He stood up, walked away. " 'S got into him?" California Joe asked.
Dutch Henry could only shrug.
As the moon descended behind the timber, a thick ground fog began to boil up and spread, creating an eerie effect. Custer kept opening his pocket watch and snapping it shut. Finally, it was time. He tucked the watch away and pushed down the ivory-handled butts of his Webley Bulldog pistols to snug them in the holsters. He issued his last orders. Haversacks to be dropped. Overcoats and sabers to be left behind. No firing until he gave the signal.
Feeling heavy, filthy, tired, Charles swung his right leg over Satan. Custer saw that the column was formed, summoned his trumpeter up beside him, and started to walk Dandy forward through the trees. The ground fog stirred and eddied around the animal's knees.
Suddenly a great gasp went up from the men. Charles turned to the east, where Dutch Henry pointed. There above the trees glimmered a golden spot of light.
"Morning star," someone said. .
The planet was more like a military rocket, blazing as it ascended slowly and majestically while they watched. Custer's face seemed to pick up a little of that awesome golden light.
"By God," he said in a reverent tone. "By God. This expedition is blessed. That's the sign."
They advanced to the irregular bluff above the river. The muffled thudding of so many shod horses sounded thunderous to Charles. Surely there would be some response from the sleeping village. There was; a dog barked. Within seconds, half a dozen more joined in.
Custer held up his right hand and started down the slope. Dandy slipped and skidded, but reached the river without mishap. Others began to descend, the scouts to the right of the trumpeter, who was leading the bandsmen down.
Charles had his gypsy robe tucked up and his Army Colt ready in his belt. He held the Spencer across his knees with one hand. Slowly, with creakings and jinglings and occasional muffled expletives, the force descended to the Washita. Down at the level of the river, where the water turned the air noticeably colder, Charles had a new perspective on the cottonwoods on the other side. Through them, amid them, against the faintly paled sky, he now saw the crossed poles of many tipis.
Whose?
"Trumpeter —" Custer began.
In the dark woods, someone fired a warning shot. Custer said something wrathful. Then several things happened at once. There was a noise on the open ground across the river; whinnying, as of many ponies suddenly disturbed. They'd probably smelled the white men's horses.
From the background of the dark woods, a man with a rifle broke and ran toward the river. Custer saw the Indian coming and raised one of his pistols. "Trumpeter, sound the charge," he yelled, firing from horseback. The Indian flew backward, his rifle spinning out of his hand.
The trumpeter sounded the call. To the far left and right of Charles, and behind him as well, men shouted and cheered. Before the trumpeter finished, the band burst into "Garry Owen," and the Seventh Cavalry poured over the Washita to strike the village.
50
Satan carried Charles over the Washita with a great leap. He hugged the piebald with his knees, was dashed with icy spray when Satan landed in the shallows on the other side. They galloped up the bank. To one side, he saw Griffenstein, a revolver in each fist, a smile on his bearded face.
The daylight was coming. The bleached hide covers of the tipis showed clearly among the cottonwoods. The pictographs were distinctive; there was no doubt that it was a Cheyenne village. To the left and right of the main force, the support columns were moving in, hallooing and cheering. Charles even heard a rebel yell.
The van of the attack swept toward the tipis across a level areas broken by low knolls. The earth shook from the pounding of the horses. Suddenly the sun cleared the horizon, and streaks of orange shimmered on the great curve of the Washita where it bent away north, just east of the village.
The Cheyennes poured from the tipis as the troopers rode down on them. The men struggled with their bows and rifles. Charles was dismayed by the sight of many woman and young children. Some of the sleepy youngsters were crying. The women wailed in fright. Dogs barked and snapped. The sudden fire from the charging cavalry worsened the bedlam.
Breath plumed from Charles's mouth. He was within fifty yards of the first tipis in the trees, but some troopers had already reached them. One shot a dog snapping at the horses. Another put a bullet in the breast of a gray-haired grandmother. The women screamed louder as their men staggered forward to defend them. Against the mounted blue lines they had no chance at all.
The charge carried Charles into a lane between tipis with smoke curling out of their tops. Griffenstein rode ahead of him, pistols cracking. A spindly old man defending himself with the faded red shield of his youth stared at the troopers with stunned eyes. Dutch Henry put a bullet into his open mouth. A great flying fan of blood spread behind the man. It splattered his tipi like paint.
Charles had to rely on Satan not to fall among the panicked Indians, who were yelling and clubbing at the soldiers, and to avoid the cook fires smoldering in the lane. His mind seemed benumbed. He'd yet to fire the Spencer.
Satan took him on down the lane to the far side of the village. There Charles wheeled back, nearly knocked from his saddle by a collision with two troopers executing the same maneuver. On their faces, in their glinting eyes, he saw an eagerness that didn't distinguish between warrior and woman, society soldier and stripling.
A platoon in double column led by First Lieutenant Godfrey, of K Troop, dashed out of the cottonwoods and away from the village. Waving hats and swinging ropes, the men in the column split right and left, circling the pony herd, which was already beginning to trot away southeast to escape the noise. The troopers managed to turn and surround the ponies. Observing, Charles wondered why General Custer went to the trouble. The ponies were Indian bred and trained; they'd be useless as cavalry remounts.
Powder smoke began to drift in heavy layers. Charles headed Satan back up another lane. He guessed the village to be about the size of their first estimate, fifty tipis. On his left, three troopers pulled one down. Inside the collapsing hide cover, he heard the high-pitched voices of terrified children. The troopers jumped off their horses and riddled the fallen tipi.
The pace of the charge in the lanes slowed now. Men from the detachment that had encircled the village came in, adding to the confusion. Directly ahead of Charles, a woman ran from behind a tipi, a bedraggled woman with unbound hair, holding a small white boy against her shoulder. She clutched the back of his head protectively. Her hands and face were weathered pink; a white woman.
She screamed at the soldiers. "My name is Blinn. Mrs. Blinn." The captive, Charles remembered. "Please don't hurt Willie or —" A volley of shots jerked her like a marionette. Half of the little boy's head sheared off as he and his mother crashed into a tipi, tearing the cover and falling through.
Vomit rose in Charles's throat. He booted Satan past the torn tipi. The slain boy was no older than his own son.
The lanes filled with troopers excitedly firing despite the bucking and balking of their horses. Charles saw one corporal with a bloody sleeve, but no other sign of Army casualties. He walked Satan forward, peering through the trees to the open ground they'd crossed in their charge from the river. There, seated on Dandy on the highest of the knolls, Custer observed the fighting through binoculars.
Down a short lane between tipis, Charles spied Dutch Henry kneeling on the bullet-pierced body of a Cheyenne, whose head he lifted with one hand while he cut quickly around the scalp with the other. The victim was still alive. He screamed. His face was seamed and old. Sixty winters, or more. Charles turned away.