“Inconclusive.”
“Yes, sir.”
“General, this is Colonel Falcon MacCallister.”
“Colonel MacCallister? Have we met, sir?” Gibbon asked.
“No,” Falcon replied. “I’m not a colonel in the regular army, I’m a colonel in the Colorado Guard.”
Gibbon looked confused. “If you are in the Colorado guard, what—”
“He is accompanying Custer,” Terry said, interrupting Gibbon’s question. “He is out here to look for Gatling guns that fell into the Indians possession.”
“Good Lord,” Gibbon said. “Gatling guns in the hands of the Indians?”
“Don’t worry about it, the situation has been dealt with. Colonel MacCallister found one of the guns and disabled it. He also destroyed the ammunition so, though the Indians have the other gun, they won’t be able to use it.”
“Uh, that may not be true, General,” Gibbon said with a rather rueful tone to his voice.
“What do you mean?”
“One of our wagons broke down and we had to abandon it. At first, we thought the only thing on it was canvas and tent stakes. Later, we discovered that there were three cases of ammunition on board. One of the cases was fifty-caliber rounds for the Gatling gun.”
“And you didn’t go back for them?”
“By the time we discovered we had lost them, it was too late. They were too far back.”
“All right, there’s no sense in crying over spilt milk,” Terry said. “This is what I want you to do.”
Terry pointed to the map, indicating where Custer was at the moment, and where he thought Crook was— though as he had had no contact with Crook, he could only guess.
“I’m going to send Custer up the Tongue River, then have him come down the Rosebud. I’ll augment your column with three companies from the Seventh, and have you move up the Rosebud. If the village you saw is still on the Rosebud, we’ll have them trapped in between.”
“You won’t trap them, General,” Falcon said.
Both Terry and Gibbon looked at Falcon in surprise. “What do you mean, we won’t trap them?” Terry asked.
“There are far too many Indians out there for them to be concentrated in a village that small. That was either a temporary village on the way to join one that is much larger—or—the other Indians are coming to join it, in which case it will become much larger,” Falcon said.
“What makes you think there are that many Indians out there?” Gibbon asked.
“Have you seen no Indians other than this village?” Terry asked.
“Well, I did have some scouts encounter a war party that was big enough to prevent them from getting through to Custer. But I only had two scouts out there, so it didn’t require that large of a party. We just haven’t seen anything to suggest that there is a significantly large body of Indians operating out here.”
“I have seen them,” Falcon replied.
“Have you now? And where was that, Colonel?” Gibbon asked.
“Colonel MacCallister and Mr. Dorman recently returned from a very hazardous scout of their own,” Terry explained.
“I see. Well, I’m sure that to a colonel from the Colorado Guard, any significant body of Indians is apt to look very large,” Gibbon said. “But I wouldn’t worry about it.” Gibbon turned his attention to General Terry.
“General, how soon do you want me to start up the Rosebud?”
“Not yet,” Terry said. “I think perhaps I’ll send a scouting party, in strength, to scout the Powder River to its forks, then to the head of Mizpah Creek down to its mouth, then by Pumpkin Creek to the Tongue River.” Terry pointed out his plan on the map. “It just doesn’t seem likely to me that there can be that many Indians operating out there, but I am not going to totally disregard the information given me by Colonel MacCallister. I want to find out just what is in front of us. Obviously, any Indians out here are going to be by one of the rivers in order to take advantage of the water.”
“General, you know what will happen if you send Custer at the head of that scout, don’t you?” Gibbon asked. “If he does find any Indians, he’ll turn the scout into an opportunity to attack on his own.”
Terry stroked his long, luxurious beard for a moment, then nodded. “You may be right,” he said. “All right, I’ll send Reno.”
“I don’t understand why Terry sent Reno instead of me,” Custer complained as he watched Reno leave at the head of six companies. “There is no way Reno is going to find something, and if he does, he won’t have the slightest idea what to do about it. This whole scout is a waste of effort and a waste of time.”
“Why worry about time?” Benteen asked. “We aren’t on any kind of schedule out here.”
“Oh, but we are, Colonel,” Custer replied, using Benteen’s brevet rank. “We are most definitely on a schedule. The twenty-seventh is fast approaching.”
“The twenty-seventh is approaching? I don’t understand, General. What is significant about the twenty- seventh?” Benteen asked.
