land.
It wasn’t long before the fog rolled in, first forming in the low places, down in the coulees. Then like a growing thing it crawled up to take over the prairie itself. Becoming thicker all the time, like Mother Donegan’s blood soup coming to a boil on the trivet she would swing over the hearth in their tiny stone house back on that miserable and humble plot of ground where his father had died trying to grow enough to feed a family.
By seven o’clock Grouard had the soldiers skirting to the east of the northern end of a long and narrow landform that would one day soon be known as Slim Buttes. When he found a brushy ravine filled with plum trees, their branches heavy with fruit, the half-breed suggested a halt. Eagerly the men attacked the brush, stuffing the shiny, rain-washed plums into their mouths with one hand as the other hand pulled more off the branches.
An hour later Mills had them back in the saddle and inching off again through the soupy fog. Uneasily they probed south until noon, when the captain called another halt. This time Grouard brought them into the lee of a low bluff, protected from view to the east, from the prairie. On some good grass the horses were allowed to graze at the end of their picket pins and lassos. Then Mills allowed the men to gather some wood, dig fire pits, and boil some coffee in their tin cups. By one o’clock they were back in the saddle, Lieutenant Emmet Crawford’s battalion taking the lead, something warm now in all their bellies to go with the wild plums they had enjoyed for breakfast earlier.
Having had nothing to eat since leaving Crook’s column, the men knew the plums and coffee were better than nothing at all. Fear is always a poor feast for an empty stomach.
Just past three o’clock, not long after the thickest of the fog lifted, Seamus watched Frank Grouard reappear at the top of a rise more than a mile ahead of the column. Expecting Frank once more to do as he had been doing most of the day, checking on the column’s advance as he kept far in the lead, turning around after a moment to disappear again over the hilltop, Donegan was surprised this time when the half-breed rode back toward the column, at a gallop.
Off on the far left flank Jack Crawford had seen Grouard too and was loping back toward the van of Mills’s column.
“C’mon, ol’ boy. Time to find out what’s got Frank so spooked he’s willing to kill his horse to tell about it.”
The half-breed was already telling his story to Mills and his officers by the time Donegan got near enough to hear snatches of the tale.
“… ridge yonder … some three miles.”
Grouard was pointing. Time and again he turned in the saddle, pointing toward the Buttes that they had been skirting to the east ever since morning.
“Herd of ponies. Forty. Maybe a few more.”
“Sioux?”
By now Seamus picked up all of Frank’s answer. “Chances are good, Colonel. That’s who we been following, ain’t we?”
“You see anything of a village?”
Donegan came to a halt in that knot of horsemen as Grouard replied, “A small one. Down in a little bowl made by a ravine that cuts down from the bluffs. Think the Sioux call it Rabbit Lip Creek.”
Glancing at the western sky and the aging of the day, the captain asked his head scout, “Can we take them at dawn?”
Grouard nodded. “Only time to do it. I saw hunters south of their camp. Coming in with game. Might be other camps nearby.”
The captain licked his lips, then grumbled, “Don’t doubt they’ve found game. Red bastards been running off everything in this country.” Then Mills stood in the stirrups, peering off to the east. “Crawford,” he said, flinging his voice to the scout, “did you pass anything back on your side of the column what might conceal the command for a few hours?”
“Yes, sir, Colonel,” Jack Crawford answered. “I can show you a place where we can lay in for a while.”
“Lead us there,” and Mills turned to his lieutenants. “Gentlemen, have the command follow that scout into hiding. We’ll discuss our options once we’re sure we haven’t been discovered.”
“Options?” Lieutenant Schwatka asked.
“Yes,” Mills replied. “Whether or not to attack.”
“I thought our primary mission was to secure food for the column, Colonel,” said George F. Chase.
Mills’s brow knitted in consternation and he said, “Just take your men into hiding, Lieutenant.”
Behind a low ridge northeast of the enemy village, with his troops concealed and pickets posted to guard against their discovery, Mills put the question up for discussion. About half of the officers and noncoms urged caution, voicing concern for attacking an enemy village of unknown strength, while the other half cheered for an immediate attack.
“It’s time we finally got in our licks,” added Adolphus Von Leuttwitz.
“But do we know just what we’re charging into?” asked Emmet-Crawford.
“Sure as hell Custer didn’t,” Chase groaned.
Bubb said, “Colonel Mills, as your second in command, I suggest we send word back to General Crook immediately, before we pitch into anything.”
“Request denied, Lieutenant,” Mills snapped, clearly tiring of the debate. “I’m sure you will all remember certain Academy courses in military strategy—even in philosophy—that teach just how often success, even victory, rests upon a man making his own luck, taking what advantages there are and striking quickly.”
“Besides,” Von Leuttwitz said, “we all know the Indians won’t stand and fight. They’ll scatter before a vigorous cavalry charge.”
Then Mills added, “I want you all to remember that we might do what some of you suggest and make a wide detour of that village—only to find that tomorrow some hunting party discovers our tracks and sets out in pursuit of our tired horses. No, I say—this is our chance to seize the advantage.”
After a spirited argument of it, Mills finally called an end to the discussion and told his officers he had decided they would retire a safe distance, and there the command would wait out Grouard’s scout of the village.
“And if it will make you all feel better, I’ll go with Grouard myself to determine the makeup of the village,” Mills explained, quieting the murmured clamor. “How many lodges and wickiups, how many warriors might be in there.” He looked at the half-breed. “We’ll find out what we’re facing.”
He then ordered Crawford and Donegan to lead the soldiers to the rear and hide themselves in a brushy ravine 150 feet deep with a narrow stream running through the bottom.
At twilight Donegan settled into the soggy mud beside Mills. “Colonel, you figure we ought to send a rider back to alert Crook that you’ve run onto a village?”
Mills turned as if smarting at the question. “I’ll know that answer as soon as I return from making a reconnaissance with Grouard, Mr. Donegan.”
“Didn’t mean to rile you, Colonel. But the both of us can remember what we pitched into over on the Powder River last winter, remember how we expected reinforcements to show up from the rear—”
“My memory isn’t faulty, Mr. Donegan,” Mills snapped, getting to his feet. “This, I assure you, is nothing like that. Our situation is that Crook remains far behind, and unavailable for support.”
“But if we give him a chance to know what we’re pitching into, maybe we could hold off till he could get here.”
“I’ll trust you to keep your nervous worries to yourself, Mr. Donegan—and leave the military planning to me. Your anxiety has already infected Lieutenant Bubb. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I figure it’s dark enough to reconnoiter the enemy’s stronghold.”
Seamus watched the captain move off through the soldiers, who dozed or talked in small groups, smoking their pipes and boiling their coffee over small fires ignited at the bottom of pits. A crumb of hard bread and a scrap of bacon broiled on a stick would have to do while some of the packers boiled down a soup of pork grease and a few handfuls of flour.
Seamus decided he would save what little he had left— certain there would be wounded. At times like this —with the waiting and the unknown and the dread—if a man only thought of someone else, he could feel the presence of something bigger than himself.
Refusing to listen to the growl of his aching stomach, he tried to sleep but only dozed, part of him painfully
