Long Winter Gone

me.”

In stony silence, the commander of the Department of the Missouri turned back to the wide window behind his massive oak desk, his eyes gazing far beyond the bustling Topeka, Kansas, street below. Though he stood shorter than most of the officers gathered around him, Sheridan somehow conveyed a greater stature than most men of the day. Here stood a confident man, every inch of muscle rippling with the martial fervor that had made him the hero of countless cavalry battles in the late war between the states.

But that rebellion lay some four and a half years behind him. Today he had a new war to fight.

The leaden skies dropped a wet, icy snow that turned the Topeka streets into a barnyard slop. Sheridan turned back to his staff and sank heavily into his chair at last. “Sandy, tell me what you’re thinking.”

Major George A. Forsyth cleared his throat. “Undoubtedly, Custer did more at the Washita than my command of frontier scouts ever hoped of doing, pinned down on Beecher’s Island, General. I can’t fault him his success.”

“He damn well could have gotten himself wiped out!” blurted Lieutenant Colonel James W. Forsyth, Sandy’s brother. “Himself … along with a good piece of his regiment. But we all know that, don’t we? That’s something no one in this room has had the guts to mention. Begging the General’s pardon—”

Sheridan waved his hand; flakes of ash littered the papers scattered across his desk. “No offense, Tony. We all know—don’t we, gentlemen—that Tony’s right. But that’s not all that bothers me.” He rose stiffly, the cold in this office penetrating to his marrow more of late. At the nearby hutch where the ever-present bottles and glasses waited, Sheridan poured himself a few fingers of amber liquid. Without ceremony or inviting the others to join him, he tossed the fire down a throat more parched these days with the burn of long hours and too many cigars.

“Is this damned Custer doing a single thing different than he ever has in his military career, sir?” Michael Sheridan asked.

With the back of his hand the general wiped some lingering drops of whiskey from his bushy mustache after a second drink. “Near as I can tell, Custer’s still the same cavalry magician he was at Gettysburg, Shenandoah, and Appomattox Wood.” He slammed the empty whiskey glass down. “And frankly, gentlemen—Philip H. Sheridan isn’t a man to argue with success.”

“All of us need reminding that those victories were exactly why we wanted Custer brought out of that year of his … unofficial retirement.” Major Morris V. Ashe uttered the words the rest of Sheridan’s staff wouldn’t admit to. “All of us asked for him back before his court-martial was over … simply because we all knew he was the only one who could march into Indian Territory. Any man here who says he didn’t believe Custer was the only one who could slash his way through the hostile tribes last year is a damned liar.”

“Strong words, Major.” Michael Sheridan sank into his horsehair-stuffed chair, hands steepled before his bearded chin.

“But true, sir,” Ashe said. “Wasn’t a one of us didn’t know what Custer could accomplish … what Custer is.”

“Sounds like you agree with his tactics, Morris.”

Ashe glared at Michael Sheridan. “He won, didn’t he?”

The younger Sheridan turned away without a word, lighting his own cigar.

“Goddamn it, that’s what we’re all about, isn’t it?” Ashe prodded the rest of them.

Philip Sheridan finally filled the aching silence. “Yes, Major. I suppose you are more than right. You’re damned right. We are army. It’s not just what we do. It’s what we are.”

“General, again I beg your pardon,” Tony Forsyth said, “but Custer’s success last winter don’t hide the fact that he blundered twice in winning his startling victory.”

“His lack of reconnaissance,” Michael Sheridan added. “The lack of intelligence before attacking Black Kettle’s camp is more than appalling, Philip. It could have cost him—us—the entire campaign!”

The general rose. “We’re all aware my brother has never shared a high opinion of Custer. What I want to know, Tony, is what was Custer’s second blunder.”

“Elliott, sir.” Ashe allowed the death knell of that name to hang in the cold air of the room. “Major Joel H. Elliott, Seventh U.S. Cavalry.”

Philip Sheridan turned back to the smudgy window, peered out into the gray of early winter battering the plains. “With Grant in the White House and Sherman replacing Grant as commanding general of the army, we can now focus our attention elsewhere, gentlemen.” Sheridan’s breath clouded the window before him. “If Custer’s done nothing else, he’s brought peace to the southern plains.”

“And the Southwest, sir?” Major Sweitzer inquired.

“Quiet for now.”

“The Northwest?”

“Nothing stirring there either.” Sheridan sighed.

“All that’s left is the northern plains, sir,” Sandy Forsyth said. “Command have someone in mind?”

The question hung like day-old smoke in the room. This staff that was the cream of the officers corps of Sherman’s “New Army of the West” could only stare at General Sheridan’s back.

“Short of me going personally,” the general replied, “there isn’t a man in this room who’s up to taking on the likes of those Sioux and Northern Cheyenne. Short of me, there remains only … Custer.”

“That sonuvabitch charges without knowing his enemy’s location, strength, or desire to fight!” Michael Sheridan fumed.

“It’s not Custer’s reconnaissance that wins his battles for him, Michael,” Philip Sheridan said. “It’s Custer’s bold, daring charge into the face of any enemy no matter that enemy’s strength. It’s always been his damnable Custer’s Luck.”

“You’ll reassign Custer to the northern plains?” Tony Forsyth asked.

“Not yet. That’ll come soon enough. Look around you, goddammit. The whole country’s clamoring for him. He’s even more of a hero now than he was at the end of the war. Back east they’ve all heard how he wiped out Black Kettle’s village—what the Republican papers called a nest of vipers. And with that reporter Keim accompanying Custer on his winter campaign last year, the public damn well knows how Custer himself brought the Kiowa, Arapaho and the rest of the Southern Cheyenne back in to their reservations, single-handedly putting an end to their bloody forays into the Kansas settlements … all without firing another goddamned shot.”

“A stroke of genius?” Michael Sheridan asked.

“Damn right it is,” the general growled. “For those who want a peaceful resolution to the Indian question, Custer has conquered five bands of hostiles without firing a single bullet. And for those who desired a bloodier close to the problem … well, gentlemen—they got the Washita.”

“You make him sound like a publicists’ dream,” Sweitzer said.

“I’m beginning to think that’s what he is,” Philip Sheridan admitted.

“So you’ll assign him to Terry’s Department of Dakota?”

Sheridan glowered at his younger brother. “Not just yet.” He turned back to his window, watching the drizzle becoming a wet snow. Soggy flakes layered the sill outside. The silence in the room turned as cold as the snow lancing down from the heavy cloud underbellies stalled over eastern Kansas.

George Forsyth finally cleared his throat. “General, I can’t shake the feeling that something’s still bothering you about this whole matter of Custer’s success with the southern Indians.”

Without turning, Sheridan said, “You’ve hit it right on the head, Sandy. Something’s kicked around inside me ever since I rode north, leaving Custer at Fort Sill to finish that winter campaign on his own. And the bastard did better than I expected him to. He even followed my orders, for a change.”

The general wheeled on them, his Irish eyes grave. “So somebody tell me why I can’t sleep at night. Why I drink more than I should … why I have the dread feeling that even I, his commanding officer, can no longer check or restrain George Armstrong Custer.”