Hard down the plain the Red Man rode
Against the Red Man; Pawnee slew
His hated enemy, the Sioux,
And bathed him in his brother’s blood.
For they were wily, wild and strong,
Revengeful, fearless, fierce and fleet.
They murmured: Oh, revenge is sweet
When Red Men ride to right a wrong.
LIEUTENANT MURIE--“GOOD INDIANS”--“DON’T LET HER KNOW.”
“Read to me, Jim,” said the sweet girl-wife of Lieutenant Murie.
“I can’t read long, my love,” said the gallant scout. “I have just
learned that there is trouble out West and I must away to the front.
That beardless telegrapher, Dick, has been here with an order from
Major North and they will run us out special at 11:30 to-night.”
The Lieutenant picked up a collection of poems and read where he opened
the book:
“Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind,
That from the nunnery
Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind
To war and arms I flee.”
“Oh, Jim,” she broke in, “why don’t they try to civilize these poor,
hunted Indians? Are they all so very bad? Are there no good ones among
them?”
“Yes,” said the soldier, with a half smile. “They are all good except
those that escape in battle.”
“But tell me, love, how long will this Indian war last?”
“As long as the Sioux hold out,” said the soldier.
At eleven o’clock the young Lieutenant said good-by to his girl-wife
and went away.
This was in the ’60’s. The scouts were stationed near Julesburg, which
was then the terminus of the Union Pacific track. The special engine
and car that brought Lieutenant Murie from Omaha, arrived at noon, the
next day after its departure from the banks of the muddy Missouri.
Murie had been married less than six months. For many moons the
love-letters that came to camp from his sweetheart’s hand had been the
sunshine of his life, and now they were married and all the days of
doubt and danger were passed.
An hour after the arrival of the special, a scout came into camp to say
that a large band of hostile Sioux had come down from the foot-hills
and were at that moment standing, as if waiting--even inviting an
attack, and not a thousand yards away. If we except the officers, the
scouts were nearly all Pawnee Indians, who, at the sight or scent of
a Sioux, were as restless as caged tigers. They had made a treaty with
this hostile tribe once, and were cruelly murdered by the Sioux. This
crime was never forgotten, and when the Government asked the Pawnees to
join the scouts they did so.
The scouts did not keep the warriors waiting long. In less than an
hour, Lieutenant Murie was riding in the direction of the Sioux, with
Lieutenant Creede second in command, followed by two hundred Pawnee
scouts, who were spoiling for trouble. The Sioux, as usual, outnumbered
the Government forces, but, as usual, the dash of the daring scouts was
too much for the hostiles and they were forced from the field.
[Illustration]
Early in the exercises, Murie and Creede were surrounded by a party
of Sioux and completely cut off from the rest of the command. From
these embarrassing environments they escaped almost miraculously. All
through the fight, which lasted twenty minutes or more, Creede noticed
that Murie acted very strangely. He would yell and rave like a mad
man--dashing here and there, in the face of the greatest danger. At
times he would battle single-handed, with a half dozen of the fiercest
of the foe, and his very frenzy seemed to fill them with fear.
When the fight was over, Lieutenant Murie called Creede to him and
said he had been shot in the leg. Hastily dismounting, the anxious
scout pulled off the officer’s boot, but could see no wound nor sign of
blood. Others came up and told the Lieutenant that his leg was as good
as new; but he insisted that he was wounded and silently and sullenly
pulled his boot on, mounted, and the little band of invincibles started
for camp. The Pawnees began to sing their wild, weird songs of victory
as they went along; but they had proceeded only a short distance when
Murie began to complain again, and again his boot was removed to show
him that he was not hurt. Some of the party chaffed him for getting
rattled over a little brush like that, and again in silence he pulled
on his boot and they continued on to camp.
Dismounting, Murie limped to the surgeon’s tent, and some of his
companions followed him, thinking to have a good laugh when the doctor
should say it was all the result of imagination, and that there was no
wound at all.
When the surgeon had examined the limb, he looked up at the face of
the soldier, which was a picture of pain, and the bystanders could not
account for the look of tender sympathy and pity in the doctor’s eyes.
Can it be, thought Creede, that he is really hurt and that I have
failed to find the wound? “Forgive me, Jim,” he said, holding out his
hand to the sufferer, but the surgeon waved him away.
“Why, you--you couldn’t help it, Nick,” said Murie. “You couldn’t kill
all of them; but we made it warm for them till I was shot. You won’t
let _her_ know, will you?” he said, turning his eyes toward the medical
man. “It would break her heart. Poor dear, how she cried and clung to
me last night and begged me to stay with her and let the country die
for itself awhile. Most wish I had now. Is it very bad, Doctor? Is the
bone broken?”
“Oh no,” said the surgeon. “It’s only painful; you’ll be better soon.”
“Good! Don’t let _her_ know, will you?”
They laid him on a cot and he closed his eyes, whispering as he did so:
“Don’t let _her_ know.”
“Where is the hurt, Doctor?” Creede whispered.
“Here,” said the surgeon, touching his own forehead with his finger.
“He is crazy--hopelessly insane.”
All night they watched by his bed, and every few moments he would
raise up suddenly, look anxiously around the tent, and say in a stage
whisper: “Don’t let _her_ know.”
A few days later they took him away. He was not to lead his brave
scouts again. His reason failed to return. I never knew what became
of his wife, but I have been told that she is still watching for the
window of his brain to open up, when his absent soul will look out and
see her waiting with the old-time love for him.
One of his old comrades called to see him at the asylum, a few years
ago, and was recognized by the demented man. To him his wound was as
painful as ever, and as he limped to his old friend, his face wore a
look of intense agony, while he repeated, just as his comrades had
heard him repeat an hundred times, this from Swinburne:
“Oh, bitterness of things too sweet,
Oh, broken singing of the dove.
Love’s wings are over-fleet,
And like the panther’s feet
The feet of Love.”
“Good-by, Jim,” said the visitor, with tears in his voice.
“Good-by,” said Jim. Then glancing about, he came closer and whispered:
“Don’t let _her_ know.”
It is a quarter of a century since Murie lost his reason and was locked
up in a mad-house, and these years have wrought wondrous changes. The
little projected line across the plain has become one of the great
railway systems of the earth. “Dick,” the beardless operator who gave
Murie his orders at Omaha, is now General Manager Dickinson. The
delicate and spare youth, who wore a Winchester and red light at the
rear end of the special, is now General Superintendent Deuel, and
Creede, poor fellow, he would give half of his millions to be able to
brush the mysteries from Murie’s mind.
[Illustration]