CHAPTER 31
It was true that the Crow were leaving the canyon, or at least most of the warriors were. They advanced toward the river, led by Broken Pine. The soldiers started to turn toward them, bristling as if getting ready to fight again, but Tyler strode forward and called, “Hold your fire, men! Lower your rifles!”
“Are you sure about that, Lieutenant?” one of the dragoons asked.
“I’m certain,” Tyler said. “Broken Pine means us no harm. Everything the Crow have done has been in defense of themselves and their families. I’ll go talk to Broken Pine now.”
“I’ll come with you,” Preacher said. “Jamie, you mind keepin’ an eye on things here?”
“Nope,” Jamie replied as he rested his hands on his gun butts.
Preacher and Hawk walked across the open ground with Tyler. Broken Pine moved out in front of the other warriors and met them.
“Your plan has worked?” asked the Crow chief.
“It has,” Tyler replied. “I’ve relieved Lieutenant Davidson of command and I’m in charge now.”
Broken Pine nodded toward the soldiers and said, “Your warriors, they agree to follow you?”
“Some of them aren’t quite as enthusiastic as others,” Tyler replied with a faint smile, “but they’re all following my orders. The trouble is over, Broken Pine. I give you my word on that.” He paused, then said, “I was hoping that perhaps we could speak again about that treaty . . .”
Broken Pine lifted a hand to stop him. “It is too soon to speak of such things. But after we return to the village . . . I will consider it.”
“Thank you. That’s very generous and gracious of you. And more than I could expect, considering the circumstances and everything that’s happened.”
“Many things happen in life, good and bad. A stream that never flows dries up and disappears.” Broken Pine looked at Preacher. “Big Thunder?”
“He’s fine,” the mountain man assured him. “Banged up some from that fight with O’Connor, but he won and that’s all he cares about.”
Broken Pine smiled and said, “Do you think that will satisfy his appetite for battle?”
“For a little while,” Preacher said with a grin. “Maybe.”
* * *
Broken Pine and his warriors gathered up their families and started back to the village. In order to allow them to do that without having to worry about any kind of double cross, Tyler ordered the dragoons to remain where they were for the time being. Later in the day, they would withdraw to their previous camp closer to the Crow village.
Preacher and Hawk went with the Indians, while Jamie remained with the soldiers. Jamie kept an eye on Davidson and O’Connor. The lieutenant sat on the rock where he had been earlier, but he didn’t write any more in his journal. Instead he just sat with his hands clasped together between his knees, staring straight ahead as if at something no one else could see. The future of his military career, perhaps, which was very uncertain at the moment.
Sergeant O’Conner hadn’t been quiet when he regained consciousness. He had ranted and cursed until Lieutenant Tyler ordered him gagged as well as tied. O’Connor sat with his back propped against a tree, with ropes encircling his torso and binding him to the trunk. His wrists were lashed together in front of him. With the gag in his mouth, all he could do was stare daggers at Jamie and Tyler every time they moved so that he could see them. That old saying about how if looks could kill had never been more true, Jamie thought.
He still hoped that Broken Pine would reconsider and come to Fort Kearny with them to negotiate the treaty that Washington wanted, but one way or the other, Jamie was eager to get back to the fort so he could wash his hands of this whole ill-fated expedition and go home like he’d intended to start with. That was what a man got sometimes when he tried to help out: trouble right up to his neck . . .
He was musing about that when he heard a sudden sharp burst of gunfire in the distance, coming from somewhere downstream.
* * *
Preacher felt good, walking along with his family. Hawk was beside him, carrying the little girl Bright Moon. Butterfly strode along on Hawk’s other side. The boy, Eagle Feather, ran ahead with Dog. The trouble with the soldiers was over, the hunting had improved, there wouldn’t be many more wagon trains coming this direction, if any, and as far as Preacher could see, peace ought to reign over these scenic foothills, at least for a while.
He should have known better, he thought a moment later when a shot blasted somewhere to his right and one of the warriors ahead of him grunted and staggered, blood welling from the bullet hole in his side.
He’d gone and jinxed the whole damn thing.
“Down!” he shouted as more gunfire erupted. “Everybody down!”
Powdersmoke spurted from a grove of trees about fifty yards to the right. Bullets tore through the group of Crow who had been walking peacefully along the river. There was no good cover here—except for the riverbank itself. It was deep enough to provide shelter from the ambush.
Preacher’s Colts filled his hands. He blazed away at the trees, knowing it would be pure luck if he hit any of the hidden riflemen. But maybe he could distract them while some of the others made it to safety.
“Head for the river!” he bellowed. “Get down the bank to the water!”
The women and children broke into a run in that direction. Most of the warriors were still trying to put up a fight, sending arrows arching toward the trees.
Then men on horseback burst out from cover, charging the Crow and firing revolvers and single-shot flintlock pistols. More warriors fell under the onslaught, and so did some of the women and young ones.
Butterfly was one of the women who stumbled and went down. Blood ran down her leg from a bullet hole in her calf. Hawk had handed Bright Moon to her when the shooting started so that he could fight back. The girl fell when Butterfly did, but she seemed to be all right as she landed and rolled across the ground. Dog, who had gotten attached to the children, dashed up and stood over Bright Moon to protect her, snarling and growling at the attackers.
Eagle Feather started after his little sister to help her, but before he could reach her, one of the riders swooped down on him, leaning from the saddle to snatch him from the ground as he cried out in alarm. Preacher swung his guns in that direction but couldn’t fire because of the danger to the boy. The rider wheeled the horse and Preacher got a good look at the person who had grabbed Eagle Feather.
Shock went through him, turning his blood as cold as if he had been plunged into a freezing mountain stream.
The rider’s hat hung from its chin strap, letting long, white-streaked raven hair flow down her back. Preacher instantly recognized the woman’s hawk-like face, even though he hadn’t seen her in ten years. He hadn’t known she was still alive; actually, he had assumed she was long since dead, as much of a troublemaker as she was.
But even though she was dressed like a white man now, there was no doubt about the identity of the woman who glared at him across twenty yards of bloody chaos.
Winter Wind.
“Follow me, Preacher!” she cried. “Or the boy dies!”
With that she yanked her horse around and kicked it into a run toward the trees where the killers had lurked.
The other men on horseback followed her, abandoning the assault. They were a mix of whites and Indians, and he realized suddenly that this might be the same gang of outlaws that had been preying on wagon trains, the ones he and Hawk had clashed with previously. And if Winter Wind was their leader—a ludicrous idea, unless one knew what the crazed Blackfoot woman was actually capable of—she might have spotted him and Hawk during the battle and realized she had a chance to settle her old score with them.
Hawk sent another arrow winging after the riders, then turned and shouted, “Butterfly!” at the sight of his wife lying on the ground bleeding. He ran to her and dropped to his knees beside her. Bright Moon had clung to Dog’s thick fur to help her climb to her feet. She stumbled over to Butterfly from the other direction.
Preacher jammed his Colts back in their holsters and hurried over as Hawk examined Butterfly’s wounded leg. The lines of strain on her face revealed the pain she was in, but she didn’t say anything about that. Instead she clutched Hawk’s arm and said, “Eagle Feather! Where is he?”
Hawk looked around. He must not have seen Winter Wind grab the boy, thought Preacher. Seeing that Butterfly’s wound was bloody but not serious, he knelt beside his son and said, “Hawk, listen to me. One of those ambushers was Winter Wind.”
Hawk seemed baffled as he looked at Preacher and repeated, “Winter Wind . . . I do not—” Then his eyes widened as the memories came back to him. “The Blackfoot! The wild woman!”
“Yeah. Looks like she’s thrown in with a bunch of owlhoots. But she’s after you and me. She took Eagle Feather, Hawk. She dared me to come after them. This is her vengeance on us.”
“Eagle Feather!” gasped Butterfly. “Gone?”
“He was fine when she grabbed him,” Preacher assured her. “She won’t hurt him. He’s the bait for the trap she’s gonna set for me and Hawk.”
“I will kill her!” Hawk raged. “We should have killed her long ago!”
“Maybe so,” Preacher agreed, “but that don’t change things now.” He straightened to his feet and looked around. “And she sure has raised hell.”
The shooting from the trees had stopped. Preacher figured the men who’d been hidden there had taken off and followed Winter Wind and the rest of the gang. But the damage had already been done, and it was extensive. Most of the Crow women and children had made it to the safety of the riverbank, but several lay bloody and motionless on the ground. A dozen warriors had fallen in the attack and now sprawled in the stillness of death.
All because of one woman’s loco need for vengeance, Preacher thought as he grimly surveyed the carnage.
He knelt again, pulled a bandanna from his pocket, and bound it around Butterfly’s wounded leg. While he was doing that, she said, “Preacher, you must save Eagle Feather. You must go after him.”
“Don’t you worry about that,” he told her. “He’s gonna be fine. I’ll be gettin’ on their trail mighty quick-like.”
“And I will go, too,” Hawk said as he bent down. He kissed Butterfly’s forehead. “No harm will come to our son. This is my promise to you.” He put an arm around Bright Moon’s shoulders and drew the sobbing little girl to him. “Do not be frightened. Your mother is all right, and your brother will be, too.”
They were helping Butterfly to her feet when Broken Pine hurried over. Preacher was glad to see that the chief appeared to be unhurt.
“The soldiers come,” Broken Pine said as he gestured upstream.
Preacher turned his head to look. Some of the dragoons rode toward them with Lieutenant Tyler and Jamie MacCallister at their head. They had heard the shooting, Preacher thought, and had come to see what was wrong.
Several of the warriors took the soldiers’ sudden appearance as a threat and started to nock arrows. Broken Pine called out to them, telling them to hold their fire. He and Preacher and Hawk moved to meet the newcomers as a couple of the Crow women came to help Butterfly and take charge of Bright Moon.
Jamie and Lieutenant Tyler rode out in front of the others and reined in as they came up to Preacher, Hawk, and Broken Pine. Jamie looked at the bodies littering the ground along the river and said, “My God! What happened here?”
“We were ambushed,” Preacher said. His face and voice were as bleak as a frozen winter day. “An old enemy of mine—”
“And mine as well,” Hawk added.
“They laid a trap for us,” continued Preacher. “Didn’t have a blasted thing to do with all this other commotion that’s been goin’ on. Just pure bad luck, is all. Bad luck, and loco hate.”
“But you drove them off?” asked Lieutenant Tyler.
Preacher shook his head. “They left . . . but they took Hawk’s son . . . my grandson . . . with them.”
“Good Lord,” Jamie muttered. “We’ll go after them—”
“No!” The sharp word came from Hawk. “If Winter Wind sees a large force pursuing them, she might kill Eagle Feather and flee to finish taking her revenge another day.”
“I was thinkin’ the same thing,” Preacher said. “If we want to keep the boy safe, we have to give her what she wants . . . and that’s me and Hawk comin’ after her by ourselves, so she can capture us and take her time killin’ us.”
“Wait . . . wait a minute,” Tyler said. “This person you’re talking about . . . is a woman?”
Preacher nodded. “A Blackfoot woman, and a mighty evil one at that. She grew up wantin’ to be a warrior, and she made herself into a more dangerous one than just about anybody else in the tribe. It’s a long story, but what it boils down to is that she’s plumb loco.”
Broken Pine said, “You cannot go after those killers alone, just the two of you. There were more than a dozen of them. Perhaps twice that many.”
“You’d be too outnumbered,” Jamie said. “You wouldn’t stand a chance.” He crossed his hands on his saddlehorn and leaned forward. “At least let me come with you.”
Preacher’s eyes narrowed as he thought about that. He scratched his beard-stubbled jaw and then said, “Now that might be an idea. The three of us can move mighty fast, get into places a bigger bunch might not be able to, and we won’t lose the trail, you can bet a coonskin cap on that.” A whine came from beside him, and he looked down to see Dog sitting there. “All right, the four of us.”
“You ask much,” Broken Pine said. “I would go with you, and you know Big Thunder will want to, as well.”
“Not this time,” Preacher said flatly. “If the three of us can’t do it, I don’t reckon it can be done.”
Broken Pine looked like he wanted to argue more, but after a second he nodded and said, “Very well. The boy is your son and grandson. You will do what is best.”
Tyler said, “Broken Pine, my men and I would like to help you with your wounded and make sure nothing else happens.”
The idea of such a truce clearly made Broken Pine uneasy, but he nodded and said, “If the white men want to be friends, then so do the Crow.”
“That’s exactly what we want. I just wish it weren’t such tragic circumstances that led to this.”
Preacher said, “We’ll go back to the village and pick up Horse and a pony for Hawk, and then we’ll get on the trail. All right with you, Jamie?”
Jamie jerked his head in a nod. “Damn right it is. What did you say this Blackfoot woman’s name is?”
“Winter Wind.”
“Well, Winter Wind is going to wish she had forgotten all about trying to settle whatever grudge she’s holding against you.”
“I hope you’re right, Jamie. I sure hope you’re right.”
* * *
The Crow women tended to Butterfly’s wounded calf, cleaning the injury and then binding a poultice of healing moss on it. She was able to stand up long enough to hug Hawk as the three men—and Dog—got ready to leave the village.
“Bring my son back to me,” she said as she rested her head against Hawk’s chest for a moment.
“I give you my word.”
“And you come back safely to me, as well.”
“Of course.” He patted her back, kissed her forehead.
A few yards away stood Preacher and Jamie, holding the horses. Dog paced back and forth, ready to get on the trail of their enemies.
Broken Pine and Big Thunder came up to them. The giant warrior looked forlorn as he said, “Big Thunder wants to come with Preacher.”
“I know, old friend, and most of the time, I’d sure be happy to take you along if I was ridin’ into trouble.” Preacher squeezed one of the massive arms. “But not this time. The kind of fellas we’re dealin’ with . . . well, they’re so evil you don’t need to be around ’em.”
“Besides,” added Jamie, “I told Lieutenant Tyler you’d give him a hand keeping an eye on the prisoners until Preacher and Hawk and I get back. You’re the only one big and strong enough to handle that Sergeant O’Connor.”
Big Thunder scowled and said, “O’Connor is a bad man. Big Thunder beat him.”
“You sure did,” Preacher said. “We couldn’t have put an end to all that trouble without your help. So now, if there’s gonna be peace between the whites and the Crow, Big Thunder, you were a big part of it.”
That seemed to satisfy Big Thunder.
Broken Pine said his farewell. An air of mourning gripped the village, understandably so, but Preacher knew that under Broken Pine’s leadership, the Crow would get through this and grow strong again. When Hawk joined them, Broken Pine embraced him briefly and said, “If you need us, get word to us. Every warrior among our people will fight to help you.”
“It is my fault that some of our warriors lie dead, along with our women and children,” Hawk said gloomily. “Winter Wind hates me as much as Preacher.”
“Then by God, it’s Winter Wind’s fault for carryin’ around that much hate!” Preacher said. “Sure, we killed a hell of a lot of Blackfeet that year, but only because they wiped out a whole village of Absaroka first! Evil like that, you’ve just gotta put a stop to it, whatever it takes.”
“And yet evil goes on and always will.”
“Just because you can’t always win don’t mean the fight ain’t worth fightin’.”
Hawk nodded slowly and then said, “Let us go.”
They swung up on their horses and rode out. As they left the village, Lieutenant Tyler rode over to intercept them.
“Are you sure you don’t want any more help from us, Preacher?” the young officer asked.
“You’ve got your own problems to deal with,” Preacher told him. “Davidson and O’Connor givin’ you any trouble so far?”
Tyler shook his head. “All the fight seems to have been knocked out of Edgar. He never dreamed anyone would ever stand up to him the way we did. And O’Connor . . . well, he’s just one man, and he’s being well guarded.”
“Better keep that up,” Preacher said. “I wouldn’t trust that fella any farther’n Big Thunder could throw him.”
“We’ll wait here, or nearby, at least, until you return, Mr. MacCallister,” Tyler said to Jamie. “We left the fort with you, and I’d like to have you with us when we return.”
“I appreciate that, Hayden,” Jamie said. “But you do what you think is best.” He grinned. “You’re in command now, you know.”
“Yes, thanks to your help. The help of all of you.” Tyler sat straight in the saddle and saluted. “Good luck and Godspeed, gentlemen.”
“We’ll take it,” Preacher said, and then he led his companions toward the scene of the ambush, where they would pick up the trail of Winter Wind and her gang.