CHAPTER 16
Jamie rode with Corporal Mackey beside him. Sergeant O’Connor was off to the right of them about twenty yards, and the other three troopers—Privates Albright, Jenkins, and Stallworth—trailed behind. Jamie had advised the men not to talk too much and to keep their voices down when they did. Voices carried out here on the prairie, and Jamie didn’t want to spook any game they might come across.
O’Connor hadn’t looked happy about that. Not because he disagreed, necessarily, thought Jamie, but rather because the sergeant didn’t like the idea of anyone else giving orders. O’Connor had gone along with it, though, and stayed relatively quiet during the morning.
So far they hadn’t come across any wildlife except rabbits and prairie chickens, and as Jamie explained to the others, such small game wasn’t worth messing with when they were after fresh meat for a whole troop of hungry dragoons.
“Yeah, I reckon you’d have to kill a bunch of rabbits to satisfy those appetites,” Mackey commented with a smile. “Nobody can eat like soldiers.”
“I don’t know about that,” Jamie said. “I’ve known some fur trappers and bullwhackers and keelboaters who can really put away the grub.”
They rode on mostly in silence. At midday they paused to make a skimpy meal on some salt pork and biscuits they had brought with them. Then, to let the horses rest and graze some, the men sprawled on the ground and took it easy themselves for a while.
“I wish we’d brought along some coffee and a pot,” Private Albright said. The Platte River was still in sight, about a quarter of a mile to the south, so they could have gotten water there.
Jamie sat there with his knees drawn up and his forearms resting easily on them. His eyes narrowed as he gazed to the northwest.
Corporal Mackey noticed the big frontiersman’s intent look and asked, “Is something wrong, Mr. MacCallister?”
“Nope. Maybe something right.” Jamie lifted an arm and pointed. “Look yonder.”
O’Connor was lying on his back, a ways apart from the other men just as he had ridden during the morning. He sat up now, looked in the direction Jamie was indicating, and said, “I don’t see a damned thing.”
“Look closer,” Jamie advised.
O’Connor’s frown deepened as he peered toward the northwest. All the troopers were sitting up and looking now. After a moment, O’Connor shook his head and said, “I still don’t see it.”
Jamie stood up, slapped dirt and grass off the seat of his trousers, and said, “There’s dust in the air, a good-sized cloud of it. It’s a little thin, and that makes it hard to see, but it’s there.”
Corporal Mackey scrambled to his feet as well and asked, “What’s causing it, Mr. MacCallister?”
“Only thing I know of that would kick up that much dust is a herd of buffalo.”
That brought excited exclamations from the other three troopers. O’Connor didn’t look as impressed. He said, “We’ve heard all about how these plains are supposed to be covered with buffalo, and we haven’t seen any of them yet. I’m starting to think they’re not really out here.”
“Oh, they’re here, all right,” said Jamie. “During the winter, the herds drift pretty far to the south, where the grazing is better and the weather’s not as bad, and then during the spring they start meandering back up this way. What you’ve got to remember about a buffalo is that he hardly ever gets in a hurry.” Jamie grunted. “Of course, when he does get upset about something and starts to run, you don’t want to be in his way.”
“Are we going to try to find that herd?” Mackey asked.
“Buffalo’s pretty good eating. And if we bring down a few of them, we can skin them and have plenty of meat ready to roast by the time the wagons and the rest of the troop catch up with us.”
“What if they stampede?” Private Jenkins asked nervously.
“We’ll try to make sure they don’t come in our direction,” Jamie replied with a faint smile. “Let’s get ready to ride.”
“Hold on a minute,” O’Connor snapped. “I haven’t said we were going after any damn buffalo.”
“I am,” Jamie told him bluntly. “You can make up your own mind.”
O’Connor looked like he wanted to argue, but after a couple of seconds, he jerked his head toward the horses and told the troopers, “Get mounted.”
The five men rode toward the area where Jamie had spotted the dust. As they came closer, the grayish-yellow cloud became easier to see.
“Are they stampeding?” Corporal Mackey asked.
“No, if they were running, they’d be kicking up a heap more dust than that,” Jamie replied. “You wouldn’t have had any trouble spotting it. I think they’re just ambling along, looking for a good place to graze.”
“Are our rifles powerful enough to kill a buffalo?” asked Private Stallworth. “I’ve heard that they’re enormous creatures.”
“Twelve feet tall at the shoulder, that’s what I heard,” Private Albright added. “And their heads are so big, you need a wagon to haul one in.”
Jamie couldn’t stop himself from laughing. He said, “Buffs are big, all right, but not that size. A middling big one would run about half that.” He grew more serious as he went on, “But don’t let that make you take them lightly. Like I said, you don’t want to get in their way. They’ll hit you like a runaway locomotive on one of those railroad lines back east.”
“What about the rifles, though?” Corporal Mackey pressed. “Can we use them to kill buffalo?”
“Just don’t shoot the varmints in the head,” Jamie advised. “Their skulls are thick enough that most bullets will just bounce off. They’re like any other kind of game animal. You want to target your shots so you take ’em in the heart or lungs. Heart’s better.” He paused. “That’s a quicker kill. I’d just as soon not see any creature suffer any more than necessary.”
O’Connor let out a harsh laugh and said, “I wouldn’t think a big, bold frontiersman like you would care about such a thing, MacCallister. They’re just dumb animals.”
“That’s right,” Jamie said. “That means they hadn’t done anything to deserve to suffer. Not like some two-legged critters I’ve come across, who had whatever they got coming to them.”
O’Connor drew in a sharp breath and scowled. He asked, “You’re talkin’ about me, are you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
But Jamie didn’t deny it, either.
O’Connor subsided into a sullen silence as the hunting party rode on. After several minutes, Jamie pointed again and went on, “Look how the dust cloud is thinning and breaking up. That means the herd has stopped moving. They’ll be grazing for a while now. If nothing disturbed them, they’d probably settle down for the night right where they are.”
“But we’re going to disturb them, aren’t we?” said Corporal Mackey.
“That’s the plan,” Jamie agreed.
More time went by, and a large, dark mass came into view up ahead, unmoving and low to the ground.
“That can’t be the herd,” Mackey said. “It’s too big.”
“That’s it, all right,” Jamie said, nodding. “Some of those herds have millions and millions of buffalo in them. I’ve heard men talking about sitting on a hill and watching a herd go by all day and all night, and it still hasn’t all passed by the next morning.”
“There can’t be that many buffalo in the whole world,” Private Albright said in awe.
Jamie looked over his shoulder with a smile on his rugged face and said, “That’s just one herd I’m talking about, son. There are a lot of different bunches out here, scattered from up in Canada almost all the way down to Mexico. All the Indian tribes live on them, using the meat, the hides, the bones, the guts, everything about them.”
“Then we should get rid of the buffalo,” said Sergeant O’Connor, “because that’d make it easier to get rid of the filthy redskins, once and for all.”
“I don’t reckon the buffalo will ever be gone,” Jamie said, “but if that ever happens, it’ll be a sad day.”
And the same was true of the Indians, he thought.
As the riders came closer to the herd, Jamie motioned to the others and said quietly, “All right, it’s more important than ever not to make much noise now. Buffalo can’t see very well, but they’ve got good senses of hearing and smell. The wind’s blowing toward us, so they shouldn’t catch our scent, but we don’t want them to hear us sneaking up on them, either. Let’s get down and go ahead on foot.”
For a second, he thought about telling O’Connor to stay there and hold the horses. But he knew the sergeant would never go along with that, so instead, when he had swung down from the saddle, he said, “Private Jenkins, you stay here and hang on to these mounts for us. I’ll let you know when to bring them on up.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. MacCallister,” the trooper responded.
O’Connor snorted disgustedly and said, “Jenkins, you ought to show that much respect to Lieutenant Davidson when you talk to him.”
“Yes, Sergeant O’Connor,” Jenkins said. “I’ll try to remember that.” He didn’t sound very sincere about that.
O’Conner glared at him for a second, then turned to Jamie and said, “What do we do now?”
“Your rifles should be loaded and primed. We’ll walk ahead until we’re in range, then stop and pick out our targets. We’ll probably only have time for one volley. We might be able to reload and get off a second shot before the rest of the herd spooks and takes off. But most likely not, so make that first shot count.”
Mackey, Albright, and Stallworth nodded. O’Connor just looked vaguely hostile.
Side by side, the five men started forward at a deliberate pace.
Jamie was at the right end of the line, with Mackey next to him on his left, then Stallworth, then Albright, and finally O’Connor at the left end. Jamie didn’t care how they were arranged as long as they all did what he told them to do.
Soon they were close enough that instead of a large, amorphous dark blob, they were able to see individual buffalo and make out some details in the animals nearest to them. The huge, shaggy beasts stood with their heads down as they grazed contentedly. Jamie and his companions approached until they were a hundred yards away from the edge of the herd.
“Good Lord,” Albright breathed. “There are so many of them. If they ever did stampede in this direction, there’s no way we could escape. We’d be goners.”
“They’re not coming this way,” Jamie said. “They’ll run away from the sound of the shots.” He raised the heavy Sharps. “Draw your beads, and make sure none of you are aiming at the same buff.”
The troopers lifted their rifles and pressed their cheeks to the stocks. Jamie aimed his Sharps at a massive bull that might weigh close to a ton.
“Wait for me to give the word,” he whispered.
Before that could happen, however, quick movement came from the other end of the line. Jamie saw it from the corner of his eye and looked in that direction in time to see O’Connor swinging his rifle to the south.
“Indians!” the sergeant yelled. “They’re attacking us!”
“No!” Jamie said. “Don’t—”
It was too late. O’Connor pressed the trigger, and his rifle went off with a loud blast that echoed across the plains.