Eyes of Eagles

by William W. Johnstone

  “I ain’t met the boy as yet,” Burl said to his two friends. Just about his only friends. “But ever’body says he’s a right nice boy. Big for his age and sol-emnlike.”

  “Well, you got to talk to him, Burl,” John said. “And since we’re your duly sworn deputies, we’ll ride along with you out to the Montgomery place. I think once you talk to him, you’ll see what me and Hart already know: he’s an Injun. And we don’t want no damn Injuns around here.”

  John and Hart were sworn deputies, albeit unpaid ones. However, they both knew that few in the community took them very seriously.

  Burl checked on his prisoners before he locked up the sturdy log jail. Both men were in leg irons and behind bars, and that, coupled with their wounds, insured that they were not going anywhere. The “doctor,” actually a barber and bartender by profession, had to dig and cut the arrowheads out of the rump and leg of the Saxon brothers. Not a very pleasant experience. The brothers lay on their bunks and suffered with a great deal of loud complaining.

  “Be a relief just to get away from those two,” Sheriff Marwick said, as he locked the outer door. It was a long ride out to the Montgomery place, and Burl was not a good horseman. By the time he arrived, his “deputies” with him, the sheriff was not in a good mood.

  And John had been right: Burl took an immediate dislike to Jamie. The boy was big for his age, and there was cold defiance in those pale eyes. And something else, too: the boy was not afraid of him. That was unsettling to Burl. He’d never met a boy who wasn’t afraid of, if not the man, as least the badge pinned on the outside of his black coat. But not this boy. And Burl had never been comfortable in the Montgomery home. It was too fancy for his tastes.

  Burl questioned the boy, and got the same story as he had earlier from Sam Montgomery.

  “Let fly them arrows a bit quick, I’d say,” Hart Olmstead said.

  “You weren’t here,” Jamie said, meeting the man’s gaze. “So how would you know?”

  “Don’t you sass me, you smart-mouthed half Injun pup!” Hart said.

  “That’ll do, Hart!” Sam stepped between them. “You’re forgetting that you are in my home. I’ll not permit you to browbeat this boy.”

  “I’m an officer of the law, Sam. You interfere with my questionin’ of this boy and I’ll put you behind bars.”

  “I’d like to see you try that, Hart,” Sam’s words were quietly offered. But they were edged with tempered steel. “As far as you being an officer of the law, you’re nothing but a joke. You and John both. Now get out of my house.”

  Hart Olmstead marched to the front door of the fine home near the edge of wilderness, his boots thudding heavily. At the door, he turned and pointed a blunt finger at Sam. “I’ll thrash no man in front of a good woman, Sam Montgomery, and your Sarah is a good woman. But I give you warnin’ now, first time I see you alone in town, I’d challenge you to fists, by God.”

  Sam stiffened in anger. He was not as big as Hart Olmstead, but was very strong. And Jamie suspected, from looking at Sam’s big, flat-knuckled hands, the man knew how to fight.

  “Sam ...” Sarah said.

  “Stay out of this, Sarah. I’ll have no man throw down a challenge and expect me to stand by and do nothing. Get outside, Olmstead. I am going to teach you a lesson you will never forget.” Sam had no way of knowing how prophetic his words would turn out to be.

  Hart Olmstead’s face turned first chalk white and then beet red. He very nearly tore the door down getting out of the home. Sam Montgomery removed his coat and took off his shirt. His muscles fairly rippled as he flexed his arms. He winked at Jamie. “I don’t hold with fighting, lad. But there comes a time when a man must fight for what he believes in. Sarah, would you be so kind as to grind some beans and have a fresh pot of coffee for me. And also have some hot water to bathe my cuts and bruises. Mr. Olmstead is a brute, and I shall not come out of this unscathed.”

  Sarah waited until the heavy bell stopped ringing in the front yard.

  “Certainly,” Sarah said, her face pale. She cut her eyes to Jamie. “The boy...”

  “The boy has been a man for some time, I suspect. He will be outside, with me.”

  “Why the bell, Sam?” Sarah asked.

  “Olmstead wants everyone in our community to be here to see me receive a thrashing at his hands. I am afraid he is to be sorely disappointed. Sorely, in more ways than one,” he added with a small smile.

  Sam and Jamie walked out of the house while the neighbors were gathering. The women hurried into the house. In the front yard, Sam said, “Get away from Sarah’s flowers. I don’t want them trampled on.” Sam walked out of the yard and to the side of the road. “Get over here, Olmstead, and toe the mark.”

  Jamie looked back at the home. All the women had gathered at the windows and thrown open the shutters. He turned to look at Hart Olmstead. Sam had been right; the man was a brute, with massive shoulders and arms. And Jamie could tell he was spoiling for a fight.

  Olmstead spat on the ground and lifted his fists. “Now, rich boy, you’ll get your comeuppance. I intend to knock you off that ivory tower you sit on like a king.”

  Jamie had been right in guessing that Sam Montgomery was a man of substance. And people like John Jackson and Hart Olmstead always resented those with money.

  Jamie’s pa had told him that.

  Unbeknownst to anyone, Jamie had taken a pistol from Sam’s holster that hung from a peg in the hallway and shoved it behind his belt and pulled out his shirttail to cover the butt. He didn’t trust the sheriff or John Jackson. He believed neither of them to be honorable men.

  Hart walked up to Sam and Sam hit him twice in the face before Hart could blink. The blows were powerful ones that rocked Hart’s head back and bloodied the bigger man’s lips and nose.

  Hart cursed Sam and took a wild swing that, had it connected, would have done some damage. Sam ducked under the whistling fist and struck Hart a terrible blow to the stomach. The air wheezed out of Olmstead and before he could recover, Sam had knocked him down in the mud with a hard left.

  “I’m probably making a bad mistake, but I’ll not put the boots to you, Olmstead,” Sam told him, backing up and giving the man room. “Although if the position were reversed, I believe you would not hesitate to kick me.”

  Hart Olmstead rose slowly to his feet, hate and fury in his eyes and on his bloody face. “No man does this to me,” he panted the words. “No man!”

  “I just did,” Sam spoke calmly. “But it need not continue. Whether it does or not, depends entirely on you.”

  With a roar of rage and a wild obscenity on his lips, Hart charged Sam, hoping to get him in a bear hug and crush some ribs. But Sam had anticipated that and merely stepped to one side and tripped the bigger and heavier man, sending him crashing to the ground, sliding in the mud for a few feet, on his belly, chest, and face.

  The men all laughed and that made Hart Olmstead even angrier. “Damn you all!” he screamed, getting to his knees and squatting there in the mud and the blood. “I’m an officer of the law in this county. I demand respect. And I command the whole damn lot of you to stop laughing.”

  That brought even more laughter and hoots and catcalls of derision from the crowd of men. Over it all, Jamie could faintly hear giggling coming from the house. Jamie cut his eyes to Sheriff Marwick. The man looked embarrassed.

  Hart got to his feet and the man was a mess, mud and blood dripping from him. Sam stood nonchalantly, still neat as a pin. He had not even broken a sweat.

  “Give this up, Hart,” Sam said. “We’ll call it a draw and shake hands and you can clean up over yonder at the rain barrel. What say you, Hart?”

  “I’ll kill you!” Hart screamed, and rushed at Sam.

  Hart was swinging both fists and they both connected against Sam, knocking the man backward and bloodying his lips. Sam regained his balance and clubbed the maddened Olmstead hard on the back of the neck, knocking him down. Olmstead was up on his feet fast and rushed
Sam. For a moment, the two men stood toe to toe and slugged it out, both of them landing hard punches.

  But soon Sam’s blows began to have an effect on Olmstead, backing the man up, blood streaming from the man’s mouth and nose. Olmstead’s lips were pulped and his nose was nearly flat.

  Hart back-heeled Sam and sent him crashing to the ground. Hart tried to put the boots to the smaller man and Sam rolled away, jumping to his feet. Hart rushed him and Sam stopped the man cold in his tracks with a solid left and right to both sides of the man’s jaw. Hart’s knees wobbled and Sam bored in relentlessly, hammering hard with blows to the head and the body.

  Hart covered up his face and backed away, trying to clear his head and recover his waning strength. But Sam pressed him, hitting hard with body blows. Hart lowered his fists to protect his bruised and aching belly and Sam wound up a right and blasted the big man flush in the mouth, following that with a left that when it landed sounded like someone hit a watermelon with the flat side of an axe. Hart’s eyes rolled back and he went down to his knees in the churned-up mud. He stayed on his knees for a few seconds, then slowly toppled over, face first in the rutted road.

  The crowd stood silent, but every man there had a smile on his lips. And that did not go unnoticed by Sheriff Marwick and John Jackson. It was at that point when Jackson realized just how much he and Marwick and Olmstead were disliked by the members of the community.

  “Is anybody gonna help me get Hart to his feet?” Marwick said, walking over to the unconscious Olmstead.

  No one in the crowd made a move.

  Jamie felt eyes on him and turned his head. John Jackson was staring straight at him, the hate shining bright and hard. Jamie knew then, but did not know why, that he had made a terrible enemy of the man.

  Sheriff Marwick dragged Hart Olmstead off the road while Jackson fetched a bucket of water from the well. Sam was drying his face and upper body with a rag one of the neighbors had handed him. Jackson poured the bucket of well water on Olmstead’s head and the man groaned and rolled over. Jamie had never before witnessed such a beating as this one — and he was not alone, neither had most of the others present.

  Hart Olmstead’s face was cut, battered, bruised, and bloody. One eye was completely closed and one ear swollen nearly three times its normal size. His lips were swollen and his nose was mashed all over the center of his face. On his bare torso, there were huge splotches of red and blue/green where Sam’s fists had landed.

  Olmstead moaned and sat up, with a little help from Marwick. Through his one good eye, he glared balefully first at Sam Montgomery then at Jamie. He didn’t have to say a word. The eye spoke silent hatred.

  “This is not over, Montgomery,” Hart pushed the words past swollen lips.

  “It is as far as I am concerned,” Sam told him, slipping into his shirt he’d hung on the split-rail fence.

  “I’ll kill you someday,” Hart said.

  “Shut up, Hart,” Sheriff Marwick told him. “Don’t talk like that.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Hart said to Sam.

  Sam stiffened, for that was an insult that warranted killing.

  “He didn’t necessarily say that to you, Sam!” John Jackson said hurriedly. “Just take it easy, Sam. Your name wasn’t connected with that oath.”

  “That’s true, Sam,” a neighbor said. He looked at Hart, now standing on his feet, leaning against the sheriff. “You best clear this up, Olmstead. Did you hurl that insult at Sam?”

  Hart stood for a few seconds, then slowly shook his head. He was in no shape for a pistol affair, and he knew it. “No. Of course not.”

  “I’ll accept that,” Sam said.

  Both Marwick and Jackson breathed a bit easier. Neither of them wanted to see a duel between Sam and Hart. Dueling was still very common. It had not been that many years back that Andrew Jackson and Thomas Hart Benton had gone at each other with pistol and dirk in a Nashville, Tennessee, hotel, with Jackson coming out on the short end of that fight.

  It took both Marwick and John Jackson to get Olmstead into the saddle, with Olmstead muttering fearful curses, carefully directed at no one in particular. Olmstead did not once look at Sam. John passed the reins to him and then the men climbed onto their mounts and started slowly up the road.

  “No good will come of this,” Sam said to no one in particular. “I have just made a mortal enemy, for Hart Olmstead is a good hater.”

  “You whipped him fair, Sam,” Luke said. “You did not use no boots on him nor bitin’ or eye-gougin’.”

  “That’s the problem, Luke. I whipped him. And he’ll not forget it. Not ever.”

  “You men gather over yonder under the shade tree,” Sarah called from the open door to the house. “We’ll bring coffee and bread and molasses out. I don’t want you stomping around in this house with your muddy boots.”

  “By the Lord!” Mason said. “That was a good fight, it was. I don’t recall ever seein’ none better.”

  While the men laughed and gathered under the huge old tree by the side of the house, Jamie slipped inside and put Sam’s pistol back into the holster, then quickly rejoined the men as Sarah and the other ladies were bringing out refreshments.

  Sam sidled over to Jamie and whispered, “Did you put my pistol back, Jamie?”

  Without changing expression, Jamie said, “Yes, sir.”

  “Would you have used it, lad?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Ummm,” was all Sam ever said about that.

  Five

  The following morning, Jamie started doing chores before Sam or Sarah were even out of bed. He had not forgotten how to milk — but he had forgotten how a tail full of burrs felt when it came in fast and hard contact with the side of his head — and had the cow milked, the hogs slopped, the eggs gathered, and firewood stacked neatly when a still tousled-haired and sleepy-eyed Sam stuck his head out the back door and called to him.

  “Yes, sir?” Jamie said, walking up to the back door of the home.

  “How long have you been up, lad?”

  “Since the cow started lowing.”

  Sam smiled. “That fight yesterday must have taken more out of me than I thought. Well . . . Sarah says to tell you that breakfast will be ready in a few minutes. Why don’t you come on inside and help me grind the beans and we’ll have some coffee in no time.”

  “All right, sir.”

  Sam did not say anything about the way Jamie was dressed. In his buckskins. It was not that it was unusual dress for the time, for many men still wore skins, but for Jamie... he would have to somehow point out that it would be best if he dressed more like a schoolboy, which he would be in a short time. The sooner the townspeople forgot he had once been a Shawnee captive, the better for everybody. He lifted his gaze. Jamie was seated at the table, watching him.

  The boy was so damn quick it startled Sam.

  “I’ll wear my skins working out here, sir. But I had to save the other clothes. I’ve only got the one set.”

  Sarah gasped as she worked at the stove and Sam closed his eyes and shook his head. “Jamie... I’m sorry. Sarah, how’s about us going into town today? We’ll get Jamie all decked out in store-bought shirts and britches.”

  “What a grand idea!” She whirled around from the stove. “And I have to get some things for the to-do this Saturday night. Yes. We’ll all go into town to Abe Caney’s store. But first the cow has to be milked, the hogs slopped, the eggs...” Her eyes fell on the basket of eggs on a chopping block.

  “Jamie did all that while we were still abed, Sarah,” Sam said softly. “I think we have us a godsend here.”

  “You did it all, Jamie?” Sarah asked.

  “It wasn’t that much. If I didn’t do at least that much before the others got out of their robes back at the Shawnee town, I got a beating, I learned to do things fast and right the first time.”

  Tears sprang into Sarah’s eyes. Sam ducked his head for a few seconds. “You’ll get no beatings here, Jamie,” she said.r />
  Sam lifted his head and there was a twinkle in his eyes. “Besides, I’m not so sure I could whip Jamie.”

  * * *

  Abe Caney pulled Sam off to one side while Sarah was busy shopping. “That must have been some fight out at your place yesterday, Sam. The whole town’s talking about it.”

  “It’s over, Abe. I hope I never have to have another one.”

  But Abe was eager for details. “Where’d you learn to fight, Sam? You’re known as a peaceable man.”

  “My father insisted I learn all forms of self-defense, Abe. From fencing to bare-knuckle boxing. His father knew James Figg, really the first bare-knuckle champion.”

  While Sarah shopped and Sam and Abe chatted, Jamie stood on the porch of the store and watched as several boys walked up the street. He had a hunch they would angle over to him, and they did.

  Jamie did not see the Reverend Hugh Callaway walk up the short street and stop a dozen yards from where Jamie stood, leaning up against a post and sucking on a piece of peppermint candy. Nor did he know that two of the boys were sons of John Jackson and Hart Olmstead. He would learn that very soon.

  “Hey, there’s the Injun boy,” Jubal Olmstead said.

  “Yeah,” Abel Jackson said. “Let’s go over and see if he wants to fight.”

  “You better leave him alone,” the third boy said. “My pa said if I called him names or caused him any trouble, he’d take a piss-elm branch to my butt. And he will, too.”

  “Then you just stand aside and stay out of this,” Abel said. He was built like his father, and had just about as much sense. The three boys were all thirteen years old and as boys were prone to be during that hard and brutal time, they were strong from long hours of chopping wood, clearing timber, moving huge rocks, and putting in back-breaking hours in the fields.