The Mountain: An Event Group Thriller (50 page)

Sergeant Major Dugan stepped up, rubbing his hands together. To John Henry’s surprise Dugan had trimmed and cut his beard to a manageable jumble. His boots were polished and his brass shined in the dreary late-afternoon sunlight that filtered through the black clouds overhead. Thomas did a double take when he noticed the change in the gruff Irishman.

“Is that a hair treatment I smell?” Thomas asked as he took a tentative step away from the sergeant major.

“Might be a touch. Had a hard time getting my cowlick to settle in.”

“Uh-huh. And instead of sleeping you polished boots and brass and curtailed that jumble of baling wire you call a beard.”

“I slept plenty on the train.” He sniffed the air and then slapped his hands together. “Well, I think I’ll go see what the navy has rustled up for mess call.” He started to turn away.

John Henry kept his gaze on the east as he scanned the plain for a sign of Gray Dog, whom he had sent ahead to scout.

“I suppose this sudden change has nothing to do with that spit-and-polished first sergeant of Her Majesty’s Black Watch making you feel somewhat”—he turned to Dugan with a smirk—“lacking?”

“Me, lacking decorum to a bloody damn Brit? Not likely Colonel boyo. Why I would—” His words trailed off when he saw Gray Dog riding hard and fast for the camp. Dugan nodded his head. “Gray Dog’s back and it looks like he might have something to say.”

The Comanche rode hard directly into the center of the large encampment. The noise of beating hooves woke many, including Captain Jackson and Colonel Taylor. Others stepped out into the cold to see what the excitement was about.

Gray Dog remained seated on his saddle blanket. His horse was winded.

“Riders, over fifty men.”

“Same uniforms?” Thomas asked as he made sure Jessy was awake and listening. Grandee assisted in this by handing both officers a steaming tin cup of thick and rich coffee.

“No, dress in black, flowing robes. Headdress. Swords, and are well mounted.”

“Who in the hell is this now?” Jessy asked as he stepped closer and took hold of the reins of Gray Dog’s horse. “How far?”

“They wait in a draw two miles up.”

“For a barren wasteland it sure is getting crowded out here,” Taylor said as he took a sip of the coffee and then made a face and dumped the cup into the fire.

“Report,” John Henry said to Gray Dog as his eyes scanned the horizon in the east.

“They not come from west of us, but east. I backtrack and pick up sign coming from a pass next to Black Mountain.”

“Again, I didn’t fare too well in geography. What’s over those mountains?” Jessy asked.

“That is Persia. Not a real friendly place. However, they have no love for the Ottoman Empire either,” Jackson said as he too nervously watched the horizon.

“Good report. Get some hot food in you. I need you back out there,” John Henry slapped Gray Dog’s horse on the hindquarters and sent it toward the smell of cooking food.

“Odds on hostility?” Claire asked, walking up from behind, surprising them all. She was dressed and bundled and looked as if she were ready to travel. She was joined by McDonald and Ollafson, the latter looking like death warmed over, as if he had gotten no sleep at all.

“Transitioning state, that’s about all the briefing I received on Persia. After all, we didn’t plan to gain the summit of Ararat from the eastern side,” Jackson said as he nodded a greeting at Claire, who was impressing the young naval officer more each day.

“Inform the mess to slap some bacon on a biscuit and drown the men in coffee. I want to break camp in fifteen minutes. Get the tents struck and the wagons hitched.” The officers and sergeants stood rooted to the spot for only a moment at the sudden change of orders. “Move, gentlemen.”

The men broke and started rousing the camp. The men grumbled, but soon enough word spread that there might be a hostile force nearby and they started moving more lively. John Henry gave the Rebel cavalrymen their due, they were fast and efficient after years following the zigzag command tactics in hit-and-run employed by Robert E. Lee. They were silent and precise as they hitched and reloaded wagons.

It was Claire who noticed the rumblings first. Corporal Jenks and five other prisoners were speaking with Taylor and the talk looked animated. Claire turned to John Henry and pointed this out.

“We may have a situation here, Colonel,” she said, getting his attention.

Thomas turned and saw the confrontation developing between Jessy and his men. He watched as the colonel looked their way and then said something to the six men who also looked toward them. Taylor nodded and then turned away and made for John Henry. He rubbed his beard and then looked up into the expectant face of his former brother-in-law.

“The men are scared. Besides that goddamn mountain spooking the hell out of them.” He turned toward Claire and dipped his head. “No offense.” She shook her head, indicating that his words did not make her blush in the slightest. “But that ugly mountain combined with our wandering friends out there is having a most undesirable effect on the boys.”

“They want arms.” It was a statement from Thomas, not a question. “No.”

Taylor didn’t say anything but looked over at Claire. “Does he realize that frightened men fail to do what’s expected of them?”

Claire remained silent as she glanced at Thomas, who stood steadfast.

“The marines are armed. If we move fast enough, we can—”

The first gunshots caught John Henry in midsentence. He turned in time to see at least twenty-five riders top the small rise and charge into the head of the camp. Several were swinging large Saracen swords at the men as they raced past. Many more were firing old-fashioned powder-and-ball rifles. Thomas saw one and then a second man fall. One marine and one Rebel. The marine tried in vain to grab the reins of a passing horse and failed, being cut almost in half by the large, curved sword. The Rebel cavalryman was shot as he tried to get to the fallen lance corporal. Taylor and John Henry both pulled their Colts and immediately started to return fire. Slowly the marines started to respond. Several of the black-clad riders fell off their mounts and were beaten half to death by the unarmed men who descended on them like a pack of wolves.

“My tent!” Ollafson screamed loudly, startling a frightened McDonald next to him.

Thomas turned and saw several of the flowing headdresses as they entered the professor’s tent. The four men had sneaked into the camp from the side opposite the attack. Now John Henry could guess why.

“The artifacts!” Ollafson called out as he blindly ran for the tent.

“Dugan, bring that shelter down!” John Henry yelled.

Sergeant Major Dugan saw what was happening and hurriedly ordered ten marines into a firing line and in seconds had them rapid-firing with their Spencer carbines into the large tent. Bullet holes appeared and the white canvas looked as though it were being buffeted by an internal windstorm as the large rounds tore it to pieces.

“My things!” McDonald screamed in horror as the tent started to collapse.

“The last of them are running, Colonel,” Jackson reported as he holstered his smoking navy Colt.

The marine line ceased their torrid fire into the now-flattened tent. The only thing still standing was the shelter’s center pole, and even that strong member was tilted and shattered. Dugan approached cautiously and just as he got to the tent he was charged on from the inside. A large Persian with a gold band holding his headdress in place slammed into the sergeant major as he jumped from the wreckage of the tent. The man swiped at Dugan with his sword and the Irishman dodged backward and fell into the grass. Taylor raised his pistol to shoot but John Henry stayed his hand. Thomas shook his head as he saw the Persian had the satchel, which contained the two artifacts. As they watched, the man grabbed a set of reins and jumped aboard the horse. With a twirl of his sword he sped out of camp.

John Henry looked quickly around. He saw who he wanted. It was Gray Dog, who had yet to leave camp. He was wiping blood from his knife, and that was when most noticed the dead Persian at his moccasined feet. Thomas whistled and when Gray Dog looked up he gestured at the fast-retreating rider. He pointed and then made a fist. Gray Dog jumped upon his horse and then sped as fast as a bolt of lightning toward the running Persian thief.

“I need him alive!” Thomas said as the Comanche rode past at breakneck speed.

The officers looked around the shattered camp. Men were assisting others who had taken sword wounds to their bodies.

“Damn!” John Henry said as he took in the destruction that had occurred during the short and very one-sided battle.

“I want my men armed,” Jessy said as he helped a wounded Rebel soldier to his feet.

John Henry eyed Jessy and it told him that was now was not a good time. “Report, Captain,” he said instead, turning to Jackson.

“Very lucky, for being caught off-guard, I would say. One dead and sixteen wounded. Two severely.” He turned to Taylor. “Both of them your men.”

“Correction. From this point forward, they’re
my
men, Captain.”

“Are they?” Jessy asked angrily.

“Sergeant Major Dugan!”

“Sir!” The sergeant major was a little embarrassed but no worse for the wear after his encounter with the sword-wielding Persian.

“Break out the crates of arms. I want every man armed with one of the new Henry repeating rifles. Marines also. I want each trooper issued a sidearm with fifty rounds of ammunition for revolving pistol. Each is to get a full field pack. Is that clear, Sergeant Major?”

“Sir!” Dugan started to turn away with a cautious look at Colonel Taylor. “Giving guns to those hooligans is like giving dynamite to a group of drunk Irishmen, I swear…”

They watched the grumbling sergeant major inform the marines what to do.

“I am happy to see you listening to the voice of reason,” Jessy said as he faced John Henry.

“Hell, Jessy, I probably just signed the death warrant of every man in this expedition.”

As Taylor walked away Thomas saw Claire as she tried to console Professor Ollafson. McDonald was using the toe of his boot to see if any of his personal property was still intact. But it was Claire he was thinking about. Issuing weapons to a band of Confederate prisoners who were over six thousand miles away from home seemed a good way to start either a war or a rebellious mutiny. As he watched Claire and her ministrations toward the old man, he wondered if he had also condemned her to a short trip and a brutal death, because the last he heard the Persians did not hold their women in high regard. He was terrified how they would treat the emancipated Claire Anderson, the former Madame Claire Richelieu.

But even more confusing was the concern he was feeling for someone he hardly knew.

He turned away from the image of the woman and saw the mountain ahead. What lay in store for them at the summit was constantly on his mind and the subject had him wishing his friend the president had just left him alone on the American plains counting savages.

The Plains Indians were tame compared to the foreboding peaks of Ararat.

*   *   *

The marine medical corpsman had to sedate Ollafson. The young marine didn’t like doing it for the simple reason he suspected the old professor had a bad heart. The man’s color was faded and the rumors were quickly spreading, as rumors always do in camp, that Ollafson was being affected by the mountain. The corpsman had tried to put the kibosh on the ridiculous talk but it spread nonetheless. Having lost the only two artifacts to come from the summit of Ararat was just too much for the enduring Swede to recover from.

The men and wagons had been loaded and John Henry ordered the column forward just before the sun set in the western sky. For the first time that day the sun had actually peeked out from the ominous clouds, but only after the burning orb had been chased into the west and had lowered in the sky. Still, after the humiliation of the day at the hands of the Persians, Thomas observed that seeing the sun, no matter how brief in duration, assisted in putting the men in a better mood. That and being armed once more.

“Your mount is saddled, Colonel,” Dugan said as he turned quickly and looked ahead to see if there was any sign of that troublesome Indian, Gray Dog. Thomas could see that even the heartless sergeant major was worried for the young Comanche, as this land was not exactly his element.

“Don’t fret, Sergeant Major. I’m beginning to think Gray Dog understands more of what’s going on here than we do.” Thomas pulled on his leather gauntlets and then accepted the reins from a marine corporal with a nod of thanks. He saw Jackson and Jessy waiting. A wagon rolled past and he saw Claire in the back on the second in line tending to Ollafson. Even with John Henry’s assurances Ollafson had lost hope of ever seeing those cursed artifacts again. John Henry saw the gentle way Claire had about her. She looked up and gave Thomas the barest hint of a smile.

“Rider!” one of the Rebels cried from atop his wagon.

It was Gray Dog, and it looked as if he was dragging something behind the small pony he was riding. Many of the wagons and most of the riders slowed their march to see just what the Comanche was up to now. They were shocked, but pleased, to see that Gray Dog hadn’t failed in his mission. But by the looks of his captive, he might not have. Gray Dog pulled up on the reins and hopped from the pony just as it skidded to a stop in front of John Henry. He immediately drew his bone-handled knife and cut the rope he had used to tie up the battered Persian. Taylor was smiling and shaking his head as the Persian sat upright and cursed the young warrior. The bearded Persian spat as Gray Dog sheathed his knife. He turned and looked at John Henry and then went to his pony. He untied the satchel and tossed it to Dugan. Then he silently mounted and sped off to the east once more to start his scout.

Two marines, with a helping hand from Corporal Jenks, slapped and kicked the Persian to his feet. Jenks reached out and pulled off his headdress to reveal the black hair underneath.

“Take that to Professor Ollafson. Maybe it will cheer the old boy up,” John Henry told Dugan as he slapped one gauntleted hand into the other. Jessy saw the determined look in Thomas’s face and then decided he should be in on this before John Henry lost their source of intelligence.