Hell Hath No Fury

by Charles G. West

  Pickets were set for the night and the patrol bedded down, intent upon getting an early start the next morning. The night passed peacefully enough and they were underway again before sunup with just enough light to see the tracks they followed. The scouts were sent out up ahead of the column as it approached the mountains, still capped with snow from the winter just past.

  The trail led them around the east side of the mountains for a distance of about two miles before turning to follow a ravine up to a shelf thick with pines. The narrow trail that led through the pines was not wide enough for two men to ride abreast. The scouts were forced to meet at the head of the trail to decide what to do. “I think we’re gettin’ close,” Hawk offered his opinion.

  “Yeah?” Nestor responded. “What makes you think that?”

  “I smell smoke,” Hawk answered. “And if you listen real good, you can hear a waterfall through those trees up ahead, about halfway up the mountain.”

  “Yeah, I’ve been smellin’ that smoke for quite a while now, and I can hear that waterfall,” Nestor claimed. “I didn’t figure you heard it.” In truth he hadn’t smelled smoke and he couldn’t hear a waterfall, but he would never admit that to a man he so despised. Thinking now that they might be approaching the Sioux camp, they could find themselves caught in an ambush. That trail looked so narrow that, if it opened into a clearing, there could very well be a Sioux welcoming committee waiting with rifles. Never one to stick his neck out if he could help it, Nestor said, “One of us will have to go back to tell the lieutenant what the setup is. I reckon I’ll do that, since you’re the one that found this trail.”

  “Yeah,” Hawk said. “One of us had better go back to bring the patrol up to this ledge. I’ll follow this trail a little farther and see where it comes out.”

  “Yeah,” Nestor said. “Good idea, you see where this trail leads.” And maybe if I’m lucky, you can get your ass shot off, he thought. He backed his horse away to give it room to turn around and rode back down the ravine.

  Hawk watched him ride away until he was out of sight. That’s right, you lyin’ son of a bitch, he thought, you go on back and get the soldiers. Nestor hadn’t smelled any smoke and he didn’t hear any sound of a waterfall—and neither did he. He was confident that there was a Sioux camp where this narrow path through the pines came out on a grassy expanse by a small pond created by the rapid flow of the stream from above it. He knew this because he had camped there, himself, while hunting in these mountains. It was well known by the Blackfoot, and apparently by the Lakota Sioux as well. And he knew the party he followed was going there as soon as they turned up into the ravine. Now, with Nestor out of his way, he could follow this trail and see who was camping by the pond.

  With the gentle slap of pine boughs against his arms and shoulders, Hawk nudged Rascal forward, following the narrow passage so thick with pine trees that the sun was blocked out. The only sound coming to his ears was the gentle plodding of Rascal’s hooves on the thick carpet of pine needles. He proceeded for about fifty yards before seeing the sunlight filtering through the opening ahead. He dismounted then and walked to the opening, leading his horse behind him. From that point on, it was wise to be cautious. He remembered this place well and knew there was still plenty of cover in the meadow beyond in the form of two rock formations that jutted out from the face of the mountain. When he reached the opening, he looped the buckskin’s reins around a pine bough, drew his rifle, and checked the load. Then he ran across the open expanse of grass to the first of the rocky outcroppings. From this point, he was able to see the camp, but he needed to get closer. He could see a fire with some people around it, but they all looked to be women and children.

  Another expanse of grass, this one about thirty yards wide, would have to be crossed before reaching the second rocky outcropping. He paused to scan the area before him. It appeared to be a peaceful camp. No one seemed to be alert to the possibility of attack. He took a deep breath and sprinted across the grass to the rocks beyond. After a couple of minutes waiting, it appeared that no one around the fire had noticed him. From this position he had a better view of the camp. He could see their ponies grazing on the far side of the pond and children running among them, playing. Where were the men? Then he spotted a couple of old men who appeared to be staking meat out to be smoked. He was not sure, but he felt as if he had seen one of them before. Straining to see more, he noticed a boy of perhaps twelve or thirteen standing by the fire. This was hardly a war party, and as he peered at the boy and the women, he was struck with a stunning realization. These were not Lakota Sioux. They were Blackfeet! He looked again at the old man and realized that he had seen him in Walking Owl’s village when he had hunted with his friend Bloody Hand. He had lived with the Blackfeet. Seeing this pitiful gathering of old men, women, and children, his first inclination was to shout out to them, tell them to get on their ponies and run. But he knew it was inevitable they would be caught, and he would be instrumental in bringing the soldiers down upon them.

  His mind was racing, for he had to do something quickly. He didn’t have much time. Conner and his men were waiting at the base of the mountain for word from his scouts. How long would it take Nestor to get back down to get them? Knowing it would be one hell of a long shot to pull off, he decided to do the only thing he could think of at the moment to keep his Blackfoot friends from being hauled back to Fort Ellis. He was well aware that he was risking his employment with the army. “To hell with it,” he muttered, and stepped out from behind the rocks. “Hey-yo,” he called out, and strode boldly toward the small gathering around the fire. “I am a friend.”

  Their reaction was swift, but nonthreatening, for there was not one firearm in the party of old men, women, and children. Armed only with bows and knives, several old men and the few boys old enough to use them, stood ready to defend their camp. “Hawk!” one of the old men called out, recognizing the scout as a friend of Walking Owl’s. He came forward to meet Hawk, telling the others as he walked that there was nothing to fear from the white man. To Hawk, he said, “Welcome. My name is Big Otter. You came to our village on the Musselshell with Bloody Hand. We have fresh meat. Come and eat with us.”

  Hawk remembered then why the old man had looked familiar to him. It was two years ago when he and Bloody Hand visited Big Otter’s village. Now he couldn’t help wondering what had happened to the rest of the village, if this handful of desperate people was all that remained. There was no time to catch up at the moment, however. Somewhere on the other side of that thick belt of pine trees, Lieutenant Conner with a scout and fifteen soldiers were even now making their way up the mountain. “Big Otter,” he greeted him hurriedly. “Thank you, but there is no time to talk.” He paused just a moment to make sure of his Blackfoot words. “Close behind me, the soldiers come. They come to punish those who stole the cattle.”

  Big Otter, as well as those close enough to hear, reacted immediately with gasps of alarm. Hawk could see that they were completely surprised, probably thinking that they had lost the soldiers at the river. At once frightened, the women began to run to gather their children, preparing to escape into the pines. “Wait,” Hawk said. “How much of the meat has been prepared?”

  “Most of it,” Big Otter answered, and turned to get a nod of confirmation from another old Blackfoot man, who had joined them by then. “It is wrapped in the hides and ready to pack on the horses.”

  “Where are the heads and hooves of the cows?”

  “In a big hole on the other side of the pond, near the horses,” Big Otter replied. Again his friend nodded excitedly.

  “All right,” Hawk said, talking to both of them now. “Here’s what we’ve got to do and it has to be quick.” Having to hesitate now and again to make sure he was using the right words, and not slipping into the Crow tongue, he told them what they must do to keep from being arrested. Eager to do his bidding, for they had no protection against a cavalry patrol, the whole camp followed his orders without question. They
had accomplished about as much as they could before Nestor had gotten back to report to Conner that he spotted Hawk’s horse tied to a tree near the end of the path.

  “Where the hell is Hawk?” Lieutenant Conner asked when Nestor reported. “You sure that was his horse you saw and not some Sioux pony?”

  “It’s his horse, all right,” Nestor replied, “that buckskin he loves so damn much.”

  “But no sign of Hawk?”

  “No, sir. Course, his horse was tied near-bout at the end of this damn pine tunnel we’ve been movin’ through. And I couldn’t see what was on the other side of that horse, but it was in the open. That Sioux war party coulda been waitin’ for me to step out of them pines, but I ain’t that dumb.”

  Conner thought about that for a moment before continuing. He could well understand why Hawk had no use for the man. “You do know why we employ scouts, don’t you?”

  “Sure, I do,” Nestor replied, oblivious to the sarcasm in Conner’s tone. “You need us to find the Injuns for you, not to get ourselves killed.”

  “All right, let’s get moving,” Conner said, his patience with the obnoxious scout exhausted. He turned in the saddle and signaled the column forward. When they neared the end of the forest trail, they saw the opening out onto the grassy meadow, but there was no sign of Hawk’s horse. Conner halted the column, thinking it best to take no chance on the possibility his men might be riding single file into a wall of rifle fire.

  “I’ll go take a look, sir,” Corporal Johnson said when Nestor showed no inclination to, and Conner motioned him on. Johnson was back within minutes. “Hawk’s standin’ about fifty yards away near a pond. Looks like he’s talkin’ to some Injuns standin’ around a fire. Don’t look like he’s in any trouble. They’re just talkin’.”

  Conner looked at Nestor. There was no effort to hide the disgust in his face. “You could have told me that, if you’d gone all the way to the opening when you were here before.”

  “Like I said,” Nestor replied, “I ain’t gettin’ paid to get shot.”

  Conner gave the order to proceed, along with a precautionary order to load their carbines, and the column rode out into the mountain meadow. Hawk turned and waved them over. “Looks like we got our trails mixed up somewhere back on the Yellowstone, Lieutenant. These folks ain’t Sioux, they’re Blackfoot. This is Big Otter. He says they ran across some tracks of a party about the same size as theirs. I reckon we tied onto the wrong band.”

  Conner didn’t say anything for a long moment while his eyes swept across the gathering of women and children staring back at him with eyes wide and uncertain. He returned his gaze to Hawk, who was watching him and waiting. “What’s in the packs loaded on those horses?”

  “Meat,” Hawk answered. “Deer meat. Big Otter said they lucked up on a big herd a couple days ago—made a big killin’.” He pointed to the one boy in his teens, who made it a point to stand close to Big Otter, fiddling idly with a deer hoof. “That’s Broken Wing,” Hawk continued. “He got his share of the deer.” Hawk could sense Conner’s skepticism and feared he had not prepared the Indians enough.

  “All with bow and arrow,” Conner remarked.

  “Yes, sir,” Hawk replied. “These boys can shoot.”

  Back to the meat loaded on the horses, Conner remarked, “It looks like they wrapped all that meat in the deer hides. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen Indians wrap meat with the fur inside like that. Is there a reason to have the fur touching the meat?”

  Damn, Conner, Hawk thought. How many more questions are you going to ask? What the hell do you care how they handle the meat? To the lieutenant, he answered, “They just do that sometimes when it might be a while before they get it back home—keeps it cooler.” Noticing the wry smirk across Conner’s face, it struck him then. The son of a bitch is playing with me. He knows what’s going on, and he just wants to make me sweat. He suddenly realized that Conner was going to go along with his attempt to save his Blackfoot friends. He knew about Hawk’s friendship with the Blackfoot Indians. As soon as he released a sigh of relief, he was startled by the lieutenant’s next comment.

  “It’s been a while since I’ve tasted venison. Maybe your friends might want to share some of their fresh kill. We could leave them some of our salt pork in exchange—give us both a change.” Hawk tensed. He could dare not look at Big Otter, afraid he would see the panic in his eyes, for the old Indian understood a little English. Before Hawk could answer, however, Conner said, “On second thought, I don’t think we’ll take the time for it. We’ve already spent too much of the army’s time chasing the wrong Indians. Johnson, turn ’em around and let’s get the hell out of here.” As he wheeled his horse, he favored Hawk with an amused smile. “You coming, Hawk?”

  “I’ll be along,” Hawk replied. He decided at that moment that Mathew Conner was a man with the right moral compass and was a friend of John Hawk’s. He whistled for Rascal and while he waited for the buckskin to trot over from the pond, he said farewell to Big Otter. The old Blackfoot was well aware of the chance Hawk had taken and thanked him for his compassion. “You can thank that lieutenant, too,” Hawk said to him. “He could have taken all that meat from you and probably hauled you and two or three others to prison.” He would have warned him not to steal cattle, but knew that when the food got scarce, they would take it wherever it was and whoever it belonged to. “Where are the young men?” Hawk asked, and was told they had moved north to avoid being sent to the reservation. “Why did you people not go with them?”

  “We are too old to make a new place across the medicine line in Canada,” Big Otter said. “There were some women and small children left behind also and we didn’t want them to live on the reservation. So we live as we have always lived, but my eyes are old and can no longer aim my bow as I did when I was a young man.”

  Hawk felt compassion for the old man’s plight, but there was nothing he could do to help. “I must go,” he said, and stepped up into the saddle. “Just be careful when you steal the white man’s cattle.”

  CHAPTER 2

  “How many cows did that fellow say the Indians stole of his?” Lieutenant Conner asked Hawk when they stopped to rest the horses.

  “He said six,” Hawk replied. “But I figure it was more like three or four.” He didn’t tell the lieutenant the reason he thought that was because the Blackfoot camp had only four horses loaded heavily. He was still not ready to admit the hoax he attempted to pull on Conner. There was the chance that he had misread Conner’s comments, so why risk it? Conner’s next comment settled that question.

  “Even if there were only three cows stolen,” Conner went on, “I didn’t see that much meat packed on those horses. Where do you suppose the rest of that venison was?” The broad grin on his face was evidence of the enjoyment he was getting from japing the rangy scout.

  “In a gully beyond the pond, settin’ on top of a pile of horns and hooves,” Hawk answered. “They were runnin’ outta time and deerskins,” he said, emphasizing deerskins.

  Conner threw his head back and enjoyed a good laugh. Afterward, he assured Hawk that he wouldn’t let on to anyone that he had a compassionate spot in his heart. Easing up on his teasing then, he turned to more serious talk. “We wasted a helluva lot of time running this little group of Blackfoot down. My mission was to track that Sioux raiding party that burned a farmhouse to the ground and ran his stock off. I thought sure we were on their trail when we got the word about the cows. Unless Meade had better luck than we have, those Sioux are still gonna be killing and robbing settlers up and down the Yellowstone. We’ve only got rations for three more days. I wish to hell we could run across those Sioux before I have to take this patrol back to Fort Ellis. Have you got any notions where they might show up?”

  Hawk shook his head slowly. “I ain’t got any idea. I don’t think they know where they’re gonna show up. From the way they’ve been bouncin’ back and forth across the Yellowstone, it looks to me like they’re just keepin’ o
n the move, hittin’ everything they stumble on. Go north, go south, whatever notion strikes ’em.”

  Conner nodded thoughtfully. Hawk was right, of course. This band of warriors was just out to raise as much hell as they could, take as many horses as they could steal, and kill any white man they stumbled across. Conner didn’t know what to do except to return to Fort Ellis and see if there were any further reports on the whereabouts of the hostiles. Possibly Lieutenant Meade, who led another patrol, might have had better luck. “Well,” he decided, “we’ll head back to Ellis in the morning. With the rations we’ve got left, we can take an extra day and ride south to Three Forks, then swing back east from there.”

  “Headin’ back to Bozeman, are we?” Roy Nestor asked, having heard Conner’s last remark as he walked up to join them. “Too bad about them Blackfoot. I knew we’d run off in the wrong direction when you found their tracks. I coulda told you it warn’t the same trail we started out on. I’da picked up them Sioux again if I hadn’t had to come back to see what happened to you. I reckon we could go back and pick it up again, but it’s been too long now.”

  “I reckon we shoulda checked with you before startin’ out after that party of Blackfoot.” Hawk couldn’t help a snide reply.

  “Might have, at that,” Nestor was quick to agree. “Didn’t do us a helluva lotta good trackin’ down a party of old men and women, did it?”