would not be keeping his promise to be home by this special day—their son’s first Christmas. Time and again Samantha read each word, each line, every sentence to wring from those two spare pages all that they had to tell her about the what and why of his not coming back with the rest of the Bighorn and Yellowstone Expedition that Crook was disbanding.
If the generals were sending the men back to their winter quarters, then why wasn’t Seamus among them?
Each time that question tore at her heart, each time she thought about this child’s first Christmas, Sam told herself that she must trust in him. Trust that her husband would always do what was right by them all. Not just what was right for country and flag … but what was right for his own family. She decided some time ago that she could do nothing less than trust in him.
As well as trust in God to bring Seamus back alive.
The child was beginning to squirm and fuss, what with all the noise from happy children and the singsong voices of those adults calling out their merry wishes to loved ones and good friends all. She probed a finger into his diaper and found that he wasn’t wet. Perhaps he was getting hungry. Samantha would have to take him upstairs soon, where she would nurse him and he would fall asleep with his tummy once again filled with warm milk.
But for now she prayed he would not grow too fussy and would allow her to stay down there among the noise and the warmth and the celebrants moving in and out as they visited the houses and quarters at Fort Laramie this cold, cold Christmas Day.
It helped to keep her mind off Seamus and what he might be facing in that frigid north country. Helped her forget how much she had counted on his being home for their son’s first Christmas … and it was beginning to appear as if Seamus might not even be home a week from now—the first day of 1877.
Her eyes misted, and she fought the sour taste her sobbing made at the back of her throat—fought back vainly, bouncing the boy on her knees, turning him so he could watch the room and people and flutting candles with her, all those colors and movement as he gurgled and chewed on a knuckle.
Oh, how she remembered Seamus’s big-knuckled hands … so rough and callused, then grown so gentle and soft whenever they brushed her flesh.
“Merry Christmas!” she called out as another group burst in through the front door and stomped across the entryway, scattering snow and ice from their boots, bringing in that sweet tang of bitter cold on the coats and scarves, hats and mittens, they swept off and hung on the last of a long row of iron hooks imprisoned on the nearby wall.
From pockets came the tiny packages wrapped in red-colored tissue, or perhaps nothing more than homely newspaper if one could afford nothing else. Small presents from the heart, purchased from the sutler with a particular someone in mind. There wasn’t all that much out there for folks to choose from at this holiday of gift giving. But now that she had been an adult for a few years, Samantha was coming to realize at last what this holiday was truly all about.
Not the tiny presents wrapped in scraps of newspaper. Not even those rare and fine presents her parents had wrapped in delicate tissue to present to her and Rebecca back home many years ago.
Christmas was about friends and gathering close to loved ones.
Christmas was about family.
The baby fussed, perhaps sensing her disappointment as Samantha’s eyes glistened and the candle- and lamplight grew soft and fuzzy. Sam blinked to clear them, frustrated when she felt the tears spill down her cheeks.
“Oh, Sam,” Martha Luhn said gently as she came up to her and knelt beside her chair, laying one hand on her arm, the other hand on the boy’s tiny legs. “It’s Christmas, and we are all here together. I know how you must miss him so.”
She tried twice to say something, but the words would not come out. All she could do was swipe at her tears.
“He’s safe. Trust in God, Sam,” Nettie Capron cooed. “On this day especially. Please trust in God to watch over him … wherever he is right now.”
“Yes,” she croaked. How she wanted to believe.
The baby fussed, and she bounced him some more, blinking as the swirl of people and candlelight became fuzzy again.
“He’ll be home soon, Sam,” Elizabeth Burt said softly at her side. “He promised you before, and he kept his promise. Remember that. Seamus Donegan will move heaven and earth—and even hell itself—to keep his promise to you, Sam. You just remember that.”
“Yes … I’ll t-try.”
“I’ll bring you some cider, and then we’ll gather with Lieutenant Bingham’s wife at the piano. She does play so well, doesn’t she?” Elizabeth asked. “And singing will brighten your spirits, won’t it, now?”
Sam watched Mrs. Burt rise and move off into the knots of well-wishers and joyful celebrants that Christmas morning.
Swallowing down her fear the way she blinked back her tears, Samantha Donegan resolutely told herself that she would have to trust in God to bring Seamus back alive.
She would simply trust in God.
*The Fetterman Massacre at Fort Phil Kearny, as told in
†Fort Phil Kearny, Dakota Territory.
#Fort C. F. Smith on the Bighorn River in Montana Territory.
*Mackenzie’s raid, 23 October 1876,
Chapter 20
26-29 December 1876
BY TELEGRAPH
Discredited Rumor of an Indian Massacre
Sitting Bull Driven Across the Missouri
New Plan for the Management of Indians
Sitting Bull Heard From.
ST. PAUL, December 21.—The following was received at headquarters department of Dakota to-day:
FORT PECK, M.T., December 8.—Yesterday, with a force of 100 men of the Fifth infantry, I followed and drove Sitting Bull’s camp of 190 lodges south across the Missouri river, near the mouth of Bark creek. He resisted my crossing for a short time, and then retreated to the bad lands. Sitting Bull is in camp on Bark creek with over 5,000 warriors.
[signed]. FRANK D. BALDWIN
Lieut. Fifth Infantry, Com’dg.
A New Idea.
WASHINGTON, December 21.—At a meeting of the house committee on Indian Affairs to-day, Seelye
