Long Winter Gone

examining the age of the marrow. Custer watched her repeatedly place her palm against the ground, as if testing for the warmth of some print left by man, beast, or lodge pole.

Romero interpreted her conclusions. “Twelve lodges camped here, a small band of some petty chief. Says the village broke up to hunt some time back, but seems they’re gathering for something important. Left here less than two weeks ago.”

“Were they scared off? Know of our coming?”

“She says no—they packed and rode off in no particular hurry.”

“How far will they travel each day?”

Monaseetah gazed thoughtfully across the merry stream before her hands danced as gracefully as two birds fluttering in courtship. “When the Cheyenne travel in late winter—when the grass is scarce—they make short trips each day. Moving from one stream to the next. Where they know there’ll be water,” she signed, and Romero interpreted for Custer.

One ability no one had ever questioned was Custer’s memory for detail, like the topography of the old maps he studied every night by lamplight. His command had already crossed Elm Fork, at times called the Middle Fork of the Red River. Several miles to the east, that Elm Fork joined a sizable prairie river called the Sweetwater.

“By glory, the bands are heading north by east!” Custer exclaimed. “Marching to the Sweetwater.”

Romero shook his head. “Cheyenne head south this time of year. Especially when they’re hungry. They’re moving toward the buffalo with empty bellies, General.”

Monaseetah broke in, wagging her head, her chatter quick and hands flying.

“What did she say?”

“Funny thing,” Romero admitted, his dark brow furrowed. “Says she can’t make sense of it either—seems the bands are moving backward for the season. Gotta be something important for them—”

“What do you mean backward?”

“I’ll be damned but she claims the bands are marching north and east, just like you figured.”

Custer couldn’t help smiling now. He had drawn a card few men would have pulled from the deck, winning a big hand of the game. But by no means the last hand of the night.

“I’ll soon have my Indians, Romero—the ones I’ve wanted since last fall.”

“Dog Soldiers now, General.” Romero eased himself down on a stump.

“Ask her what’s so important to the Cheyenne for their bands to move backward now.”

When her hands came to a stop, Romero looked at Custer, his dark eyes brooding. “To join with many others, to come together to fight Yellow Hair.”

The news she had given Hiestzi had saddened Monaseetah. She remembered how hopeful she had been at first, thinking she would have him forever. Now, that girlish dream seemed cold as yesterday’s fire.

Each night since the baby had come, she yearned for him anew. Yet more and more he made himself too busy with the other soldier chiefs and that young brother who called her Sally Ann. Monaseetah hadn’t bled for days now. No longer did she wear the rope and blanket scrap that absorbed her flow. Healed at long last.

Why will he not come to me? she wondered.

Of late Custer seemed obsessed with finding the Cheyenne bands she knew were gathering for a great war council. Once Yellow Hair found and destroyed their camps as he had done on the Washita, Monaseetah knew the soldier chief would leave her.

Even if the Cheyenne surrendered, as he had conquered the Kiowa without a shot fired, Yellow Hair would leave her. With victory complete, the soldier chief would ride far to the north.

Back to his other woman.

Up and down this creekside camp she listened to soldiers excited at finding the trail of the hostiles warming. But Monaseetah sank into a wallow of despair. Beside her, the infant wailed, his belly empty.

She sensed the keening of her heart signaled a deeper hunger still.

Hot tears slipped down her cheeks. Never before had she felt for any man as she did for him, and never before had Monaseetah felt so abandoned, knowing that Yellow Hair was slipping from her life already … as surely as the spring tore itself from the winter.

A long, long winter gone.

CHAPTER 22

STILL more lodges joined the trail early the next day. By late morning Custer’s scouts ran across a second and larger campground. The number of fire pits indicated the village had grown to twenty-five lodges.

More surprising still, by the next day, 12 March, Jack Corbin tallied better than a hundred sets of travois poles scratching the earth, joining the northbound march of the Cheyenne war camps.

“By glory, Jack!” Custer cheered at the news, happier than he had been in weeks. “We’ve flushed ’em like a covey of prairie hens now. We’ll herd them on ahead of us until they’re gathered up.”

“And you’re ready to strike.” Corbin picked something off the trail. “We’re right behind ’em. Trail’s warm.”

“Horse apples?”

“Though they ain’t steaming, they’re still warm to the touch.” Corbin crumbled one in his threadbare mitten.

“How far ahead of us?”

“Two, maybe three days, the way they’re lollygagging along.” It was Milner who answered this time. “Don’t seem they know we’re fixing to run up their backsides neither.”

“If you don’t want them Cheyenne to know you’re coming, best keep your flankers and skirmishers in close, General,” Corbin advised.

“All right. Bring them in. Let Pepoon’s trackers know too. Saints preserve the man who lets the Indians discover us now!”

“Should I take word to the commands, sir?” Moylan flung a thumb back along the columns.

“By all means. No bugle calls, no more hunting. No firing of guns for any reason. See that Captain Myers posts sentries with the wagons and the herd, and deploys a perimeter guard tonight. Small fires, for cooking only. Fires out after supper, before dark. I’ve gotten this close—”

“You don’t want a damn thing spoiling it now!” Moylan agreed.

A half hour later Custer sat with his scouts at a small fire, brewing coffee, discussing the country ahead, when a young soldier approached.

“General Custer?”

Custer looked up. “Private Reed, isn’t it?”

“Yessir. Ellison Reed.”

“What have you there?”

“Salt, sir.”

“Where’d you find salt?”

“Down by the river, General. There’s a salt stream, yonder by the spring. Banks piled high with salt cakes like this. A natural lick drawing critters from all ’round. Thick with tracks down at the spring. Figured we gone without salt for too long now. This here’s for you, sir.”

“That’s kind of you, Private. How do you figure to grind it?”

“Have a coffee mill, General?” Corbin interrupted. “I’ll show you how we grind salt back to home.”

“Splendid, Jack! Not only have you tracked the end of the trail for these Cheyenne we’ve been following, but you have a way to grind the salt Reed’s discovered.”

“A treat for any man likes the taste of red meat, General,” Milner added.

“Man needs a treat,” Custer said, “before he likely heads into battle.”

Before winter’s dusk had swallowed the encampment, Custer called his officers together and issued marching orders. Tom Custer listened as his brother stated that any item of personal gear such as blankets or tents or