“You said steal the black horse,” Lone Eagle said. “You did not say kill the rider.”
“Then I will,” O’Hannigan said.
“No!” Lone Eagle said. “Leave him. Black Wolf counted coup. We have the horse. We go.”
Will felt the eagle talon under his shirt digging into his chest.
CHAPTER 36
* * *
Will opened one eye. His head throbbed. He opened the other eye. His ears buzzed. “Hwm,” he groaned.
“Easy, Will.” Homer’s voice sounded far away. “Doc say you have a mighty bad concussion.”
“Hwm.” Will groaned again and raised up onto his elbows.
“Easy,” Homer said. “Doc say you gonna be all right. Jest have a bad headache for a while.”
“He’s got that right.” Will reached up and explored the bandage wrapped around his head. He winced when he touched the lump behind his ear. He was thankful his reflexes had made him duck, otherwise the tomahawk would’ve fractured his skull.
“Where am I?”
“Fort Russell hospital.”
“How’d I get here?”
“When them four trailing racers dropped down to the creek they seen the Indians racing away with Buck and seen you sprawled on the trail. They fetched the soldiers from the fort who brung you here.”
“Buck’s gone?”
“I reckon so. Leastwise that’s what them other racers say.”
Will lay on a cot along one wall of a spartanly furnished room. Homer sat opposite him on a matching cot. Between the cots, beneath a window, a nightstand held a pitcher of water, a glass, and a white towel. A single doorway entered the room opposite the window. A soldier stood in the hallway—a carbine on his shoulder.
“How long have I been here? How’d you get here? Who won the race?”
Homer chuckled. “One question at a time.”
Will grinned, but wished he hadn’t. It hurt to move the muscles in his face. He gritted his teeth. “All right, one question at a time.”
“Kavanagh declared hisself the winner when his thoroughbred crossed the finish line alone. That made everybody in Cheyenne, including me, suspicious. No other racers showed up at the finish line. Them other racers knowed they’d lost, so why continue. Weren’t no prize for second place. When them racers never showed up for the longest time, I gots real worried. I grabbed my horse and started back down the course looking for you. I passed them other racers heading back to Cheyenne and they tole me what happened.”
Footsteps echoed in the hallway. The soldier stepped aside and brought his carbine to present arms. Will raised up far enough to see two men stop outside the open door.
“I tell you, Doc, General Dodge isn’t going to take this well.” The man who spoke wore an officer’s blue uniform jacket with silver eagles on its shoulder boards. The other man wore the white uniform coat of an Army surgeon. “Dodge counted on the Army to maintain order during the race. To have Indians attack one of the riders, almost within sight of the fort, and steal General Rawlins’s horse is too much. Dodge’s not going to like it. Rawlins isn’t either. I remember from the war Rawlins has a short temper. No sir, Doc, neither one of them is going to like this one bit.”
The officer who’d spoken stepped into the room. His flowing mustaches blended into long side whiskers that touched his shoulders on either side of a bare chin. The doctor followed.
“Afternoon, son. I’m Colonel John Stevenson, commanding officer of the Thirtieth Infantry and commandant of Fort D. A. Russell. The doctor tells me you’re Major Sean Corcoran’s nephew. That right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I know your uncle. Knew him during the war. Good man. I’ve sent a courier to Fort Sanders to inform him and General Dodge about the . . . accident.”
The doctor stepped up to Will’s cot. “We sent word to your uncle that your injuries are neither fatal nor lasting. Nasty blow to the temple, to be sure, and a slash across the forehead that may leave a scar. Not a bad one, I don’t think. After a few days of bed rest you’ll recover.”
“Days?” Will asked. The doctor nodded.
“Your man’s welcome to stay here with you,” Colonel Stevenson said, “unless we need the other bed for a soldier.”
“He’s not my man,” Will said. “My friend’s a member of my uncle’s survey inspection team.”
“Well, whatever.” Colonel Stevenson inclined his head toward Homer. “You can stay.”
“Thank you, suh,” Homer said.
“You rest here for a few days, son. And when the doctor says you’re fit to travel, you can return to Fort Sanders.”
“Colonel?” Will asked.
“Yes, son.”
“You’re sending troops to retrieve General Rawlins’s horse?”
“No, son. I’m too shorthanded to send men chasing after a horse. Shame to lose such a fine animal. With all due respects to Generals Rawlins and Dodge, I’ve got better things to do with my men right now. Cheyenne is a lawless town.”
The doctor adjusted the bandage that encircled Will’s forehead. “You took quite a blow. Your concussion may make you unsteady on your feet for a while. The headache will persist for a day or two. I’ll check on you from time to time. Your man . . . I mean, your friend can bring you meals from the dining hall until you’re able to go there on your own.”
“Thank you,” Will said.
“Another thing. When I examined you I saw that you’ve had a recent wound to your left bicep.”
Will described how he’d received the arrow wound.
“Seems like you’ve had your share of hard luck, young man,” the doctor said. “The arm is healing nicely. You won’t suffer any permanent damage.”
“Son,” Colonel Stevenson said. “Sorry about your . . . incident. I must return to my duties now. When I receive any dispatch back from your uncle, I’ll inform you. In the meantime, you rest here in the hospital as our guest.”
The officers left the room. The soldier with the carbine stepped back in front of the door.
“We’re more prisoners than guests,” Will said.
Will swung his feet off the cot and sat up. He hunched forward, his elbows on his knees, his chin in his hands. He touched the bandage gingerly with his fingertips.
“Worried ’bout your headache?” Homer asked.
“That’s not what worries me.”
“What’d you mean?”
“I mean General Dodge is going to be so upset that I let Buck get stolen. He’ll think I’m not responsible enough to work for the railroad.”
“General Dodge’ll think no such thing.”
Will looked at Homer. “I have to get Buck back. Colonel Stevenson isn’t going to send any soldiers to get him. I don’t know what might happen to Buck in the hands of those Cheyenne . . . not to mention that rascal Paddy O’Hannigan.”
“Paddy O’Hannigan?”
“Yes. He was with the Indians. He would’ve killed me if he’d had his way. But Lone Eagle stopped him.” Will touched the front of his shirt. The scratch of the eagle talon against his chest felt comforting.
“Lone Eagle?” Homer asked.
“Yes. He was with them—the band that attacked us down on Lodgepole Creek—the same ones that raided the train. It was the blackened-faced one that clubbed me with a tomahawk. I think Lone Eagle called him Black Wolf.”
“Hmmm,” Homer said. “Well, I reckon yore even with Lone Eagle now.”
“Even?”
“He tole you he owed you his life after you saved him from that quicksand. Now he saved you from that no-account Irishman and them other Indians. That ’bout makes you even on saving lives, way I sees it.”
Homer was probably right. Will pushed himself off the cot and extended a hand to the windowsill to steady himself. Through the window he saw there were no buildings behind the hospital. He had a clear view of the Laramie Range to the west. “There’s no stockade,” he said.
“They don’t need no walls ’round this f
ort,” Homer said. “With a entire regiment of infantry here, any Indian would be a fool to attack this place.”
Will swayed slightly, but remained standing. His head kept spinning.
“You needs to lie down and rest,” Homer said.
“No, I need to go get Buck back.”
“You ain’t gonna do no such thing.” Homer rose from the cot and stood before Will. “Yore in no condition to be going anyplace, much less out yonder to find a horse that you got no idea where it is.”
“I do have an idea where he is.”
“How you know?”
“I studied General Dodge’s map at Fort Sanders. He’d penciled in the location of an Indian encampment along Lodge-pole Creek, just north of Cheyenne Pass.”
“Cheyenne Pass! That’s thirty miles from here.”
“Just a day’s ride.”
“Jest a day’s ride if you was in good condition . . . and if you had a horse.”
“You’ve got a horse. You said you rode out here to find me.”
Homer shook his head. “Don’t do it, Will. How’ll I explain to your uncle if you go off and try this fool thing in the condition yore in?”
“Homer, I’m going. Uncle Sean will understand. I’ll be letting him down, as well as General Dodge and General Rawlins, if I don’t get Buck back. So you either let me have your horse, or I’ll start walking.”
“Aw,” Homer sighed. “If yore that determined, I’ll fetch my horse.”
“Thanks. And I need you to get rid of that soldier guarding the door.”
“I don’t like this, one bit. You’re as stubborn as your uncle when it comes to wanting your way.”
Will grinned. He liked being compared to his uncle.
“You can’t just walk out the front door of the hospital and ride out of the fort. We’ll wait till sundown when the soldiers have to stand to attention on the parade ground ’round the flagpole. When they’s lowering the flag I’ll bring the horse ’round to the window here. Then I’ll come back in and distract the guard so’s you can climb out.”
“Good,” Will said.
“Then, I’se got to get back into Cheyenne and pick up that other horse and Ruby and hightail it back to Fort Sanders to tell your uncle what yore doing.”
A few hours later, a bugle call summoned the soldiers to assemble on the parade ground. Will could hear the officers calling the troops to attention for the daily ritual of lowering the flag. The Army called the ceremony “retreat.” Strange name, Will thought. He didn’t think the Army liked to retreat.
The front door of the hospital banged open and he heard Homer shouting and cursing from the entrance. The guard stepped away from the door to investigate. Now was the time.
Will pulled the night table away from the wall and pushed opened the window. He swung a leg over the windowsill. The drop to the ground was farther than he’d hoped. He swung the other leg outside, took a quick look back inside the hospital, then launched himself off the sill with a shove. He landed feet-first with a jolt. “Hwm!” A stab of pain shot through his head.
His sudden appearance startled the horse and it pulled back hard on the reins which Homer had wedged into a loose board on the hospital wall. “Easy, boy,” Will said. He caught the reins and patted the horse’s neck.
Homer had left his saddlebags on the animal’s flanks. Hopefully they contained a canteen and some food. Maybe even a revolver. Will didn’t have time to check.
Another bugle call sounded from the parade ground on the other side of the hospital. “Dismissed!” The command announced the end of the assembly. Will had to move.
He mounted the horse and rode away from the hospital, dropping down the steep embankment to Crow Creek. He was beneath the view of anyone at the fort. He turned southeast and rode parallel to the creek.
The sun was setting behind him over the Laramie Range, the sky streaked with reds and yellows. Even in the diminishing light he easily identified the spot where he’d been ambushed. Broken bushes and tree branches revealed where the Indians had hidden before their ambush. Will reined in and dismounted.
He examined the trail where the grass was heavily trampled and found what he was looking for. The clear impressions of two shod horses and the markings left by half a dozen unshod ponies led away from the trail and down to the creek’s edge. Paddy O’Hannigan would’ve ridden one of the shod horses. The other was Buck.
Will led his horse through the brush and down to the creek. Broken bushes on the opposite bank revealed where they’d raced to get away. They hadn’t bothered to conceal their route. Will mounted and rode across the creek.
On the opposite bank he found the tracks of the Indian ponies and the two shod horses heading northwest. He was right. They were heading for Lodgepole Creek.
CHAPTER 37
* * *
Paddy had ridden with the Cheyenne to their village following the theft of the horse. The last couple of hours of the ride had been especially difficult. After the sun set there’d been no moon to illuminate the trail, but that hadn’t slowed the braves. A sixth sense seem to guide them. Paddy simply trusted his horse to follow the Indian ponies.
At the village Paddy had to sleep outside. The Cheyenne neither offered him the hospitality of a tepee, nor the nourishment of food. Fortunately, he’d strapped a blanket roll behind his saddle. He’d wrapped himself in the blanket and laid on the ground beneath a cottonwood tree.
He thought about the first time he’d seen Will Braddock’s face looking down at him from the stable loft over the barrel of a revolver. His failure at stealing the horse that night always made him seethe. When he’d failed the second time at getting the horse during the train raid, and had convinced himself it was Braddock’s fault, he’d become doubly infuriated. That’s when he’d sworn vengeance against Corcoran’s nephew.
He’d missed killing Braddock when he’d shot at him a few weeks back in Julesburg, and when he’d had the chance to make good on his promise during the horse race, that bloody half-breed Lone Eagle had stepped in and stopped him.
But at least this time, he’d finally been successful in stealing the Morgan. Kavanagh would be proud of him for that. He smiled, snugged the blanket under his chin, and fell asleep.
Paddy squinted and rubbed his eyes. The morning sun felt warm on his face. Where was he? Oh yes, on the ground under a cottonwood outside the Cheyenne camp. He got up and took a dozen steps to Lodgepole Creek where he splashed cool water on his face. He cupped his hands and slated his thirst with the refreshing stream water.
He watched the encampment as one by one the women slipped out of their tepees and poked at the coals to restart cook fires that had cooled overnight. Several of them walked past him to the creek to fill buckets, skins, or gourds with water to prepare the morning meal for their menfolk. Few looked at him. None said anything.
He returned to the tree, gathered up his blanket and shook it.
“You’re a white man.” The English-speaking voice startled him. He spun around. A pretty, black-haired white girl dressed in buckskin held a battered tin bucket. A rawhide thong dangled from around her neck.
“Sure, and I am,” he said, “and who’re ye?”
“Jenny McNabb. They’ve kidnapped me. I need your help to get away.”
“Get away?”
“Yes. What’s your name?”
“Paddy O’Hannigan’s the name . . . but why would I want to help ye get away?”
“Because we’re both white. I don’t belong here.”
“Well, do ye see now, that’s beside the point. These redskins would slit my throat if I raised a hand to help ye.”
The girl glanced back to the ring of tepees. “I don’t have much time. I’ve got to get this bucket of water back right away or Small Duck will be after me.” She nodded back toward an old crone that stood between two tepees in the outer ring.
“Small Duck?”
“Chief Tall Bear’s wife.” She lifted the rawhide thong. “Small Duck only lets go
of this thing when I come to fetch water because she’s too lazy to walk out here herself. I’m her slave.”
“Ah, now, darlin’. If that be true, I sure don’t want nothing to do with helping ye escape. Chief Tall Bear is not one to trifle with.”
A tear trickled down her face. She turned from him and walked to the creek. He felt sorry for her, but what could he do in the midst of a band of Cheyenne warriors? She filled the old bucket and headed back toward the tepees.
“Miss McNabb. There is one thing I might be able to do.”
She stopped and looked at him. “What?” Her blue eyes flashed.
“Well, d’ye see, I might be able to get my boss to buy ye from the chief.”
“Your boss? Buy me?”
“Sure, and he’s Mortimer Kavanagh. Owns the Lucky Dollar Saloon. If ye’d agree to go to work for him as a dance hall lady, he might buy ye.”
“And become a slave to a dance hall? Humph! I may as well remain a slave here.”
A few hours later, Paddy sat cross-legged on the compacted dirt floor of the buffalo hide council tepee. Chief Tall Bear sat opposite him, across a small fire that burned in the center of the circle of warriors. Paddy pointed at Lone Eagle. “Well, d’ye see, the half-breed protected the boy what was riding the black horse. Sure, and we should’ve killed him.”
The chief spoke to Lone Eagle, obviously asking for a translation. The chief and Lone Eagle spoke for a moment in Cheyenne, then Lone Eagle faced Paddy. “Killing the rider was not in the deal. I said so yesterday. Chief Tall Bear says so today.”
“Well, don’t ye see, that boy can identify the lot of ye who stole the horse.” Paddy made a sweeping gesture at the braves who were participants in the theft. “And by all the saints, he might identify me. Sure, and he may not have seen me. But he may’ve recognized my voice, it being such a lilting Irish accent I have, don’t ye know.”
“You told the chief that Kavanagh wanted a horse stolen,” Lone Eagle said. “You did not say Kavanagh wanted the rider killed. We stole the horse. The deal is done.”
Eagle Talons (The Iron Horse Chronicles: Book One) Page 17
