Winter Woman, page 5
Cora turned her eyes away from the long line of people with their vehicles waiting to enter the cemetery with their dead. When she and Maude had arrived with their father's body, they'd waited for hours until their turn came to receive the help of the gravediggers. The number of vehicles now lined up at the gate to the cemetery was even larger.
"Faster, Maude, get us of this hell-hole city of the dead and into the country," Cora cried.
Maude struck again, this time lowering her aim and cutting the horse on the rump with the metal tip fastened to the end of the whip. The horse sprang forward, increasing its pace. With the iron-rimmed wheels of the buggy rattling over the cobblestones, the two women sped away from the cemetery.
On all sides, near and faraway, the thunder of cannon fire rumbled and hammered the frightened city. The very air around the buggy seemed to buck and surge with the concussions. As the buggy passed a tall building, ancient bricks, softened by age and shattered by the explosions of the big guns, rained down with a clatter to the street. The horse was startled by the bricks tumbling across the street and tried to run. But Maude held it with a tight, sawing rein.
Tar barrels burned at many intersections and threw off clouds of acrid smoke that seared the women's lungs. Many of the wooden tar barrels had given way under the charring fingers of fire, spilling the tar to spread in a bubbling, flaming blanket that nearly blocked the street. At times the sisters encountered black swarms of mosquitoes that had fled the smoke zones and congregated in clear areas. The women covered their heads with cloth to ward off the attack of the insects.
In the early night, they came upon a large fire burning in the middle of the street. Pieces of wood, tables, chairs, a door ripped loose from somewhere, and other burnable odds and ends were used as fuel. In the center of the flaming, crackling mass, a human corpse was being consumed. Maude pulled the horse to a halt.
"Don't stop," Cora said, and flung a look about in all directions. She remembered Thurgood's warning of danger.
Maude reined the horse to the side and guided it up on the sidewalk in front of a hardware store to get past the fire. The horse halted, balking at the leaping flames. She cut it smartly with the whip. The frightened animal whinnied loudly in protest.
"Get on with you!" Maude shouted at the horse, and cut the brute again with the whip.
The horse went fearfully forward into the opening between the fire and building.
The fire was close on Cora's side of the buggy, the flames leaping higher than her head. She shielded the side of her face from the intense heat with her hat. The smell of burning flesh filled her nose, and she shivered. Knowing it was from the burning corpse made her ill.
The buggy passed beyond the fire and Maude turned the horse back off the sidewalk into the street. Before the horse could pick up its trotting pace, two men darted from the black shadows in the mouth of the nearby alley. One grabbed the bridle of the horse and yanked the animal to a halt. The second man leaped close to the buggy and, reaching in, caught hold of Cora by the wrist. A third man ran from the alley on the opposite side of the street and charged at Maude.
"Give me your money," the first man ordered Cora. He squeezed hard on her wrist and twisted. "Where's your purse?"
Cora had been so startled by the sudden and unexpected attack that she had put up no resistance to the man grabbing her arm. But now she let loose with a wild cry and began to struggle to tear loose from the man's grip. Her free hand clawed at his face, and she felt her nails ripping skin and flesh.
"Goddamn you, bitch!" the man cursed, and slapped Cora savagely on the side of the head.
Maude, watching the man running toward her, hastily reached down for the pistol she had stowed away in the satchel at her feet. Frantically she rummaged through the contents, feeling cloth and a shoe. Before she could find the gun, the man had reached the buggy. His hand snaked out to catch hold of her.
Maude snapped up her booted foot and jammed it into the man's cruel face. She thrust out powerfully and sent the man crashing down on his back in the street.
The robber, his face twisted with murderous rage, jumped back to his feet. He snatched a pistol from a holster belted on his side and started to raise it to shoot.
Maude had found her gun and snatched it from the satchel. She felt the buggy rocking from the struggle between Cora and her assailant over the purse containing the money. Maude wanted to help her sister protect the money, but the man with the pistol had to be dealt with first.
She thumbed back the hammer of the pistol as she lifted it. She pointed it into the robber's face not ten feet distant and reflecting a demon-like red cast from the light from the funeral pyre. She fired and the iron weapon jumped in her hand. A round black hole instantly appeared in the man's forehead. He was slammed backward and down on the pavement.
With a feeling of satisfaction, and amazement, at how easy it had been to kill the man, Maude whirled to assist Cora.
The robber holding the head of the horse had seen Maude shoot one of his cohorts. Surprised at the strong, fierce resistance of the women, he quickly drew a pistol and shot at Maude. At the instant the man pressed the trigger of his gun, the frightened horse jerked its head and bumped the man. His shot went wild.
Maude spun toward the sound of the shot. She saw the man and swung the barrel of her weapon, firing back at him. The bullet missed her intended target for she had fired hastily without taking time to aim. The man ducked down behind the horse.
Maude held her pistol aimed at the spot where the man had disappeared. She felt no fear, only a burning desire to kill her enemy. Then the man's head appeared past the shoulder of the horse, and his eyes locked on hers. She shot and did not miss, the bullet catching the man in the center of his face. Again she was amazed at how easily a man could be killed. She wheeled around to the battle beside her.
Cora clung doggedly to the purse. She was determined that the robber would not get the money. In the struggle, he dragged her from the buggy and she fell on her knees on the stone pavement of the street. He continued to pound her with a fist, at the same time trying to wrench the purse from her now two-handed grasp. The blows sent pain rocketing through her head. She didn't know how much longer she could hold on.
"Maude, help me!" Cora cried out desperately.
Cora heard another crack of a pistol. The blows of the fist to her head stopped abruptly. The robber's hold on the purse came loose. He staggered away from Cora. Immediately Maude jumped from the buggy and stood beside Cora.
Cora threw a look at the man who had attacked her. He was holding his side and scampering away. Maude shot again as the man vanished into the shadows of the alley from where he had come.
"Run, you bastard! Run and hide before I blow your brains out," Maude shouted. She laughed in a high, shrill voice.
Cora looked up at her sister. In the light of the flames from the funeral pyre, Maude's face held a strange expression, one Cora had never seen before. The face appeared twisted, distorted as if by a touch of madness.
Then Maude turned her head and. Cora could no longer see her face.
Cora rose to her feet. She must have been mistaken about Maude. The expression on her face was from the strain of the battle and the flickering light from the fire.
Maude hugged Cora close against her. "You did well, little sister. They didn't get the money."
"He hurt me bad. He split my lip, and my head aches awfully."
"We made them pay dearly for trying to rob us," Maude said. She turned Cora's face up and examined the bruises. "You're not going to be pretty for a few days," she said.
Cora thought there was a half pleased tone in Maude's voice. But that could not be. She must be mistaken about this, as she had been about the strange expression on Maude's face shortly after the robbers had been killed.
"Get in the buggy," Maude said. "The man wasn't badly hurt and he may get his courage up and come back shooting."
Cora climbed into the buggy. Maude went swiftly to the far side and jumped in. She whipped the horse to a fast pace. They plunged into the darkness beyond the light of the funeral pyre. As the darkness closed around her, Cora began to doubt they would escape alive from the city with its violence and deadly disease.
They came to the end of the paved streets of the central city and plunged on along wet, muddy ways. Several minutes later they reached the edge of the city and entered the countryside. On the top of one of the rare occurrences of high ground on the flat Mississippi delta, Cora caught hold of Maude's arm. "Stop here. I want to take one last look." At some primal level she knew that she would never again see the city where she was born, and her family buried.
Maude pulled the horse to a. stop. Both women stood up in the buggy and stared back at the city. The thundering boom of the cannons was much weakened, the nearer ones lying more than a mile away. The flames of the many funeral pyres were dirty red splotches on the blackness of the dismal night. The larger fires, shining against the bottom of the low overcast sky, had turned patches of the clouds red.
"All of our family are dead, mother, father, and brothers," Cora said sadly. "All we have is each other, and a little money. What will we do now, Maude?"
"There's danger everywhere. But we'll make it all right." Maude touched the pistol that she now wore shoved under the belt of her trousers. Oddly she had not been afraid during the gun battle with the robbers. And they had died so easily. She sensed a power in herself that had not existed there before, and she liked it. She would keep this feeling a secret from Cora.
Rain broke loose, pouring down from the dark heavens. The young women hastily raised the canvas top of the buggy and pulled down the side curtains. Maude again took up the reins. The buggy with its two occupants went into the blackness of the rainy night, and towards a distant, unknown destination.
Seven
Dakota Territory, 1859
The trail left by the horses of the Sioux raiders ran straight north across the sun-scorched plains as it had for the past six days.
Lieutenant Steptoe, U S. Cavalry out of Fort Laramie, held his fighting force of twelve dragoons, three Crow scouts, and three mountain trappers at a grueling pace upon the sign of the Sioux war party. They had chased the band of Sioux, containing an estimated twenty warriors, north across the Niobrara River, the White River, and the Cheyenne River. Now the dark silhouettes of the Black Hills reared up on the horizon barely a day's ride ahead.
The Sioux had attacked a small wagon train camped on the North Platte River in the Nebraska Territory. Several immigrants had been killed and most of their horses stolen. A man riding one of the few horses remaining to the people had reached Fort Laramie with the news of the attack two days later. Colonel Granger immediately ordered Lieutenant Steptoe to take a squad of dragoons in pursuit of the Sioux and punish them.
The lieutenant checked the three Crow scouts riding point, Wolf Voice, Little Horse, and Long Running. They were dressed in buckskin breeches and blue army shirts. Strips of blue cloth were tied around their heads to hold their long black hair. The Indian warriors had appeared at Fort Laramie three weeks earlier. Wolf Voice had requested that he and the other two Crows be hired as scouts for the army. Colonel Granger had decided to try the Crow warriors. He had explained to Steptoe and the other officers that having some Crow scouts might lessen the warlike nature of the Crow nation. He replaced their muskets with army carbines and Colt revolvers, and put them on the firing range to practice. They quickly became skilled with the weapons. Wolf Voice could have qualified as an expert marksman, had he been a trooper.
Lt. Steptoe twisted in the saddle and looked to the rear. His troopers in their dust-covered blue uniforms rode two abreast directly behind him. His eyes caught those of Sergeant Huntiley. The sergeant came instantly alert, awaiting an order. But the lieutenant looked past him without a change of expression.
The three trappers rode several horse lengths further back to stay clear of the dust kicked up by the troopers. Each trapper was armed with his own .52-caliber Sharps carbine in a scabbard on his saddle, and a Colt revolver and long-bladed skinning knife on his belt. They were garbed in worn buckskin breeches and shirts, and wide-brimmed hats.
Lt. Steptoe, because of the unknown loyalties and abilities of the Crow warriors, was glad the three trappers were riding with him. They had appeared at the fort after a winter's trapping in the Big Horn Mountains. Renne Chabot, near death from a bullet lodged in his chest near his heart, had been transported unconscious on a crude travois by Glen Kinshaw and Jacob Morgan.
Upon the promise of Kinshaw and Morgan to pay for the medical assistance, Colonel Granger ordered the post surgeon to operate on the wounded man. The bullet was successfully extracted. However, Chabot hovered on the verge of death for days. Then he had abruptly taken a turn for the better and rapidly recovered his strength.
Jacob Morgan caught Lieutenant Steptoe's eyes upon him and gave him a surly look. The lieutenant ignored the trapper because he didn't care a damn for the man's anger. He recalled how strongly Morgan and Kinshaw had resisted Colonel Granger's attempt to enlist the three trappers to help the army against Indian raids. They'd wanted to pay the army with some of the furs they had trapped in the mountains. But the colonel had reminded them that they had promised to pay for the service of the post surgeon and the use of the hospital, and that it was his choice how that payment was to be made. The trappers had argued loudly and heatedly that they should be the ones setting the method of payment, and further that they had been in the mountains all winter and should be allowed to ride on to St. Joseph, Missouri. The colonel would have none of that, and informed them the payment was a month of service with troopers in the field. He told the men that they would have plenty of time to whore, drink, and fight and still get back to the mountains before the next winter's trapping season began.
Kinshaw had angrily informed the colonel that he had a woman in St. Joe and she was no whore. Morgan had cursed and stomped the ground. Chabot had said not a word, very conscious that he was the root of all the trouble.
Lt. Steptoe knew Colonel Granger had a second reason for forcing the trappers to ride with his dragoons. Fort Laramie was dangerously under-manned. Three proven fighting men were much more valuable than a few furs. The colonel had been correct, for this was the second campaign since the trappers had become part of the army's fighters. Even though the trappers had been damned unhelpful in most things, once the actual combat began they fought like demons.
Jacob watched Lt. Steptoe turn back to the front. Glen and Renne and he should not be riding their horses' hearts out trying to catch the Sioux, but rather should already be in St. Joseph drinking cold beer and making love to pretty women. But they were committed to ride with the lieutenant for only five more days. Then they would hurry east.
Jacob continued to stare at the lieutenant's back. He could not understand why the man would want to be an army officer. How could he endure always being under sworn obligation to follow the orders of another man? And even worse, one whose orders might be completely wrong.
Jacob removed the battered old hat from his head and wiped the sweat from his face with the sleeve of his buckskin shirt. He checked the yellow sun burning its way across the heavens. Beneath the sun, a hunting hawk was soaring on the hot updrafts. It gave a keening cry. Foolish bird, thought Jacob, it must be young or very hungry, for its prey would be hidden away in some cool underground burrow.
He dropped his eyes to the flat plains. The heat-warped air shimmered and danced, distorting vision and distance. Mirages quivered and fumed on the horizon. A band of antelope stood off a ways in one of the mirages and watched the troop of horsemen pass. The heat-distorted air had melted away the legs of the antelope and their bodies floated spirit-like above the ground.
Jacob glanced to the southwest where a storm front of towering thunderheads was advancing swiftly. Rain would be falling before nightfall. Already a thin film of fast-scudding clouds was closing on the sun.
Glen, riding beside Jacob, noted him watching the approaching storm. "By the size of those thunderheads, they could hold hail as well as rain," he said.
"Could be," Jacob said.
"I wonder what the lieutenant will do when it rains and wipes out the Sioux's tracks?" said Renne.
"Well now, he's a West Point graduate and I suspect they've got a book answer to that," Glen said.
The three laughed and rode on after the horse soldiers.
* * *
Jacob and the other men of Steptoe's force of fighters rode hard into the growing evening dusk. Jacob often looked to the southwest and watched the monster thunderheads, soaring five miles, six miles into the sky, advance upon them. One of the mammoth thunderheads was charging directly at the band of men. Already the frontal winds were whipping the grass and stirring the dust around them.
Thin streamers of rain began to leak from the dark bottom of the clouds. Lightning flashed orange and yellow, trapped within the towering cloud mass, lighting it internally with a smoldering, infernal glow.
The lightning broke free of the thunderhead and lashed out to strike the earth. The charge rebuilt quickly to uncontrollable level and slammed down a second time, skittering across the darkening plains.
"Better get our rain gear on," Glen said.
The three men extracted their rain slickers from the tarpaulin-wrapped packs tied behind their saddles and pulled them on.
The storm roared relentlessly closer to the band of men. Then it seemed to jump forward, pouncing upon them. The belly of the cloud split open and the rain poured down, big drops driving hard, slapping their slickers and pounding down the brims of their hats.
The weary horses lowered their heads and humped their backs as the chilling rain fell upon their flanks.
Lightning flared all around, hissing and cracking like a thousand bullwhips. The explosions of thunder deafened the riders, each blast of lightning temporarily blinding them.
