always.”
No matter that so many came to join that autumn. They did not want for anything.
Here in the country of the Upper Powder they would be safe this winter, far from the soldiers to the south, far from the soldiers on Elk River, far from the soldiers to the east.
Here they would be safe.
THE INDIANS
Return of the Sioux Commission.
CHICAGO, October 27.—A telegram from the Yankton agency says the steamer C. K. Peck passed down at noon to-day, with the Sioux peace commissioners on board. They report that their mission has been satisfactory and successful. They held councils at all the agencies on the upper Missouri, and the treaty was signed by all the head chiefs of the different bands. The commission, at the request of the Indians, struck out the sections proposing to remove them to the Indian territory. The Indians accepted all the other propositions without objection.
“I suppose they’re still counting, for what it matters to us,” John Bourke grumbled.
Seamus looked up from his meal of bacon and biscuits, everything smothered in white gravy. “Counting what, Johnny?”
“The votes,” Crook’s adjutant replied with that tone a man took when he expected everyone else to know already what the devil he was talking about.
So Seamus went back to eating his late breakfast. Although he had missed morning mess because he was attending to the matter of reshoeing the big bay he was riding north, the army cooks liked the big Irishman’s ready smile and his quickness with a kind word—so it wasn’t hard to get a hearty breakfast rustled up and set before him in nothing flat.
“You know, the goddamned votes,” Bourke repeated. “The votes for president.”
Around a slab of bacon Donegan mumbled, “Right, Johnny—the votes. I suppose that’s supposed to be the most important thing in our whole world right now.”
“By bloody damn, it is!” Bourke all but shrieked. “It’s been one of the toughest campaigns ever held. But then, you being from Ireland, I suppose it wouldn’t matter to you?”
“Not matter to me?” Seamus growled indignantly with a mouth full of food, fire in his eye. “I left the land of me birth because me mither sent me away from County Kilkenny,” slipping back into a peaty Irish brogue the way he did when he grew angry. “But I’ve damn well stayed here in America—John Bourke—because this is me adopted home. So don’t ye go getting off so high-and-mighty with me, Lieutenant!”
“Easy, Seamus!” Bourke hushed, holding up both his hands in front of him as if he expected Donegan to make a grab for him at any moment. “I’m … I’m sorry!”
“Damn well you should be,” the Irishman grumped, then drank down the last of his lukewarm coffee. “I’m as American as any man of ye now. Lived here in this country longer’n I lived in Eire, I have. So go and stuff that up your ballot box, John Bourke.”
“Someone has been stuffing the ballot boxes, Seamus,” Bourke said. “Both Tilden and Hayes are claiming victory in the swing states of Florida, Louisiana, and the Carolinas.”
“How can they both claim victory? Ain’t it a democratic election?”
With a slight shrug Bourke said, “I suppose the count is so close. This morning on the wire, word had it that General Augur—who commands the Department of the Gulf—is taking infantry and artillery units with him to Florida because of all the threats of bloodshed.”
“I damn well thought we already fought one war of American against American!” Seamus howled.
“Things aren’t settled down South—won’t be for a long time,” Bourke replied. “The news that our troops are being sent in is about as bad as news of hostilities with a foreign nation. This could be even worse, because internecine wars always have a rich infusion of religious fanaticism to them.”
“Mind what I say, Johnny: more men been put to the sword in the name of one religion over the other, than for all the bleeming politics in the world,” Seamus declared solemnly.
“Aye, Seamus,” Bourke said. “Severe as our coming experiences in the Indian country may be, they will be more welcome that a campaign in the sunny lands of the South having to fight against our own misguided people.”
“Is the coffee burned yet?” a voice called out behind them.
Seamus turned to look over his shoulder at the civilian entering Fetterman’s mess hall, dusting the flakes of frozen snow from his fur hat.
“It ain’t bad for beggars like us, Frank. They just brewed me a fresh pot. Come—have you a cup.”
“Lieutenant Bourke,” Frank North acknowledged the officer as he came to the table, “the general asked me to fetch you up. Says he’s wanting you to bring up one of the Sioux leaders from the scouts’ camp down across the river. To have a chat with him about all the complaining the Sioux have been doing.”
An hour later Seamus and Bourke had returned with Three Bears and a few other ranking warriors eager to have an audience with Three Stars Crook. As the Sioux settled onto the floor in the tiny, drafty office, Crook dragged a chair around the side of the desk and set it directly in front of his guests. Then he glanced at his interpreters and asked, “What’s Three Bears got on his mind?”
The general’s question was translated. Getting to his feet and readjusting his blanket about his shoulders, the Sioux leader began to speak slowly, pausing now and then while the interpreters hurried to catch up.
“Before leaving Red Cloud Agency, I told the agent I wanted him to give our people their regular allowance of rations while we were gone on this scout. I am talking now for all our families left back to Red Cloud Agency. I want the beeves turned out the same as they ever were while we are away.
“I have three things to say and that’s all. When that delegation gets back from the Indian Territory, I want it to wait for me and not go to Washington until we can start together. I don’t want them to start before that time. As soon as we get through with this business out here, we can work together, and that’s the reason I want them to wait for me. Sometimes I may want to ask for something, and whenever I do, I want Three Stars to agree to it. When we travel together, we ought to work together as one.
“A great many of our men back at the agency have guns but no ammunition. I want to have a message sent to both those stores at the agency to have them sell ammunition for a couple of days, because the hostile Indians will come down there and raise trouble with our people while we are away. I want you to write this letter right away about my words, because if my young people don’t cry for food while I am away, I’ll like you all the better when I go back.
“The Pawnees have a great herd of horses here; we want half to drive along.”
“Is that all?” Crook replied, his eyes moving from Three Bears to the interpreter, then back to the Sioux.
“Yes,” answered the translator.
“All right. There’ll be a fair division made of the horses.”
Jutting his chin, acceptance brightening his face, Three Bears continued, “I want you to put in your letter we got one half of those horses back. And when you send us out on a scout, we want to work our own way.”
The general nodded. “That’s it, exactly.”
“If a man wants to live in this world, he has got to do right and keep his ears straight,” Three Bears continued. “Then he gets along without trouble. We are going to listen to you after this and do what you tell us. If we get any money for our country that you want us to sell back to you, we don’t want it taken away from us. I want the Great Father to hear me when I call for oxen, wagons, and sheep—and when they are given to me, I don’t want the agent to keep them for me in his corrals. I can keep them myself.”
“I have no problem with that,” Crook replied. “I’ll see that it is done.”
“It is good that we can work together, Three Stars,” the Sioux leader said as he motioned the other warriors to rise.
“Yes, it is good,” Crook replied. “Now, what say we go see about catching Crazy Horse?”
When the Indians had filed from the room, crossing the parade to follow the wide wagon road that would take them down the bluffs to the mouth of La Prele Creek, where they would cross on the ferry to the cavalry camp on the north bank, Crook watched them disappear in the swirls of ground snow.
