Cry of the Hawk

By that time Sweete was in the water up to his knees, slurping and gurgling. He turned and hurled his voice up the bank to the four civilians who stood looking down on the two scouts and their thirsty horses.

“By damned is right, boys. When you’re chasing Sioux with George Armstrong Custer, you better be ready to ride across the fry pan plains of hell itself at double time!”

“Sweet Jesus, but you can’t be here yet!” the voice muttered from the top of the bank.

Shad spread his arms out, dripping wet from dousing his hair with a hatful of water. It seeped off his mustache and beard. “Take a look, pilgrims. This ain’t no goddamned ghost you got your eyes laid on.”

Hook joyously flung some water his way. “No, sir. We ain’t ghosts a’tall. Just a pair of poor resurrected souls come wandering in off that godforsaken prairie!”

Jonah got to his feet wearily as Hickok and Sweete came up to the small knot of civilian scouts huddled beneath the stars.

“No word waiting for Custer when we got in,” Hickok told them. Beyond the station’s three low-roofed buildings, the Seventh Cavalry was going into camp. The twinkling of those first few fires brightened the noisy celebration of water.

“Where we head from here—Custer figure that out yet?” Comstock asked.

“He wired for written orders from Sherman … Sheridan—anyone at this point, fellas,” Hickok explained. Then he glanced at Sweete.

The old mountain trapper nodded. “That’s when Custer found out the post commander at Sedgwick already sent written orders out to Custer. Somewhere … out there”—he flung his arm southwest—“there’s a Lieutenant Lyman Kidder and ten troopers of the Second U.S. Cavalry hunting for us now.”

Comstock dug a toe into the sandy soil. “Unless Pawnee Killer’s Sioux already got ’em.”

The group fell quiet a moment. Then Hickok spoke again.

“I figure we’ll find out soon enough what happened to that patrol. As for us, grab what shut-eye you can. We’re back in the saddle before sunup.”

“Marching north to Sedgwick, ain’t we?” Comstock asked. “It can’t be more’n fifty mile up there.”

Hickok shook his head. “Fort Wallace, Will.”

“Fort goddamned Wallace? Why in hell?”

“Custer figures its the only place where there’ll be enough supplies to ration this outfit,” Sweete told them. “’Sides, I think Custer can’t get Kidder’s outfit off his mind.”

Jonah turned toward the southwest, at his back the twinkling firelights of the cavalry camp, staring into the slap-dark of the rolling prairie grassland that had swallowed Custer’s regiment and spit them back out again. He wondered if Kidder’s men would be so lucky.

The next morning the entire command was moving at first-light, moving away from the South Platte, reluctantly.

Twenty … twenty-five … thirty and more miles per day Custer put behind them. Pushing relentlessly toward Fort Wallace. That night a half dozen men slipped off unheard into the prairie darkness.

And the following dawn found the rest whispering at report before they saddled up and pushed off again behind their hard-driving commander. Better than forty miles he prodded them to march.

Through that night of 6 July more than two dozen slipped away, every last man of them taking his horse with him.

Already the mad chase had covered as many miles as he had fingers on one hand.

Pawnee Killer’s blood was up. His thirty warriors were warming to the kill. For this was truly fun—to have a wild chase such as this, running down each victim and killing him before continuing on the trail of the rest.

The Sioux had cut a fresh trail miles back—a dozen, perhaps as many as fifteen men. Iron-shod horses. White men.

Within minutes, his war party had been rewarded with finding the quarry in the distance. One man out in front by a few hundred yards. A leader riding in the van. And ten soldiers in a short double column.

The white man always rode like that, Pawnee Killer knew. While the Indian rode in single file.

His warriors now had four of the soldiers dead behind them in the running battle. The white men riding their worn-out horses would turn and attempt to shoot behind them at the warriors on their furious ponies.

The air crackled with sporadic gunshots. The white men cursed and cried out as the warriors drew near. But not a one gave up easily.

It was good, the Killer thought. Good that each one should fight to the last breath.

The last eight finally reined up in a frantic spray of dirt and summer-cured grass, dismounting on the run, dragging their lathered horses into a crude ring. They began shooting the animals as Pawnee Killer’s screeching warriors topped the rise.

Down behind the still-quivering, thrashing horses the last soldiers crouched, laying their pistols and long banded-barrel rifles over the still-heaving ribs of the foam-flecked army mounts. And began returning a hot fire like nothing Pawnee Killer had ever seen in his fighting life.

The white men had decided to sell their lives dearly.