CHAPTER XVII. Re-enforcements Arrive
For a week after the massacre, Guy Preston and all the other officers and men of the Fort acted as if they were in a dream. The orders were given in a low tone of voice, the men responded to them with a silent touch of their caps, for every one seemed to think that it would not be long before they would be laid out awaiting burial, or be doomed to a worse fate in the Sioux camp. Guy was there during the burial of the men—he was one of twenty soldiers who fired the shots over their graves—and then he braced up, dashed the tears from his eyes, and tried to do his duty as he did before. He had ten men who had been detailed for various other duties when the Company was ordered out, and he was the sole officer in command of them.
Guy was not long in missing his old friend Cyrus, whose fate no one knew. Did he get through in safety with his dispatches, or was he captured by the Sioux who had taken revenge upon him for the braves they had lost during the massacre? One morning, just after Guy had come off duty during the night, the Colonel sent for him, but it was not to reprimand him. He saw that as soon as he got into his room. The Colonel had a paper in his hand which he handed to Guy.
"There is your medicine," said he. "Cyrus wanted me to give it to you under the impression that you might some day fall into the power of those thievish rascals outside."
"Why—why did not Cyrus take it with him, sir?" stammered Guy.
"No; he said the war was not yet over, and you might some day need it. You do not intend to be a prisoner in the hands of those fellows, do you?"
"No, sir," said Guy hastily. "They kill everybody who falls a captive to them. And what is the reason Cyrus would not take it with him, sir? I am afraid he——"
"Well, go on," said the Colonel, after waiting a moment or two for Guy to say what he was afraid of, "Do you think he has been captured?"
"I think he would have been safer, if he had taken this letter with him, sir," replied the young officer.
"Yes; but you know it has saved one civilian and the next must be a soldier."
"That is so, sir. I will put it right there among the little money I have left, and I hope it may do me some good, if I chance to fall into their power. Don't you think it is about time to hear from Cyrus, sir?"
"I do; but if he has met with the usual luck that some of our scouts do, it may be another week before we get news of him."
The Colonel picked up some papers which were lying near him on the desk, thus intimating that their interview was at an end; but there was one more question that Guy wanted to have answered before he left.
"Do you think he has got through in safety, sir?" said he.
"That is hard to tell," replied the Colonel slowly. "Cyrus is a brave man, and if he fails I don't know what we shall do. That's all, Guy."
"Cyrus has failed," said Guy to himself, as he put on his cap and left the room, "I could see that by the way the Colonel looked. By George! I wonder what will be the next move the Sioux will make? Well, if worse comes to worst I will have to go. I wish I could see my mother once before my time comes."
Guy stopped after he passed the Orderly and dashed some tears from his eyes. He was the commander of a Company now, and it would look very unseemly for him to be found that way by any of his men. He took his way to his room, that room which he occupied all by himself now, and then the tears came forth afresh, until Guy began to be ashamed of his conduct. He rolled over and tried to catch the slumber he so much needed, but when the Orderly came to call him to dinner he was wide awake.
But the Colonel was wrong in his predictions. Three days passed and then a horseman was seen rapidly approaching the Fort. The sentry called the corporal of the guard, and that officer did not stay beside him for more than a moment when he shouted:—
"There comes Cyrus!"
Guy was off duty then, and he lost no time in climbing up beside the sentry. The horseman was still so far away that they could not see his face, but the way he waved his hat around his head and used it to urge his horse to greater speed proclaimed who the newcomer was. The Colonel was out by that time, and Guy turned to him with a face that was beaming over with pleasure.
"It is Cyrus, sure enough, sir!" he exclaimed, "Re-enforcements are not far off."
In a quarter of an hour the horseman, mounted on a nag that was almost tired out, dashed through all the men assembled at the gate, and presently was shaking hands with everybody that could get around him. It was the scout sure enough, and judging by the grin that was on his face he was glad to get back.
"Halloo, Guy," he shouted. "I haven't time to speak to you all now, only to grasp your hands and say that I am overjoyed to see you all above ground. Help is coming. Where's the Colonel?"
So Cyrus got through, after all. The story he told after he had reported to the Colonel did not amount to much in passing through his hands. He had not seen a hostile Indian from the time he left Fort Phil Kearney until his journey was safely accomplished. The pow-wow the Sioux held on the night of the massacre "threw them all crazy," as Cyrus had predicted, and there was not one to dispute his attempt to reach Fort Robinson.
"The General was awful uneasy about us, because he did not hear anything," said the scout, in conclusion, "and he was on the point of sending three hundred men to see about it; and I tell you he packed them off in a hurry as soon as I got there."
"Bully for the three hundred men," said Guy. "Are they coming now behind you?"
"Yes, sir. They are coming as fast as they can. We have got men enough now to get that village out of there and make them take to the hills where they belong. Well, Guy, the Sioux have not scalped you yet. Have you been out after any more sage hens?"
"No, sir, and I don't think I shall go any more until we get the Sioux out of there. Cyrus, you must have had a terrible time of it."
"Oh, nothing to speak of. I went out on purpose to get to Fort Robinson, and I went. I wonder if you have anything to eat in the house? We have been in such haste to get here that we did not stop to cook any breakfast."
Guy took Cyrus under his charge and conducted him into the mess room, intending to hear more of his story when he got him by himself; but before he could ask him to go on with it, a cheering arose out by the gate and Cyrus was left to finish his breakfast alone. There they were, three hundred infantrymen, who were moving with weary steps as if it was all they could do to drag one foot after the other—for they had made a forced march since they left Fort Robinson—but the way the garrison greeted them showed them that their trouble was over. Colonel Smith was there, vigorously shaking hands with Colonel Carrington, and when the two were through welcoming each other, they went into the commander's headquarters. The troops assembled on the parade ground, and when they had broken ranks, Guy speedily hunted up the Second Lieutenants, one of whom he found to his astonishment to be an old schoolmate of his. They had been at West Point together, had graduated at the same time, one being ordered to the Cavalry and the other to the Infantry. It took some little time for Guy to recognize Fred Bolton in this muddy, travel-stained boy, but when he saw the smile that beamed upon his face, and his extended hand, the old schoolboy came back to him, and catching Fred around the waist he fairly raised him from the ground.
"Fred, old boy, how are you?" he exclaimed, as he swung him around once or twice before he put him on the ground again.
"Say," replied Fred, gently untangling himself from Guy's detaining hands. "Have you an apple about you?"
"An apple?" echoed Guy, not understanding the question.
"Or peanuts; anything that will do to eat. I am so hungry that I can smell the bacon in the storehouse clear out here."
"Why, come in," said Guy. "The Sioux have kept us on pretty short rations, but I guess I can give you bacon enough to satisfy you."
Guy was introduced to the other Second Lieutenants as they were going to the mess room, and the first thing the boys asked him about was the massacre.
"Did they whoop and yell as the storybooks tell about?" said one of the newcomers. "Tell us all about it, please. We have never seen an Indian fight and we want to know what is in store for us."
"Don't ask me about it," said Guy.
"But you must have seen some of it, and we should like to know how it looked," insisted Fred. "What is the reason you were not in it? Was not your Company ordered out?"
Guy saw that there was no chance for him to plead ignorance, and while the boys were waiting for their bacon and hard-tack he went into the particulars of the fight, getting through with them as soon as he possibly could. The Second Lieutenants must have seen how badly he felt about it, and did not ask him any more questions; but when he came to tell of Winged Arrow's medicine, they looked incredulous. They were too polite to interrupt him, but exchanged significant glances with one another as if to ask what their companions thought about it.
"I don't ask you to believe my word, but here is the evidence," said Guy, producing his pocketbook. "That letter has saved the life of one scout, and if I fall into their hands while I have that letter about me, I shall expect that it will save my own."
Of course there was much to talk about and a good deal of time taken to tell it, for the supports were not expected to go on duty that day. They were given time to rest after their long, fatiguing march, and they made the most of it. At dress parade the men appeared in fine order, and then they received notice of what they were to do on the following day. Their force was strong enough now to assume the offensive, and to-morrow morning a battalion of three hundred men would start out to break up that Sioux village and, as Cyrus had said, "drive them into the hills where they belonged." Colonel Smith was to be in charge of the troops, with Major Powell second in command. There was one thing that made Guy grow an inch taller when the order was read: his small company of men were not to be left out after all. There were a hundred cavalry to go with the troops, to serve as eyes for them, and Guy and his company were to make part of them.
"I hope the Colonel will lead us across that battlefield," said Fred, as they returned to their quarters.
"Oh, he will," said Guy. "But we will not see anything—nothing but the spot where brave men offered up their lives to try and 'pacify' those Sioux. We will see the signal tower too. I hope that when you go there to take charge of it, you will see a better time than I did."
"Well, wait until a history of this thing gets to Washington, and we will see help coming out here enough to annihilate those Sioux. The General was sorely put out about it, and he sent a dispatch that will make those fellows open their eyes."
Morning came at length, and with it came the men who were to compose the expedition, forming on the parade ground in view of all the officers. There was one thing about it that Guy always disliked to see, and that was their ammunition and provision train. Before the troops could go into a fight with the Indians, they would be obliged to take care of that train, because when that was lost, everything they had was lost. The hostiles would make an attack upon that train first, paying no attention to the other men, and if they could stampede that, their-success was assured. The Indians did not believe in taking any train with them. All the ammunition and food they needed during their raids were carried on their horses, and if they were worsted in the fight they got out of the way with wonderful celerity and their ammunition and food went with them.
Fred and the other newcomers who had arrived with the re-enforcements the day before gazed with interest at the picket tower, saw that the soldiers who had come to relieve them took the place of the men who had stayed there all night, and then went on to the battlefield. As Guy had said they found nothing there, not even a bayonet with which the soldiers had endeavored to defend themselves, for the Sioux had searched the field thoroughly and everything had disappeared.
"Here's where Captain Brown and three others defended themselves," said Major Powell, drawing Colonel Smith's attention to a place in the rocks where the grass was all trampled down and empty cartridge shells were scattered all about. "They must have made sure play for some of those fiends who came at them. Captain Brown killed himself right here."
It was a gloomy place, the battlefield that but a short time before had resounded with the war cry of the fierce Sioux and the rattle of carbines from the soldiers, and Guy was glad when they left it behind. Something kept telling him that he was going to see trouble before he came back, but he banished all such thoughts and had no place for them. His work lay in the expedition before him, and to that he gave the whole of his attention. In a short time the memory of the scene through which he had passed left him, and he was ready to join in with what the others had to propose, so long as it did not attract the attention of their commanding officer, Major Powell. So it is with soldiers the world over. A disastrous battle, during which so many of their old friends, perhaps their own tentmates, have gone to their long home, will depress their spirits for a time, and they welcome anything, no matter how trivial it is, that will draw their thoughts away to other matters and make them soldiers as they were before.
In due time they reached the site whereon the Sioux village had stood while they were engaged in the massacre, and where everything denoted that they had abandoned it with the utmost haste. Plunder of every sort which goes to make up the wealth of the Indian was scattered about, and beside the lodge poles, for the tents were gone, were the remains of half a dozen Indian ponies that had been sacrificed to go with their owners to the Happy Hunting Grounds.
"I don't understand the meaning of that," said Fred Bolton. "Did they kill their ponies on purpose?"
"Certainly," said Guy. "The Indian ponies have spirits as well as their masters; and when one is killed and his scalp not removed——"
"Do their scalps have anything to do with it?"
"Of course they do. If you scalp an Indian, his body becomes so much carrion which is not worthy of a burial; but if his friends can save the Indian without letting him fall into our hands, he is given all the rites that an Indian can think of. These ponies will go with him to the spirit land, and if we had time to hunt up the places where the owners are buried, we would find there their rifles, matches, scalping knives, and every other thing they need to go right to work."
Guy had many things to tell the newcomers, and during the two weeks that the expedition was out he had plenty of time around his camp fire at night to tell them all he knew about the hostile Indians. What he did not know the guides took up, and if the new men did not learn something about the Sioux before they got through, it was their own fault. They generally told some funny stories, but a wink from Guy told how much of them they had better believe.