disgusting truth flashed clear on Jones. Uttering a single
disconcerted syllable of rage, he wheeled and went by himself into
the barracks, and lay down solitary on his bunk and read a newspaper
until mess-call without taking in a word of it. "If they go to put
me in the mill fer that," he said, sulkily, to many friends who brought
him their congratulations, "I'm going to give 'em what I think about
wearin' disguises."
[Illustration: "'AIN'T Y'U GOT SOMETHING TO SELL?'"]
"What do you think, Specimen?" said one.
"Give it to us now, Specimen," said another.
"Against the law, ain't it, Specimen?"
"Begosh!" said Jack Long, "ef thet's so, don't lose no time warnin' the
General, Specimen. Th' ole man'd hate to be arrested."
And Specimen Jones told them all to shut their heads.
But no thought was more distant from General Crook's busy mind than
putting poor Jones in the guard-house. The trooper's willingness, after
eight months hunting Indians, to buy almost anything brought a smile to
his lips, and a certain sympathy in his heart. He knew what those eight
months had been like; how monotonous, how well endured, how often
dangerous, how invariably plucky, how scant of even the necessities of
life, how barren of glory, and unrewarded by public recognition. The
American "statesman" does not care about our army until it becomes
necessary for his immediate personal protection. General Crook knew all
this well; and realizing that these soldiers, who had come into
winter-quarters this morning at eleven, had earned a holiday, he was
sorry to feel obliged to start them out again to-morrow morning at two;
for this was what he had decided upon.
He had received orders to drive on the reservation the various small
bands of Indians that were roving through the country of the Snake and
its tributaries, a danger to the miners in the Bannock Basin, and to
the various ranches in west Idaho and east Oregon. As usual, he had
been given an insufficient force to accomplish this, and, as always, he
had been instructed by the "statesmen" to do it without violence--that
is to say, he must never shoot the poor Indian until after the poor
Indian had shot him; he must make him do something he did not want to,
pleasantly, by the fascination of argument, in the way a "statesman"
would achieve it. The force at the General's disposal was the garrison
at Boise Barracks--one troop of cavalry and one company of infantry. The
latter was not adapted to the matter in hand--rapid marching and
surprises; all it could be used for was as a reinforcement, and,
moreover, somebody must be left at Boise Barracks. The cavalry had had
its full dose of scouting and skirmishing and long exposed marches, the
horses were poor, and nobody had any trousers to speak of. Also, the
troop was greatly depleted; it numbered forty men. Forty had deserted,
and three--a sergeant and three privates--had cooked and eaten a
vegetable they had been glad to dig up one day, and had spent the
ensuing forty-five minutes in attempting to make their ankles beat the
backs of their heads; after that the captain had read over them a
sentence beginning, "Man that is born of a woman hath but a short time
to live, and is full of misery"; and after that the camp was referred to
as Wild Carrot Camp, because the sergeant had said the vegetable was
wild carrot, whereas it had really been wild parsnip, which is quite
another thing.
General Crook shook his head over what he saw. The men were
ill-provided, the commissary and the quartermaster department were
ill-provided; but it would have to do; the "statesmen" said our army
was an extravagance. The Indians must be impressed and intimidated by
the unlimited resources which the General had--not. Having come to this
conclusion, he went up to the post commander's, and at supper astonished
that officer by casual remarks which revealed a knowledge of the
surrounding country, the small streams, the best camps for pasture,
spots to avoid on account of bad water, what mules had sore backs, and
many other things that the post commander would have liked dearly to ask
the General where and when he had learned, only he did not dare. He did
not even venture to ask him what he was going to do. Neither did Captain
Glynn, who had been asked to meet the General. The General soon told
them, however. "It may be a little cold," he concluded.
"To-morrow, sir?" This from Captain Glynn. He had come in with the forty
that morning. He had been enjoying his supper very much.
"I think so," said the General. "This E-egante is likely to make trouble
if he is not checked." Then, understanding the thoughts of Captain
Glynn, he added, with an invisible smile, "_You_ need no preparations.
You're in marching order. It's not as if your men had been here a long
time and had to get ready for a start."
"Oh no," said Glynn, "it isn't like that." He was silent. "I think, if
you'll excuse me, General," he said next, "I'll see my sergeant and give
some orders."
"Certainly. And, Captain Glynn, I took the liberty of giving a few
directions myself. We'll take an A tent, you know, for you and me. I see
Keyser is sergeant in F troop. Glad we have a non-commissioned officer
so competent. Haven't seen him since '64, at Winchester. Why, it's
cleared off, I declare!"
It had, and the General looked out of the open door as Captain Glynn,
departing, was pulling at his cigar. "How beautiful the planets are!"
exclaimed Crook. "Look at Jupiter--there, just to the left of that
little cottonwood-tree. Haven't you often noticed how much finer the
stars shine in this atmosphere than in the East? Oh, captain! I forgot
to speak of extra horseshoes. I want some brought along."
"I'll attend to it, General."
"They shouldn't be too large. These California fourteen-and-a-half
horses have smallish hoofs."
"I'll see the blacksmith myself, General."
"Thank you. Good-night. And just order fresh stuffing put into the
aparejos. I noticed three that had got lumpy." And the General shut the
door and went to wipe out the immaculate barrels of his shot-gun; for
besides Indians there were grouse among the hills where he expected to
go.
Captain Glynn, arriving at his own door, stuck his glowing cigar against
the thermometer hanging outside: twenty-three below zero. "Oh Lord!"
said the captain, briefly. He went in and told his striker to get
Sergeant Keyser. Then he sat down and waited. "'Look at Jupiter!'" he
muttered, angrily. "What an awful old man!"
It was rather awful. The captain had not supposed generals in the first
two hours of their arrival at a post to be in the habit of finding out
more about your aparejos than you knew yourself. But old the General was
not. At the present day many captains are older than Crook was then.
Down at the barracks there was the same curiosity about what the "Old
Man" was going to do as existed at the post commander's during the early
part of supper. It pleased the cavalry to tell the infantry that the
Old Man proposed to take the infantry to the Columbia River next week;
and the infantry replied to the cavalry that they were quite right as to
the river and the week, and it was hard luck the General needed only
mounted troops on this trip. Others had heard he had come to superintend
the building of a line of telegraph to Klamath, which would be a good
winter's job for somebody; but nobody supposed that anything would
happen yet awhile.
And then a man came in and told them the General had sent his boots to
the saddler to have nails hammered in the soles.
"That eer means business," said Jack Long, "'n' I guess I'll nail up mee
own cowhides."
"Jock," said Specimen Jones to Cumnor, "you and me 'ain't got any soles
to ourn because they're contract boots, y'u see. I'll nail up yer feet
if y'u say so. It's liable to be slippery."
Cumnor did not take in the situation at once. "What's your hurry?" he
inquired of Jack Long. Therefore it was explained to him that when
General Crook ordered his boots fixed you might expect to be on the road
shortly. Cumnor swore some resigned, unemphatic oaths, fondly supposing
that "shortly" meant some time or other; but hearing in the next five
minutes the definite fact that F troop would get up at two, he made use
of profound and thorough language, and compared the soldier with the
slave.
"Why, y'u talk almost like a man, Jock," said Specimen Jones. "Blamed if
y'u don't sound pretty near growed up."
Cumnor invited Jones to mind his business.
"Yer muss-tache has come since Arizona," continued Jones, admiringly,
"and yer blue eye is bad-lookin'--worse than when we shot at yer heels
and y'u danced fer us."
"I thought they were going to give us a rest," mumbled the youth,
flushing. "I thought we'd be let stay here a spell."
"I thought so too, Jock. A little monotony would be fine variety. But a
man must take his medicine, y'u know, and not squeal." Jones had lowered
his voice, and now spoke without satire to the boy whom he had in a
curious manner taken under his protection.
"Look at what they give us for a blanket to sleep in," said Cumnor. "A
fellow can see to read the newspaper through it."
"Look at my coat, Cumnor." It was Sergeant Keyser showing the article
furnished the soldier by the government. "You can spit through that." He
had overheard their talk, and stepped up to show that all were in the
same box. At his presence reticence fell upon the privates, and Cumnor
hauled his black felt hat down tight in embarrassment, which strain
split it open half-way round his head. It was another sample of
regulation clothing, and they laughed at it.
"We all know the way it is," said Keyser, "and I've seen it a big sight
worse. Cumnor, I've a cap I guess will keep your scalp warm till we get
back."
And so at two in the morning F troop left the bunks it had expected
to sleep in for some undisturbed weeks, and by four o'clock had eaten
its well-known breakfast of bacon and bad coffee, and was following
the "awful old man" down the north bank of the Boise, leaving the
silent, dead, wooden town of shanties on the other side half a mile
behind in the darkness. The mountains south stood distant, ignoble,
plain-featured heights, looming a clean-cut black beneath the piercing
stars and the slice of hard, sharp-edged moon, and the surrounding
plains of sage and dry-cracking weed slanted up and down to nowhere and
nothing with desolate perpetuity. The snowfall was light and dry as
sand, and the bare ground jutted through it at every sudden lump or
knoll. The column moved through the dead polar silence, scarcely
breaking it. Now and then a hoof rang on a stone, here and there a
bridle or a sabre clinked lightly; but it was too cold and early for
talking, and the only steady sound was the flat, can-like tankle of the
square bell that hung on the neck of the long-eared leader of the
pack-train. They passed the Dailey ranch, and saw the kittens and the
liniment-bottle, but could get no information as to what way E-egante
had gone. The General did not care for that, however; he had devised his
own route for the present, after a talk with the Indian guides. At the
second dismounting during march he had word sent back to the pack-train
not to fall behind, and the bell was to be taken off if the rest of the
mules would follow without the sound of its shallow music. No wind moved
the weeds or shook the stiff grass, and the rising sun glittered pink on
the patched and motley-shirted men as they blew on their red hands or
beat them against their legs. Some were lucky enough to have woollen or
fur gloves, but many had only the white cotton affairs furnished by the
government. Sarah the squaw laughed at them: the interpreter was warm as
she rode in her bright green shawl. While the dismounted troopers
stretched their limbs during the halt, she remained on her pony talking
to one and another.
"Gray Fox heap savvy," said she to Mr. Long. "He heap get up in the
mornin'."
"Thet's what he does, Sarah."
"Yas. No give soldier hy-as Sunday" (a holiday).
"No, no," assented Mr. Long. "Gray Fox go teh-teh" (trot).
"Maybe he catch E-egante, maybe put him in skookum-house (prison)?"
suggested Sarah.
"Oh no! Lor'! E-egante good Injun. White Father he feed him. Give him
heap clothes," said Mr. Long.
"A--h!" drawled Sarah, dubiously, and rode by herself.
"You'll need watchin'," muttered Jack Long.
The trumpet sounded, the troopers swung into their saddles, and the line
of march was taken up as before, Crook at the head of the column, his
ragged fur collar turned up, his corduroys stuffed inside a wrinkled
pair of boots, the shot-gun balanced across his saddle, and nothing to
reveal that he was any one in particular, unless you saw his face. As
the morning grew bright, and empty, silent Idaho glistened under the
clear blue, the General talked a little to Captain Glynn.
"E-egante will have crossed Snake River, I think," said he. "I shall try
to do that to-day; but we must be easy on those horses of yours. We
ought to be able to find these Indians in three days."
"If I were a lusty young chief," said Glynn, "I should think it pretty
tough to be put on a reservation for dipping a couple of kittens in the
molasses."
"So should I, captain. But next time he might dip Mrs. Dailey. And I'm
not sure he didn't have a hand in more serious work. Didn't you run
across his tracks anywhere this summer?"
"No, sir. He was over on the Des Chutes."
"Did you hear what he was doing?"
"Having rows about fish and game with those Warm Spring Indians on the
west side of the Des Chutes."
"They're always poaching on each other. There's bad blood between
E-egante and Uma-Pine."
"Uma-Pine's friendly, sir, isn't he?"
"Well, that's a question," said Crook. "But there's no question about
this E-egante and his Pah-Utes. We've got to catch him. I'm sorry for
him. He doesn't see why he shouldn't hunt anywhere as his fathers did. I
shouldn't see that either."
"How strong is this band reported, sir?"
"I've heard nothing I can set reliance upon," said Crook, instinctively
levelling his shot-gun at a big bird that rose; then he replaced the
piece across his saddle and was silent. Now Captain Glynn had heard
there were three hundred Indians with E-egante, which was a larger
number than he had been in the habit of attacking with forty men. But he
felt discreet about volunteering any information to the General after
last night's exhibition of what the General knew. Crook partly answered
what was in Glynn's mind. "This is the only available force I have,"
said he. "We must do what we can with it. You've found out by this time,
captain, that rapidity in following Indians up often works well. They
have made up their minds--that is, if I know them--that we're going to
loaf inside Boise Barracks until the hard weather lets up."
Captain Glynn had thought so too, but he did not mention this, and the
General continued. "I find that most people entertained this notion," he
said, "and I'm glad they did, for it will help my first operations very
materially."
The captain agreed that there was nothing like a false impression for
assisting the efficacy of military movements, and presently the General
asked him to command a halt. It was high noon, and the sun gleamed on
the brass trumpet as the long note blew. Again the musical strain
sounded on the cold, bright stillness, and the double line of twenty
legs swung in a simultaneous arc over the horses' backs as the men
dismounted.
"We'll noon here," said the General; and while the cook broke the ice on
Boise River to fill his kettles, Crook went back to the mules to see how
the sore backs were standing the march. "How d'ye do, Jack Long?" said
he. "Your stock is travelling pretty well, I see. They're loaded with
thirty days' rations, but I trust we're not going to need it all."
"Mwell, General, I don't specially kyeer meself 'bout eatin' the hull
outfit." Mr. Long showed his respect for the General by never swearing
in his presence.
"I see you haven't forgotten how to pack," Crook said to him. "Can we
make Snake River to-day, Jack?"
"That'll be forty miles, General. The days are pretty short."
"What are you feeding to the animals?" Crook inquired.
"Why, General, _you_ know jest 's well 's me," said Jack, grinning.
"I suppose I do if you say so, Jack. Ten pounds first ten days, five
pounds next ten, and you're out of grain for the next ten. Is that the
way still?"
"Thet's the way, General, on these yere thirty-day affairs."
Through all this small-talk Crook had been inspecting the mules and the
horses on picket-line, and silently forming his conclusion. He now
returned to Captain Glynn and shared his mess-box.
They made Snake River. Crook knew better than Long what the animals
could do. And next day they crossed, again by starlight, turned for a
little way up the Owyhee, decided that E-egante had not gone that road,
trailed up the bluffs and ledges from the Snake Valley on to the barren
height of land, and made for the Malheur River, finding the eight hoofs
of two deer lying in a melted place where a fire had been. Mr. Dailey
had insisted that at least fifty Indians had drunk his liniment and
trifled with his cats. Indeed, at times during his talk with General
Crook the old gentleman had been sure there were a hundred. If this were
their trail which the command had now struck, there may possibly have
been eight. It was quite evident that the chief had not taken any three
hundred warriors upon that visit, if he had that number anywhere. So the
column went up the Malheur main stream through the sage-brush and the
gray weather (it was still cold, but no sun any more these last two
days), and, coming to the North Fork, turned up towards a spur of the
mountains and Castle Rock. The water ran smooth black between its edging
of ice, thick, white, and crusted like slabs of cocoanut candy, and
there in the hollow of a bend they came suddenly upon what they sought.
Stems of smoke, faint and blue, spindled up from a blurred acre of
willow thicket, dense, tall as two men, a netted brown and yellow mesh
of twigs and stiff wintry rods. Out from the level of their close,
nature-woven tops rose at distances the straight, slight blue
smoke-lines, marking each the position of some invisible lodge. The
whole acre was a bottom ploughed at some former time by a wash-out, and
the troops looked down on it from the edge of the higher ground, silent
in the quiet, gray afternoon, the empty sage-brush territory stretching
a short way to fluted hills that were white below and blackened with
pines above.
The General, taking a rough chance as he often did, sent ground scouts
forward and ordered a charge instantly, to catch the savages unready;
and the stiff rods snapped and tangled between the beating hoofs. The
horses plunged at the elastic edges of this excellent fortress,
sometimes half lifted as a bent willow levered up against their bellies,
and the forward-tilting men fended their faces from the whipping twigs.
They could not wedge a man's length into that pliant labyrinth, and the
General called them out. They rallied among the sage-brush above,
Crook's cheeks and many others painted with purple lines of blood,
hardened already and cracking like enamel. The baffled troopers glared
at the thicket. Not a sign nor a sound came from in there. The willows,
with the gentle tints of winter veiling their misty twigs, looked serene
and even innocent, fitted to harbor birds--not birds of prey--and the
quiet smoke threaded upwards through the air. Of course the
liniment-drinkers must have heard the noise.
"What do you suppose they're doing?" inquired Glynn.
"Looking at us," said Crook.
"I wish we could return the compliment," said the captain.
Crook pointed. Had any wind been blowing, what the General saw would
have been less worth watching. Two willow branches shook, making a
vanishing ripple on the smooth surface of the tree-tops. The pack-train
was just coming in sight over the rise, and Crook immediately sent an
orderly with some message. More willow branches shivered an instant and
were still; then, while the General and the captain sat on their horses
and watched, the thicket gave up its secret to them; for, as little
light gusts coming abreast over a lake travel and touch the water, so in
different spots the level maze of twigs was stirred; and if the eye
fastened upon any one of these it could have been seen to come out from
the centre towards the edge, successive twigs moving, as the tops of
long grass tremble and mark the progress of a snake. During a short
while this increased greatly, the whole thicket moving with innumerable
tracks. Then everything ceased, with the blue wands of smoke rising
always into the quiet afternoon.
"Can you see 'em?" said Glynn.
"Not a bit. Did you happen to hear any one give an estimate of this
band?"
Glynn mentioned his tale of the three hundred.
It was not new to the General, but he remarked now that it must be
pretty nearly correct; and his eye turned a moment upon his forty
troopers waiting there, grim and humorous; for they knew that the
thicket was looking at them, and it amused their American minds to
wonder what the Old Man was going to do about it.
"It's his bet, and he holds poor cards," murmured Specimen Jones; and
the neighbors grinned.
And here the Old Man continued the play that he had begun when he sent
the orderly to the pack-train. That part of the command had halted in
consequence, disposed itself in an easy-going way, half in, half out of
sight on the ridge, and men and mules looked entirely careless. Glynn
wondered; but no one ever asked the General questions, in spite of his
amiable voice and countenance. He now sent for Sarah the squaw.
"You tell E-egante," he said, "that I am not going to fight with his
people unless his people make me. I am not going to do them any harm,
and I wish to be their friend. The White Father has sent me. Ask
E-egante if he has heard of Gray Fox. Tell him Gray Fox wishes E-egante
and all his people to be ready to go with him to-morrow at nine
o'clock."
And Sarah, standing on the frozen bank, pulled her green shawl closer,
and shouted her message faithfully to the willows. Nothing moved or
showed, and Crook, riding up to the squaw, held his hand up as a further
sign to the flag of peace that had been raised already. "Say that I am
Gray Fox," said he.
On that there was a moving in the bushes farther along, and, going
opposite that place with the squaw, Crook and Glynn saw a narrow
entrance across which some few branches reached that were now spread
aside for three figures to stand there.
"E-egante!" said Sarah, eagerly. "See him big man!" she added to Crook,
pointing. A tall and splendid buck, gleaming with colors, and rich with
fringe and buckskin, watched them. He seemed to look at Sarah, too. She,
being ordered, repeated what she had said; but the chief did not answer.
"He is counting our strength," said Glynn.
"He's done that some time ago," said Crook. "Tell E-egante," he
continued to the squaw, "that I will not send for more soldiers than he
sees here. I do not wish anything but peace unless he wishes
otherwise."
Sarah's musical voice sounded again from the bank, and E-egante watched
her intently till she was finished. This time he replied at some length.
He and his people had not done any harm. He had heard of Gray Fox often.
All his people knew Gray Fox was a good man and would not make trouble.
There were some flies that stung a man sitting in his house, when he had
not hurt them. Gray Fox would not hurt any one till their hand was
raised against him first. E-egante and his people had wondered why the
horses made so much noise just now. He and his people would come
to-morrow with Gray Fox.
And then he went inside the thicket again, and the willows looked as
innocent as ever. Crook and the captain rode away.
"My speech was just a little weak coming on top of a charge of cavalry,"
the General admitted. "And that fellow put his finger right on the
place. I'll give you my notion, captain. If I had said we had more
soldiers behind the hill, like as not this squaw of ours would have told
him I lied; she's an uncertain quantity, I find. But I told him the
exact truth--that I had no more--and he won't believe it, and that's
what I want."