“You take care of the sheriff, I’ll take care of my brother,” Angus promised.
Chapter Thirteen
From the moment they left Long Shadow, the possibility of a stampede was always in the back of everyone’s mind. The problem was, nobody could predict when a stampede might occur. Sometimes they would be so stable that not even a close-strike lightning bolt could set them off. At other times they could be startled by the snap of a twig.
The most effective way to stop a stampede was to have the flank rider on each side gradually turn the cows in front until they were moving in a wide circle. If a rider on one side saw the herd turning his way, then he would fall back and let the man on the other side tighten the turn of the leaders until he, too, was in position to help. Once the cows were running in a circle, they would run themselves down.
On this day, there had been no water since early in the morning, and they had pushed the herd hard to get them through a long dry passage. The cows were hot, tired, and thirsty. They began to get a little restless, and James and the others who were working around the perimeters were kept busy keeping them moving.
Then, at about three o’clock in the afternoon, Matthew Scattergood saw a rattlesnake.
“Rattler!” he shouted, as he pulled his pistol.
“No, Matthew, don’t!” Bob called to him.
Despite James’s warning, Matthew fired at the rattlesnake and, missing it, fired again and again, until the pistol was empty. Frightened, the cows jumped, then began to run. The terror spread throughout the herd and, like a wild prairie fire before the wind, the herd ran out of control.
“Stampede! Stampede!”
The warning was first issued by Bob, then picked up by the others, though as the herd was now in full gallop, there was no longer any need to issue the call.
“Stampede!”
Although there was terror in the cry, there was grim determination, too, for every man who issued the cry moved quickly to do what he could do to stop it.
James was riding in the right flank position when the herd started. Fortunately for him, the herd started to the left, a living tidal wave of thundering hoofbeats, millions of pounds of muscle and bone, horn and hair, red eyes and running noses. Over three thousand animals welded together as one, gigantic, raging beast.
A cloud of dust rose up from the herd and billowed high into the air. The air was so thick with it that within moments James could see nothing. It was as if he were caught in the thickest fog one could imagine, but this fog was brown and it burned the eyes and clogged the nostrils and stung the face with its fury.
James managed to overtake the herd, then seeing that the front had veered to the left, proceeded to tighten the turn, attempting to force them into a great churning circle. The cowboys were shouting and whistling and waving their hats and ropes at the herd, trying to get them to respond. That was when James caught, just out of the corner of his eye, Mark Scattergood falling from his horse. The stampeding cows altered their rush just enough to come toward the hapless cowboy and he stood up and tried to outrun them, though it was clear that he was going to lose the race.
James tried to get to him but it was too late. The herd rolled over him and Mark went down. If Mark screamed, his cry was drowned out by clacking horns and thundering hooves that shook the ground. James had time for only a passing thought as to Mark’s fate, before he turned back to the business at hand.
Finally, under the relentless pressure of the cowboys, the herd was twisted into a giant circle. They continued to run in the circle until, finally, they tired and slowed from a mad dash to a brisk trot, then from a trot to a walk. The stampede had at last run itself out, brought under control by the courage and will of a few determined men. An aggregate total of less than fifteen hundred pounds of men were once more in control of nearly two million pounds of cattle.
They buried Mark Scattergood’s mangled body under a small scrub tree, not too far from where he fell. Even as they were walking away from his grave, Luke and John were in an argument over his clothes.
“That there red-and-blue shirt of his’n is mine,” Luke insisted.
“What do you mean it’s yours?” John asked.
“ ’Cause Mark hisself told me,” Luke said. “He said, Luke, if’n anythin’ ever happens to me, I want you to have my red-and-blue shirt.”
“You’re a lyin’ son of a bitch. He never said such a thing.”
“Yes, he did.”
“Well, it don’t matter none, anyhow. You can have the shirt. I want his boots.”
“I want his pocketknife.”
“Listen to you two,” Revelation said, scolding them. “Mark isn’t cold in his grave yet, and you two are fighting over his things. Can’t you feel a moment of sorrow over his death?”
“Don’t know why you so broke up over it,” Luke said.
“Because he was our brother,” Revelation said. “Can’t you understand that?”
Luke and John looked at Revelation for a long moment, then John looked at Luke. “I get the saddle,” he said, completely ignoring his sister’s remarks.
“The hell you do. That saddle is mine,” Luke replied.
Realizing that her admonition had meant nothing to them, Revelation shook her head and walked away from her quarreling brothers.
The wagon train was called the Meechum Party because it was under the command of Captain Louis Meechum. It was quite small when compared to the wagon trains of a decade earlier. Then, trains of more than one hundred wagons were not unusual. This train consisted of only twenty wagons.
The Meechum Party was one month out of Omaha, bound for Dakota, not for gold but for land. As the steel- rimmed wheels rolled across the hard-packed earth, they kicked up dirt, causing a rooster tail of dust to stream out behind them. The wood of the wagons was bleached white, and under the sun it gave off a familiar smell.
Young Millie Parker sat in the sun on the dried seat of the wagon, reading over the latest entry in her journal.
The Magnificent Adventure
of the Parker Family
by
Millie Parker, age 16
Our days begin before dawn. The wagons have been drawn into a circle for the night, because Captain Meechum says this is the most convenient way of encampment. We are greeted each morning with the whistles and shouts of those who have been standing the last hours of the night watch.
Sometimes I like to wake up early so I can watch as the men and women begin emerging from their night- quarters. It is interesting to watch the new day start.
