the enemy camp spread before him, a sizable pony herd grazing between him and the lodges. By some stroke of luck, the camp appeared too busy to notice the soldier as he quickly grasped the muzzle of his horse in one hand and reined about, back into the ravine, where he slipped from the saddle.
“I found the camp!” he whispered excitedly as Sweete and North came up.
“Get on back there and tell the general,” North ordered.
Connor quickly issued battle orders to his officers, then formed up two columns before he spoke personally to the enlisted men.
“This is our day! Should we get in close quarters, you men must remember to form by fours and stay together at all costs. Use your rifles as long as possible to defeat our enemy, and under no circumstances are you to use your service revolvers unless you are out of rifle ammunition and have no other choice.”
He took his hat off and swiped a finger inside the headband, preparing to lead the charge himself. “You must endeavor to make every shot count, but each of you must be ever mindful of leaving one shot for yourselves. Rather than fall into the hands of the hostiles, use that last shot for yourself—as it will be preferable to falling into the hands of these savages who have killed up and down the length of Dakota.
“Very well, men. This is our day!”
11
AS HOOK FOLLOWED Sweete out of the ravine behind the hundred Pawnee scouts, the level ground where Wolf Creek poured into the Tongue River sprouted close to three hundred lodges, most already nothing more than skeletons bare of buffalo–hide lodge covers.
“They’re breaking camp a’ready!” Sweete hollered as the pony herd began to whinny alarm. The frightened animals bolted in all directions as the soldier columns poured out of the ravines like columns of black ants across the brown landscape.
The village erupted with the shrieks of women, cries of children, and shouts from warriors hustling for their weapons. Every throat rang with alarm as ponies were caught up. Dogs barked and howled, a thousandfold. A frightening cacophony more fitting to hell itself.
Connor’s battalion burst from the ravine, wheeled left into line.
“
Up and down the long line of 250 troopers, officers echoed the order. Now the soldiers raised their throaty roar to the sky, matching that of the warriors waiting to take the blow of the coming charge.
At four hundred yards officers ordered the first volley.
“Look at all them sonsabitches!” Hook muttered, just loud enough for Sweete to hear.
“These soldiers are outnumbered, Jonah. We best hope Connor can put the fear of God in these Injuns.”
“Bunch of ’em running already.” Jonah pointed to the north where those on ponies and on foot were struggling up the bluffs into the surrounding hills along Wolf Creek.
“Mostly old women and young’uns, Jonah. Scattering whilst the warriors cover the retreat. You’re gonna find a lot of the younger squaws hanging back in the village—fighting ’longside their men as these soldiers charge in —”
“Shad!”
They both found Bridger reining for them at a gallop, his bony, arthritic hands gripping the reins like life itself.
“This is Black Bear’s bunch!” cried the old trapper as he came alongside the two horsemen. The three reined up in a swirl of dust as the Pawnee surged on, yelling their own war cries.
“Arapaho? You sure, Gabe?”
“You never questioned me afore, you idjit!”
“You always been right as I recollect. But this bunch can’t be Arap.”
“They are—and Connor’s making him one big mistake.”
“How you gonna get him to stop?”
“No way. Blood’s spilled now,” Bridger groaned.
“What’s the difference?” Hook asked. “This bunch made trouble for the settlers and soldiers, haven’t they? Time they paid.”
“This is a ragtag band compared to the Bad Face fighting bands we ought to be hunting down,” Shad said.
Ahead of them the first soldiers were now among the lodges, forced into a fierce firefight with the warriors and half again as many squaws who shot rifles, pistols, and bows, then ran and dodged before they would wheel and fire again behind another lodge or some concealing brush. The ground lay littered with robes and blankets and bodies of those men and women who had fallen in their fight or flight.
A light rain of arrows fell short of the trio’s horses, some sticking in the ground, others clattering against brush and rocks noisily.
“We can’t be sitting here!” Bridger shouted.
“You figure to fight now?” asked Sweete.
“If we don’t—it’s our hair, you old pilgrim!”
“C’mon, Jonah!” Sweete hollered as Bridger tore off into the fray, flailing the sides of his army mule with his moccasins.
In the time it takes the sun to move from one lodgepole to the next, the Arapaho were driven from their village, into the rough, brushy country upstream along Wolf Creek. For ten miles Connor and his men pursued the fleeing band. Yet with every mile more and more of the soldiers were forced to drop out and turn back, their horses exhausted from the forced march of the past two days.
“General!”
Connor finally turned, clearly surprised to find only Sweete, Bridger, and Hook—along with no more than a dozen soldiers still capable of maintaining the chase. He threw up an arm and ordered a halt.
“Bridger! My God—where’s the rest of my command?”
“You damned well outrun ’em, General.”
“What man among you has paper and pencil?” Connor inquired. A corporal raised his hand, patting his tunic. “Good, soldier. Take the names of every trooper here who was capable of keeping up with the chase. I want a commendation written for each man.”
“You ain’t got time to take names and hand out your congratulations!” Sweete warned in a blistering tone.
Connor twisted in the saddle. He and the rest of the soldiers saw them coming.
It hadn’t taken the Arapaho long to realize the soldiers had slowed their pursuit. The warriors doubled back on the trail and found the soldiers greatly outnumbered. In a screeching, angry mass, like a disturbed nest of hornets, the warriors swarmed back down the creekbank in a rattle of rifle fire and the hiss of stinging arrows.
“Let’s get—”
A soldier yelped in pain as an arrow caught him in the leg.
Jonah felt his horse jerk, then wheel suddenly, around and around in a wild circle. It collapsed on its front legs as he dismounted to keep from falling, yanking free the carbine from its shoulder sling.
“Up here, son!”
He turned. The old mountain man held out a hand. In a fluid leap, Jonah was atop the big Morgan mare behind Sweete, who whirled the horse about as the last of the soldiers lit out.
As they raced downstream, Connor picked up more and more of the soldiers who had been forced to turn back. Slowly, by adding small groups of troopers here and there along the way, the white men were able to hold off the counterattacking Arapaho.
By the time they reached the mouth of Wolf Creek where the rest of the general’s men were mopping up the defenders, the Arapaho held back from pushing their attack. Instead of pursuing into the village, the warriors fought from long-distance, and when they didn’t fire at the soldiers, they flung their curses and rage at the white men
