“Go on ahead, I’ll catch up,” she called back to Rose and Jerome Some Horses. “Boys, you go on, too.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Although she didn’t ask Graver to wait, he did, as he attempted to puzzle out where he’d seen that lawyer before. Then he remembered the December day ten years ago when he’d gone up to Wounded Knee, hitching a ride with a wagonload of whiskey for the extra troops, who arrived so quickly they outran their supplies, especially nonessentials like liquor. The merchants in Rushville had telegraphed an urgent order to Babylon and John Parker had decided to take matters into his own hands. His plan was to drive all the way to Wounded Knee and sell directly to the troops. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision on Graver’s part. One moment he was listening to the talk in the livery stable, where he’d come to have a broken wagon wheel repaired by the blacksmith, the next he was helping Parker heft the barrels and bottles of whiskey on the wagon and climbing up beside him.
The ride there was bitter cold, and the wind bit into his face and through his coat. He and his bride had just moved into the hills, and it felt like a fine adventure to finally see an Indian encampment and the soldiers he’d heard so much about. His wife was safe; he’d kissed her good-bye and left her in a room at the hotel with a book and plenty of blankets against the cold. He’d also left her with the last of their cash in case she needed anything. Even then, he shook his head at his ignorance. She was seventeen. Of course her eye would be taken by the bright playthings the stores displayed.
They arrived just after dark, pulling behind the last row of tents so as not to attract the attention of the officers. The sentries let them through as soon as Parker revealed the wagon’s contents, and word quickly spread through the enlisted ranks. For a few hours, they did a land-office business, and by nine o’clock they were rolling out blankets in the bed of the empty wagon. Parker had saved one bottle for himself, and Graver took a couple of quick swallows to warm his empty stomach. By the time he drifted off to sleep, the drunken noise of the camp had grown so loud it formed a disturbing barricade that brought bad dreams and little rest.
He awoke at dawn to find his blankets and hair coated with heavy frost. Parker shook himself off and climbed down to piss. Graver followed, shaking in the damp cold that had settled in his clothes. Parker tilted his head toward the cooking fires and the two men were able to find coffee and plates of bacon and beans without much trouble, even though the soldiers, holding their swollen, battered faces in their hands as they fought hangovers, were less than eager to see them again. Graver could feel the ill will and short tempers ooze around the camp like a yellow pestilent cloud. Then the Indian drums began to pound and the heads of the men near them jerked up, eyes wild.
“Are they comin’?” one soldier whispered as he reached for the rifle on the ground beside him.
Another soldier stood and brought his telescope to his eyes. “Just dancing.” He sat down hard, as if his legs gave out.
“They’re comin’,” said the first soldier, who stood and cocked his rifle, his face covered in greasy sweat, a sour stink rolling off him in waves.
Parker stabbed his fork into another piece of bacon and jammed it in his mouth, then stood, placing his metal plate in a pile with the others. “Let’s take a look before we go.” He nodded toward the small valley where the tipis had been hastily rigged. The camp was alive with playing children, romping dogs, and figures collecting at the dance site, the drummers gathering on the circle.
Behind them a bugle sounded and the hungover men clumsily prepared arms. The Indians seemed to ignore the soldiers, although Graver noticed some officers in conversation with a couple of their elders, while their few young men acted guard, pacing nervously behind them.
This went on for a while until the young men went back to their tipis, retrieved their old guns and pistols, and dropped them at the feet of the colonel in charge. The steady drumbeat and pulsing rhythm found its way into Graver’s body—thud, thud, thud, the sound pumped in his blood, up his legs, into his chest, down his arms, and inside his head, knocked against his skull and the backs of his eyes until he felt both restless and lulled. The din of the soldiers behind them grew louder, and the young braves standing guard paced, keeping one eye on the soldiers. Graver saw the big Hotchkiss cannons wheeled into place on the rise above the camp. Surely they didn’t mean to . . .
A dancer threw back his head, chanting in Lakota, and tossed a handful of dirt to the sky. Then a rifle fired. There was a moment of stunned silence, and then all at once every gun roared in reply. Parker pulled him flat and they watched as the cavalry fought the Indians. The big guns mowed down dancers, tipis, children, dogs, old people, and women alike. At some point Graver clamped his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut. Behind him, he could hear soldiers hit by gunfire cry out.
When the Hotchkiss guns finally went silent, Graver rose to his hands and knees, looked out across what was left of the camp, now strewn with bodies and burning tipis, and threw up. Parker stood, his expression dazed. He shook his head, made a sound of disgust in his throat, spit, and turned away. “I’ve had enough. You coming?”
Graver paused, uncertain, and then followed. They didn’t speak all the way to Rushville, where they were forced to spend the night because Parker had driven the horses too hard the night before.
They bedded in the livery, since it was already snowing. The New Year coming, and his wife alone. At the time, Graver had no idea that night was only the start of the disappointment that awaited her in married life. Warm at last, nestled in the straw of the loft, he couldn’t stop replaying the morning’s bloody images, and finally he rose and walked down the street to the hotel. Although it was coming on midnight, the town was awake with dangerous energy like they rode an electrical current that would never release them. He could hear men swearing and fighting up and down the street. Whatever they had done up there, he was sure they would never be free of it.
At the hotel saloon he stood at the bar and ordered a beer. The stranger next to him turned and raised his glass in a toast. Graver stared at the man, tall, blond, and handsome with unearned amusement in his eyes, like he had won some game without having to play too hard. His lips were pursed as if he held in outright laughter and Graver’s first instinct was to punch him in the face. The man dropped something on the bar and Graver stared at a pair of child’s moccasins, beaded, the bottoms barely worn. He raised his eyes to the stranger, who shrugged and drank from his glass of whiskey.
“You there today? Thought I saw you there. Yes, you were the one brought the whiskey to the troops.” The man nodded and a conspirator’s smile, small and confident, appeared on his face.
Graver thought to deny that it was his liquor, then said nothing and looked at his beer. He didn’t want to be here. Didn’t want the man to say another word.
“We were lucky to be there. Spectacular show. Never saw anything like it. Especially afterwards . . . some wonderful pieces to be had . . . I found these on a young girl.” He spread his palm over the moccasins.
Graver lifted his fist, then dropped it, turned, and walked out. The man’s smug laughter followed him all the way into sleep when it finally arrived around dawn. The memory still chilled him, made him feel as if he had somehow used a gun on those people, too.
The lawyer, Percival Chance, was the man in the bar, Graver was certain. He would never forget the amused expression on the man’s face as he gestured toward his trophy.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN