La Vengeance des mères

by Jim Fergus

  Bourke nodded, clearly pained at these memories. “I did, Lady Hall. Helen was a fine woman. On the few occasions when I saw her, I very much enjoyed discussing the flora and fauna of the region. She was quite knowledgeable, and a great talent.”

  “Indeed.”

  “And have you discovered Miss Flight’s fate?” he asked.

  “I have, sir, yes. The Army killed her.”

  Again Bourke winced, as if almost in physical pain. “She had taken up arms against us, Lady Hall,” he said. “May I assume that you and Miss Alford were not participating as combatants with the Cheyenne, as was, by her own admission, your colleague, Miss McGill?”

  “You may so assume, Captain. Our place was strictly with the defenseless women and children.” This I stated with a certain tone of irony.

  “And of what service can General Crook be to you, madam?”

  “He can release Miss McGill, to us, of course, sir. She may have been riding with the Cheyenne when taken captive by your criminal scout, Jules Seminole, but Molly was not acting as a warrior. May we see her, sir?”

  At the mention of Seminole, Bourke raised an eyebrow. “Miss McGill is no longer here, madam. She left yesterday with a military escort headed to Medicine Bow station. There she will be turned over to agents of the U.S. Marshals Service who will conduct her back to her former residence in New York.”

  Hannah and I exchanged a worried glance. “I see.”

  “I am most curious to know what dealings you have had with Sergeant Seminole, Lady Hall.”

  “None, personally, sir,” I answered quickly, realizing that I had said far too much. “We just know of him by way of his bad reputation among the Cheyenne.” I took a deep breath and stood. “Well then, I see that we’ve come on a fool’s errand, Captain. I believe we’ve taken up enough of your time. We shall be on our way.”

  “Where will you go, madam?”

  “We will return to the Cheyenne, sir.”

  “As you must well know by now, Lady Hall,” he said, “that is hardly a safe place to be these days. I could place you both under protective custody.”

  “That will not be necessary, Captain,” I answered, uncertain from his tone whether he meant this an offer or a threat.

  “Tell me, please, are there others of you with the Cheyenne?”

  “Others of us, Captain?”

  “You know quite well what I mean, madam. Other members of the brides program. Are there presently other white women living with the tribe?”

  “The various bands under different chiefs move around a great deal these days, Captain,” I equivocated, “as you must certainly know—coming and going, chased hither and yon by the Army. I really could not say if there are any other white women among them.”

  “Please, sit down, Lady Hall,” he said, indicating my chair. “If you will excuse me for a moment, I shall see if General Crook is available for a conference. I believe he will be very interested in meeting you.”

  As soon as Captain Bourke left the tent, I whispered to Hannah, “We must leave here right now, dear.”

  “Methinks the very same, m’lady.”

  Hoping to avoid raising further suspicion, we walked briskly, but as nonchalantly as possible, back to where the guards had tied our horses to a hitching rail. We thanked them politely, mounted, and turned the horses back down the wagon road, heeling them into a trot, and then a light lope. It is then that we heard Captain Bourke shout at the guards. “Stop those women!”

  In unison, we kicked our horses into a full run and turned off the road into the hills, galloping all the way back to our camp along the creek, where we told the others to quickly gather their affairs. They asked no questions, and were saddled, mounted, and ready to head out in short order. Only when we were moving again did the chaplain ask: “Where are we going?”

  “Medicine Bow station.”

  “And why is that?”

  “That is where they’re taking Molly. As I most feared, they’re sending her back to Sing Sing. Do you know how to get to the station in Medicine Bow, Christian?”

  “It is there where I first arrived after I was conscripted into the Army,” he answered. “It is nearly due south, but I would guess over two hundred miles from here.”

  “She is being escorted by soldiers. They left yesterday morning. Can we overtake them?”

  “If Molly is being transported by wagon, which I would expect, we should be able to travel considerably faster than they. But even if we do find them, what then? Do you have a plan, Lady Hall?”

  “None whatsoever, sir. I have only the sense that the farther away from us she gets, and the closer to that train, the less chance we have of ever bringing her back.”

  The chaplain had no trouble locating the main route south, for ever since the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 there has been sufficient traffic to well mark its passage on the face of the landscape, largely due to the movement of the Army troops back and forth. He estimated that we could reach Medicine Bow in seven days or less, and if we were lucky and kept up a steady pace, we could cut the trail of Molly’s party within two days.

  And thus on we rode, as fast as we could push our horses and Martha’s briskly trotting little donkey, blindly following the chaplain, with no plan, on a virtually impossible mission, our spirits subdued. With the Bighorn mountains to the west, and the plains to the east, the only limits to the horizon were of sight, and we felt again our sheer smallness and helplessness in the face of this immense land. We felt no stronger, no more important or permanent than the grains of grit that stung our faces in the wind. And no one felt like singing.

  * * *

  Tonight we are camped along a tiny trickle of a creek, just far enough off the main road to be hidden from view to anyone passing by. The country is more arid here, the Bighorn mountains receding farther to the west. We encountered not a single other traveler on the road today, which was a relief, for another of my worries was that we might cross paths with one of the band of brigands who are said to rove this countryside, preying on the weak and defenseless. With only one man among us, and one, at that, who won’t raise a hand against others, we are awfully vulnerable.

  Undated entry

  Time has passed and due to desperate circumstances, duress, and exhaustion, I have lost track of the date. Much has happened … I shall try to tell of it … try to make sense of something that makes none.

  In the morning of our second day after departure from the Army supply camp, we came upon a family of pitifully poor Indians traveling north—a husband and wife, an old woman, who we presumed to be a grandmother, and two small boys—of what tribe we were uncertain, but we guessed they had come from the Indian agency. By the look of them, they appeared to be near starving. We had heard stories from other reservation defectors who had joined us on the Little Bighorn, that the white agents who were in charge of distributing government-issued rations to the surrendered Indians routinely stole the shipments and sold them at a profit to settlers. The old woman rode a bony, swaybacked horse with a swollen belly, while the parents and the boys walked. When they came abreast of us, the entire family enviously eyed a brace of jackrabbits Christian had shot at dawn near our overnight camp, which now hung from the pommel of his saddle, and was meant for our midday meal.

  The chaplain and Martha were the most gifted of us with the sign language, and they both spoke to the family in hand gestures, the chaplain pointing down the road. I understood that he was asking if they had passed any other travelers. They answered, yes, and made the signs for wagon wheels, horses and soldiers, and other signs I was unable to read myself.

  “God bless you,” Christian said to them, making the gesture of thanks and handing down the rabbits to the grateful mother, a satisfactory transaction to all parties. And to us he said: “They are not far ahead now. “Only a several-hour ride, if I understood correctly.”

  “But how do we know it is Molly’s party?” I asked.

  “They say ther
e was a white woman in the wagon with the driver, and two soldiers,” said Martha, “and ten more soldiers on horseback.”

  “Oh, crikey, an escort of a dozen soldiers, is it? I daresay, that will present a challenge.”

  “Have you been working on your plan, Lady Hall?” asked the chaplain.

  “Night and day, sir.”

  “And what have you come up with?”

  “Absolutely nothing.”

  “We shall trust in God.”

  “Easily said, Christian. Let us hope that he has a plan.”

  “God always has a plan.”

  Those proved to be prophetic words on the part of the chaplain, for the scene we came upon several hours later was nothing any of us might have imagined, or planned for. We spotted them from some distance away, and knew that it was, indeed, Molly and her escort with whom we had caught up. The road here ran along a high, arid, red rock bluff, the cliffs carved over the eons by the Powder River, which wound its way through the broad green valley a hundred or so feet below. On the crest of the bluff, unbroken by so much as a single blade of grass, the wind blew hard as a hammer and chisel, sculpting the rocks and stinging our faces.

  Their procession appeared to have come to a halt here, and the soldiers had dismounted. As we approached closer, we saw why … Molly stood on a promontory at the very edge of the cliff; the soldiers were gathered in a cluster roughly a hundred feet behind her. Between them and Molly stood another figure whom we were unable to identify from a distance, but whom I assumed was the driver of the wagon. We were still sixty or seventy yards away from them, and with all sound stolen by the wind, and so intent were they, our arrival had not yet even been noticed.

  There seemed no reason for us to approach cautiously now, and we kicked our mounts into a gallop. We had nearly reached them before they heard us. The soldiers turned and readied their weapons, and Christian waved his arm in the air, calling out: “Don’t shoot! We are friends! We come in peace! Don’t shoot!” The wagon master, too, had turned, and as we came closer we recognized that it was none other than our friend Gertie. The only person who did not turn to look at us was Molly. She remained motionless on the edge of the cliff, gazing intently into the abyss below, the fierce wind swirling her blond hair around her face, threatening to push her over the edge.

  We reined up beside the soldiers. One of them stepped forward, his rifle leveled at us. “I am First Sergeant Matthew Broughan, the commander of this detachment. State your business, please.”

  “We are friends of the prisoner,” I said, dismounting, and making it up as I went along. “We come from General Crook’s camp on Goose Creek. Captain Bourke told us to present ourselves directly to you, Sergeant Broughan. Please, sir, what is happening here?”

  “The prisoner is threatening to jump. We have agreed to stay back while our muleskinner tries to talk her out of it. For what reason did Captain Bourke send you, madam?”

  “So that we might join you for protection on the trip to Medicine Bow. We, too, wish to take the train.”

  He looked me up and down, and then at the rest of our group, who remained mounted. “Why are the three of you dressed as squaws, and you, sir, as a brave?” he asked them. “And why did he not send an escort with you?”

  I plucked my own threadbare clothing. “As you can see, Sergeant, we have been living under conditions of some duress. We were captured several months ago by the savages. This kind gentleman is a missionary, a man of God, who does his work among them. He effected our release. We were in a rush and did not wait for an escort.”

  “Do you bear a letter of introduction from the captain?” the sergeant asked.

  “We do, sir, yes … I should say, we did. However we were robbed by brigands the night before last. They stole the saddlebags in which the letter was inside. Please, Sergeant, can we not discuss this later? May I approach your muleskinner? I believe I can talk our friend down off the cliff.”

  He nodded. “Very well, please give it a try. The captain will not be happy if we lose this prisoner. The rest of you, stay where you are.”

  I led my horse to where Gertie stood.

  “I don’t know what in the hell you’re doin’ here, missy,” she said, “how you found us or what you got in mind. All I know is that Molly ain’t goin’ back to prison. She won’t even let me get any closer. She’s goin’ to jump, I just know she is.”

  “Molly, please,” I called to her in the wind. “It is I, Ann Hall, please let me come talk to you.”

  She turned then and looked at me. “No, Ann,” she called back. “Do not come any closer.”

  “Allow me just to approach within five paces of you. You know me as a woman of my word. I swear I will not come any nearer than that, nor will I try to touch you. I only wish to speak to you in private, so that we don’t have to shout to be heard.”

  Molly continued to look at me, but did not answer for some time. Finally, she said. “I will let you approach to within five paces, Ann. But I’m warning you, if you lay a finger on me, I will take you over the edge with me. And you know that I am strong enough to do so.”

  “First of all, dear, I know you wouldn’t do that. It is one thing to kill yourself, quite another to take a friend with you. Secondly, I am terrified of heights, therefore you may rest assured that I have no intention of getting into a wrestling match with you on the edge of a cliff.”

  I handed my reins to Gertie.

  “Don’t do anything foolish, missy,” she warned.

  I approached Molly.

  “That’s close enough,” she said. “Stop right there. What do you want, Ann?”

  “Well, you could start by getting down from there, Molly.”

  She laughed. “I, too, am afraid of heights,” she said. “That’s why I haven’t jumped yet. You know, it is the strangest thing, but I have had this dream nearly all my life, ever since my parents took me to Niagara Falls when I was a little girl. I’ve dreamed of being here on this very edge, about to jump. It is as if this place has been waiting for me all this time.”

  “And have you ever jumped in your dream?”

  “Yes, always, I always jump eventually. And I always soar like a bird. It’s a wonderful feeling. But first I stand here for a while, looking down, terrified. I jump, finally, in order to stop being afraid, for I know that when I do, I will fly … free.”

  “Listen to me, Molly. This is not a dream, and this time, you are not going to fly. Let me turn and walk back toward Gertie, and just as I reach her, I’ll take the reins of my horse and begin to mount, and when I do you run to me, quick as you can, and leap on behind. We’ll make a dash for it, you and I.”

  “Thank you for offering to risk your life for me, Ann, but with the two of us on your little horse, you know we could never outrun the soldiers. They will catch us and put my leg shackles on again, and I will be sent back to Sing Sing. And you will all be arrested for trying to help me escape. Don’t you see? This is the last, the best, the only chance I have to be free.” Molly turned again to face the edge, raising her arms out to her sides like wings.

  “Don’t do this, Molly, please,” I begged, beginning to weep now, “please don’t jump.”

  “Turn and walk away, Ann. I’m sorry … good-bye, my friend.”

  It is then that I heard the high, shrill shriek of a hawk overhead, and looked up to see it above, wings set and soaring on the wind, weaving and dancing in the air like a child’s kite.

  Molly, too, looked up. “I knew you would come for me, Hawk,” she cried. “I knew it, I’ve been waiting for you.” Arms still spread wide, she leaned forward to fall from the cliff.

  “No, please, Molly, don’t!” I screamed, collapsing to my knees and putting my hands to my face, unable to watch, sobbing in terror now.

  I do not believe in native superstitions that tell of people becoming other animals, or making themselves bulletproof by painting figures on their body, or of men flying like birds … But in the very next instant when I lowered my hands
and looked up again, two riders had appeared on the ridge, riding north toward Molly at a full gallop … it was Pretty Nose on her dappled paint and Phemie, on the cliffside, astride her big white prairie pony. As they approached Molly, Phemie crouched low in the saddle, leaning down to her right, and holding out her arm, crooked like a scythe. With the horse barely breaking stride, Molly grabbed hold and as if she was but a wisp of a girl, light and agile as a spirit being, she swung onto the horse’s back behind Phemie. I stood and in the split second it took them to thunder by, Molly looked directly at me and smiled … a smile both triumphant and amused. “I told you, Ann,” she cried, her words streaming behind her as they passed, “in my dream, I always fly!”

  Now carried on the wind, I heard Hannah scream, and scattered exclamations of shock and horror, and I turned to look back at Gertie and the others. They wept and cried out, the chaplain uttering ululations of grief to the heavens … Gertie raising her clenched fists in the air. “Goddamn you, Molly,” she roared, “goddamn you, why didya have to do it? Why didya jump, goddamn you!” Only Martha did not weep, but seemed to be gazing calmly off toward the ridge with a slight smile on her face.

  The soldiers, too, milled about, shaken; some had turned their backs, scuffing the ground with the toe of their boots, muttering and swearing. “Son of a bitch, she did it!” one of them hollered. “The crazy bitch jumped!”

  Had I gone bloody mad? Did I imagine it all? But when I turned again, I saw the two horses, one paint and one white, galloping north along the bluff, bearing our three Strong-heart Women—an Indian girl, a black girl, and a white girl—all retreating into the distance.

  Also by Jim Fergus

  The Memory of Love

  The Wild Girl

  The Sporting Road

  A Hunter’s Road

  One Thousand White Women

  About the Author