disappearing like breathsmoke on a winter wind soon enough, what with this squad of Seventh Cavalry coming up from the south and Frank North’s Pawnee Battalion sweeping the country clear along the Platte River itself. It was North’s Pawnee who were going out to the scene of the derailed train. And likely, Jonah Hook would be with them.
Not that he was worried about Jonah either. The Cheyenne would be long ago gone from the countryside around Plum Creek Station by the time Shad Sweete led Captain Louis Hamilton and his two companies of cavalry to the scene.
There was no danger the Seventh would catch the warriors. Too far to travel for this bunch of plodding horsemen. And he doubted this bunch of cavalry had the resolve to find the guilty warriors anyway. Easier to jump the villages filled with women and children and the old ones too sick to fight. Much harder to track and follow the wild-roaming bands of young warriors ready to turn and spit in your eye.
Sweete knew his son would likely be among them. Riding with Roman Nose or Turkey Leg, Tall Bull or White Horse. Every bit as likely as the fact that the main bands of Dog Soldiers would soon be coming together for the fall hunt. Breaking up only after the first good cold snap, that first early snow foretelling of the harsh arrival of winter.
As certain as the sun rose each new morn, Shad knew his son would be in on that hunt this autumn. Like every year gone before, the bands would be laying in the meat that would see them through the winter.
Except that this year—the bands would be hunting some new game: two-legged game.
36
Company B, under newly promoted Captain James Murie and Lieutenant Issac Davis.
Each of the four bands of Pawnee had been formed into a formal company of scouts. Which meant that the army hired three white officers to command each company. In this case, the sergeant of Company B was one Jonah Hook.
Company B had just received orders to find the bunch that had destroyed the tracks west of Alkali Station. Hunting Cheyenne ranked right high on the list of what the Pawnee liked to do. And word had it that the Cheyenne were getting bold enough to make another raid on the track.
Frank North made it plain he felt the rumor was just that—not worthy of belief. But he determined he would ride out for Plum Creek with Captain Murie and Company B.
“I’ll be go to hell,” North muttered, the men around him stunned into silence.
“Sounds like you didn’t believe we’d find ’em. At least not this quick,” said Hook, his eyes scanning the far hills where at least 150 warriors sat their ponies, breaking the skyline.
Company B had just ridden down to the ford at Plum Creek, closing on the old bridge near the abandoned stage station, in no way expecting to find the Cheyenne so quickly.
“I truly didn’t,” North replied. “Captain, let’s get this bunch into battle order!”
Something easier said than done.
Every one of the forty Pawnee had already spotted the Cheyenne, their ancient enemies. Their blood instantly hot, the scouts were already stripping for battle, hollering at one another, working one another up for the coming fight. They checked their weapons, straightened the little bundles of war medicine each man carried tied around his neck, maybe under an arm, perhaps tied behind an ear or adorning the long, unbraided hair that stirred with each hot breeze.
Murie and Hook were among them, the captain shouting his orders in English, waving his arm to show his meaning. The ex-Confederate on the other hand rode up and down the entire line of the brigade, hollering in his crude Pawnee, getting his wards to spread out on a wide front to receive the coming assault.
“We must cross at the bridge, Captain!” North shouted, his cheeks gone flush with adrenaline.
“This bunch will cross ahead of us at the ford if we don’t get moving,” Murie hollered back against the din of screeching raised by the Cheyenne warning their women and children away, against the noise of the ringing war songs of the Pawnee as they tightened saddles and bound up the tails of their ponies.
“Hook—order the scouts to cross at the bridge. Warn them that the ford may be filled with shifting sand and unpassable. Everyone is to follow me!”
“Yessir, Major!” Hook reined about to deliver his order as North and Murie trotted down to the old bridge fifty yards off.
He was too late explaining the danger in crossing at the ford. Already the first of the eager Pawnee were in the water, their army horses fighting them, head-rearing, snorting, bogging down in the mud of the crossing as the scouts called out for help from those yet to enter the water.
In a mad scene of confusion, a dozen not yet gone to the water wheeled about and tore down the bank toward the bridge, crossing on the heels of their white commanders while the rest soon abandoned their horses in the water. One by one and in pairs, the rest dropped from their saddles, plunging into the creek that rose above their knees—as the Cheyenne opened fire.
Bullets smacked the water. Slapped into the old grayed timbers of the bridge long used by the stages bound east or west from Plum Creek Station along the Platte River Road. Snarled overhead madly like angry hornets.
As he reached the far end of the bridge, the Cheyenne were slowly backing into the nearby bluffs, already carrying five of their own with them. On the north bank of Plum Creek lay a wounded Pawnee calling out to the others. Nearby lay another scout, past all caring, his body lapping against the sandy mud and willows on the bank.
“Hook! Get those men to force their horses out of the river!” North shouted, pointing his rifle at the horses struggling in the creek.
Hammering heels against his mount’s heaving sides, Jonah was among the scouts in a heartbeat, yelling in Pawnee, trying to make himself heard above their own courage-shouts and the rattle of their gunfire.
“We can’t follow the Shahiyena if you do not have your horses to ride!” he screamed at them.
The first to understand rose from his knee where he had been firing at the fleeing Cheyenne and turned back into the creek. Then a second, and finally more rose and returned to the muddy, churning water, snagging up the reins to their frightened mounts, soothing the animals if they could. The scouts got the horses to the north bank, where they quickly mounted and swirled around Hook.
Jonah realized if he did not take command immediately, the hot-blooded Pawnee would go to fight without him. Flicking his eyes at North and Murie, Jonah found the white men waving him to advance with his thirty scouts.
But to do that did not make sense to him. Why go join the officers and their ten warriors … when the Cheyenne were escaping in a totally different direction?
“Follow me!” he ordered in Pawnee.
With an ear-shattering whoop, the thirty obeyed. A rattle of saddle and bit, a grunt of frightened animal, and the shriek of worked-up warrior in each of them drowned out all protests flung in their direction by North and Murie.
But instead of sitting back to watch the chase, North and Murie led their ten to join it.
The Cheyenne were not long in running, stopping after less than a mile among their women and children. The travois filled with lodges and camp plunder had been following the procession of warriors when the men blundered into the Pawnee. Now they were back among their families, where the warriors turned about on their Pawnee pursuers, shouting the courage-words to one another, here to make a stand and protect the weak ones from their tribal enemy.
With screams of panic, the women furiously tore at the baggage, freeing the lodgepole travois from most of the ponies, abandoning their camp gear, putting a child and old one on nearly every animal before turning to scatter north into the hills, away from the charging Pawnee.
Ahead of the broad line of scouts he led, Jonah watched the Cheyenne warriors swirl in among themselves, as if confused, disorganized, until suddenly they reined about with a shout and leapt away from the scene. They left
