Michener, James A. (132 page)

'Agent Rusk,' Reed said as if launching a new problem, 'you and I share a most difficult responsibility.'

'We do.'

'Now you are harboring in your camp—'

'We harbor no one, Captain. We provide a home for Indians on their way to civilization.'

'This time you're harboring a fiendish killer, Chief Matark of the Comanche.'

'I know Matark. I cannot believe—'

'I've heard the usual ugly rumors people spread.'

'Have you ever heard of the little girl Emma Larkin?'

i don't know that name.'

'At Bear Creek, Matark massacred fifteen men, women, and children, and he massacred them most horribly. Would you care-to hear the details?'

'I am not interested in soldiers' campfire tales.'

Reed did not hesitate: 'When you and 1 find the little girl, and we will—believe me, Agent Rusk, we will—we'll see that her cars and her nose have been burned off. We'll find that she's been raped incessantly. She'll probably be pregnant, but we'll find her.'

Rusk blanched: 'I find such stories repulsive '

'They are,' Reed said, 'but in this case they're real. I found the bodies, hacked apart. I reassembled them as best I could. I buried them.'

'That's a terrible charge for thee to make, on a guess.' And there the struggle intensified, for Rusk's continued use of the Biblical thee seemed to be parading his virtue, as if to say: 'I am more Christlike than thee. I am of a higher moral order.' This infuriated army men. for they interpreted his pacifism as the behavior of a simple-minded man who could scarcely differentiate dawn from dusk

Reed, having sworn not to lose his temper with this difficult Quaker, smiled icily: 'I am not guessing, Agent Rusk I know.'

'Thee is being terribly unfair to Chief Matark.' Impulsively, for he was a good man striving to protect other good men, he sent for Matark, and within a few minutes the three protagonists who would compete for Texas rights so desperately faced one another. Matark appeared as if he had come from a pleasant hunt, his features in repose, his body at ease. It seemed doubtful that he had ever committed an act of warfare, let alone massacre, but Reed noticed that he did stay close to Rusk, as if he realized that this man was now his appointed protector,

'This is my friend Chief Matark,' Rusk began, and he expected the two men to shake hands, but Reed refused to touch the Indian 'Chief, Captain Reed tells me that thee attacked supply trains.'

'Lies, lies.'

'He has men out there to prove that thee attacked the train, black soldiers whose reports we can trust.'

'Must have been Kiowa. No Comanche. None '

When the interpreter translated these words, Rusk smiled thinly and held up his hands: 'Thee sees, I was sure it must have been other Indians. We have great trouble with the Kiowa, chiefs like Satanta, Satank.'

841

'Matark's Comanche were nowhere near Three Cairns?'

'No. Never so far south. We hunting Indians, not fighting. We stay on reservation.'

Reed did not respond to this. Suddenly he asked: 'What have you done with Emma Larkin?'

Matark stiffened, a fact which Rusk noticed, then said: 'Kiowa killed her people. We rescued her. She safe with us.'

Reed bowed his head, visualizing what safe meant in such situations. Rusk noticed this too, and asked: 'It is true that thee holds a white child?' and Matark replied: 'For safety. To keep her from the Kiowa.'

Even Rusk could see the cynicism of this response: any white child held captive by Indians should be returned to white protectors, and if the child was a girl, the obligation was doubled. For the first time since he came west, this peace-seeking Quaker experienced a grain of doubt about the goodness of his Comanche, but he raised no questions because he honestly believed that Matark was an innocent man vilified by the rough soldiers at Fort Garner. Rusk still did not comprehend the terrible problems faced by white settlers in Texas, and he refused to admit that his Indians ever raided down in Texas and then found sanctuary a few miles to the north in the Indian Territory.

Reed and Matark understood each other: with them it was a duel to the death, and if Matark had had just a little more time the other day, he would have captured one of Reed's wagon trains and killed every soldier guarding it; on the other hand, if Reed had been able to keep the Indians south of the Red River for one more day, he would have tried to annihilate them. It was brutal, incessant warfare, and each man wondered at the naivete of Agent Rusk, who did not comprehend this.

Captain Reed accomplished nothing at Camp Hope except his own humiliation, which he accepted silently, but on his return to Fort Garner he felt he must as a responsible commanding officer broach a subject which threatened to undermine the effectiveness of his troops. He summoned Logan and began cautiously: 'Were you able to speak with Colonel Minor when they brought him in? Very bad knock in the left hip.'

Two minutes, three minutes. As you would expect, he was smiling.'

'Very good man, Minor. He performed well at the Cairns.'

'You'd expect him to.'

'He'll be a long time mending. Perhaps we should send him home.'

'He wouldn't like that. He asked me to assure you . . .'

Reed had to wonder whether Minor had actual!} said that, or whether Logan was merely endeavoring to keep Nellie Minor at hand, and he judged that now was the tune to be frank 'Maioi johnny Minor's going to have a rough tune with that hip. He'll need all the support he can muster From his wife especially '

'That is sure.'

'I'd take it kindly. Major, and so would Mrs Reed, if von saw less of Minor's wife '

'Yes, sir.'

No more was said, and Reed told his wife: 1 think the matter of Nellie Minor has been settled,' and Mrs. Reed said Thank God. These things can get so out of hand in a lonely fort.'

This one was far from settled, however, for even if her lover was willing to cease the affair, Nellie Minor was not, and one morning, after dressing her husband's suppurating wound, she mounted a horse and rode far out to the tank, where she had insisted that Jim Logan meet her. They allowed their horses to wander into that glade where the Indians had observed them before the attack on the wagon train, and there they renewed their passionate love. When they lay looking up at the endless blue sky, Logan said: 'The last time. 1 can't make love to the wife of a wounded comrade.'

'You damned men! You know he cares nothing for me.'

'He did. And now he needs you.'

'Need! Need! That's all I hear. 1 need things too.'

Mrs. Reed, who learned quickly of Nellie's brazen escapade, was not disposed to have this headstrong young woman wreck her husband's command by some act that would be reported to Washington. Fort Garner had already been marked unfavorably because of the loss of men in the attack upon the wagons and because Reed had allowed Matark to reach sanctuary across the river, and one more unfavorable notice might be decisive. She therefore summoned both Nellie and her lover to her rooms in the commander's building, the second on the base to be converted to stone—the hospital invariably being first—and there she presented them with surprising information.

'I have consulted with the surgeon from Fort Richardson, and he at first warned me that Colonel Minor was too weak to be moved. So 1 had to bide my time and let you two run wild '

'We have not—' Nellie tried to break into the speech, but Mrs Reed ignored her.

'But now your husband is mending, Mrs. Minor, and 1 am asking that he be taken from here m an ambulance tomorrow And my husband is recommending that when he is recovered he

be assigned to desk duty with Lieutenant General Sheridan in Chicago. You will accompany him when he leaves this fort.'

Logan felt that he must protest: There is no cause for such dismissal.'

'Mrs. Minor is not being dismissed. She is merely accompanying her husband, as a good wife should.'

'But—'

'Especially when he has been wounded in a gallant charge against the Comanche.' She was implacable in her opposition to this adulterous pair and had taken the precaution of informing others, before the meeting took place, that the Minors were being shipped out, and had arranged that the ambulance which would carry them away be brought to the rear of the hospital, where its wheels and fittings were being checked.

So when Johnny Minor's lady and her Irish lover left the commander's quarters, everyone on the base, even the black cavalry privates, knew that they were in disgrace, and since her reputation could degenerate no further, Nellie went boldly to the stables, where she asked one of the cavalrymen to saddle her horse, and upon it she rode toward the tank. Moments later Logan, in disregard of the punishment that must surely be visited upon him, rode after her, and the fort buzzed at his arrogant defiance. Even a laundress who worked sometimes in the hospital as a kind of nurse felt obligated to inform wounded Johnny Minor of his wife's intemperate behavior; he ignored the gossip, taking refuge in the fact that very shortly he would be rid of Fort Garner and its complexities, but finding no assurance that when his headstrong wife reached Chicago she would behave any differently.

Before Nellie had reached the tank, Logan had overtaken her, and when he saw the extreme agitation which possessed her, he realized for the first time that their love-making had become considerably more than a mere escapade. It was now something so important in her life that she could not face surrendering it, no matter what cold New England women like Mrs. Reed said or what Reed himself might do to protect the integrity of his command.

i won't go to Chicago. I won't waste my life with that cripple.'

'You'll have to. Can't stay here.'

'I'll leave the ambulance when we reach Jacksborough. Finish with the army, Jim, and join me there.'

'And do what?' This was a compelling question, for he was an Irishman trained only in the care of horses and their utilization in battle. He had not wanted assignment to a regiment of Negro cavalry, but he had accepted because that was the only pattern of

life open to him, and now even that frail opportunity was being threatened. 'I can't leave the regiment.'

She sat on the ground beside the gray water and enticed him to join her, and after they had made love, for the last tune he swore to himself, she casually reached across to where his he! took from its holster his heavy Colts, pointing its barrel at her head: i think it best if I end this nightmare '

'Nell! Put that down!' He reached out to retrieve his gun, when he saw to his horror that she was now pointing it at him, and with a skill he had not suspected, she was releasing the safety. The last thing he saw was the steel-gray barrel aimed at his forehead and her finger pressing the trigger.

As soon as he fell, she resolutely and with no regrets placed the barrel deep in her mouth, its end jammed against the roof, and pressed the trigger a second time.

Preoccupation with the tragedy ended when a special courier arrived from headquarters in St. Louis in response to an urgent appeal from the governor of Texas. Major Comstock, after revealing his purpose to Reed, asked permission to address the officers: 'Gentlemen, as you've probably heard, the Texas Rangers are being reactivated for the first time since the end of the late war They're needed because that damned bandit Benito Gar/a has been chewing up American settlements along the Rio Grande. They need our help.'

Wetzel, as a professional soldier, growled: if you listen to the Texans, their Rangers can defeat anybody. Why do the}' need us?"

Comstock had a reply so convoluted that these professionals gasped in wonder at its fatuity: 'Garza holes up on the Mexican side of the river. The U. S. Army can't touch him From that sanctuary he makes sorties into the United States, robbing and killing. If we catch him over here, of course we can kill him, but we cannot chase him if he escapes to Mexico. Forbidden by international law. Absolutely forbidden by Washington.'

'Then why are we going?' Wetzel asked.

'To support the Rangers. They can cross the river. Not being legally a part of our forces, they can pursue the bandits in what they're calling "hot pursuit," that is, in the heat of battle.'

Reed broke in: 'So our troops are to protect the American side while the Rangers go after them 7 '

'Precisely. And that's all you're to do. Because if you invade Mexico to get him, you become bandits, just like him.'

For two hours Comstock reviewed this unusual situation, placing before the restless officers so many ramifications that Wet/el

snapped: 'Hell, this sounds like our border with Indian Territory. The Comanche sneak in and kill, then dart back across the border and claim immunity.'

'Exactly, but in Garza's case it's even more complex, because a foreign power is involved.'

Now the question became 'whom to send?'—and Reed pointed out that with the deaths of young Toomey at Three Cairns and Logan at the tank, plus the disabling injury to Minor, his staff was pretty well depleted, especially in the cavalry.

'What about this Lieutenant Renfro?'

'Desk duty, Washington. Can't seem to pry him loose.'

'One of those,' Comstock said with disgust, and no more was needed.

Finally, both Reed and Comstock agreed that the ideal man for the assignment was Wetzel, and when this was decided, the courier asked that he meet with Reed and Wetzel alone. As they sat in Reed's stone house the major was blunt: 'Captain Wetzel, I've heard only the highest praise for your military prowess, but this is an assignment fraught with danger. Can you be trusted to take your men right up to the edge of the Rio Grande and keep them there, regardless of provocation, until you catch Garza on our side of the river?'

'Yes, sir.'

'None of this "hot pursuit"?'

'No, sir. Here on this northern border of Texas we learn discipline.'

'Captain Wetzel, on this border you have hundreds of observers to report if you stray. On the southern border you have only yourself to enforce the rules.'

'Sir, I'm an army captain. I'm also a Prussian. I've been trained to obey orders.'