I hope Spicer and Jerusha have been of use.
Mark didn’t know of Royal’s death so her letters weren’t reaching him. She posted them at every opportunity, even stopping northbound mail details as they flew by on the road. What else could she do?
Margaret Carrington sends warm regards. She is very fond of you. I have become great friends with her older son, Harry, an intelligent boy who will be twice the man the father is. (Harry asks of you often, I’ve noticed, and seems to welcome the mail trains as eagerly as I do. I believe you’ve made a conquest there.)
Morale among the men and officers is getting worse every day. Carrington brings this on himself with his dithering and obsession with minutiae. Brown and Bisbee are especially critical. I sincerely hope Sherman replaces him and soon. We must succeed. Careers hang in the balance.
The Indians haven’t made much mischief beyond their usual pilfering and begging. Still old Jim Bridger constantly sounds the alarm, thus encouraging Carrington’s natural timidity.
They are a fine pair.
I hear the boots and saddles—
I remain, your loving husband,
Mark Reynolds
Rose closed her eyes, longing to feel Mark’s arms around her, his breath warm on that spot where her neck met her shoulder. She sensed she was different this way from other wives, who spoke of the marriage bed as a thing to be endured. She enjoyed their time in bed together, looked forward to it, in fact, and felt no shame or guilt. After all, she reasoned, if there is a God, He gave man—and woman—a capacity for pleasure for a reason, did He not?
Clara moaned and Rose went to her, lifting her head as she drank a cup of water without fully waking. She tried to get Rollo to take some water also but he refused the nipple. His skin was dry and hot as a stone in the noontime sun.
The nighttime quiet was broken by the howl of a single wolf. Bridger once told her a real wolf’s howl produced no echo but the cry of an Indian imitating a wolf did. Was there an echo? She listened, trying to hear, and fell asleep, dreaming she was alone in a darkened house with long hallways and many cavernous, high-ceilinged rooms. Something was in the house with her, something evil and deadly, silently moving closer. She waited, frozen with fear, powerless to escape. All at once a man was beside her in the darkness. He took her in his strong arms and told her not to be afraid. In an immediate, sweet rush of knowing, Rose understood she was safe. Only when the sentry’s call woke her did she realize the man in her dream was not Mark but the surgeon, Daniel Dixon.
Chapter Twelve
It was almost dawn when Anderson left his wife’s bedside to relieve the watch. The air was hot and motionless and Rose’s skin was damp under her clothing. She wondered if she should wake Clara and the boy to give them water but decided to let them sleep a while longer.
She stood and stretched. Her back muscles ached from a night on the floor. What she wouldn’t give for a hot bath and freshly laundered clothing that smelled of soap and sunshine! At Fort Reno she would—
“Indians! Turn out! Turn out! Indians!”
The cry shattered the stillness like a rock through glass. Rose felt a blast of fear. She heard the crack of a carbine, another and another, followed by a shrill whistle. Shaking off her paralysis, she ran to the door. Half-dressed men in stocking feet burst from their tents to take positions on the sandbag parapets or at loopholes in the adobe walls. Already the air smelled of gunpowder.
“Lord a’mighty.” Jerusha stood at Rose’s shoulder. “Sweet Jesus, have mercy on us.”
“Oh, God!” Clara reached down and pulled Rollo from his basket, holding him close.
Rose looked toward Antelope Creek, where a mist thick as smoke hung over the water. Barely visible in the haze, bare-breasted warriors on spotted ponies drove mules and horses, some dragging picket pins, away from the post. Two Indians rode along the flanks keeping the frightened animals together and moving in the right direction.
“They’re stealing the livestock,” Rose said. “They’re not here for us—they’re here for the horses and mules.”
Trover stood in the center of the yard, leaning on his crutch and shouting instructions. Only when the shooting subsided did Major Henry poke his head from his tent. His face was white and sweaty.
“You can come out now, Major,” Anderson said. “It’s safe.”
“I resent your implication, sir,” Henry said, smoothing his thin, ginger-colored hair across his wet forehead. “I’ll have you know I was guarding the payroll.”
Anderson laughed. “Indians aren’t interested in your payroll.”
“They could’ve been road agents disguised as Indians. Such things happen, you know.”
Anderson shook his head, then ordered his troops to saddle the remaining horses still tethered to a picket line just outside the walls. He went to his wife’s bedside, lifting her hand to his lips.
“Oh, Frank,” Clara whispered. “Are they gone? I was so frightened.”
“Yes, they’re gone.” He stroked her hair. “Poor girl. You and Rollo are having the devil’s own time of it.” Anderson touched the baby’s face. “The boy is cool. I believe his fever’s broken.”
“Oh, we’re better today,” Clara said. “Much better. I’m sure of it.”
“Well, let Jerusha fix you a good breakfast,” Anderson said. “Regain your strength. I’ll be back before you know it.”
“Back?” Clara tried to sit. “What do you mean? You can’t mean to go after them!”
Anderson pushed her gently back on the pillow. “I have no choice. We need those animals, we are paralyzed without them. Be brave, Clara.” He kissed her on the lips, Rollo on the forehead. “Take care of our boy. As I said, I’ll be back in no time.” He left without looking back, though Clara called his name. Rose followed him to the door, where she was surprised to see Dixon and Gregory waiting in the ragged line of horsemen.
“Mount up!” Anderson said as he swung into the saddle. “We’ll teach those redskins to steal from the United States Army!” One of Trover’s men, a strapping youth with hair the color of corn silk, stood frozen beside his horse.
“What’s wrong with you?” Anderson said. “Mount your horse!”
Tears rolled down the boy’s face. “I can’t, Lieutenant,” he said. “I’m scairt of Injuns, terrible scairt, ever since I seen what they did to Eyetalian Joe.”
“What’s your name, soldier?” Anderson said.
“Schubert, sir. Otis Schubert.”
“Schubert, you get your sorry ass up on that horse or so help me God I’ll drum you out of here with nothing but a toothpick and the clothes on your back!”
As he spoke three Indians appeared on the ridge across the creek, riding their ponies back and forth and shouting insults. One dismounted and turned his backside toward the watching soldiers, lifting his breechcloth to expose his buttocks. This taunting continued until Anderson’s men, including the ashen Schubert, trotted from the redoubt in columns of two. Dixon broke away at the last minute and rode to Rose at the cabin door.
“Do you have a gun?” he said.
She reached into the pocket tied around her waist and withdrew a .44 caliber Colt with ivory handles. “My brother carried it through the war. He said it brought him luck.”
“Do you know how to use it?” Dixon said.
She nodded, and their eyes met in a powerful exchange of feeling. Rose was unprepared for the emotion that welled inside her. She should turn away, she knew that, but she did not want to. She was sorry when the moment ended, when he turned his horse and joined the others.
Rose made sure all six of the revolver’s chambers were filled and clicked the cylinder back into place. If the time came, could she send a bullet crashing into human—even Indian—flesh and bone? She returned the revolver to her pocket and reentered the cabin.
Chapter Thirteen
Time passed slowly. Rose made oatmeal for breakfast and forced Clara to take a few swallows. Rollo could manage nothing more than a few fe
eble pulls on his water bottle. The child was dying, Rose felt certain of that.
Trover’s little cabin was surprisingly comfortable and well-furnished. The earthen floor was carpeted with grain sacks sewn together and pegged down at the corners. Red woolen blankets hung on the chinked log walls provided color and warmth. A small stove stood against one wall and a sturdy bunk, occupied by Clara and Rollo, was built into another. There was a tin washbasin and pan of brown soap on a table by the door with a clean towel and shaving mirror hanging from nails above. Curtains of a sky-blue fabric hung at the cabin’s lone window and the morning sun shining through them produced a pleasant, watery light.
Jerusha took Rollo from the bed and unpinned his napkin. The child was so dry it scarcely needed changing.
“It’s here,” she said.
“What do you mean?” Rose sat beside Clara on the bed, sponging her head, neck and shoulders. Her breath was so foul Rose had to turn her head.
“That time I told you about,” Jerusha said. “The time of testin’.”
They had spent many hours together but Rose realized did not know Jerusha at all. At one time she had hoped the two could be companions, friends to one another but it had gradually become clear to her, for whatever reason, this would not happen.
“Jerusha,” Rose said, “I’ve often wondered . . . my husband offered you freedom after the war. Why didn’t you take it? Why are you here? Please, speak freely.”
Jerusha smiled to herself but did not answer. Instead she lowered her head to the baby in her arms and rocked him gently. “This baby is about to meet our Lord.”
Rose looked down at Clara, thinking his mother would soon follow. What a cruel world this is, she thought. Why did this woman and her son have to die while a man like Ranald Henry lives on? Maybe if she had faith, if she had attended church as her grandmother wanted, she could know the answer to these questions.
Suddenly she was desperate to escape the cabin’s tomblike atmosphere. “I’m going for water,” she said, picking up the empty bucket and walking out into the yard. The morning sun was dazzling. She shielded her eyes with her free hand and saw Trover on the sandbag parapet looking through field glasses. He seemed very intent.
Curious, Rose dropped the bucket and climbed onto the sentry walk. Two soldiers with coils of rope wound over their shoulders were splashing across Antelope Creek to collect the remains of the mule herd, the sorry few that were too old or infirm to run with the rest. An Indian’s body lay on the slope of ground between the redoubt and the creek. He was on his back with his arms fully extended, like Jesus on the cross, his head turned at an unnatural angle. Trover turned to a tall, hard-faced man next to him. “Mike, get on out there, help Skinny and Pat with those mules. Take Reuben with you.”
“Me?” The soldier, Reuben, had wiry red hair and a head several sizes too small for his body. “Why me?”
Mike jumped down and clapped a dirty hand on Reuben’s shoulder. “C’mon, Rube,” he said. “Me and you is gonna get us a scalp!” He slapped the sheathed knife hanging from his cartridge belt. “And we’ll take some fingers too. Make us a necklace like them Cheyenne bucks wear.”
Clara and Rollo temporarily forgotten, Rose stayed on the walk watching the soldiers. When they reached the Indian’s body Mike kicked it with his square-toed boot then dropped to his knees beside the corpse. He unsheathed his knife, grabbed a fistful of the warrior’s long, unbraided hair, and began to cut, beginning behind the left ear. Rose turned away. “You permit such things, Mr. Trover?” she said.
He responded without lowering his glasses. “Once I would not have, Mrs. Reynolds. Now it hardly seems to matter.”
When the scalping was complete, Mike hopped around the body in an imitation of an Indian war dance, waving the bloody thing above his head for the benefit of spectators in the redoubt.
“Get on with it, dammit!” Trover shouted.
With a shrug, Mike tied the scalp to his belt, picked up his carbine, and waded into the shallow water of Antelope Creek. Reuben, who had not participated in the scalp dance, followed. Meanwhile, a sentry called Trover’s attention to a cloud of dust rising above the brown hills to the north. Trover trained his field glasses on horsemen cresting the ridge. “It’s Anderson,” he said, “coming like the devil himself is on his heels.”
Rose felt for the revolver at her waist as Trover swung his field glasses to a ravine east of the redoubt. Swearing, he dropped the glasses and called to Mike and Reuben, now halfway across the creek. “Come back!” he shouted, making wild windmilling motions with his arm. “Run for it!”
The two men turned and started back toward the redoubt, but the others, Pat and Skinny, were fixing a rope line in the cottonwood thicket on the far side of the creek and out of earshot.
Ellen heard the blast of a bugle and warriors sprang from the ravine to fire at the four soldiers caught outside the walls. Mike and Reuben splashed through the creek as bullets sent up fan-shaped sprays of water and gravel. They raced through the gates and immediately took up arms to help defend Skinny and Pat.
Now the Indians trained all their fire on these two, and the futility of their position was obvious. They burst from the scrub and floundered into the water. Pat flung aside his carbine as he ran but Skinny, tall and skeletal, paused in his flight to take a shot. Trover’s men kept up a steady covering fire, with every man in the redoubt, even the Mexican teamsters, helping out. To the north, Anderson’s men rode for the redoubt at top speed pursued by at least fifty warriors. They gained steadily on the soldiers, whose underfed horses were played out.
Trover called down to Rose. “Take cover in the cabin, Mrs. Reynolds. Now!”
Frightened though she was, Rose could not retreat like an animal to its hole. Somehow she had to participate in her own defense. “I have a gun,” she said, showing her weapon, “and I can use it.”
“Suit yourself,” Trover said. “I warned you.”
By now Pat had cleared the creek and was starting the final dash to the redoubt. Skinny still struggled through the water, a dark stain spreading on his thigh. He was nearing the bank when he threw up his arms and pitched forward, falling to his knees in the stream with an arrow protruding from his back. When he finally managed to get to his feet his coat was black with blood and water. “Pat!” he cried. “Come back. Don’t leave me, you little shit!”
Pat turned and took one step in Skinny’s direction, but an arrow grazed the front of his blouse, tearing the fabric. He broke and ran for the redoubt and through the gate without slowing. Skinny staggered forward out of the water before a bullet struck him in the leg. He fell again. “Help me!” he yelled. “Please, somebody help me!”
Now the Indians turned their fire on Anderson’s men, thundering forward in a white cloud of dust. Pat stood beside Rose on the sentry walk, his eyes fixed on Skinny, who was slowly dragging himself forward. Rose heard a strangled sound and saw Pat was crying. “Come on, Skinny,” he whispered. “Please, come on.”
The first of Anderson’s men reached the creek. Jack Gregory rode at the head of the column but at the last minute his Appaloosa stallion reared and refused to enter the water. Gregory applied his spurs to the horse’s flanks and at last the animal surged forward, plunging through the stream. Once across Gregory galloped to Skinny, dismounting before his horse had fully stopped. He lifted the wounded man easily as a sack of grain and tossed him across the saddle but as he put a foot in the stirrup to remount, an arrow brushed the stallion’s shoulder, causing him to wheel in circles with Gregory hopping alongside. Rose gasped, sure the animal would fall, crushing both men, or bolt and carry Skinny into enemy hands, but somehow Gregory managed to gain his seat and control of the horse. The soldiers in the redoubt cheered as he and Skinny rode through the gates.
“I was wrong about you, Jack,” Skinny said as the scout lowered him to the ground. “I’ll never call you harelip again, I swear it.”
By now the rest of Anderson’s men were fording the creek
. Rose found Dixon, with a Henry rifle, at the rear of the column. As she watched he shot two Indians off their horses. One of the first soldiers to clear the water took an arrow in the back. He fell from his horse, catching a boot in the stirrup. Terrified, the animal ran blindly, dragging the soldier toward the Indians. Rose looked on in horror as he struggled unsuccessfully to free himself, each bounce along the rocky streambed driving the arrow deeper into his flesh.
Finally he worked his boot free. The horse, bleeding from wounds in the withers and flanks, continued running with the saddle turned under his belly. The soldier managed to gain his feet—Rose recognized the man with the yellow teeth who had saddled Carl for her the day of the sandstorm—but his leg was bent at an unnatural angle and would not support his weight. He fell to his hands and knees and tried to scuttle to the redoubt like a sand crab but before he made even ten yards a warrior was on him. The soldier screamed and raised an arm as the Indian lifted his heavy war club and, with one powerful swing, crushed the man’s head, rotten teeth flying from his mouth like seeds.
Anderson’s men, singly or in groups of two or three, ran their horses through the gates and into the yard. Dixon triaged the wounded as the others joined the defense, firing on the Indians who were now circling the redoubt on painted ponies.
Their horses careened through the redoubt, endangering the wounded. Trover ordered Pat, still beside Rose on the walk, to control them. Even as he spoke, a bullet hit Pat squarely between the eyes. He stiffened, then pitched forward into Rose’s arms. She heard a woman screaming as Pat’s body slid down hers, leaving a trail of blood and brains on her dress. Only when it stopped did Rose realize the screaming woman was she.
Chapter Fourteen
The sun was a blister in the sky. By noon the thermometer had climbed to 107 degrees. Each person was allowed one-half dipper of water every hour and the suffering animals got none. Anderson posted a soldier at each of the three water barrels to prevent stealing.
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