAPTER XVII
Jason made his way carefully down through a washed-out draw that led to a treeless creek basin. He held closely to the shadows of the wash, avoiding the open moonlit areas. It had been at least twenty or thirty minutes since he had heard the Cheyenne war cry that pierced the night. It was difficult to judge exactly where the sound came from and, as he made his way slowly and cautiously in the general direction, he stopped often to look and listen. The war whoop was not repeated and he feared that it might have been a signal that someone had found a heap of trouble.
He followed the wash until it reached the creek. Dismounting, he paused a minute to consider the options. He could go back to the point where he had left Blevins’ trail or he could continue down the creek in the general direction of the war cry. There was a possibility that both trails led to the same place so he decided to continue on down the creek. He waited until Black finished drinking and then started out again on foot, leading his horse.
The moon had risen high when he found the bodies. Had it not been for the bright moonlight, he might not have seen them at all for they were lying beside a grassy knob some yards away from the creek. Before examining them, he left his horse on the backside of the knob and scouted a wide circle around them to make sure he wasn’t going to be the next victim. Satisfied that the killer had since gone on, he returned to look at the bodies.
Even in the shadows, it was easy to identify the dead and he felt an immediate rush of sorrow as he knelt down beside the bodies. He had not known Little Hawk and Cross Bear for very long but he had taken a liking to the two Crow scouts and he felt a loss at their passing. There was little doubt that this was the work of Black Eagle. Both bodies were scalped and badly mutilated. It appeared they had been taken by surprise, struck down from behind with arrows and finished off with a war axe. It was not a pleasant way to die.
There was no time to do anything for the bodies now so Jason whispered a soft “Sorry, friends,” and made his way silently down the creek. He had not traveled more than another few hundred yards when he heard the soft whinny of a horse. In a moment it was answered by another. Once again, he tied Black off and made his way forward on foot, keeping to the banks of the creek and the shadows.
“Well I’ll be . . .” he muttered under his breath. In a grassy bottom by the creek, a herd of twenty-five or thirty horses had gathered to feed off the lush grass near the water. All of the horses were saddled so there was no doubt that he had stumbled on the mounts of the entire troop . . . and there was no camp anywhere about. That meant they were all dead or they were all on foot somewhere. He bet it was the latter, figuring the horses were what Little Hawk and Cross Bear were looking for when they got jumped.
He had to be sure Black Eagle was not waiting in ambush somewhere, waiting for someone else to come for the horses. Still on foot, he circled the herd of horses, moving slowly and scouting carefully until he had satisfied himself that there was no one watching the herd. He studied the low bluffs near the creek and the higher ridges beyond that stretched for as far as he could see. H Troop could be anywhere. He was reluctant to lose the time it would take to back trail but he could see there was no sure way to find the troop without going back to pick up their trail again, leaving the creek.
By the time he doubled back and picked up the wide trail left by Captain Blevins’ patrol, the moon had traveled past the low ridges before him and the shadows had lengthened. It would be daylight in a few more hours. Jason prodded Black onward. He was approaching what appeared to be a pass through the high hills and he stopped to consider it. He was about to continue when he halted in his tracks and listened. It was a sound, like a rifle bolt clicking shut. He closed his eyes and strained to listen. There . . . another sound, this time a stray voice, spoken softly but caught on the gentle breeze and carried to him. He was sure he had found H Troop. He moved up closer.
He had found them all right. Though still a couple of hundred yards away, he could make them out now. It looked as though they were pretty much hemmed in, holed up in a coulee on the eastern floor of a narrow pass. An odd place to set up a defensive position, he thought . . . like a shooting gallery. If he had to guess, he’d bet the moon hadn’t come up when they crawled into that hole.
Since they were on that side of the pass, he had to figure they were being held down by someone firing from the ridge on the opposite side. Stands to reason, he thought as he looked at the side of the hill. One man could do a lot of damage with a rifle up there. Well, there’s no need for me to join the shooting gallery down below. The man I’m looking for is somewhere up on that ridge. He turned Black toward the rocky hillside.
* * *
The way was steep and the ground under Thad’s feet was loose in many places, causing his boots to slip on the small bits of rocks and gravel. This side of the hill was shrouded in darkness, shielded from the bright moon that had now made its way past the ridge above him. Working up through the boulders and sparse pines, he stopped often to look and listen, each time having to wait for his breath to settle in order to hear the night sounds.
Halfway up the slope now, he began to wonder if Linus might have been right. Maybe it was a mistake to go out after the savage. He suddenly felt out of place and awkward, climbing and clawing his way up this dark ridge. The man he sought to kill or capture was at home in this rugged country. Dammit! he thought, I can’t even see where I’m going. But somebody had to go after this hostile. He was sick of hiding in that coulee, trying not to get shot. He was
too deeply committed now. He couldn’t turn back. His pride wouldn’t let him. Thoughts of Martha Lynch persisted in crowding into his mind and he would let them take over his concentration until he forced himself to set his mind on the business at hand. Still she pervaded his thoughts. He had tried to tell himself that his feelings for her were naive and unrealistic. Why would he expect an eastern-bred girl to embrace this rugged life? Especially a girl who knew him for such a short time. They had barely spent hours together, yet he had fallen hard for her and needed no more time to know he wanted to marry her. Her decision to return to the east had torn the heart out of him and, since her rejection, he didn’t care whether he lived or died. Now, in the cool black shadows of this lonely ridge, he began to reflect on his original thoughts and the more basic instinct of survival became the dominant influence. It caused him to reprimand himself for his careless thoughts. Get your mind on what you’re doing, he silently scolded and pressed onward again.
About two thirds of the way up the hill, he came to an almost level meadow, surrounded by pines. He stopped to catch his breath again. While he waited for his heart to quiet its pounding, he looked back over the way he had climbed. The coulee where H Troop was holed up was still bathed in moonlight though no one was visible down in the shadows. He was only a fair shot but he felt he could keep a troop of men at bay from this position above them. Any man crawling out of that coulee would stand out like a sore thumb. His thoughts turned back to the man who held an entire troop of cavalry pinned down. What kind of savage killing machine could this man, this Black Eagle, be? One would expect a defiant warrior to flee this territory to join other hostiles like Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. But Black Eagle remained to wage a one-man war on the regiment at Fort Fetterman. Sergeant Brady had said that the savage actually had one enemy he sought to kill—Jason Coles—and if Coles left the fort, Black Eagle would disappear also. That might be true but H Troop alone had lost ten men to the savage in just one night.
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