‘Take your posts!’ roared the young soldier Dusty illegally promoted to corporal. ‘Move it, shake the bull-droppings from your socks!’
Dusty reached the side of the wagon, knocking the sentry’s rifle into the air before he could fire. The rider came straight at the wagons, clear of the Sioux but they had come swarming towards him and at a charge. For all that he rode a big Sioux paint and dressed in buckskins the newcomer was no Indian. His face had a tan, but the long hair which showed from under his hat was red, not Indian black. The Henry rifle in his hands crashed fast as he rode, he tumbled a brave over. Then he swung the Henry to fire from waist high into the face of a second Sioux just as the brave came charging in to skewer him on the end of a lance.
‘Hold your fire!’ Dusty roared to the men who came rushing up.
At such a time volley firing would not be the answer, for the Sioux closed in around and behind the fast riding man. A skilled and careful aim was needed at this moment, not a mass of shots directed towards the enemy.
‘Pour it on, Lon, Mark!’ he ordered.
Two rifles began to crack, rifles handled by men who could call their shots. Mark sighted and shot at a brave who drew back a bow ready to send a buffalo arrow between the newcomer’s shoulder blades. The brave tilted backwards, his arrow flying into the air. At the same instant the Kid chopped a rifle-armed brave from his horse by sending a bullet within inches of the fast-riding white man.
The rider made the circle, his horse sailing over the barricade and coming to a rump-scraping halt. Dusty ordered off a volley, his voice acting as a spur, raking home and causing every trigger-finger to squeeze. The shots ripped out, two more braves and a horse fell, then the rest retreated to a safe distance.
Dropping from his horse the man came towards Dusty. He stood an inch or so over six foot, with wide shoulders slanting down to a lean waist. From the battered campaign hat he wore, his buckskins and the army belt around his waist, a Remington Army revolver in the holster and a bowie knife at the other side, Dusty took the man to be a civilian scout.
‘Howdy, captain,’ the man said, shifting his Henry to his left hand, holding the right out. ‘Name’s Jim Halter, chief scout out to Fort Tucker. Mr. Gilbert, him being senior officer there, sent me to look for you.’
Watching the man’s tanned, handsome face Dusty could read no hint of trickery in it. The small Texan had not overlooked the possibility of this being a renegade white man, a friend of the Sioux, trying to trick the soldiers into a fool move which would lay them wide open for an attack.
Halter went to his horse and pulled an envelope from the saddle-pouch, then returned to hand it to Dusty. His eyes went to the Sioux on the slopes, flickered to the setting sun and he grunted.
‘That’ll be all for today, unless they make another attack real soon. I reckon seeing your men standing to by the wagons, scared them off.’
‘Sure,’ agreed the Ysabel Kid. ‘I thought they was all set to make a rush when you shot out and the young corporal there got the others into place. It sure scared that old medicine-man up there. He called off the attack right on the spot.’
The scout’s eyes went to the Kid, looking beyond the innocent face and not needing to ask how so young a man knew about Indians, not even needing to ask how a Texas cowhand came to know what Sioux thought. Jim Halter was a quarter Blackfoot and knew another part-Indian when he saw one.
‘You’d best come down this way,’ Dusty drawled.
Halter came with Dusty and the Kid attended to the scout’s horse. The scout had a puzzled glint in his eyes which did not clear up when he saw the wounded sergeant-major. He watched Dusty give orders for the men to stand down, then rubbed his jaw as if thinking hard.
‘This’s Sergeant-Major Hogan,’ Dusty said.
‘And you?’ asked Halter. ‘I came across a riderless hoss, knew it belonged to Billy Cragg, a scout from Fort Bannard, so I backtracked it. Found Billy and another man dead and buried under a pile of rocks, scouted and found four dead Sioux. Then picked up the trail of four hosses, one without a rider, brought me here. Only the man with Cragg, he’d got him an army shirt on, officer’s white shirt.’
‘That was the late and unlamented Captain van Druten,’ growled Hogan grimly. ‘This here’s Captain Fog.’
For a moment Halter did not reply, then slowly he nodded his head. ‘Captain Dusty Fog?’
‘The same,’ replied Hogan.
‘Never knowed you were in the U.S. cavalry, Cap’n Fog.’
‘I’m not,’ Dusty answered quietly, then he explained the circumstances and Halter’s face remained grave.
‘It’s luck you come along when you did,’ he said, pointing to the slope. ‘They’re going to make camp for the night.’
‘Looks like we’re held here though,’ Dusty drawled.
‘It looks like there’ll be trouble here and at Fort Tucker,’ answered the scout. ‘When they hear they’ve still not got a leader the whole place’ll blow apart at the seams.’
‘What’re you meaning, friend?’ asked Hogan grimly.
‘You know how long the battalion’s had to run without a commanding officer, with three green lieutenants in command?’ drawled the scout, squatting on his heels. ‘They’ve done their best, but the men are getting slack, discipline’s near on gone. Word gets out that new commander’s dead you’ll be lucky if there’s a man left in the Fort come nightfall.’
‘Why was there such a delay in replacing the commanding officer?’ asked Dusty.
‘We lost the first man sent with the report, a fortnight went by before any of us thought anything about it. Got off Cragg with another message as soon as the shavetails realized the first hadn’t got through. But by that time the damage was done.’
All too well Dusty knew how quickly discipline could fade from men who were left without a strong leader. He could see the general slackening, the non-corns failing to hold control because of the lack of correct backing from the officers, in his imagination. The new commander at the Fort would need to be firm in his handling of the situation and he must get there in a hurry.
‘Things started to get bad. The shavetails have managed to keep patrols out and stop the worst of the rushers getting through, but enough slip in and get out to make Eagle Catcher, he’s the old man chief of the Sioux in this section, get riled and talk harsh,’ Halter went on. ‘Down in Shackville, ‘bout a mile from the Fort, the rushers are gathering. Word gets out that the new commanding officer’s dead they’ll go over the Tucker River and into the Black Hills—and mister, happen that many of them gets in every Sioux from here to the Canadian line’ll paint for war. That old medicine-man, Sitting Bull’ll start his dreaming again and we’ll see the Sioux tribes, the Northern Cheyenne, the Blackfeet, all of them on the rampage.’
‘Which’s what the brass wants to avoid,’ Hogan said quietly. ‘They want to hold off this year, then next they plan to send in the biggest force that’s been mustered since the War. Get all around the Sioux lands and close in, make them go into a reservation and stop at peace.’
None of the men spoke for a few moments. The soldiers were breaking out rations, sentries alert on each flank and watching the Sioux who kept enough men out to make sure there would be little chance of anyone slipping through their net. Over the rim fires flickered as the main body of the Indians prepared a meal. By now the sun had almost gone and soon night would descend on the land.
‘Captain Fog,’ said Hogan quietly. ‘Would you stay on and take over the Fort until we can have a relief arranged!’
CHAPTER THREE
For a long moment Dusty Fog did not reply to Hogan’s question. He stood with hands clasped behind his back and face bleak while Hogan, Mark and Halter watched him. Not one of them spoke, offering to help him make up his mind. Two of the men, Hogan and Halter, knew the seriousness of the situation even better than the third. Mark knew Dusty, knew him as one Confederate officer knew another.
Dusty’s eyes went to the company guidon which fluttered on its staff to one side of the camp, then to the blue sleeves of the uniform he wore.
‘I was never so fond of your flag that I’d ride under it,’ he said quietly.
‘The war ended ten years ago, Cap’n Fog,’ Hogan answered.
‘Did it?’ said Dusty. ‘And how about the southern boys like Bill Longley and Wes Hardin, did it end ten years ago for them?’
‘No, or for a lot of folks. You know as well as I do that a thing like the War couldn’t end and be forgotten like it never happened,’ replied Hogan. ‘It was less than a year after the war you rode south of the border into Mexico to fetch back Bushrod Sheldon.* He got fair treatment, and the men who came back with him.’
Once more the silence dropped on the men. Dusty looked at Mark and the big blond man nodded gravely.
‘You reckon I could get away with it?’ asked Dusty.
Hogan waved a hand towards the soldiers who busied themselves at the task of feeding their horses or preparing a meal for themselves. The young man Dusty promoted to corporal appeared to be a natural in the way he handled the others and kept them working.
‘There’s not the one of them would say you’re not an officer. And you fooled me, a man with twenty-eight years in the army.’
‘I’ll do it on one condition,’ Dusty finally said.
‘And that is?’ asked the non-corn.
‘That you never forget, or try to get out of, the idea that I’m a captain in command of the Fort. I handle things the way I would if they were my troop and you take my orders as if I’d the full authority of the War Department behind me. Is that clear?’
‘As clear as the waters of the River Shannon, which I’ve never seen but always heard were clear, sir,’ Hogan replied.
Dusty smiled. ‘All right, sergeant-major. You know what happens to people who impersonate officers, and to those who aid and abet them?’
‘I’ve a fair idea, sir,’ grinned Hogan. ‘Sure I’ve never been in trouble through me entire career and I think me luck’ll hold out for a bit longer.’
‘Do they know who’ll be taking over at the Fort?’ asked Mark.
‘Sure,’ replied the scout. ‘The courier riding despatch between the posts brought word.’
The men exchanged looks. Dusty saw a chance of their being detected before they even had a chance to do anything about squaring up the company and holding it together until a new commanding officer came from the regiment’s headquarters.
‘Who’d be likely to know van Druten?’ he asked.
‘Devil the few,’ replied Hogan. ‘Wasn’t Dandy van Druten always the desk-warmer in Washington, where there’s not been a man of the Fifteenth since the war?’
‘They’ve all been with the regiment for at least five years, over at the Fort,’ agreed Halter. ‘I reckon you could get by as Dandy van Druten, Cap’n Fog. Who’s going to think different when they see you ride in with the reinforcements and see me and the sergeant-major accepting you as van Druten?’
‘Ain’t but one thing to that,’ drawled the Kid sardonically, having come up in time to hear enough to know what was being planned. ‘We’ve got to get away from here first.’
This brought all thoughts back to their present position. It did not seem worthwhile plotting what they might do when they reached the Fort, with a tough bunch of Hunkpapa Sioux out there, hidebound that the soldiers were staying where they were. All eyes went to Dusty and Hogan thought of how they might have been reacting if this man really was Dandy van Druten. The young officer would never have been able to pull the troop together in the way Dusty had on his arrival. Then the sergeant-major caught the glances Halter threw at the two Texans and realized the scout did not know them.
‘Jim,’ he said. ‘This here’s Mark Counter and the Ysabel Kid. Gents, get acquainted with Jim Halter.’
‘Thought that’s who you might be,’ drawled Halter. ‘How’re you aiming to put you two over at the Fort?’
‘Lon can take over as scout and Mark ride with him,’ Dusty replied. ‘But like Lon said, we’ve got to get clear of that bunch first. What’ll be their next play do you reckon, Jim?’
‘Hold off until dawn for sure. Then they’ll come in as soon as it’s daylight to take us afore we’re properly awake.’
‘Sure,’ agreed the Kid. ‘Only if that fails them they’ll not be so all-fired eager to try again. If we could hit them hard enough on their first rush they might pull out.’
‘The Kid’s right in that,’ Halter stated.
Dusty came to his feet and went to the side of the wagons, peering through the fast coming night towards the surrounding country. He ignored the dead bodies of the Sioux, beyond making a mental note to warn the sentries to make sure they knew where each body in their area lay so as not to start shooting at a corpse in the darkness. His main attention went to the scrub oaks and rocks scattered around the area and in his mind’s eye he pictured the land around the group of wagons.
Looking into the wagon he stood by Dusty saw it to be filled with blankets and bales of clothing, replacements for the Fort’s quartermaster’s department. He guessed this to be a supply train, helping fill the Fort’s stores for the forthcoming winter when the snow would cut it off from the resf of the world. In the wagons would be most of the things the soldiers at the Fort needed to survive in the Black Hills winter.
Turning, Dusty returned to the others. By now Hogan’s iron hard frame had shaken off the effects of the blow on the head. He stood erect, peering around the camp to make sure all was under control and being done as Captain Fog wanted.
‘What supplies have you?’ asked Dusty.
‘Ammunition, which I unloaded and stored in a trench between the horse lines. Clothing, general stores, saddlery, blacksmith’s supplies, sir.’
‘Rope?’
‘Three mile of it, in half-mile rolls, over there in the fourth wagon,’ Hogan answered.
This was as Dusty hoped, although he expected a vital commodity like rope would be included in the supply train. He could see the way the other men looked at him, and hid a grin as he saw the eager way in which Mark and the Kid watched his face. The time had long gone when he could fool them, or hide his emotions from either of his
amigos
. They knew, from his attitude and voice, that some plan had formed itself and he was going to pass it on to them. He expected that, though knowing him as they did, his idea might surprise even Mark and the Kid.
The young corporal, showing the sort of tact which along with his proven ability would carry him a long way as a career soldier, had caused a fire to be built at hand. With wood from the rawhide possum bellies under the wagons the men were making small fires near their posts and cooking food. The corporal started one for Dusty, then stood back, clearly awaiting orders.
‘Corporal,’ Dusty said. ‘I didn’t get your name.’
‘Dunbrowski, sir.’
‘You’d best hear this, it’ll save me repeating myself.’
The Kid had collected their coffee pot from the bedrolls and set it on the fire, filled with water from a butt on a wagon. He almost knocked it over as he spun around on hearing Dusty’s plan. He, and all the others, stared at Dusty for the plan would call for skill, nerve and more than a little luck.
‘It could work, given good men,’ drawled Halter.
‘It’s got to work, Jim,’ corrected Dusty. ‘Sure we can hold them off, but they’ll whittle the command down slowly and we’ll be using supplies needed for the fort. We’ve got to break that attack and break it hard. My way ought to do it.’
The Kid grinned, his teeth showing white against his tanned skin in the firelight. ‘Comes to a real mean point, Dusty, there ain’t no one but you, Jim, Mark and li’l ole me who’d be good enough in the dark to chance it.’
‘Going to need a few hands to tow all that rope though.’ Mark went on. ‘I reckon you thought out some way to run the rope out to us?’
Dusty nodded, turning to Dunbrowski. ‘That’s your job, corporal. Take some men and break out one of those half-mile coils of rope. Get a crowbar from the blacksmith’s stores and put it through the hole in the centre of the coil, rest it on the sides of the wagon at a corner, so it can pay out.’
‘Yes, sir,’ replied Dunbrowski, his face showing he understood the order. He paused before going to obey the order. ‘Request permission to join the laying party, Cap’n, sir.’
For a moment Dusty thought of refusing the permission and going himself. He saw the grin which flickered for a moment on Hogan’s face and knew the reason. They both liked the spirit the young corporal showed. He did not volunteer for the dangerous mission because he thought doing so would impress his superior officers, but because he regarded it as part of his duty to go. Dusty promised himself that whatever the result of this affair, no matter how it ended for him, he would try and ensure Dunbrowski held the rank, for the young man was a soldier to the core and would make a good non-com.
‘Permission granted,’ Dusty replied. ‘Take two men to assist in the paying-out party. You’ll be in command of that detail tonight, sergeant-major.’
‘Yo!’ Hogan answered; he would have liked to argue the order but knew better. Captain Fog was not the kind of officer a man argued orders with, not twice anyway.
‘May I suggest the captain has lengths of cord cut to secure the rope in position at the right height?’ put in Dunbrowski. ‘It might slip down if we don’t.’
‘Good man,’ Dusty answered. ‘See to that. I’ll have you in charge of that detail. You’ll wait at the starting point with one man, then when the laying party return to you go around and secure the rope. See to it that every man has eaten in forty-five minutes, then allow the fires to die and have your detail standing by ready to move.’
Dunbrowski went to attend to his duties. Watching the young man Dusty could see he’d made a good choice in the promotion, even though he’d no right to break the other soldier and give Dunbrowski the rank. There was the air of command about the young man, the way of a natural leader. The others obeyed him with a spring and willingness which the man Dusty broke could never get.
‘There’s a good soldier,’ Dusty remarked to Hogan as they settled down to a meal of jerked beef and hardtack biscuits, washed down with hot coffee thick and strong enough to float an anvil. ‘You’ll see he keeps his rank when the new post commander arrives?’
‘That I will, sir,’ answered Hogan. ‘The army needs good non-coms, they’re all that hold it together.’
‘I thought the officers had something to do with it,’ drawled Dusty, then glanced at the broken corporal who sat by the fire not worrying about his loss of rank by all appearances. ‘How about the one I broke?’
‘Sure he wasn’t never but a desk-warmer, sir,’ answered Hogan with a fighting soldier’s contempt for administration personnel. ‘But young Dunbrowski, sir. He’s such a natural he might be Irish.’
With the meal finished and without needing to be told Dunbrowski gathered a quartet of muscular young soldiers and headed for one of the wagons. Dusty walked along to see his orders were obeyed. He stood back and allowed the corporal to get on with the work. Leaving the men to break out and cut the sacking from around a new bundle of rope Dunbrowski headed for the wagon with the blacksmith’s stores and with the aid of a lantern found a stout crowbar. He did not come straight out of the wagon, but rooted around until he located a couple of large staples and a hammer. With these and the crowbar he headed back to the other wagon where his four men waited.
First the crowbar was passed through the hole in the centre of the hard plaited Manila rope. Then it was lifted and the ends of the bar rested on the two sides of the wagon where they formed a corner, facing the open range. Next Dunbrowski placed a staple over each end of the bar and hammered it home, holding the bar in place so that the rope could be drawn off the coil. He made sure the rope ran smoothly, dismissed his men and reported to Dusty.
‘We’ve nothing to do but wait now, corporal,’ Dusty remarked. ‘I’ll have it placed on your record how well you handled the work. Set the men to cleaning their arms, then resupply with ammunition.’
‘Yo!’ replied Dunbrowski and went to his work.
Watching Dunbrowski stride away, Dusty felt that they might pull off their wild masquerade. Clearly the young corporal did not doubt Dusty’s right to give orders and accepted him as an officer. Dusty also saw that he could leave the routine duties in Dunbrowski’s hands. Swiftly the corporal paraded the men, checked their ammunition and drew on the supply to replenish every man to his thirty-rounds quota. Then he set the men to cleaning their weapons.
Not until the arms were cleaned and the men fed did Dunbrowski relax. He joined Dusty’s party at the central fire and taking a seat slid out the knife he carried in a boot-top sheath, took a piece of sandstone from his pocket and began to hone the blade.
That’s a fair-looking knife,
amigo
,’ said the Kid, looking at the weapon with some interest. ‘One of those made by Ames or the Dragoons in the Mexican War days, ain’t it?’
‘Sure is, my pappy carried it down there.’
The Kid held out his hand and Dunbrowski held the knife hilt foremost to him. The Ames knife had been quite a weapon in its days, almost the equal of the bowie. The one held by the Kid was a good example of the type the Dragoons, and all who could get their hands on one, carried in the war with Mexico. With a blade eleven and three-quarters long the knife exceeded the Kid’s bowie by a quarter of an inch. In width the bowie had an advantage, being two and a half inch at the guard to the Ames’ inch and a half.
‘Don’t take to a spear-pointed knife myself,’ the Kid remarked, drawing his bowie to compare the weapons. ‘Nope, give me a clipped point any time. You can make a better backhand slash with the false edge of a clipped point. See you keep a good point on your knife. Most folks just sharpen the edge, but you need a good point in a fight.’
Taking back the knife Dunbrowski slipped it into his boot top and then settled himself on his side, pillowed his head on his arms and went to sleep. Dusty watched this with a smile flickering on his face.
‘That’s a real soldier,’ he said. ‘I’ll take first watch, the rest of you catch what sleep you can.’
Dusty allowed the fires to die down. Long after midnight, the camp all but in darkness, he woke his men. The Kid faded off into the darkness beyond the wagons and some time later returned as silently as he went.
‘Quiet as the Llano Estacado at noon,’ he said quietly. ‘Head ‘em up and point ‘em out.’
Hogan climbed into the wagon and took the end of the coil of rope, passing it to Mark and Halter as they stepped from the gap and into the hostile land beyond. They began to draw off the rope as they went through, followed by two men who would help tow the rope as more and more of it stretched behind Mark and Halter. Dunbrowski and another soldier followed them, each carrying several cut lengths of rope. They did not follow the first group beyond the nearest scrub oak. Here Mark and his party turned, the rope curling around the tree and following them. The Kid glided out and on his way, flanking the towing party, alert for any sign of the Sioux. He picked a careful way among the dead Indians which lay scattered on the ground from the earlier fighting, his knife in his hand, for he knew any defending of himself or the others could best be handled by cold steel.
At the first tree Dunbrowski stood, he kept one hand lightly on the passing rope feeling it running out steadily. Then his attention went to the body of a Sioux warrior which lay sprawled by a bush. He had not noticed it at first, then it caught his eye, laying flat on its belly with arms thrown out wide—only now the arms were not thrown wide and he could swear the dead Sioux had moved even closer, so that it now lay clear of the bush.
For a moment Dunbrowski watched the Indian but it made no move. Or did it? Slowly it appeared to be inching over the ground towards them. By Dunbrowski’s side the other soldier fidgeted nervously, for it was a nerve-racking business being out of the protective folds of the wagons. Dunbrowski hissed an order for the soldier to stay still. His eyes never left the shape on the ground, so slowly did it move that he might have thought himself to be wrong. Only he knew he wasn’t wrong.
Dropping his hand towards the flap of his holster, Dunbrowski prepared to draw and shoot. Then he remembered Dusty’s orders. Firearms must only be used as a last resort. The shot would alert the Sioux and might bring disaster to the rope-laying party. It would certainly alarm the camp and some young sentry, his nerves already on the jump, might throw lead wild to the danger of Mark and the others. No, if he must deal with the Sioux he had to do it in silence.
‘Back down the rope to the wagon, Joe!’ he whispered urgently to the man at his side.
‘I thought you sa—!’
‘Do it, damn you!’
Silently the soldier obeyed and Dunbrowski slid the Ames knife from his boot. Although it took all his will-power, Dunbrowski kept standing with his back to where he sensed the Sioux creeping towards him.
Hearing a soft movement behind him, Dunbrowski sidestepped. Something shiny hissed by his shoulder and buried into the tree trunk. Instantly he turned, driving out his knife at the shape looming before him. The spear point sank into flesh until he felt the hot gush of stomach gases hit his hand and blood spurted over it. A hand gripped his wrist and in trying to free it, he ripped the knife through flesh. Soundlessly the shape fell away from Dunbrowski’s knife and went to the ground, writhing at his feet.
‘Nice moving, boy!’
The voice came floating from the darkness as gentle and soft as a breath of wind and just as hard to pin down as to its source. Dunbrowski came around fast, the knife held ready for use. He saw nothing for a couple of seconds, then the Kid came into sight from the side where the corporal least expected him.
‘There was one out here, Kid,’ he gasped.
‘Yeah. Must have crawled down for water, or maybe to scout us,’ answered the Kid. ‘Reckon he either saw or heard you and came over for a look at what fool game you was playing. Thought to take him a coup.’
Dunbrowski made no reply. Suddenly his stomach seemed to be heaving violently as he realized what he’d done. Yet he did not wish to be sick while the Kid was at hand, for that dark boy had reputedly killed more than one man with a knife. He would not think highly of a man who showed such a weak stomach that he fetched up because he’d dropped a Sioux warrior.
‘Let it go, boy,’ drawled the Kid, resting a hand gently on the soldier’s shoulder. ‘There’s no shame in it.’
With that the Kid faded off into the darkness once more, not wishing to embarrass Dunbrowski with his presence. The young corporal leaned against the tree and took the Kid’s advice. He was in control of himself when he saw the rope-hauling party appear from the opposite direction to which they went on the way out. He helped Mark make the leading end of the rope secure to the tree, regulating the height carefully. Then with one of his lengths of cord he secured the rope to the correct height, lashing the cord into place to hold it there.
‘Let’s go, boy,’ said the Kid. ‘I’ll come with you.’
They made a circle of the camp, following the rope around and at the places where it curled around the trunk of a tree fastened it to the right height with the lengths of cord. By the time they’d finished the entire camp was surrounded at a distance varying according to where the nearest tree stood, from thirty to fifty yards by the rope. If it worked they would break the Sioux attack. If it failed the Sioux might take it as a sign the white man’s medicine was bad and they’d gain heart by it.
The rope-laying party returned to the camp, slipping through the gap between the wagons and reporting to Dusty. The Kid entered last and threw a grin and wink at Dusty as Dunbrowski joined his captain, stood at a brace and reported.
‘Everything set as ordered, sir.’
‘No trouble?’ asked Dusty.
‘I had to kill a Sioux scout. I did it silently.’
‘
Bueno
,’ drawled Dusty, then realized that Captain van Druten would hardly be likely to use Spanish words so casually. ‘You did well, corporal and I’ll have it entered on your record.’
‘Orders for the morning, sir?’ asked Dunbrowski, showing his pleasure at the words.
‘Have the men standing to their posts at half an hour before first light. Make sure they take their places in silence.’
‘Yo!’
‘Now catch some sleep,’ Dusty finished. ‘And you, sergeant-major.’
‘With all respect, sir,’ replied Hogan. ‘I’m rested. Would the captain get sleep? I’ll wake him in time to stand-to.’
‘Thanks, I think I will,’ answered Dusty.
It hardly seemed to Dusty that he’d done more than closed his eyes when he felt a gentle hand shaking him. He opened his eyes and found Dunbrowski kneeling beside him holding a mug of coffee.
‘The sergeant-major told me to waken you, sir,’ he said. ‘Company is fallen in as you ordered. There is some activity among the Sioux but no sign of an attack so far.’
‘My compliments to the sergeant-major,’ Dusty replied, taking the mug. ‘I want one man with a repeater at each flank. The three scouts to take north, south and east flanks. I’ll be at the west.’
‘Yo!’ Dunbrowski answered and shot away to deliver the order. Dusty sat up and looked the camp over. In the east the sky bore just the faintest lightening which would herald the new day. Soon would be the time of the attack, the time when the plan would either succeed or fail.
Finishing his coffee Dusty watched his orders being obeyed. Slowly the grey of dawn improved, the trees around the camp showed clearly and the rest of the area came gradually into view as the day became lighter.