Edge’s voice was as hard as mahogany granite. “So tell the boys to start shooting,” he rasped. “If I turn you loose inside rifle range I’m dead anyway.”
The chief’s reply was a short sentence of Siouan. The nervous brave approached him slowly, passed over the rope bridle then scuttled hurriedly back to join the audience. Edge would have preferred to keep the chief and the rest of the tribe in view, but it would have meant him walking backwards. And he could not afford a stumble. So he side-stepped around another half-circle.
“Nice and easy, feller,” he instructed.
Black Hawk started forward. Edge moved off in his wake with the length of the pony between them. A thousand pairs of moccasined feet shuffled along behind him.
“Don’t think the boys and girls have got the idea,” Edge hissed.
The chief barked out a single syllable and the Indians halted. Edge’s arms were aching from holding the Winchester in the same position for so long. His hands were sticky with the sweat of stress and there were dark stains on his tattered shirt. But with each pace, widening the gap between his itching back and the leveled rifles of the braves Edge’s discomfort lessened. But then, when he and his prisoner were well advanced up the slope towards the ridge, relaxation of tension became a threat. A delayed reaction to his lack of proper rest over so many hours combined with the painful gnaw of hunger to assault him with weakness. The head-dress of the chief became a colorful blur. His legs seemed to be fastened with hanging weights. A buzzing like the sound of thousand hornets filled his skull. He felt ready to drop in his tracks. But the itch between his shoulder blades became a pressure point, as if he could actually feel the weight of the many guns against his flesh. This prodded him into fighting the fatigue.
“How far?” Black Hawk grunted.
“Top’ll be fine,” Edge replied.
“We still catch up with you. You bring disgrace on Black Hawk. Must be avenged. You suffer real bad.”
Edge ignored the threat. Talking disturbed his concentration. The chief’s voice seemed to float in to him from a great distance and his own words had a detached quality in his ears. He gritted his teeth and snapped open both eyes to their fullest extent. He saw only the feathered headdress, which appeared to be floating along in front of him on a sea of blackness which blotted out everything else from his consciousness. But suddenly the chief stopped. Edge halted automatically. He glanced to left and right, then over his shoulder. They had arrived at the top of the rise. The camp fires below were distant pinpricks of red and orange. The Indians had clustered into one enormous group. The moonlight shone on their upturned faces.
“You did a good job,” Edge told Black Hawk, who was immobile, with his back still turned to the half-breed.
“Sioux are patient people,” the chief said. “We wait.”
“I always tip a waiter,” Edge told him, lifted his right leg and kicked out.
The toe of his boot caught the Indian chief in the small of the back and he lurched forward with a cry of alarm. He saw the lip of a ledge before him and unfolded his arms to beat at the air. The rope bridle slipped from his hand and Edge reached out and caught it as the pony reared. Black Hawk’s body was canted too far forward and his momentum was too great for him to save himself. He went head first off the ledge, cartwheeled once on the almost perpendicular cliff-face and thudded to a crushing stop twenty feet below.
A roar of rage exploded from the massed Indians at the foot of the butte, masking the groans of the chief as he stared at the jagged point of his fractured right femur jutting from his thigh.
“Pale face speak with forked tongue!” he bellowed.
Rifle fire sounded from the camp, some of the Indians crouching to aim at the out-of-range target while others broke away at a run towards the corral. Edge swung a long leg over the back of the pony and thudded in his heels, urging the animal off the ledge and down a natural pathway.
“Black Hawk birdbrain to believe!” he yelled as the hoots and hollers of war cries rose from the camp.
He rode as fast as he dared down the rugged slope, guessing that the Sioux brave would not have cut out the best pony from the corral. But the animal was sure-footed enough, ignoring certain jerks on the reins when his own horse sense and sharp eye showed him a safer turn than that indicated by his rider. His weakness showed up on the comparatively flat terrain stretching so many miles towards the forest in the south. He moved well through a trot into a canter, but the promise was not fulfilled when he reached a gallop. He snorted and strained, game to give what his rider demanded, but incapable of the speed Edge needed to outrun the Indians.
Being astride a horse eased the half-breed’s physical fatigue. And he could relegate the need to satisfy hunger to its proper position in the priorities. But the insect-like buzzing continued to fill his head and the blur of speed which was spread over the ground immediately beneath the pony’s pumping hooves extended to the horizons on all sides. So that, when he glanced over his shoulder, the mass of mounted Sioux racing down the side of the butte seemed as one with the gigantic outcrop, as if the rock and earth had turned to seething, boiling mud.
“Bastards killed Beth!” he yelled at himself. “Gotta get him before they get me.”
There had been a score or more braves who raided the cabin and carried his wife away. To be certain he wrought vengeance upon all of those responsible, he would have to kill every brave in the Sioux nation - be they Santee, Teton or Yankton. That was impossible. So he channeled every iota of his hate towards: the tongueless Indian who had appropriated her dress. He was the one who would have to pay for all of them. He fixed in his desperately weary mind a vivid image of the brave’s viciously scarred face and it was this mental exercise which held him on the bare back of the pony - kept him from slumping to the rushing ground, senseless, in the path of the enraged Indians who pursued him.
But something more was needed if he was to survive the headlong chase and live to carry out what he had to do. For relentlessly, with every yard covered by the struggling pony, the shrieking braves were overhauling the white man. He did not look back to see them, but the increasing volume of their high-pitched war cries was evidence enough that they were closing up on him. And the absence of rifle fire told of their intention to capture him alive: Black Hawk’s order that all whites should be slaughtered without delay obviously did not apply to Edge.
At night, the terrain presented a bleaker prospect than it had during the blazing heat of the day. For the shadows thrown by the pale moonlight seemed somehow more menacing and with no shimmering haze clinging to the ground the horizons retreated, enlarging the desolate wasteland and emphasizing the lack of adequate cover. Blurred eyesight, which occasionally cleared and just as often expanded into double vision, added greatly to Edges’ desperate situation.
It was during a period of receiving dual images as he crouched low on the pony, clinging to the stretched neck, that he first saw the soldiers. They were mounted cavalry and there seemed to be a whole battalion of them, grouped at the top of a slight rise a mile or so ahead.
Edge was certain it was an hallucination. He screwed his eyes tight shut and held them so for long seconds. In the self-imposed pitch darkness, the screams and war cries of the Sioux swelled to enormous volume. He tightened his already vice-like grip on the Winchester and tensed himself for the impact when the leading brave leapt at him and knocked him to the ground.
But as the seconds were stretched into hours by the struggling forces of hate, torment and exhaustion in his broiling mind, his head-long dash continued unabated. He started to open his eyes, cracking them against the sting of rushing air. The war cries faded, became faint and ceased. His eyes took in a crystally-clear vista of a twelve-man patrol, jerking from a halt into a full gallop.
He pulled himself upright and twisted his head. He thought every brave in the camp had been sent in pursuit of him. But there were less than twenty of them. They had seen the horse soldiers at the same time as Edge, an
d slowed to consider the new situation with its changed odds.
Rifle fire exploded against the background rumble of shod and unshod hooves. It was the soldiers who had opened up, their bullets whining close by Edge’s head. He went into a low crouch on the pony again, expecting to hear an answering fusillade which would put him in a deadly cross-fire. But it didn’t happen. The group of Sioux split into two sections and veered away in opposite directions. One brave was hurled from his pony, his hip wound proving fatal as his head smashed against the ground, snapping his neck. The other braves in both groups completed a full circle and merged again, racing away, back towards the twin-peaked butte.
“We got ’em on the run!” a young trooper yelled excitedly, exploding a useless bullet towards the retreating Indians as they galloped out of range. “Scared the crap outa ’em.”
As Edge hauled on the reins, bringing the snorting pony to a halt, he doubted that the trooper’s jubilation was based on a correct guess. For under normal circumstances a score of Sioux would have considered themselves more than adequate in a pitched battle with a dozen horse-soldiers. But caught in the middle was Edge, the man Black Hawk wanted alive - and the Sioux chief was too far away to offer guidance under the fresh set of circumstances.
Edge slid from the pony and sat down hard as the animal skidded to a stop. He drew in great gasps of air and tried to yank the knife from the Winchester stock. His inability to complete this simple task revealed the extent of his weakness.
He gave up and waited for the soldiers to arrive, choking and coughing on the dust raised by the sliding and stamping hooves of their horses. The patrol was under the command of a fresh-faced young captain with eager eyes and a jutting jaw line. There was one sergeant and the rest were enlisted men. They looked curiously down at Edge seated on the ground at the side of the pony. He had lost his hat and his long hair was matted and coated with dust.| Crystals of dried sweat salt made highlights in the long; stubble of his lower face, His pants were ripped over the right knee and his shirt was in ribbons. Exhaustion showed in every sagging line of his lean face and muscular-body. But his unbroken spirit glinted through his hooded eyes as he curled back his lips in a grin.
“Obliged, feller,” he said to the officer.
The youngster saluted smartly. “Captain Booth at your service sir. Like to ask you some questions.”
“Ought to promote you,” Edge muttered, massaging his forehead as he suddenly saw two officers astride two horses.
“Beg pardon, sir’?’ Booth asked with a quizzical look at the half-breed.
Edge closed his eyes and sighed. “Ought to be a general,” he mumbled. “Army sure brought this sinner salvation.”
He toppled sideways into warm unconsciousness.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The captain was torn between leaving a man to take care of Edge and leading the others in pursuit of the band of Sioux, or making a strategic withdrawal from the area. For the orders given by his commanding officer were not precise when applied to this situation. His job was to patrol deep into the broken plain to try to spot and estimate the strength of Sioux concentrations. He was supposed to avoid clashes and in the event of an unprovoked attack, to follow a course by which the safety of himself and his men was at least risk.
The sighting of twenty braves who had unaccountably turned tail and ran merited further investigation. But it was the possibility that the Sioux had taken off to fetch reinforcements which finally settled the decision for him. Out here in open country with such sparse cover, his men were at high risk.
He tried to rouse the unconscious Edge, but without success. The half-breed had a lot of exhaustion to shed in the warm darkness of deep sleep before his mind was prepared to admit the cold light of waking.
His decision made, Captain Booth wasted little time in implementing it. The Indian pony was abandoned to wander at will, while two troopers lifted Edge’s inert form and slung it across the sergeant’s horse, forward of the saddle. Then, with all the men remounted, the order was given to move out, and a single column was formed. The captain was at the head and set a cantering pace. The sergeant rode immediately behind the officer, cursing under his breath as he struggled to stay on station while having to constantly re-adjust the limp form of Edge to keep him from sliding to the ground.
Back marker was the young trooper who had been so filled with joy at the sight of the fleeing Sioux. But now his mood had undergone a drastic change. He had been told a lot of horrifying tales about the artfulness of Indians. What if the band of Sioux had tricked the captain into believing they were retreating ? They could be moving up again, stealthily and silently - and riding at the rear of the column, he was sure to be the first soldier killed.
The column kept up a hard, relentless pace, angling towards the south-west throughout the entire night. Then the grayness of a new day put out feelers across the dark sky, like probing fingers which discovered it was possible to dim the bright dots of stars and pale the moon into insignificance. Soon, when this advance attack proved successful, the big guns of the sun exploded from the eastern horizon.
Captain Booth ordered no breakfast stop for in the far distance he could see his objective and he was eager to reach it. He never looked back over his shoulder, confident that the nervous young trooper at the rear was constantly alert and would immediately report if a tell-tale dust cloud rose in the light of the new day.
He led his men into Fort Wells at eight-thirty and without exception the troopers were grateful that he had forced such a hard pace. Not that the fort itself offered very much in the way of security from Indian attack. It consisted of one large headquarters building constructed of prepared timber and a half dozen bunk-houses built of rough hewn logs, the whole set in a compound bounded by a roughly circular trench with the displaced earth piled around the outer rim. Planks of timber were rested across the trench at one point, to allow the patrol into the compound, and removed when the horses had clattered over the bridge. But although the fort could not be termed a stronghold, at least it was manned by thirty more troopers and two officers. The members of the patrol were very pleased to see their comrades.
Fort Wells was sited on the fringe of the forest twenty miles west of the point where the Sioux had led Edge out of the timber. Its sole purpose was to monitor Indian activity on the rugged plain spread to the north and relay reports to Fort James which lay forty miles to the south. It was, in fact, a patrol from Wells which had first spotted the signs of a massing of Sioux strength.
Edge came out of his stupor as the fort’s only medical orderly stooped over him to force brandy between his lips. The half-breed’s throat constricted against the burning liquid and he was certain he was being choked. He snapped open his eyes and saw the blurred shape of a man towering over him with both arms stretching out towards him. In a lightning reflex action, the urge to survive over-riding his weakness, he streaked a hand to the back of his neck. But the familiar smooth wood of the razor handle protruding from the pouch was not there. This lack triggered his memory to summon total recall of everything that had happened to him. He blinked and his vision cleared. He recognized the uniform shirt of a soldier, and saw the expression of naked fear on the young orderly’s face.
“I look that bad, trooper?” he croaked, glancing around him.
He was lying, fully dressed, on top of the covers of a cot in a tiny sick bay. There was another cot in there, but it was empty.
“Christ, mister,” the orderly gasped. “You looked ready to kill me.”
Edge showed his icy grin and took the tumbler from the man’s trembling hands. He gulped the brandy at a single swallow and then allowed his head to fall back on to the pillow. “Looks can’t kill, trooper,” he said. “And looking’s about all I feel up to right now. But if your food’s only half as good as your liquor, I won’t even glance at you - if that makes you feel any better.”
“There’s some soup on the way,” the orderly answered. “Major Schmitt’s anxious you be
strong enough to talk as soon as possible.”
“Obliged to the major for thinking about my welfare,” Edge said cynically, pushing his legs off the side of the bed and sitting up.
The orderly made a move to restrain him, but sensed that his patient was the kind of man determined to do whatever he wanted to and would not take kindly to advice. Edge didn’t have to stand up to see through the window. From the bed he could see a wide view of the compound and a stretch of the perimeter trench and earth wall. A dozen troopers had their backs to him, resting their rifles across the heap of dirt and scanning the sun-baked plain to the north.
A cook corporal brought in a bowl of beef broth and some sourdough biscuits and Edge was halfway through eating the meal when Captain Booth entered with his commanding officer. Schmitt was a big, broad-chested man in his late forties with weary eyes and a crooked mouth. Anxiety showed in every line of his squarish face.
“How are you feeling?” he asked as if he didn’t care.
“Alive,” Edge answered.
Schmitt nodded his bullet head in curt acknowledgement. “What were you doing out there in Indian land?” he demanded.
Edge chewed on a chunk of tough beef. “Looking for Indians,” he replied, and saw the flush of anger tint the major’s deeply-tanned complexion. “Ones that kidnapped my wife.”
It dampened Schmitt’s threatened anger. “See anything before you ran into the bunch that was after you?”
Edge continued to eat, emptying his mouth before replying. “Nothing good. A thousand or more are camped north of the twin-peaked butte.”
The major and the captain exchanged dour glances. “They in a fighting mood?” the senior officer wanted to know.
“Painted like fifth of July, feathered better than full grown buzzards and clawed with Winchesters fresh out of the plant.”
Schmitt gave another of his short nods. “Thank you. Rest now. If I’m ordered to hold this fort, I’ll need every able-bodied man I can get.”
Sioux Uprising (Edge series Book 11) Page 11
