The Crossed Sabres (18 page)

For two weeks Tom Winslow immersed himself in the life he had chosen. Although he was detached from A Company, he spent as much time as possible with the troop, getting to know the men and the officers. The routine and discipline of army life brought back his days in the Confederate Army, and he soon discovered how much he had missed the comradeship of men. There was a pleasure in becoming part of the group, and as the days passed he realized that he had needed acceptance from men like himself.

They were a tough group, the Seventh, and the enlisted men of A Company did not roll out a red carpet for any man. Every new addition was on trial as the men waited to see if the rookie could pull his weight. The test they chose would prove it. It was not a formalized initiation, but in the violent world they inhabited, the soldiers had to know if the man on their right and their left could be trusted. And when the bullets started flying, it was too late for such tests; therefore, there were other ways to test a man’s mettle.

Winslow was targeted for such a test more than most, due to his rapid promotion. Most men endured years of hard work for the right to wear the sergeant’s stripes, but the fact that Tom’s was a special assignment made no difference to the men of A Company. He had joined them; now they needed to know if he had the backbone they needed to see in their noncoms.

Corporal Babe O’Hara, a red-faced, battle-scarred hulking
Irishman with beefy shoulders, made it his business to put the new sergeant of A Company to the test. He had, he thought, a legitimate grievance, for he had expected his third stripe for a year. And the sight of a rookie without a day’s service being promoted over his head brought his ready temper to a boil. O’Hara was not highly intelligent, but he was crafty, and he knew he had to be careful. He understood that if he destroyed Winslow with his huge fists, he himself could lose his place, so he would wait for the right opportunity.

Winslow was aware of the big man’s dislike and the reason for it; therefore, it came as no shock to him when he had to face the challenge—though he was caught off guard by the way it happened. O’Hara had slyly maneuvered a situation that would force Tom to fight. It came during a patrol. Among the group going out was Yellow Face, who could come and go pretty much as he pleased. Babe O’Hara had decided to make him his instrument leading to a row with Winslow.

The first day of the patrol, they stopped for a night camp by a small stream Captain Algernon Smith had chosen. While the food was being prepared, some of the men made the campsite safe by beating along the earth to rout out any rattlesnakes. After supper, Winslow rolled into his blanket, his head on the saddle, and listened for a time to the murmuring around him. The creek made a soft gurgling sound that brought sleep quickly, but he was conscious of many memories of bivouacs in the past as he lay there. He thought, too, of Marlene and the brief time they had spent together. Inevitably this led to thoughts of Spence Grayson, and bitterness, like gall, welled up in him. After tossing about, weariness finally overtook him, and he slept.

On scout patrol there were no trumpet calls. Men simply awoke and sat up to put on their hats, blouses, and boots; fires sprang up, rich yellow in the half light; then breakfast was served.

O’Hara saw Captain Smith eat early, mount his horse, and
leave, saying, “Sergeant, I’ll take a look at that ridge. When the troop’s ready, bring the men over there to meet me.”

“Yes, sir,” Winslow nodded, and when Smith moved out of the camp, Tom went for his own breakfast.

O’Hara had noted the manner in which Winslow treated the Ree scouts, especially Yellow Face. As soon as the captain was out of the camp, O’Hara rose and moved to where the large Ree was standing beside the campfire waiting for his breakfast. Quickly, the corporal glanced around and saw that none of the men were watching. Then he spun around and drove his fist into the face of the unsuspecting Indian, and as Yellow Face was shoved to the ground, O’Hara began to curse the man.

Tom Winslow whirled and saw Yellow Face jump to his feet, only to be knocked down again by the corporal’s fists. Tom dropped his tin plate, sprang toward O’Hara, and caught the man’s arm, spinning him around. O’Hara never stopped but sent a hard fist into Winslow’s chest, knocking him backward. “Keep your hands off me, Winslow!” he yelled. “Your pet Indian gave me a shove—which I’ll take from no man—including you!”

By now the men had gathered in a circle around O’Hara and Tom, their eyes bright with anticipation. He got to his feet knowing that if he didn’t whip the big Irishman, he would be laughed out of the troop, and no man would pay any attention to his stripes. They moved in close, the faint light of the rising sun catching their eyes. Winslow saw the lust for violence and the greed for raw action. As individuals, they were good men with stamina and courage and kindness, but now they were a pack, and the smell of the pack was on them, making their faces all alike—hollow-eyed with expectation, mouths partly open, and eyes glittering in the half-light.

“All right, Babe,” Winslow nodded. “Too bad you chose this time to try me out.” He slipped out of his blouse, adding, “It’ll be a long ride for you after I teach you a lesson.”

Babe grinned, winked at his comrades. “A lesson, is it?
I’m not a good pupil, Winslow—” He waited no longer but lunged forward, throwing a long left that would have destroyed Winslow if it had landed, but it missed as Winslow moved his head to one side. The force of the blow threw O’Hara off balance, and Winslow followed it with a punch to the temple with a short, chopping right hand. O’Hara’s eyes glazed and his jaw dropped, but he was an old veteran, so when Winslow stepped in, he threw his arms around him and hung on until his head cleared.

Winslow whirled around, finally managing to throw the big man away, but when he stepped in to finish the corporal off, O’Hara caught him flush in the mouth with a driving right hand. The blow was shattering, shaking him down to his toes, so that O’Hara’s roar of triumph seemed faint and far away. Desperately he roused himself to fend off the blows from O’Hara’s big fists till his head cleared. He was driven to the ground by a hard left hand, but when he got to his feet, he saw that O’Hara was breathing hard; and for the next few minutes he merely moved around, blocking blows and making no attempt to fight the tiring corporal.

Angered by his failure to finish Winslow, the big Irishman paused, glared at the man across from him, and wheezed out, “What—are you—some kind of dancer?” Then when one of the troopers taunted O’Hara, he turned his head to answer. It was the opportunity Winslow was looking for. He threw his hardest blow, every ounce of his weight behind an uppercut that caught O’Hara flush on the jaw. The blow made a distinct click, and O’Hara dropped to the ground like a rock.

“He’s out!” Leo Dempsey exclaimed, then peered at Winslow with a grin. “Guess you learned how someplace, Sarge.”

Winslow saw the smiles of the men and knew they approved. He had been admitted to the lodge. He waited until O’Hara’s eyes fluttered, then stooped and helped him to his feet. “You’re a tough fellow, Babe,” he said.

O’Hara weaved slightly, his eyes confused, but when he came to himself, he asked curiously, “Was I out?”

“Dead out,” Dempsey grinned. “Sleeping like a baby!”

Silence fell over the group, for O’Hara had been the bully of the regiment, never bested in a rough and tumble. Some men grow bitter when they lose, and if the Irishman chose to take it that way, it would be unpleasant. But O’Hara grinned and put his meaty hand out. “You win, Bucko,” he said. “You can wear the stripes.”

Winslow took the hand and grinned in return. “My head feels as if you hit me with a sledge hammer, Babe. I’d just as soon not do this every day.”

But it was over, and when Captain Smith saw the bruised faces of the two men, he smiled but said nothing. Later when he got back to the fort, he said to Tom Custer, “Winslow licked Babe O’Hara. Some doubt in my mind about how that would come about—but he’s been admitted to the club.”

As the morning wore on, a bleak chill lay in the still air, its thin edge cutting the faces of the troopers. Sunrise broke tawny in the east, and the sleazy fog lying on the earth vanished. All this was familiar country, and the ride was just one more scout detail flung out daily to keep an eye on the Sioux. East of the river the Indians lived in sulky peace, sitting in motionless shapes along the sidewalks of Bismarck. But west of the river they rode as they pleased, made haughty and insolent by the memory of the many evils done them by white people, made proud by the recollection of their vanishing freedom, made warlike by nature.

The troop ran across many trails, some old and some new, and from time to time passed traveling parties of Sioux. One of them was a large string of ponies and riders and travois. “Fifty lodges in that group,” Smith said to Winslow. They watched the Indians as they moved west through and over and around the depressions and hummocks of the land. The line passed, but some of the warriors returned to stare at the troop, then rode away with a yell of defiance.

“Feeling pretty tough,” Smith observed. He shifted his gaze to Winslow. “How do you feel about the scouts, Sergeant?”

“Better than I feel about the general’s opinion of the Indians as fighters.”

“So?”

“I read an article by General Custer in an eastern newspaper. He said that the Seventh could whip any collection of Indians in the West.”

“You don’t believe that?”

“No, sir.” Winslow eased his weight in the saddle, watching the horizon. “Custer won his promotion to general in the Civil War by cavalry charges. But charging Indians isn’t like charging us Rebels. We would stay put and meet force with force. The Indians think that’s stupid.”

Smith nodded slightly. “In that, Sergeant, you’re probably correct. They ride around like ghosts, and we make enough noise to wake the dead. We’ll never take them by surprise.” He was an excellent officer, this Algernon Smith, a hard man, but with a keen knowledge of men. A dozen years of soldiering had formed him into a good soldier who knew the difference between caution and daring. Now he seemed to be brooding. Finally he said, “When spring comes, the Seventh will be ordered out for a campaign. We’ll do what we’re told, which will be to subjugate the Indians.” He looked at Tom, saying, “We’ll all be depending on you and the scouts a great deal, Sergeant Winslow. Don’t let us down!”

****

The encounter with Babe O’Hara left Winslow with sore ribs and a purple bruise high on his left cheekbone, yet there was an ease inside of him, and the men joked with him freely—always a good sign.

When he returned from the patrol at dusk two days later, he immediately reported to Major Marcus Reno, Custer’s second in command. Reno was a stocky, rumpled figure, round and sallow of face with black hair pressed close to his skull, and round recessed eyes, darkly circled. He listened to Winslow’s report, then asked, “What do the Ree say, Sergeant?”

“A big build-up coming, sir,” Winslow answered. “They hear that Gall and Crazy Horse will make up their differences. Rain-in-the-Face, too, and when you get chiefs like that to thinking alike, it’s trouble.”

Reno shook his head thoughtfully. “I’ve tried to tell the general we’re in for a big fight, but he thinks the only trouble we’ll have is getting the Indians pinned down for a fight. And he’s got some reason for thinking that, I suppose. We’ve spent a lot of effort chasing the bands across the desert, just to have them melt away before we can throw out troops at them. Like fighting smoke.” He waved his hand, saying, “We’ll keep sending the patrols out, but it’s wearing us down. I think we’ll find out more by sending out individuals—Reynolds, Bouyer and you—and the Ree scouts, of course.”

“I agree with you, Major,” Winslow nodded. “When a troop goes out, they’re watched every step of the way, but a single man can hide himself and do a lot of seeing.”

“I’ll talk to Lieutenant Varnum,” Reno said. He was a slow-moving man, and Winslow had the impression that he functioned well under controlled circumstances, but not under pressure. “I think we’ll follow that procedure. You’ll be on your own, Sergeant. Do whatever scouting you feel is good, and keep me posted at all times—especially if you see any heavy concentration of hostiles.”

“Yes, sir.” Winslow saluted and left the office. He took his horse to the corral, rubbed him down, and saw that he was grained. Then he headed for Suds Row. The sun in the west half blinded him, and he kept his forage cap pulled low over his brow to shade his eyes. He was tired and so occupied in his mind with plans for future scouts that he paid no heed to the figure coming around the corner of the building to his left.

“Winslow!”

The sound of the man’s voice ran across Tom Winslow’s nerves like the rasp of metal on metal. He halted abruptly, turned and saw Spence Grayson advance. He had no control
over the emotion that exploded in the pit of his stomach, but did remember somehow that he was in uniform and saluted.

Grayson stopped and began to curse Winslow, his eyes pulled into slits by the heat of his anger. He had changed little over the years, Winslow noted, and was still trim and handsome.

“Get yourself transferred out of this fort, Winslow,” he snapped, “or I’ll break you!”

Winslow stood stock-still, knowing that he was on the razor’s edge of destroying himself, for he longed to throw himself against the man and destroy Grayson’s handsome face. Tom had often known violence, but even when he had fought the Yankees, there had been nothing like this—a blind rage that longed to destroy. Finally he took a deep breath and said in a controlled voice, “I didn’t know you were here, but I won’t be leaving.”

“You’ll leave!” Grayson growled. “I won’t have you in this fort!”

“Are you afraid I’ll spoil your reputation?”

Grayson ignored the taunt, saying, “You’re an enlisted man, Winslow. How long do you think you’d last making an accusation against an officer? Custer would have you in the stockade for the rest of your life—or worse—if you lifted your hand to me. That would get you shot.”

Winslow listened, but was thinking how little of the rottenness in the man’s spirit was revealed in his face. He looked every inch a soldier, and was brave enough, but his deliberate betrayal of his best friend, his callous treatment of Marlene, abandoning her when she was in such dire need—these didn’t show. He made a gallant figure, his smooth good looks attractive to women, Winslow well remembered. Nor had it been just Marlene. There had been other women also before her—and afterward as well, he had no doubt.