Sioux Dawn, The Fetterman Massacre, 1866 (16 page)

At last she tore the flask away from her dripping lips. Now that the immediate revulsion had passed, Abigail felt better with every breath. Warmth spread through her like a gentle wave, replacing the cold knot she had suffered from the very first view of those writhing, naked brown bodies.
Whiskey. So. Not so bad after all.

But it'd be her little secret. She took one more long gulp and shook the flask.
Best leave some for the lieutenant.
Abigail retamped the cork and set it aside. Feeling like she could wait a while before she had to do anything else. Feeling much like a soggy bag of oats as she sank against the side of the wagon. And licked her lips, listening to the shrieks of warriors and the moans of dying soldiers nearby.

Irish whiskey, she thought to herself. Not so bad after all.

Chapter 11

Following every mad rush, the soldiers scraped at the hard, flaky earth with anything a man could use to make himself smaller. Skillets from their mess-kits, bayonets, or rifle-butts. Even bare hands. Every able-bodied man digging at the dry crust cracked like an overripe melon long ago, gone bone-dry beneath a relentless summer sun.

On the north and west wings of the corral the defenders eventually scratched rifle pits out of the unforgiving soil, each trench dug just beyond the ring of wagons. Those men still able to move scraped and sweat, surrendering what precious little moisture their bodies might still possess to that one-eyed monster in the sky above. Far from Fort Reno, Templeton's men found themselves with little water left among the barrels lashed to each wagon. It had been their hope to refill the water-barrels at Crazy Woman Creek after finding Dry Fork a tongue of parched sand yesterday.

The only good thing, they muttered to one another as they grubbed at the soil like frantic gophers, was that the warriors hung back—waiting.

“The bastards skittish now,” Captain Marr explained. “Reckoning on the range of your big guns.”

Donegan licked his lips, taking secret pleasure in the potion of salty sweat mingled with strong whiskey.

A potent libation.

Through the spokes of a wheel he burrowed up the dirt so that he had more to hide behind. Relieved for the moment that he had only to gaze across the slope at those mounted warriors milling about, waiting for their next charge.

“They look so … very wild and savage while galloping around us, Mr. Donegan,” Glover muttered with a weak smile.
Perhaps,
he thought,
I've conquered this immobilizing fear after all.
It had proved itself a more powerful enemy than Confederates or Sioux warriors ever would. “Yes. How I'd love to set up the camera and make some views of their riding feats. Mounted horsemen swooping down on us … like frantic swallows darting out of this dusty, yellow gloom.”

For a moment Seamus stared at Glover, disbelieving, though Donegan had seen many a man cope with the stress of battle in odd ways. Behind the photographer an old soldier growled.

“By damned, forget that nonsense of your camera! You best shoot them with that rifle of Rooney's.”

“Rooney?”

“Plopped back there.” He gestured with his head. “Gut-shot. And dead for it, thanks be. Awful way to go.”

“Lookee there!” Terrel pealed. Heads rose, following his arm as he pointed to a high piece of ground to the west, above the clearing where the warriors gathered to wait. “See that buck? I'll bet he's commanding officer o' the whole shebang. They all gathering like rebel cavalry waiting to grind us down now, boys. Charge after charge—and that bastard calling the tune. You watch … see? Keep your eye on that buck up there with the blanket.”

Donegan's eyes climbed from the fluttering feathers worn by the milling warriors to that single Sioux, stoic atop the hill. A red blanket hung from his arm, dangling off the side of his pony. As he watched, both were deftly flung into the air, the blanket swinging round and round over his head. Answering his command with a wild demonic cry, more than a hundred warriors pounded heels against ribby flanks, tearing up the slope toward the soldiers waiting in their trenches.

“Told you.” Terrel scratched at his bony chin before he eased it along the stock of his Long Tom Springfield. “That boy's running the whole shooting match, or I ain't Mither Terrel's smartest boy.”

Riderless ponies thundered up the rise. At times Donegan caught only a glimpse of a foot strapped atop a pony's flank or the bobbing shadow of a dark head pressed behind an animal's neck. But to most of those hunkered behind their pitiful mounds of dirt, it looked like just another stampede of riderless mustangs. Riderless, that is, until those ponies spewed arrows or spat random rifle-fire. Once again those still able to hold a gun answered back, the clatter of their weapons hollow in the dry air above the west and north rims of the corral.

This time the shrieking horde thundered closer still to the wagons. Closer than they had yet dared. Arrows hissed by or smacked into the dry wood. Keening bullets kicked up dirt in front of the dugouts or whistled overhead. Too often one of the soldiers would hear that unforgettable sound of a bullet slamming into flesh like a thick smack of a hand against wet rawhide. The red tide washed past as the young warriors reined away from the rifle pits, swinging onto their ponies, flaunting their inviting umber backs at the soldiers.

“Damn, but he's a heavy one. Gimme a hand here, Sarge.”

Donegan turned to see a dusty soldier yanking at the body of a young trooper. As they rolled him off the edge of the wagon and pulled him back into the corral, Donegan saw the thickening wet stain over the heart.

“Hope my bunkie didn't felt a thing when it hit, Sarge,” the soldier muttered morosely. “Only way to pass on 'round.”

“Shit.” Terrel helped heave the body behind that of Templeton's dead horse. “Never do feel a thing when you get hit with the bullet that snuffs out your candle!”

“No pain a'tall?”

“None.”

“Thanks be to God!” The soldier laughed, until he turned away, crying.

Donegan looked away when the young trooper gently tugged his dead comrade's eyelids closed, caressing the peach-fuzzed cheek.

On the hill above them the crimson blanket fluttered into the still air. A hundred voices clamored like cawing blackbirds rising to the clear, translucent sky overhead.

“Another go at us, boys!” Wands hollered.

On the warriors thundered, their ponies wide-eyed in the race, nostrils funked in the exertion of their chase, each animal laying flat-out toward the wagons. Straining up the slope, tearing from west to north.

“I'm tired of having nothing to shoot at but the bastards' arses!” Terrel laughed grimly.

“Well, dammit—shoot the jackanapes' ponies instead!” Donegan hollered.

“Hurroo! Anither Irishman!” Terrel answered back, his voice rising in joy. He rose a moment to glance down the line at Donegan, tipping his hat in recognition.

“Who else would you see out here 'neath this merciless sun, letting redskin h'athens have a flog at us, eh? None but the stupid Irish!” Donegan roared.

“A right fine notion—shooting their horses, Mr. Donegan!” Reverend White raised his assent.

“Dandy idea, if I don't say!” another soldier agreed. “The ponies it'll be!”

“What we do after we shot a Injun's horse?” a soldier whined.

Terrel leaped up, hand on his hip. “Who's the dumb mither's son asked that question? I dare you own up to it! Ah, none of you children'll fess up, eh? For those what don't know what to do after you got one of them red buggers knocked off his horse—you shoot the bastards!”

“That's the idea, Sergeant!” Donegan agreed. “Put 'em afoot!”

“We topple Mr. Donegan's red heathens from their ponies to slow 'em down,” White hollered in that high, grating preacher's pitch, “we'll have a better chance of hitting them afoot.”

“Kick 'em outta the saddle!” Bradley yelled weakly back in the corral, a bandage smeared with a brown stain wrapped round his skull.

“'At's it, Lieutenant!” Terrel cheered. “Glad to have your rifle to bark back at these red mongrels.”

With the next charge three warriors found their ponies pitching headlong as they approached the wagons. One did not rise from under his struggling animal. A second crawled to his feet, was shot by a soldier, then lumbered to the edge of that ravine to the south where he pitched out of sight. The last warrior tumbled across the sage and dust, springing to his feet. Flinging his broken bow aside he dashed toward the corral, axe in hand.

“That'un's yours, Terrel,” Donegan offered.

“No, sir. I think the bastard belongs to you. After all, t'was your fine idea knocking 'em outta the saddle. Besides, appears he's coming to call on a fine civilian gent like yourself.”

“Naw,” Donegan replied, wiping the sweat from his eyes. “He's looking for a sergeant … Sergeant.”

“But you'll shoot 'im for me, won't you, Donegan?”

“I don't want——”

“Damnation on your black Hibernian souls,” the reverend shrieked. “Will one of you bastards shoot that godless heathen before we'll be on a first-name basis with the red bugger?”

“For a man of the cloth,” Donegan stood, pressing his Henry to his cheek, “I'd do anything, Reverend.”

A puff of smoke burst from Donegan's muzzle. A blossom of red exploded in the middle of the Indian's chest, shoving him back three steps before he plopped into the dust. Donegan lowered himself into his pit.

“Too damned close, you ask me,” muttered one of the soldiers.

“Didn't hear a goddamned soul asking you, Harris,” Terrel barked, jumping to the defense of his fellow Irishman. Then he laughed, causing more soldiers and Donegan to laugh with him.

Seamus had to admit, it felt good to laugh. When a man had nothing else to do but wait. Watching that lone warrior and his blanket on the hillside. The rest of the devils gathering and milling. Waiting. He'd always hated the damned waiting.

“Simpkins is down,” Marr groaned as he knelt over the old friend bound for the Montana goldfields with him. “Relax, boy. You'll be no good to anybody now—'cept when they make a last rush on us.”

Marr gazed up at Wands. The lieutenant motioned him away from the wounded men.

“Casualties mounting up, Captain Marr.” Wands chewed at his lower lip.

“No call to address me as Captain. Seems like a long time ago, son—that war back yonder. You see action, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, sir. Enough to realize we aren't going to last a whole helluva lot longer at this rate. They get one of us most every run-by.”

Marr nodded. Looking up at the bone-yellow globe hung at mid-sky. “If the Injuns don't get us, then that goddamned sun will. But they keep coming at us like they have, it's all over before mid-afternoon.”

“You got an idea, tell me,” Wands pleaded. “I'll go along with you.”

Marr looked round the little corral. The wounded moaned in pain and thirst. The rest tried to hide from the sun. Inside one of the ambulances a baby cried pitifully. From the other came a child's whining as little Bobby Wands begged to go outside to play.

“Lieutenant, I ain't got an idea one. You and me both are used to fighting Johnnies. Even guerillas like Quantrill. But … these Injuns are something else altogether. Face up to it—none of us know how to fight like this.”

Donegan pushed himself up to the pair. “One thing you got the power to decide,” he whispered, glancing down at the toes of his dusty hog-leg boots, “is that when those red bastirds make a final push to run over our position, who among us will take care of killing our wounded … and which of us will take care of … of the women and children.”

His gray eyes sought the lieutenant's. Wands swallowed hard. Wishing suddenly for some whiskey in his belly. Better yet, some brandy right now. He liked brandy laying warm in his gut. Something to make what they were talking about a little easier to swallow. Finally he nodded.

“All right, Donegan. I think we understand each other. It comes down to it, I … I'd like to have you two take care of the women … and the children.” His eyes flooded and he turned away.

“I think it best, Lieutenant.” Marr briefly clamped a hand on the young lieutenant's shoulder.

“You and Terrel see to the wounded, Lieutenant. We don't want a one of those bloodied lads falling into the h'athens darty paws,” Donegan said, and was gone back to the trenches.

Down the slope the Sioux slipped from their ponies, settling on their haunches like they were going to make council. Talk matters over. Make some adjustments in their approach to the soldiers forted up atop the knoll. Up the far hillside loped three warriors. They dismounted to talk with their leader who carried the red blanket.

Things fell quiet as cotton down in the corral as the defenders began to broil between earth and sky.

“Hottest part of the day,” Donegan grumbled as he looked back, seeing Marr had resumed his place in the rifle-pit. Seamus glanced round their miserable refuge, finding Wands standing at the back of an ambulance. Whispering with his wife. Her head appeared momentarily. The lieutenant tenderly kissed her. Then the little boy's upper body popped out from the back. Wands hugged his son, kissed the boy's cheek, and wheeled away suddenly, swiping savagely at his nose.

Donegan sensed a hot sting in his own throat as he turned away, feeling dirty like a thief for stealing a glance at the lieutenant's little family—three people who might not have all that much time left together now.

He cursed himself. Like a darty thief, stealing a peek at happiness coming to an end.

Those few veterans of the war, sweat-stained and grimy down in their trenches, seemed the most calm. They had been under fire before. Donegan recalled his own nightmares. Hardest part was this waiting. Once the fighting began, a man didn't have time to think. Gazing now at those grim, dirty, powder-burned faces full of wrinkles and a life's share of miles, Donegan realized he was one of them. He couldn't escape it. Though he'd tried, he had never really left the army. Realizing that he, like the rest of those old files who'd fought that dirty war between the states, all sat alone, assessing some narrow odds.