people to accept the terms of the Government.
[Bull Eagle] seemed to be doing everything in his power for the good of the people, and endeavoring to bring them a more peaceful condition. He appeared to have great confidence in what I told him. I gave him five days to obtain meat; during that time he lost three favorite ponies which were brought to this place. During my absence he came in, bringing five horses that had strayed or been stolen from some citizen in the vicinity, and requested his own….
[The five murdered Sioux] were within a few hundred yards of the parade ground, where they were deliberately placing themselves in the hands of the Government, and within the camp of four hundred Government troops.
[This whole affair] illustrates clearly the ferocious, savage instincts of even the best of these wild tribes and the impossibility of their controlling their desire for revenge, when it is aroused by the sight of their worst enemies, who have whipped them for years and driven them out of their country. Such acts are expected and considered justifiable among these two tribes of Indians, and it is to be hoped that the Sioux will understand that they fell into a camp of their ancient enemies, and did not reach the encampment of this command.
Very respectfully
your obedient Servant
(sgd.) Nelson A. Miles
Colonel 5th Infantry
Brevet Major General U.S.A.
Commanding.
Seamus Donegan took a deep breath—so deep, the cold air hurt within his chest. He nudged the roan and kept the gelding’s nose pointed north.
Down the Tongue all the way to the Yellowstone.
Seamus had been there before. Last summer with Crook and Terry, after Custer got half his regiment wiped out. About the time Nelson A. Miles got itchy to break loose from the senseless thumb twiddling of the two generals and headed toward the Tongue for the winter.
It wasn’t just cold in this country anymore. No. This had become pure hell: one day after another of endless, soul-thieving cold. Then yesterday he was certain the temperature played a card off the bottom of the deck on him. Instead of warming through the day, it got even colder. Mercilessly cold.
And the wind never stopped.
Tugging the thick, wide wool scarf up to the bridge of his nose, Seamus used it to swipe quickly at the tears seeping from his eyes because the galling wind was strong enough, stubborn enough, to sneak inside every gap of his clothing—despite the Irishman’s best efforts to pull his head down inside the big flap collar of his wool-and- canvas mackinaw like a turtle, turning his face to one side as he fought to keep one eye on some landmark off in the distance. North by west.
One eye that constantly watered from that wind beneath the long gray frosted hairs of the wolf-hide cap.
“It’s your’n now, boy,” old Dick Closter had told him that Sunday morning at Crook’s wagon camp on the Belle Fourche. “I’m going back to post—put up my feet and play some cards by the stove. So I figger you need it more’n me.”
“Swear I’ll get it back to you soon as I come down through Fetterman.”
The old mule packer’s eyes had softened beneath the two bushy white beetles nestled on his brow. “You just keep it, son. And remember me as your friend when you wear it.”
Behind him whipped the wide-brimmed hat attached only by that wind string knotted around his neck. Tossed this way and that, it would again one day provide shade from a blazing sun or protect his eyes from the piercing glare off winter snow. Seamus snorted. No glare these last few days—why, the sun had been no more than a buttermilk-pale button in the sky, if that. What with the way the storm clouds danced past one right after the other, day after day. Seamus sniffed and dragged the horsehide gauntlet mitten under his sore, reddened nose.
For three and a half days he had followed Three Bears and the other Lakota scouts, who had led him northwest to the mouth of the Little Powder. He had wanted to push right on down the Powder itself, rather than chance the arduous crosscountry journey. But Three Bears had advised against it. To ride the Powder in the wintertime was a gamble: the Crazy Horse people preferred its valley at this time of the year. Upstream or down, a lone white man was taking a very, very big chance.
So just as the Lakota warrior had scratched out on his map in the snow, Seamus bid the scouts farewell and pushed on across the Powder, then slowly ascended the high divide that carried him over to Mizpah Creek. Many were the times Frank Grouard had told him stories of the Powder and Mizpah country. Prime hunting ground for the Hunkpatila of Crazy Horse and He Dog, that was.
That’s when it had struck him—remembering something Grouard had told him about the lay of the land. Something that just might take a day off his trip.
Cold and feeling more alone than he had in a long, long time, Seamus knew full well what a warm fire and new faces could do for his half-numb soul. A little hot coffee and something more to eat than dried meat and army tacks.
That’s when he decided that there would be no question if he should chance cutting at least a day off his ride to that post at the mouth of the Tongue. He would accomplish that by cutting north-northwest, cross-country after leaving the Mizpah, until he struck Pumpkin Creek. After another day and one more freezing winter night Donegan reached the mouth of the Pumpkin … to stand, finally, on the banks of the Tongue, far below where he would have struck the river had he not gambled on the shortcut.
On his left, back to the south, lay Otter Creek; beyond it was Hanging Woman Creek. Grouard had often talked about the warrior bands making camps in that country.
Donegan shuddered and turned down the Tongue.
For the better part of a week now he had been dozing in fits, too cold to get any real rest. What he did more often than not was to pull his head beneath his blankets, his breath warming the skin on his face there in his cocoon, and remember the touch of her fingers on his cheeks. Recalling the sweet smell of the babe’s breath after the child had finished suckling at its mother’s breast and Seamus would rock the boy to sleep. So lonely and cold, it was nothing he could call sleep.
So he poked his warm wool mittens down inside the stiff horsehide cavalry gauntlets and stuffed each of them beneath an armpit, trying to remember just how warm he had been back at Fort Laramie. Just how safe and secure and warm a man could feel in the arms of a woman.
Donegan discovered that his fire had gone out when he awoke in the shapeless early light that eighth morning. With one hand he pulled the two thick blankets back over his head and closed his eyes. Not going to worry about a puny fire now. He would have to be on his way soon enough. Down in that burrow of darkness he listened to the rattle of the wind as it hurtled over him, tormenting the leafless branches of the alder in the cottonwood grove he had chosen last night when the moon and stars had begun to cloud over.
Then he heard the roan snort.
Likely thirsty, he thought.
Cold and shuddering in the dark, Seamus had been forced to camp where there was shelter out of the wind, but no open water, in a copse of saplings and brush near the Tongue.
Slowly, stiffly, he pulled himself out of the wide sack of oiled canvas where his blankets kept him from freezing. Standing, revolving his shoulders to work some of the kinks out of them, Donegan trudged over to the gelding, patting its muzzle.
It took a few minutes, but he found a spot along the bank where the ice didn’t gather so thick. He smacked at it with the butt end of his camp ax, then bent his head over the hole to plunge his chin into the icy cold. His beard quickly freezing as he struggled to his feet, Seamus stood back and let the roan have its first long drink of the day.
