party rode a mile or two, through a rolling park of grass and oaks
and mountain mahogany――and then here came General Howard and his
Chiricahuas!
Haw, haw! Even the sober Maria laughed. The general was aboard
a mule, and behind his saddle sat a painted, naked Chiricahua,
holding fast with both arms around the general’s waist! It was the
piercing-eyed Geronimo!
[Illustration: IT WAS THE PIERCING-EYED GERONIMO!]
That was a great position for a brevet major-general of the United
States army; but it looked “friendly”!
A large cavalcade of warriors painted and weaponed pranced on every
side. They left a little space about a red-painted horseman who stayed
near the general.
“Cochise,” said Maria. “I see Taza, too; and Nah-che.”
The Chiricahuas uttered a loud whoop. At signs from the red-painted
horseman they spread right and left along the opposite edge of this
park. When the Bowie party and Captain Sladen arrived, General Howard
and the Cochise company were waiting.
“D’yuh notice?” remarked Jack May, one of the men who had been sent to
Bowie by the general. “Ev’ry bronc’ (‘broncho’ was a name for the wild
Chiricahuas) is stationed where he can dive into that little canyon an’
be out o’ sight in a jiffy. Those fellows are smart.”
Cochise had daubed all his face with vermilion. He seemed tense
and excited. His large black eyes darted to and fro, searching for
treachery. His hair was graying, Jimmie observed; he had grown much
older.
Taza was here. And in the background, Chato and Nah-che. Jimmie signed
to Nah-che, and Nah-che responded, but he did not dare to come over,
yet.
The council was begun at once, with General Howard and officers, and
Cochise and his captains, sitting in the middle of the circle.
A tall red-bearded man, who was Tom Jeffords the trader, did the
interpreting.
“The Great White Father has sent me to make peace between the
Chiricahua and the Americans,” said General Howard.
“Nobody wants peace more than I do,” answered Cochise. “I have done
no harm since I came from the Cañada Alamosa. My horses are few, and
I am very poor. Once we were a large people. We lived well, at peace
with everybody except the Mexicans. But one day the soldiers seized my
best friend and killed him when he was in prison. Right there at Apache
Pass other soldiers hung up my brother, after they had attacked me when
I had surrendered. So I have fought the Americans and the Mexicans,
but the Chiricahua are getting less every day. Why shut us up on a
reservation? We will keep the peace, but we wish to go around free, the
same as other people.”
“That cannot be,” kindly explained the general. “Some bad white men
might fire on you, or some of your wild young men might fire at the
white men. Then the peace would be broken. The Great White Father, who
is President Grant, will agree that you live at the Cañada Alamosa.
That is a fine country, and you liked it.”
“We would be there now if the white people had not driven us off,”
answered Cochise. “They might drive us off again, and I will not go to
the Tularosa. The Apaches there get sick, and die. Give me Apache Pass.
That is my home. I will protect all the trails. I will see that nobody
is harmed by any Indians. But my people will not go back to the Cañada
Alamosa. They are afraid. They would not be allowed to stay there.”
“Then,” said the general, “we will give you this country right here. We
cannot give you Apache Pass. We will fix the boundaries at once. Does
that suit you?”
“Yes,” declared Cochise, pleased, “that is good. We will keep my
Stronghold, and the country around, of the Dragoon Mountains and the
Sulphur Springs Valley.”
“It is settled,” agreed the general. “I have full authority to say so.
This shall be your country forever, if you keep the peace. See, I place
this stone upon the mesa.” He moved a rock. “Now, as long as this stone
lasts, so long shall last the peace between the Chiricahua and the
Americans. You may have your friend Tom Jeffords for agent.”
“That is good,” repeated Cochise. “Staglito (Red Beard) is our friend.”
“You must send for all your Chiricahua to come in. Tell them that when
they are off the traveled roads they must show a white flag of peace,
so that there will be no mistakes. When they are on a traveled road
they must meet other people without any running or fear, as the white
people do.”
“That is good,” approved Cochise. “The stone lies on the mesa. The
white people and the Chiricahua will drink of the same water and eat of
the same bread, and be at peace.”
Now there was a shaking of hands all around, and the general and
Captain Sumner and Tom Jeffords proceeded to arrange with Cochise and
Geronimo the boundaries of the Chiricahua reservation.
“Let us talk with Nah-che,” proposed Jimmie, to Maria. There had been
no call for them in the interpreting, and now was their chance to look
up Nah-che.
“Chi-kis-n,” greeted Jimmie, extending his hand to grasp Nah-che’s.
“Welcome, chi-kis-n,” replied Nah-che, as they shook.
Nah-che had grown into almost a warrior.
“How is Nah-da-ste?”
“She is not here. The women and children are in another place, till the
chiefs know whether it is peace or war.”
“It is peace, chi-kis-n.”
“I think so,” answered Nah-che frankly. “The Chiricahua wish peace.
They will keep their promise if the white people will keep theirs. As
long as Staglito stays with us, there will be no trouble, because he
understands us. All these wars between the Americans and the Apaches
come because they do not understand each other. I think if there were
more one-armed soldier-captains there would be fewer wars. That other
soldier-captain, Cluke, is honest, too, we hear. Why doesn’t he come to
see us?”
“He is getting ready to fight those Indians who are bad,” said Jimmie.
“He was told to wait until the one-armed general had offered the
Chiricahua peace. Now he will go to war against the Tonto and the
Yavapai, who have refused peace.”
Taza joined them, and shook hands. He was carrying a beautiful
breech-loading rifle――an officer’s rifle. Eying it curiously, Jimmie
suddenly recognized it. It had been the rifle of stripling Lieutenant
Reid Stewart, the dandy “shave tail”――it was the only one of its
kind――engraved so fancifully; that is, Jimmie had seen the lieutenant
with it, at Camp Grant; and now Taza had it!
Taza must have noticed Jimmie stiffen and choke, for he said, in
Spanish:
“_No trieste, hermano_ (Do not feel badly, brother).” And in Apache,
“We all do things in war that we would not do in peace.”
Nevertheless, on the way to Camp Bowie, after the council, Jimmie could
not forget the sign of Lieutenant Reid’s rifle, in the Chiricahua camp.
He was such a young officer, to have been killed so soon, without
having had a chance to defend himself. And Cochise had declared that
his people had done no harm since leaving the Cañada Alamosa!
But then, that was Indian way. And Apaches had been killed, too, by the
white men. War was a cruel game.
General Howard did not return to Camp Bowie. He had gone the other way,
to Tucson, with his party and his ambulance. From Tucson he was going
to San Francisco, to report to General Schofield; and from there he
was going to Washington.
He certainly had accomplished a great work, only――――
“Will the peace last as long as the stone, do you think, Maria?” asked
Jimmie.
“The white people will break the stone, amigo mio,” said Maria. “Some
day they will break the stone, because they want the land where it
lies. Then there will be war again, and you and I will fight Nah-che.
But Cochise spoke straight. The Chiricahua in Arizona are tired. Did
you hear about the joke on the one-armed general?”
“No.”
“Nyle-chie-zie, who is Cochise’s brother-in-law, wanted to trade two
of his young wives to the general for the general’s four wagon-mules.
The general said he already had a wife. But the girls said that made no
difference; they would all get along together nicely. If the general
had not explained that the laws of the Americans forbade him to have
more than one wife at a time, he might have been in much trouble, I
think.”
“Yes, many wives at once are a trouble,” asserted Ponce, who, with
Chie, was returning to the Warm Spring bands. “The soldier-captain saw
Cochise’s hand. That is why he refused the two girls!”
“What was the matter with Cochise’s hand?” queried Jimmie.
They all were talking in Apache.
“Those two big holes in it are where one of his wives bit him. He was
afraid he would be sick, so he burned the places.”
“The one-armed soldier-captain is very wise,” laughed Chie. “He does
not wish to lose the only hand he has.”
“But it is true that white people are allowed only one wife at a time,”
insisted Jimmie. However, Ponce and Chie did not act as though they
believed this.
Camp Bowie was reached early the next morning. It was a small army
post, about the size of Grant, composed of log and adobe buildings set
in a clearing on a hill in the middle of the celebrated Apache Pass
over the Chiricahua Mountains that extended on southward into Mexico.
The pass was long and rolling, between high brushy, thinly timbered
slopes. Bowie commanded the stage road both ways for two or three miles.
This had been Cochise’s favorite resort, in former days. At the east
end of the pass was where his brother had been hanged, after the fracas
eleven years ago, or in 1861. There had been no Camp Bowie, then; only
the stage station.
But Bowie was established the next year, 1862――the same year as Camp
Grant――and like Camp Grant, since that time it had been trailing
Apaches almost every day. What with the attacks on the stages, east and
west, and on livestock, and what with the vengeful ambushing of the
soldiers themselves, by the Chiricahuas, anybody stationed at Bowie
was certain to have plenty of excitement. Why, the graveyard there was
enough to give one the shudders. It was a famous graveyard.
Before inspecting the graveyard, Jimmie reported to Jack Long. Jack
and the pack train were here. So was Lieutenant Almy, being entertained
by brother officers of the Fifth and Third Cavalry.
“So it’s sure ’nough peace, is it?” commented Patron Jack, after he had
heard the story of everything that had occurred near Dragoon Springs.
“All right. Gin’ral Howard means well, like as not. But did you tell
old Cochise what I said? No? Humph! One thing’s sartin, anyhow: if
he was put on trial before a jury o’ Arizony people, they’d vote
yewnanimous to hang him an’ half his band. Yes, sir-ee.”
“You bet yuh,” chimed in Slim Shorty, the cencero.
And, as a matter of fact, when the general arrived at Tucson, the
newspaper and people there talked just as Jack talked. They said that
Cochise should be punished, instead of being granted a reservation, and
his Stronghold, for his own. Nevertheless, Cochise stayed there, true
to his word, until he died, in 1874; and Taza also kept from war, until
in 1876 he died. But with Geronimo and Nah-che matters went different,
just as Maria prophesied.
“Now I will show you the graveyard, amigo,” proffered Maria, when
Jimmie had been dismissed from duty, by old Jack.
The graveyard really was about the only thing of consequence to see,
at Bowie. It was the largest graveyard at any of the army posts in
Arizona. The many wooden slabs, marking the resting-place of soldier
and traveler, read much alike, except for the names.
“Killed by the Apaches.” “At the Hands of the Apaches.” “Victim of the
Apaches.” “Met his Death by Apaches.” “Of Wounds Inflicted by the
Apaches.” And so forth, and so forth.
Maria seemed to be proud of this collection, but it was too melancholy
for Jimmie. He was very glad when, on a sudden, a series of loud whoops
attracted his attention. A short, brick-topped, familiar figure in
old shirt outside of old trousers, was beckoning to him, on the way
from the parade ground. A trumpet was blowing “Boots and Saddles,”
cavalrymen were running to the stables, and packers were hustling at
the post mule-corral.
So Jimmie legged back, to find out what was up. Micky Free, the
red-head, met him, and grinned delightedly, his one blue eye sparkling.
Micky had started a moustache, red like his hair. He showed hard travel.
“Hello, Cheemie. Your patron says for you to come quick, if you want to
go to Camp Apache.”
“When did you get in, Micky?” panted Jimmie, as they trotted on
together.
“Just now. Alchisé (Al-chi-say) and I bring dispatches. The canvas suit
general is at Camp Apache, and everybody is to join him there, to go
against the Tonto.”
XII
GENERAL CROOK RIDES AGAIN
“That’s right,” Patron Jack was urging, among the fast working men.
“Move yore feet, hombres, or the cavalry’ll beat you. The old man’s up
yonder, waitin’ on his mule, with both bar’ls loaded. Mebbe it’s peace
in the south but it’s war in the north.” And to Jimmie: “Say, muchacho!
Thar’s livelier things’n graveyards. We’re goin’ after Chuntz an’ the
rest o’ those boy murderers. So you jump an’ help the cook.”
Alchisé and Micky Free had brought orders from General Crook at Camp
Apache to Lieutenant Almy to join him there at once with all the
cavalry and pack-mules that could be spared from Camp Bowie.
Of course, the orders had not explained why; but the busy-minded Micky
asserted that everybody at Apache knew why: they knew why, because the
Sierra Blanca or White Mountains had been asked to send their young men
with the soldiers and help to drive the bad Tontos and Apache-Mohaves
out of the Tonto Basin. These Tontos and Yavapais were making trouble
between the white men and the red.
The pack-train was ready first. In an hour the cavalry were ready, and
the column moved out of Bowie, for Camp Apache, two hundred miles by
trail north across the mountains.
Maria had to stay behind, at Bowie.
“Good-by, amigos,” he bade, to Jimmie and Micky. “Some day we will go
together against the Chiricahua, with your Crook.”
There were fifty cavalry, mainly of the Fifth Regiment, and some fifty
pack-mules which carried only supplies for the march. Micky and Alchisé
led by the best trail, so that the trip was made in five days.
Now Jimmie had an opportunity to see the famous Camp Apache, in the
grassy, well timbered and well watered Sierra Blanca or White Mountains
of northeastern Arizona. By reason of the fine hunting and fishing, and
scenery and climate, it was considered to be the prize army post of the
Southwest.
It had been located in 1870, and was at first called Camp Ord, and Camp
Thomas. The Chiricahuas had sneered at the White Mountain Apaches, who
had permitted a soldier fort to be established among them. But Chiefs
Pedro and Miguel and Pi-to-ne and all had continued to live just west
of the post, and to remain tame Indians. In this they were wise.
With the twelve hundred tame Indians, and the many soldiers, some
infantry but the majority cavalry, Camp Apache proved to be a stirring
place. General Crook had arrived, with his escort; clear from Fort
Whipple, two hundred and fifty miles west. He had traveled fast,
breaking camp by four o’clock every morning, and now he was hustling
matters so that he might set out for Camp Grant, to the southwest, and
organize an expedition from there.
Lieutenant Bourke was at work enlisting the White Mountain young men.
Most of the White Mountains were very anxious to take the war-path
against the bothersome outlaw Tontos and Yavapais. Alchisé enlisted,
so did Na-kay-do-klunni, so did a sub-chief named Es-qui-nos-quiz-n or
Big Mouth, so did Nan-ta-je (Nan-tah-hay), a Coyotero; so did nearly
one hundred others.
Micky knew every one of them. But his band was the Chief Pedro band.
“Are you coming, Micky?” eagerly asked Jimmie.
“Maybe. I will wait and see, Cheemie, until I can tell where there’ll
be the best fighting.”
“We’ll catch the Tonto, won’t we, Micky?”
“Oh, yes,” assured Micky. “That Cluke is cunning. All the way over he
saw that the water of the high places was frozen; winter has come and
the Tonto and Yavapai will be staying home. They cannot move their
rancherias, easy. I will go to Camp Grant with you, anyway,” added
Micky. “But don’t say so, to other people. I am not an Apache. I will
do as I please.”
General Crook did not delay an instant at Camp Apache after he had
turned his orders into action. Upon the second morning after the
arrival of the reinforcements from Camp Bowie he started, with cavalry
and pack-mules and those White Mountain scouts who were ready, for Camp
Grant.
He directed that the rest of the Apache scouts were to follow, in three
days. They would find many other Indians at Camp Grant, who would try
to be braver than the Sierra Blanca.
“My young men will show how the White Mountains can fight,” had
answered old Pedro.
General Crook was in a great hurry.
“Yuh see,” explained Patron Jack, to the men who were astonished by
being roused out at two in the morning and led on without a halt until
late afternoon, “the old man’s promised to meet a lot more chiefs at
Grant, besides those Sierra Blancas, an’ he knows he’s got to keep his
word. If you don’t keep yore word with Injuns, they call you a liar.”
The distance by trail from Apache to Grant was a little more than one
hundred miles――but each mile, as Cargador Frank Monach put it, meant
one mile up, two miles down, and one mile across! Alchisé and Archie
MacIntosh the Hudson Bay trapper, were the guides. Micky Free had not
appeared, at the start; and when Jimmie, disappointed, inquired about
him of Alchisé, Alchisé claimed to know nothing about Micky. He only
shrugged his shoulders, and grunted:
“Maybe come, maybe stay. Who can tell?”
The second day’s march was terrific, into canyons and out again;
and when darkness fell the column was still struggling to find a
camping-place. The mules and the cavalry horses had all they could do
to keep their feet amidst the brush and rocks; the general rode from
head to rear, encouraging, and looking after men and mules――he sought
no rest, for himself, and everybody worked like a demon. But Alchisé
and Archie MacIntosh, in trying a short cut, had missed the trail.
Jimmie was toiling and urging with the rest, in the depths of a
star-canopied black canyon, when he heard a laugh, close at his ear,
and a voice that said, in Apache:
“Why do you work so hard, Boy-who-sleeps? Are you afraid the Tonto will
get away?”
It was Micky Free, bareback on a mule. He could scarcely be seen, but
Jimmie recognized his speech.
“Where did _you_ come from?” demanded Jimmie crossly.
“Oh, I am here,” laughed Micky. “I know all this country very well. I
told you I was going to Camp Grant.”
“Then you’d better get to work,” retorted Jimmie. “I haven’t any time
to talk.”
“No, I didn’t come to work; I came to fight the Tonto,” laughed Micky.
“But the rest of you had better work, or I’ll be the only one to get to
Camp Grant.”
Amidst the hurly-burly of stumbling mules and perspiring packers Jimmie
lost him, and did not sight him again until long after sunrise the
next morning, when at last the command was out of the canyons and the
wearied pack-train followed the cavalry into camp.
Micky was already there, ahead, squatting beside Alchisé. He arose and
came back to where Jimmie was helping Slim Shorty, the cook.
“Alchisé says there will be some good fights, Cheemie,” remarked Micky.
“Now I want you to take me to your general, so that he will know who I
am.”
“Aw, pshaw, Micky!” protested Jimmie. And in Apache: “I can’t. I’m
busy. The general wants to eat and sleep, and so do I.”
“Who is this one-eye?” asked Slim Shorty. “Where’s he from an’ what’s
his trouble?”
“His name’s Micky Free. He was with the Pedro band and helped me get
away from the Chiricahua. He asks me to take him to the general.”
“What! Tell him to chase himself. ’Tain’t any time for payin’ social
visits,” growled Slim Shorty. “It’s grub time an’ sleep time, an’
you’re workin’ for me. Savvy that?” Slim Shorty was cross, like
everyone else. Twenty-six hours straight had they been climbing and
threshing about.
“Here comes your general now,” prompted Micky. “He doesn’t eat or
sleep. You can take me to him when he passes, Cheemie.”
Sure enough, General Crook, on the faithful mule “Apache,” was ambling
slowly from group to group, through the camp; in his stained canvas
suit, his shot gun across his saddle! He seemed to be on a tour of
inspection, with particular regard for the pack-mules.
As he passed, the men stiffened to their feet, and stood at attention.
He dropped a word here and there, and halted briefly at Slim Shorty’s
fire. Slim stood at attention, so did Jimmie, but Micky only waited,
red-headed, lightly clad, grinning amiably.
“Feed your men well, cook,” bade the general. “They’ve earned double
rations. I see you’ve got a good supply of beans. That’s right. Always
set your beans to cook the night before, and they’ll be much more
wholesome.”
“Yes, sir,” answered Slim Shorty. “But these hyar beans won’t be done
till noon. There warn’t any ‘night before,’ this last trip. Got plenty
bread, bacon an’ coffee, though.”
“Oh, in that case――――,” smiled the general. His face was a little
drawn, but he didn’t look especially tired, and neither did Apache.
“How are you, my lad?” he queried, of Jimmie, and his eyes fell upon
Micky. “Who’s this? I didn’t know he was with the column. I’ve seen him
at Camp Apache. His name is Micky Free.”
“Yes, sir,” answered Jimmie. “He lives with Chief Pedro’s band of
Sierra Blanca. He helped me get away from the Chiricahua camp, that
time.”
“He’s not Apache?”
“No, sir. He’s half Mexican and half Irish.”
“What’s he doing here? Is he enlisted with the scouts?”
“I don’t think so, sir,” faltered Jimmie. “Not with the Apache scouts.
He isn’t Indian. He followed us. He asked me to tell you that he wants
to fight the Tonto, though.”
“Well, well. That’s all right, but I haven’t time to tend to that now,
my boy,” replied the general. “I’m going after some breakfast. Let him
report to Lieutenant Bourke. Bourke has charge of the scouts. When we
get to Grant we’ll give him a chance to fight.” And the general rode
on. He kept going, until he disappeared around a shoulder in some low
ground. He did not return for two hours, and then he brought back a
load of reed birds, for the officers’ mess. What a man!
“What did he say?” inquired Micky, who spoke no English, of Jimmie.
“He said to have you report to Lieutenant Bourke, and when we got to
Grant you would be shown fighting.”
“That is good,” approved Micky. “I don’t care anything about your
Lieutenant Bourke, but the general has promised me fighting and I like
him. I will go to Grant, and then we will chase the Tonto with the
general, Cheemie; you and I.”
So saying, Micky strolled away, to eat with Alchisé. Throughout the
remainder of the march to Camp Grant he did about as he pleased:
sometimes he rode in advance, with Alchisé and Archie MacIntosh; and
sometimes he rode with Jimmie, at the rear; and sometimes he vanished,
to explore on his own hook. But he always turned up at meal times!
With his ragged clothes, and his red head and his smudgy reddish upper
lip and his one bright blue eye, Micky was a privileged character.
Camp Grant was reached exactly on time, and for the next three days of
this first week in November it was a busy place. Dispatch bearers came
and went; Chief Packer Tom Moore was here, from Whipple; one hundred
White Mountain scouts arrived, under Chief Es-qui-nos-quiz-n or Big
Mouth; Pima and Maricopa chiefs were waiting, to talk with “Cluke” and
find out what he wanted; word came that the Hualpais were ready, for
they also hated the Apaches, as the Pimas and Maricopas did. But Chief
Es-kim-en-zin refused to let any of his young men enlist; the Arivaipas
had friends among the outlaw Pinals who ranged near the Tonto Basin.
Every officer and enlisted man and pack-mule that could be spared
from the various posts, and every Indian who could be trusted off the
reservations, was called into service. Jimmie felt certain that he
ought to be included; he had done his level best, on the trip around by
Bowie and Apache――nobody had worked harder. So he anxiously consulted
Joe Felmer.
“Wall, you see it’s this way,” said Joe: “I’m goin’ as scout――Archie
MacIntosh, Tony Besias, an’ me, ’long with the Major Brown column. That
keeps us in advance, an’ ’twon’t be any place for a boy. This is war.
So you stick ’round old Jack; he’ll boss the pack-train, an’ I happen
to know that he thinks purty well o’ you. He says you tended strictly
to bus’ness, an’ obeyed orders.”
Jimmie looked up Patron Jack.