Heaven and Hell (72 page)

The Year of the Locust 453

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Louise. I held fast, saying she would continue to stay at Mont Royal as long as she wished. That incited a burst of ugly recriminations.

Before they grew as bad as last time, I fled.

Orry, I don't know what to do. I am sick of fear, and the oppression of fear. ...

"Yes, I understand," Jane said when Madeline expressed her feelings.

"My people lived with that kind of fear for generations. But I don't know that Mr. Cooper's right about the Klan giving up. Do you remember when Mr. Hazard visited, right after the war? I said I thought there would be many more years of battle before a last victory. I still believe it."

"I could go to General Hampton. He promised to help me."

"How can he help? He hasn't any troops, has he?"

Madeline shook her head.

"I think we'd better stay on watch," Jane said. "A man like that LaMotte, he might take defeat from a person of his own class, another man, but a woman? A colored woman? I'll bet he'd lose his mind rather than let that happen."

"I think he's already lost it."

Jane shrugged, not caring to argue the point. "It isn't the last battle. He'll be back."

p^w

Let us have peace.

GENERAL ULYSSES S. GRANT,

Election Campaign, 1868

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As brave men and as the soldiers of a

government which has exhausted its

peace efforts, we, in the performance

of a most unpleasant duty, accept the

war begun by our enemies, and

resolve to make its end final.

GENERAL SHERMAN to GENERAL SHERIDAN, 1868

To proceed south, in the direction of

the Antelope Hills, thence towards the

Washita River, the supposed winter

seat of the hostile tribes; to destroy

their village and ponies; to kill and

hang all warriors, and bring back all

women and children . . .

GENERAL SHERIDAN to GENERAL CUSTER, 1868

r

48

The scouts rode in, chased by four yapping dogs. Griffenstein came in, and the Corbin brothers, and a stout young Mexican interpreter who had been raised by the Cheyennes and spoke the language fluently ¦

His name was Romero, so naturally everyone called him Romeo.

California Joe rode a mule. Observing his arrival, Charles watched him sway from side to side, blithely smiling at nothing. "Drunk as a tick," he said later to Dutch Henry. "How can Custer tolerate such a clown?"

Dutch Henry scratched the head of a terrier with a stubby wagging tail. There were now at least a dozen stray dogs around the camp. "I kinda get the impression that the only strong man Custer likes is CusterDon't really make any difference, does it? You said you wanted to kill Cheyennes. Curly's going to do it."

November came down, skies like dark slate, winds bitter. In the
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camp on the north bank of the Arkansas, Custer ordered a double-up of rifle drill. Twice daily, men of the Seventh fired at targets set up at one hundred, two hundred, three hundred yards. Cooke's sharpshooters frequently dropped around to jeer and offer superior comments.

Generals Sully and Custer called a meeting of the officers and scouts to review the strategy Sheridan had conceived and gotten approved by Uncle Billy at Division. To Griffenstein, Charles whispered a question about Harry Venable, who was absent. Griffenstein said Venable

was getting over a bad case of influenza.

General Sully, U.S.M.A. '41, was a bit older than Orry would have been had he lived. The general had a famous father, Thomas Sully

°f Philadelphia, the painter of portraits and historical scenes; even a 457

458 * HEAVEN AND HELL

man like Charles, unsophisticated about art, knew Sully's heroic depiction of General Washington's passage over the Delaware.

The artist's son was a dignified sort, with the usual chest-length beard. Although he'd recently failed to find and whip any Indians south of the Arkansas, he had a first-class reputation going back to the Mexican War. He was considered an experienced Indian fighter, having chased the Sioux in the Minnesota Rebellion of '63 and driven them to refuge in the Black Hills. Charles watched Custer closely; the Boy General couldn't entirely hide his resentment of Sully. There was not room for both of them on the expedition, Charles decided.

Using maps, Sully explained that three attack columns would thrust into the Indian Territory simultaneously. A mixed infantry and cavalry column was marching east from Fort Bascom, New Mexico Territory.

A second column, Fifth Cavalry troops under Brigadier Eugene Carr, would strike southeast from Fort Lyon, Colorado, toward the Antelope Hills, a familiar landmark just below the North Canadian.

The central column was Sully's, or Custer's, depending whose side you took. It was considered the main attack force. It consisted of eleven troops of the Seventh and five infantry companies from the Third, Fifth and Thirty-eighth regiments. The column would strike due south, establish a supply base to be garrisoned by the infantrymen, then push on to trail and harry any Cheyennes or Arapahoes they found encamped in the Territory. The other two columns were like jungle beaters, Sully said, sweeping the Indians ahead of the main column. Charles discovered that all of this was made possible by some old friends of his.

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"Your boys from the Tenth," Dutch Henry said after the meeting.

"They're posted all along the Smoky Hill now. Wasn't for them, Custer would still be patrolling up there, 'stead of chasing glory down here.

Those darkies got a damn fine reputation. Man for man, they're better soldiers than all the white rum heads and peg legs in this army. Nobody

much likes to admit it, but it's true."

That brought memories of Magic Magee and Star Eyes Williams; of Old Man Barnes and Colonel Grierson. It brought a thin, pleased smile to Charles's bearded face, too. The first in some time.

One evening at the scouts' cook fire, Charles was eating a late supper when he glanced up to see a mangy yellow dog standing and watching him. Charles kept chewing his piece of jerky. The yellow dog, a stray he'd noticed before, wagged his tail and whined imploringly.

"What the hell do you want?"

On the other side of the fire, Joe Corbin laughed. "That's Old Bob. He's been roaming all over looking for a supply officer. He thinks he's found one."

Washita 459

"Not me," Charles said. He started to chew the jerky again. Old Bob frisked around him, wagging his tail and mewling more like a kitten than a dog. The mournful yellow-brown eyes stayed fixed on Charles.

Finally Charles said, "Oh, hell," took the piece of jerky from his mouth and threw it to the mongrel.

Old Bob was his from then on.

Charles wanted no part of the continuing schism in the Seventh Cavalry. Unfortunately, a man couldn't avoid it. Custer had plenty of enemies, and most of them talked about their feelings whether or not they were asked. One of the bitterest was a capable brevet colonel, Fred Benteen, who commanded H Troop under his actual rank of captain.

"Don't be fooled by how cool he acts, Charlie," he said once.

"Underneath, he's smarting over the court-martial. Of course, the Queen of Sheba"--that was what Custer's detractors called Libbie--"keeps telling him -how great he is, and innocent as a lamb. He doesn't quite believe it, though. Watch him and you'll notice he runs off to wash his hands ten, twelve, fifteen times a day. No man with a clear conscience does that. This may be Sheridan's campaign but it's Custer's game.

I

He's playing for his reputation."

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Custer had plenty of defenders, too. Cooke, of Cooke's Sharpshooters, was a strong and vocal one. So was Captain Louis Hamilton, grandson of Alexander Hamilton. Not unexpectedly, the man who usui ally spoke ahead of all the rest was the general's younger brother, Brevet

' Colonel Tom Custer, first lieutenant of D Troop. Charles listened to all the praise from the apologists and took it with appropriate cynicism.

He found one of Custer's partisans likable in spite of his blind I loyalty. The man's name was Joel Elliott. He had an ingenuous manner and a reputation for heroism that no one disputed. In the war, without connections, he'd risen from private to captain. In '64, riding with the Seventh Indiana Volunteer Horse in Mississippi, he'd taken a bullet through the lung. He made a miraculous recovery, and after the surren'

der jumped back into service by taking the competitive officer examination. He'd scored so high, he won a majority. He was Custer's second

in command, and led his own three-troop detachment. Charles formed I an immediate impression that Elliott was a good soldier.

No mistaking where Elliott stood, though.

"The general's a man of impeccable character," he said. "He quit drinking and smoking years ago. He swears occasionally, but his heart's never in it."

"He wouldn't command black troops, but I've heard it said that

[| ne'H sleep with a black whore."

Elliott froze. "A lie. He's faithful to Libbie."

460 HEAVEN AND HELL

"Sure. She's pumping him up for president."

"Charlie, he isn't a politician, he's a soldier. The winningest soldier I've ever known. That's because he rights aggressively."

"Oh, yes, I've heard how aggressive he was," Charles said, nodding.

"He led the Third Michigan to the highest casualty rate of any cavalry outfit in the Union Army."

"Doesn't that say he's a brave man?"

"Or a reckless one. One of these days he could do himself in with that kind of recklessness. His whole command, too."

"By God it better not happen on this campaign. I'm shooting for a brevet. A brevet or a coffin, nothing in between."

Charles smiled sadly at that. Elliott was so earnest. They got along
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because they argued without personal animosity. It was hard to remember that Joel Elliott was one of the three who'd chased and brought back the infamous quintet of deserters, three of them shot--on Custer's order.

Well, he liked Elliott in spite of it. The young officer was unpretentious, enthusiastic, and most important, a self-taught professional.

You could probably depend on him to carry out orders, even bad ones, to the letter. In a hot fight, that counted for a lot.

The weather grew worse, the days dark with the threat of storms that lurked in billowing black clouds in the north. The drilling continued.

Farriers tended to the animals, and issued each man a spare front and rear shoe and extra nails, to be carried in a saddle pouch.

The scouts fretted to be away. They had their own encampment, shared with another group, one Charles didn't care for--eleven Osage trackers, led by chiefs Hard Rope and Little Beaver. Charles disliked their eyes, hiding God knew what treacherous thoughts and schemes, and their ugly flat-nosed faces, and the way they constantly caressed and fussed over their big bows of hedge-apple wood, or came begging among the white scouts for sugar for their coffee. Indians were insane about sweet coffee. They put so much sugar in a cup that what resulted was a damp brown mound they ate rather than drank.

"Just keep them away from me," Charles said to California Joe Milner, whose real name was Moses, not Joe, he'd discovered. Hard Rope had approached Charles--"Me need sugar" was the best English he could manage--and Charles told him to go to hell. California Joe had called him down.

"You got to ride with 'em, Main."

"I'll ride with them. I don't have to be social."

California Joe was in his cups, and pliable. "Well, if that's how it is, that's how it is, I guess," he said.

Washita 461

Charles tended to his gear, curried Satan and fed him extra forage, scrounged scraps for Old Bob, and waited. At the end of the first week of November, the clouds cleared away. Everyone took it as a sign that they'd march soon.

Charles was ready. He felt fit, missed his son, thought of Willa more than was good for him--remembering her was melancholy and painful--and deemed it wisdom, not cowardice, to avoid Handsome Harry Venable.

Inevitably, running messages for Milner, he saw Venable around
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the encampment at various times, from a distance. On each occasion he managed to walk or ride away quickly. Of course, he knew a confrontation was certain one of these days.

On November 11, the camp stirred with the excitement of new orders. Next day, they marched.

The huge, noisy advance started at daybreak. It was a spectacle unlike any Charles had seen since the war. The supply train carrying winter clothing, food, and forage had grown to four hundred fifty white topped wagons, an immense cavalcade split into four columns traveling abreast. Two companies of the Seventh rode in front, two formed a rear guard, and the rest were divided to ride wide and protect the flanks of the train. The infantry was assigned to march near the wagons but everyone expected that the lazy foot soldiers would soon be hitching rides, which proved to be the case.

Sully and some other officers took the south bank of the Arkansas while the first of the wagons lumbered in and splashed across. So many wagons, their teamsters swearing and popping whips, created a colossal din, augmented by trumpet calls and the creak of horse gear and the lowing of the beef cattle pushed along between the wagons and the flanking cavalry.

Spruce and boisterous, Custer rode with his point detachment, avoiding Sully. Charles saw Custer on his prancing horse on the north bank, the Seventh's standard, with its fierce eagle clutching sharp golden arrows, unfurled in the wind behind him. The Seventh's mounted bandsmen played "The Girl 1 Left Behind Me" as accompaniment for the fording.

The land directly south of the river was of a kind Charles had seen with Wooden Foot Jackson: a scoured waste of sand hills cut by dry

gulches. Travel for the wagons was slow and difficult. Axles snapped.

Coupling poles split. The teamsters whipped their mules and oxen pitilessly but fell behind. The mounted soldiers soon drew away, leaving a