Kiddie the Scout

by Robert Leighton

As the rifle fire lessened at close quarters the yells and shouts grew louder and fiercer. And now Rube lost all power of distinguishing one side from the other, for it was all one vast mass of horses and men, swaying this way and that in wild confusion.

It seemed to Rube that even the horses were fighting, for they were rearing and plunging, kicking and biting, as they forced themselves through the crowd. Many of them fell, many were riderless. Some of them had two or even three Indians mounted on their backs, wielding their clubs and tomahawks.

Through the dust and powder-smoke Rube could see that the ground was thickly strewn with killed and wounded horses and men. There were wide gaps in what had been the ranks, but no order was kept, and the combatants broke off into dense groups. Here and there a chief or important warrior would draw off his section, rallying and forming them into line for a new attack, again to become mixed up in a grand scrimmage.

Rube could distinguish the chiefs by their feathered war bonnets, and amongst them he thought he recognized the young chief Broken Feather riding to and fro in the rear of his warriors as if urging them to new movements or increased effort.

Kiddie was not so easily to be distinguished, as he wore only a very simple head-dress, but Rube, knowing him by his piebald prairie pony, saw him once or twice in the forefront of the battle, and again leading a retirement to take up a fresh position on the field where the fighting was most severe.

Then for a long time there was no sign of Kiddie, and Rube began to fear that he had been killed or seriously wounded. So much did this fear oppress him that he resolved to risk his own safety by riding forward to make a search. He knew that Kiddie's main object in posting him here where he waited was to keep him out of danger. But what if Kiddie himself were in danger, or badly wounded, and needed help?

Rube Carter had often said that what he wanted more than anything else was to be of vital help to Kiddie in some situation of great peril, and the idea that such a situation was now at hand so took possession of him that caution and obedience alike were put aside. With the impulsive recklessness of boyhood, he started off to search for Kiddie in the very midst of the fighting. He had only the very vaguest notion of where Kiddie might be. He was aiming at getting to the place where he had last seen him riding at the head of a large company of the Crows to encounter an equally large company of the Sioux. The fighting at this point had now ceased, and the ground was covered with dead and dying horses and fallen warriors.

Rube did not reflect that his mount was a trained Indian war-horse, accustomed to the excitement of battle, and when he tugged and pulled at the halter rein to make the pony stop and let him dismount to go on foot amongst the wounded, the animal tossed its mane and galloped on and on to join a troop of its fellows charging across the battle front.

All Rube's efforts to keep out of the actual fighting were useless. Wholly against his will he was carried into it. Arrows and spears were flying about his head; bullets hummed past him; he saw tomahawks raised aloft to strike at him.

Suddenly the horse immediately in front of him staggered and rolled over. Rube's own mount reared and swerved to clear the obstacle. His knees lost their grip, and he was thrown to the ground.