Ghost Warrior (52 page)

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Authors: Lucia St. Clair Robson

BOOK: Ghost Warrior
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“Her spirit is gone,” Lozen screamed. “Come away now!”
Still on his hands and knees, Victorio wailed his grief and loss and rage. When the echoes of it died, Wah-sin-ton took
his father's arm and pulled him away. As though in a trance, Victorio followed them through the opening in the rocks.
On the exposed slope on the other side, the icy wind blew the torrents of rain slantwise at them. Sleet and hailstones pelted them while thunder exploded one peal after the other. Lightning-struck trees crashed around them. The thunder and lightning frightened Lozen, but she was grateful for the rain. Even the Ndee scouts could not track them through this.
They found a large boulder with a huge cedar fallen at a slant across it. Tangled with it were tree roots, trunks, and branches weathered to a silvery gray. They crawled under its shelter and pressed against the boulder. Lozen chanted to keep Thunder from hurting them.
Continue in a good way;
Be kind as you pass through;
Do not frighten these poor people.
My Grandfather, let it be well.
Don't frighten us, your people.
Wah-sin-ton moved forward at a crouch and stared out at the storm. The blowing rain washed the tears from his cheeks. Lozen put her arms around Victorio. He leaned his head against her chest and sobbed for a long time. When the rain slowed, he went out to stand with his arms up. The wind blew his wet hair and his breechclout around him.
“No more peace,” he shouted. “For as long as I live there will be war.”
1878 Warrior
Coyote and Walking Rock
 
 
Long time
ago, so they say, Coyote was walking around. He came to some other coyotes sitting near a big rock.
“You'd better show this rock respect,” they said. “It's alive.”
“Don't be silly,” Coyote said. “Rocks aren't alive.”
“It can move fast, so you'd better be careful.”
“You fools don't know anything.” And Coyote, he jumped up onto that rock and he defecated on it. He jumped back down and he laughed.
“See, I told you so.”
He started on his journey again, but that rock rolled after him. Coyote was surprised, but he said, “I'm faster than you are.”
He started to trot along, but the rock rolled faster. When Coyote looked back over his shoulder, there it was, coming after him.
Coyote said, “I'll show you how fast I can go.”
He ran as fast as he could, but the rock kept up with him. It rolled faster and faster, until it was right behind him.
Coyote got scared, and he dived down into a hole to hide. The rock rolled over the entrance to the hole and trapped Coyote inside. He tried to talk his way out, but that rock wouldn't move.
Finally Coyote said, “I'm sorry I soiled you. Let me go, and I'll clean you off.”
The rock rolled away from the entrance to the hole, and Coyote came out and cleaned the feces off the rock. When he finished, the rock rolled back to where it had been, and Coyote continued his journey.
I'm talking about fruit and flowers, and all good things.
IT'S HARD TO KICK AGAINST THE PRICKS
R
afe caught the end of the mule's lead line as it whipped past, and he planted his heels. Caesar and another soldier grabbed the rope and held on while the shrieking wind lashed snow into their faces. They pulled until the veins stood out on their arms and necks, but the mule continued to slide down the icy slope, dragging them with him.
When he lost his footing and rolled, Rafe shouted for the men to let go. The pack lines broke, strewing food and equipment into the drifts of snow. His descent ended against a boulder.
The lieutenant peered out from under the oilskin slicker tented over his hat. “Collect what you can salvage, Sergeant, and distribute the load among the troops.” He looked down at the thrashing, braying mule. “Don't waste a bullet on him.”
For the next three days they limped toward the army post at Warm Springs. Most of the horses and mules that hadn't died had gone lame. The black soldiers, Southerners all, shivered under their blankets as they walked through an assortment of rain, sleet, and snow, the one constant being wind. Rafe had never seen such weather, and this was only the first of December.
Icicles hung from the wide brims of the hats the soldiers had bought to replace their useless forage caps. Those on foot had shoes in tatters, or none at all. They left bloody prints in the snow, but no one complained. Even after weeks in the field with them, Rafe still found their endurance and optimism astonishing. He said so to Casesar.
“The Bible says it's hard to kick against the pricks,” Caesar
answered. “Acts, chapter nine, verse five. I reckon that means no sense the oxen complaining about the goad.”
“This ain't so bad, suh.” Private Ben Simpson carried the brand of his former master on the back of his hand. “Back befo' the sesesh war, my massa, he got in a heap o' trouble for killin' a white man, an' he drove all us slaves to Texas. I wuz just a sprat then. It wuz snowin' sumpin' powerful, but massa, he wouldn't give us no shoes. Wouldn't even ‘low us to wrap our feets wit' sacks. My mammy's feet, they gots all bloody, and her legs swoll up. Massa he shot her, an' kicked her whilst she lay dyin.' He said, ‘Damn a nigger what cain't stand nothin.'” Simpson shook his head. “Naw, this ain't so bad.”
You can never know a man, Rafe thought, until you've been on a hard scout with him.
This scout qualified as hard. For a month they had followed a trail of dead ranchers, dead travelers, dead mail carriers, dead sheepherders, and their equally dead flocks. They had found houses burned and corrals emptied of horses and cattle. The newfangled telegraph wires hummed. Troops converged to try to head Victorio off before he reached the Mexican border. Neither Rafe nor Caesar were optimistic about their success.
“Shoulda known it would come to this pass,” said Caesar as he and Rafe rode along, their heads down to shield their faces from the ice needles of sleet. “Shoulda known I'd have to hunt my own kinfolk 'fore it was all over.”
“Victorio has to be stopped.”
“You reckon we'll have to kill him?”
“Doesn't look like he's coming in hat in hand this time.”
Caesar fell silent. He was still haunted by the memory of the woman falling over the cliff almost two months earlier, and the wail of grief that followed her. Caesar and Rafe had been horrified to find the body of She Moves Like Water. With the lieutenant chivvying them to move along, they had lowered her into a cleft. They had taken off their hats, in spite of the pelting rain, while Caesar said a prayer for her.
Rafe reined his chestnut close so he wouldn't have to
shout. “We had no way to know she was his woman, or any woman for that matter.”
“I think my bullet might have killed her, Rafe.”
“No. Dead Shot was the one who hit her.”
“Do you think so?”
“I'm sure of it. I don't think he knew who she was, either.”
“I reckon when we see Victorio,” Caesar said, “we can tell him where she's buried.”
If we see Victorio, Rafe thought.
So far they hadn't caught a glimpse of him. Lozen was almost certainly with him, and maybe what He Makes Them Laugh said about her was true. He Makes Them Laugh said the spirits had given her the power to heal, to gentle horses, to steal ammunition, and to sense enemies.
Rafe wondered if she now considered him an enemy. He wondered if she was as cold as he was. She certainly didn't have the shelter of an adobe room to look forward to, with a clay fireplace in the corner, a stack of fragrant mesquite wood, and a cot with a heap of dry blankets.
“There it is.” Caesar pointed to the low, dark bulk of buildings.
“Thank God,” Rafe murmured into the wind.
“I hope Cap'n Hooker is off on scout,” said Caesar.
“That makes two of us.”
Capt Ambrose Hooker, the commander of Company E at Warm Springs, was infuriating. He was dangerous. He was insane.
Someone, Rafe thought, should shoot him. He had considered doing it himself.
“Rafe, someone's got to stop Captain Hooker. He's trying to get his men kilt.”
“I know he's crazy, and he's incompetent … .”
“I didn't say he's going to get them kilt. I said he's trying to get them kilt.”
“What do you mean?”
“He acts like Victorio ain't chewing up the countryside and spittin' out the bones. He grazes the livestock a couple miles from the fort, like he was inviting the Apaches to steal
'em. He only allows the sentries to carry unloaded pistols, and he won't let them saddle their mounts.”
Rafe knew Caesar didn't lie, and he didn't confuse his facts, either. Still, he had a hard time believing even Captain Hooker would send his men out on herd duty with no ammunition and no way to control their horses if they had to escape.
“I'll talk to the officers I play cards with. I'll ask them to complain about Hooker. God knows, my letters to Hatch haven't helped.”
When they reached the Fort, Capt. Ambrose Hooker wasn't on scout. He strode into the stable while Rafe was in a corner stall rubbing down the chestnut. A soldier was shoveling out the place, and Hooker lashed at him with his quirt.
“I never saw a nigger could do anything right.” He aimed a kick at him, then several more.
The man held the shovel up to ward off the blows, and that enraged Hooker further.
“I will kick out every goddamned tooth in your black head.”
“Hey,” Rafe threw down the sacking he was using to dry off his horse and left the stall. “What are you doing?”
“I'm teaching this brute the difference between a soldier and a field nigger.”
“Stop it.” Rafe grabbed the quirt.
“Get out of my way, you contemptible puppy.”
“Stop it, or I'll flog you with your own crop.” Rafe motioned for the private to leave. He obliged.
“A nigger has as much business to be a soldier as a cur to be a saint.” Hooker panted with rage. He had the same look in his eyes that Rafe had once seen in a bull that had eaten loco weed. “I'll be glad when the Apaches kill every one of those damned coons.”
Rafe left him to swear and rant, and walked to his quarters to write another letter to Colonel Hatch.
Slander, discord, reprimands, suspensions in rank, assaults, and court-martials littered Captain Hooker's career. Only recently a superior officer threw him into prison for beating a
black sergeant after Hooker had tied him in a squatting position with a pole passed under his knees. Colonel Hatch, faced with Victorio's outbreak and a shortage of officers, ordered Hooker freed from jail.
Rafe had disliked more than a few men in his life, but not since Shadrach Rogers had he loathed one as much as Ambrose Hooker.
 
 
RAIN PELTED THE WOMEN AS THE SOLDIERS HELPED THE children and the old ones out of the wagon. They watched in silence, their faces as unreadable as masks, as Caesar and the other men put their shoulders against the wagon's tailgate and the mud-covered wheels. When the driver cracked his whip, the mules heaved against their harnesses, and Caesar pushed until he grew dizzy. The wheels churned a foot or two through the mire and stopped.
The caravan consisted of four supply vehicles and twelve wagons for transporting the women, children, and old people left behind when Victorio and his warriors bolted from Warm Springs and went on their rampage. Each wagon would have to be hauled through this bog and then wrestled up the slope of the pass and down the other side. Even the oldest would have to walk much of the way. The trail was a morass of loose rocks and icy mud, and they had covered only a quarter of the four hundred mountainous miles to San Carlos. To make matters worse, Capt. Ambrose Hooker had been assigned to this detail.
The sensible plan would have been to wait until spring to transfer the band, but the army and the Interior Department thought they could hold the families hostage at San Carlos. They thought they would be able to bargain with Victorio for them.
Caesar was glad that his Apache family had left with Victorio. They would be on the run now, but at least they weren't suffering this misery. He missed the tomfoolery of He Makes Them Laugh, though. He hadn't seen his nephew,
Sets Him Free, in a long time, either. The boy must be close to seventeen now.
Caesar walked along the line and stopped at the fifth wagon back. Victorio's grown daughter and second wife, Corn Stalk, her mother, and several small children rode in it. Their clothes hung in tatters on their thin frames. The wind and rain had shredded the canvas covering, and they huddled together, trying to conserve the heat from their bodies and share it.
Every day he had tried to talk to them, using Spanish and a little Apache, but they only stared past him. Now, though, Corn Stalk caught his eye. She and her mother sat with their arms around six-year-old Istee, Victorio's youngest son. The boy shivered convulsively.
“Hisdlii,”
Corn Stalk said. “He is cold.
Kaa sitii,
he is sick.”
His grandmother took the scrap of blanket from her shoulders and wrapped it around the child.
“Nohwich'odiih, Shida'a,”
she said. “You help us, Uncle.”
Caesar untied the army-issue blanket from behind his saddle and handed it to them. He thought no more about it until that evening when he was sitting as close to the sputtering fire as he could get, and wishing he had the blanket. Captain Hooker roared into the bivouack area, his face as red as raw beef. Flecks of saliva collected in the corners of his mouth.
“Who gave military property to the Indians?” He held Caesar's blanket up and shook it.
Dread clenched Caesar's heart. “They was cold, sir.”
“I'll have you brought up on charges, you uppity, damned dog. I'll have you branded, bucked, and cashiered. See if I don't.”
 
 
THE YOUNG SOLDIER PULLED OPEN THE HEAVY OAK DOOR and let spring sunlight into the room dug into the side of the hill. The cell formed the basement for the adobe building that served as the post's guardroom. The guards in the room above had a cast-iron sibley stove for heat, but little of that
warmth seeped below. Rafe had brought Caesar blankets, underflannels, a couple of wool shirts, and a greatcoat. Caesar had slept in all of them on the bare ground.
A narrow window near the ceiling had iron bars. The room's only furniture was a pail in one corner to serve as a privy. Caesar and his three cellmates wore shackles around their ankles.
The guard stood watch while Mattie and Rafe went in with the two children. Three-year-old Ellie Liberty ran to Caesar, who picked her up and hugged her. Then holding her with one arm, he knelt to encircle seven-year-old Linc with the other.
“We gots the corn and squash and beans in the ground,” said Mattie. “Rafe done the plowin', and Lib and I scattered the seed. Linc keeps the blackbirds away.” She ran her finger through Caesar's wild curls. “You needs a barberin'.”
“You can give me one soon.” He didn't tell her that when the afternoon was over, he wouldn't need a haircut.
“Thas' right. Rafe tells me you kin come home with us today.”
“Yes, I can.” Caesar looked at Rafe. “I'll be glad to be out of this army, brother. I don't want to be shooting at my own family.”
“If I can find Victorio, I'll try to convince him to surrender.”
“I reckon the gum‘ment pushed that man as far as they's goin' to. I don't think he's gonna lay down his rifle and bow his head.”
They talked until they heard the bugler play “Assembly.”
“Mattie,” Rafe held out a quarter dollar. “Here's two bits for the children to spend at the sutler's store.” He gave her a long look. “Why don't you let them nose around there a while.”

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