SOME UNEXPECTED DISCOVERIES
His face as blanched as a dead man's, his voice pealing out above the
babel like a bell, Oliver stood to windward of the double furnace,
giving quick orders on right and left.
"Two men there on the Major's quarters--Let the guard-house go--Use your
blanket, Flaherty, use your _blanket_--Sergeant," as Kippis passed close
by, "clear the Row and bring 'em all down here. Don't let 'em stop for
anything--Boys, _boys_! turn out those horses!"
A trooper rushed up and leaned, yelling, to his captain's ear. "They
won't go, sir; they're hamstrung!"
With a command, the captain fairly threw the man toward a point where
help was needed and seized upon his first lieutenant. "Fraser, there's a
hell-hound loose in this post to-night!"
"I know, Captain. The fire started in a dozen spots."
"It's that damned Indian of yours. I'll have him shot on sight!"
Fraser was leaving. He looked back, his face all horror and smut.
"Charley?" he cried. "Never!"
Once more Oliver gave tongue, and directions were sent to the stockade
and to the Line. A signal light communicated with the lookouts on the
bluffs.
Kippis was already fulfilling his charge. Through a gap in the
northward-sweeping prairie-fire--a gap fought out and kept open by a
line of men--were coming the women of Clothes-Pin Row, each carrying a
child and dragging a second by the hand. Behind them scuttled the
papoose-cumbered squaws from the scouts' huts. At their rear trudged the
sergeant, also weighted, and jaunty no longer, but leaving red stains
where his naked feet touched the hot and smouldering ground.
"To headquarters!" shouted the captain, at the foremost laundress in the
rout. Then he turned to his trumpeter. A moment after, the fires and the
perishing horses were deserted, and the troopers, weapons in hand, ran
out upon the parade-ground, obeying a call to arms.
Oliver led them. As he approached the flagstaff, the voice of a woman
hailed him from the gallery of the nearest house. He sprang that way,
and was up the steps at a bound.
Mrs. Cummings, who had sought refuge in her own home, met him at the
top. "The Colonel's library is stripped!"
So it was. One hurried look by the light of a lamp showed that not a
bow, not an arrow remained on the walls.
But there was no time for exclaiming or conjecturing. Oliver rushed back
to the gallery and bade all the women and children collect and keep
within quarters. Around it, under Sergeant Kippis, he stationed a
cordon. Next, and while the house was being thoroughly wet down, the
ammunition stores were drawn upon, and extra guns and cartridges were
carried into the long reception-room, where the women could assist in
reloading. Barely three minutes had passed since Oliver sent his
messengers. But headquarters was fixed to withstand an assault and to
protect its inmates. And now, still ignorant of what had befallen, he
ordered the remainder of his men into line.
At this point, with the detachment about to move, a volley of rifle
shots sounded from the stockade--another--and another. Then up went a
great hubbub: "The Indians! The Indians!"
Oliver started his troopers double-quick across the square. At the
hospital one of the stockade guard stopped them.
"The Indians?" croaked Oliver.
"Gone!"
The troopers took up the cry: "Gone! The Indians are gone!"
Oliver turned them back.
They met a second man, black-faced, staggering, frenzied with alarm. It
was Fraser. He caught at the captain's ragged sleeve.
"Shot--other side--they're over there--those girls!--those girls----"
His breath failed him.
Again mingled cries went up from the troopers: "The shack, boys!"
"They'll kill them girls!" "God!"
Oliver saw the need. "To the ferry," he commanded.
Like one man, they bounded headlong across the parade, through the red
smoke pouring from barracks and stables, and on--only to come short upon
a boatless landing, where they crowded upon each other and cursed.
Fraser was half-crazed. Oliver took him forcibly in hand. No man of them
all, even if not burdened with a gun, could stem the river's current.
"There's one chance yet," he said, "the night-herd." He turned to his
trumpeter. "Sound the recall, and _keep_ a-sounding it!"
Again and again, the familiar strain rang out. All looked northward to
where they knew the herd had been, to where the long curves of the
prairie-fire were still moving.
But the minutes went, and there was no answering beat of hoofs. Where
were the herders? Why did they not obey?
Again--again--and again!
Then, to the south, a reply! Above the spiteful crackling of the tindery
buildings, out of the thinning dark, came a clear, eager neigh!
That way the troopers rushed. Gathering at the flagstaff they saw, by
the light of the burning piles, a single horse come galloping toward
them from the direction of the stockade. Her dun neck was arched like a
charger's. As she swung proudly into an imaginary line, the men greeted
her with a cheer.
That greeting was echoed. Until now, the Indians had been quiet--as
quiet as a flock of scurrying grouse. But the river was between them and
their enemy, and they felt secure from pursuit. Moreover, whisky was
working. They were boisterous with it. Casting caution aside when they
heard that cheer, they answered with defiant whoops.
The cheers of the troopers changed to anguished groans. One, wildly
repeating a girl's name, sprang toward the waiting "Buckskin." From
headquarters came the sobbing of women, the whimpering of frightened
children. And then, nearer and nearer, a dull pounding that swelled into
the steady _plud, plud_ of unshod hoofs.
Once more a cheer went up. A moment, and a cavalcade swept in--a
riderless cavalcade, with ropes dangling. It was the night-herd, the
discarded, second-choice mounts of the regiment's officers, a motley
band that had served their country through more than one enlistment, and
that, hearing the familiar summons--some limping, some hobbling--had
followed the dun cayuse to answer it.
Now, nooses were twisted about the noses of the horses. The troopers
mounted. The trumpet sounded the advance.
Again came whoops from across the Missouri. They were farther away than
the first.
"They're travellin'!" shrilled a voice.
"Go up--go up for the crossing," Oliver ordered. "Fraser! Fraser!"
But the buckskin mare, with her master, far in advance of the twenty
others, was already plunging down the bank and into a black, roily
whirl.