“Where’s Custer?”
Bouyer pointed north, toward a cloud of dust. The distant echo of shots could be heard. “There.’’
“This side of the river?”
Bouyer nodded. “He didn’t make it into the village for some reason.”
Benteen rubbed his chin worriedly.
“We’ve got to move forward,” Bouyer said.
Benteen was stunned. “What’?”
“We’ve got to move forward to support Custer.”
“Support Custer?” Benteen laughed bitterly. “We’ll do well to survive here.”
Captain Weir rode up in a hurry. “Sir, my company is ready to move.”
“Move where. Captain?”
Weir pointed in the same direction Bouyer had. “To the Sound of the firing, sir.”
Benteen realized that Weir had been taught a little too much Napoleon at West Point.
“They’re massing below us,” Benteen said. “If the pack mules don’t get here soon, we’ll be overrun.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Bouyer said as he mounted his horse. “I’m going forward.”
He held out his hand toward Benteen. “The satchel.”
Benteen took the leather case off his saddle and almost dropped it. He could smell the leather burning. Whatever was inside was very, very hot. Bouyer took it and looped the tie over his pommel. Then he simply took the one from Reno, realizing the officer was too dazed to offer any help.
Bouyer rode off. Weir looked at Benteen, awaiting orders. Benteen was between a rock and a hard place. If he ordered Weir to stay, he was abandoning Custer, much like Custer had done to Elliott at Washita so many years earlier. But if he ordered him to go, he was reducing his fighting strength by one-fifth. Probably more than that given the state most of Reno’s men appeared to be in.
Taking silence as assent, Weir yelled orders and his company charged after Bouyer. Heading toward the sound of firing.
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
“I can’t give you anything,” Dane said. He stepped back from the golden globe and reluctantly looked around the chamber. Everyone was dead. The crew of the Nautilus had gone above and beyond the call of duty to an extent none of them could have ever imagined.
“We’ve got the ozone!” Earhart yelled, causing Dane to reach up and pull the headset away from his ears. “Let’s head back to your time line.”
“We don’t have the power.” Dane stepped back into the Valkyrie suit and headed up. As he passed the control room, Earhart was waiting, also in her suit. She followed him up the tube to the upper half. The panels were folded in, and even inside the suit, Dane could feel an air of electricity filling the compartment. He continued upward toward the top of the sphere. The Naga staff was still in the keyhole, and he turned it. The top parted and Dane stopped it when there was enough room to exit. He went out, onto the top of the sphere. They were floating in water, only the top sixth of the sphere above the surface.
“What now?” Earhart asked. “We have the ozone.”
“Wait,” Dane said.
“For?”
“Just wait. We have to trust that the others have done their duty.”
CHAPTER THIRTY THREE
General George Armstrong Custer stared at the blood on his hands in disbelief. There was no pain. He just felt very, very tired. He was aware that someone was walking next to his horse, holding him in the saddle. He looked down and saw Autie guiding him. There were troopers all about, most mounted some on foot, all heading up the draw toward higher ground.
That was good, Custer thought. Higher ground was always best.
He could hear firing and screams, but they seemed far away. Where was the village? Were the Indians running? He saw Tom off to his right and slightly ahead. He tried to call out but no words would come. They came out of the draw and a knoll was ahead. Tom was deploying troopers in a defensive line, facing downslope.
Defensive? Custer thought. That was wrong. They should be attacking. Always attacking. Autie helped Custer off his horse. Custer tried to stand, but his legs were so weak. He sank to the ground. He was surprised when Autie pulled a pistol and shot his horse, his favorite steed. Why did he do that?
Custer wondered as the horse collapsed next to him. Autie helped Custer to a seated position with his back against the dead animal. He drew Custer’s pistol and placed it in his hand. Custer could barely hold on to it. He tried to ask Autie what was going on, why were they on the defensive. But no words would come and his nephew turned his attention outward, pistol at the ready. There was blood on Autie’s face. Now had that happened?
Then Custer saw beyond the perimeter. Hundreds of Indians were coming forward, up the draw like wolves to a downed buffalo calf. They were firing rifles and bows. A trooper trying to escape was swarmed by the wave of hostiles disappeared. This couldn’t be, Custer thought. It just simply couldn’t be happening. Not to my regiment. Not to the Seventh.
Bouyer and Weir, with D Company behind them, reached a high point where they could see to the north.
“Oh my God,” Weir whispered.
A small knot of soldiers was holding a perimeter about a mile away on a hill. All around were Indians, at least a thousand Bouyer estimated. The Indians weren’t charging, but holding back, pouring lead and arrow at the soldiers.
“We can’t …” Weir didn’t finish the obvious.
Bouyer understood, but he also knew he didn’t have the luxury of choice. He had three skulls. He’d had to pad the satchels with his blanket to keep them from burning his horse.
Bouyer kicked his spurs into his horse’s side and headed forward.
Weir wheeled his horse and pointed back the way they had come. His troop needed no urging. D Company raced back to the bluff that held the survivors of Reno’s command.
Crazy Horse rode around to the left, two hundred of his mounted warriors following, putting the firing to his right. He knew the terrain and knew where the battle was taking place. He also knew that the other tribes would attack head-on.
He and his warriors galloped along a draw, out of sight. Crazy Horse could sense the anxiety among his men and their desire to ride straight toward the shooting and join in the battle. But they followed his lead.
Gall strode hack and forth along the front edge of the Indian line, holding them back from charging directly into the white men’s guns. It was difficult, but his size and stature brought grudging obedience. They lay down in the waist-high grass along the edge of the coulees that flanked the hill on which the white men had set up their perimeter.
Gall had warriors with rifles move forward so they could see. He directed those with bows back, out of direct sight, and had them fire up into the air, their arrows arching over and down into the whites. Gall had his hatchet in one hand, and the satchel from the sun dance in the other.
Autie placed something in Custer’s lap. A leather satchel with something hot inside. That woke Custer from his blood-drained stupor. He blinked. Looking about. Arrows were coming down, almost as heavily as a summer squall. Some men had pulled saddles over their backs as they lay prone, firing. The ground was littered with their shafts like stalks of prairie grass.
Custer saw that the damned Springfield’s were jamming as cartridges expanded in the heat of the chamber. One trooper, fifteen yards in front of the main line of the perimeter. Was on his knees, knife in hand, trying to extract a round. Several braves saw this and charged forward. The man grabbed the barrel of his Springfield and jumped to his feet, swinging it like a madman. He knocked two of the braves to the ground before he was overwhelmed.