"Yes; five miles to Walnut Creek, sixteen from there to Pawnee Rock, eight miles from the Rock to the crossin' of Ash Creek, six from Ash Creek to Pawnee Fork, an' three miles, after crossing Pawnee Fork, on up the creek will bring us to Fort Larned, which is two miles and a half off the Santa Fé road, but in plain sight of it."
"I was thinkin'," continued Jack, "about the Walnut Creek ranch an' some o' the lively times it's seen since I first know'd it. In '57, when we come out here on the Cheyenne expedition, Allison owned it. Many's the time the Injuns made life a burden to Allison, but still he saved his scalp an' died on the square. In '58 he left his hired man, Peacock, in charge of the ranch while he took his teams an' went in to Westport, Missouri, after goods. On that trip Allison died suddenly at Westport, an', as he had no kinsfolk at the ranch an' none ever come out to claim it, Peacock jumped the claim an' held it as his own. He, too, had some lively times with the Injuns an' was finally killed by ol' Satank, in the summer of 1860. An' then Charley Rath jumped the claim an' still holds it, but more'n likely he, too, will lose his napper to some o' the Indians yet. It was near the ranch, when Peacock had it, that Pawnee, the Kiowa chief, was killed by Lieutenant Bayard; wasn't it?"
"Yes," I replied, "I was in at the death and had an opportunity to have done the killing myself that day, but Lieutenant Bayard came up and took the job off my hands. You see, I was one of the first to mount and start in chase of the Indian after he'd escaped from the ranch, mounted his horse, and was racing across the level prairie north of the ranch. I was riding that speedy little bay horse that we called 'Greased Lightning,' that the officers used in making races. I'd got the start of Bayard and the rest, overtook the Indian in about a mile and was right alongside of him, with Lieutenant Bayard coming up just behind me, and when I called back to the lieutenant to ask whether I should shoot the Kiowa he replied, 'No, let me speak to him,' and I gave way and let Bayard come in between me and Pawnee. Bayard called on him a couple of times to halt, on the second demand firing a shot in front of the Indian as a warning, and when he found that the Indian only jeered and made faces at him the lieutenant reined in a little and let the Kiowa go ahead, and, as he did so, dropped his pistol to Pawnee's back, saying, 'Take it, then,' and let him have it—shooting him through the heart. Pawnee threw up his hands and fell off his horse dead."
"Well, by rights," said Jack, "you'd overtook the Injun first an' had the best right to have done that job, but Bayard took advantage of his bein' an officer over you to hog the honors."
"I didn't consider that there was any particular honor in killing that Indian, under the circumstances," I replied, "but I should have done so if the lieutenant had said the word. But Bayard seemed to think that the Indian would halt and surrender on his demand, and when the Kiowa not only refused to yield but defied him, why, there was nothing else to do but to kill him. We thought it strange at first that Pawnee should act so defiantly when we had the drop on him, but Peacock told us when we got back to the ranch that this Indian carried a medicine or charm hung around his neck that was supposed to protect him from a white man's bullet, and when the lieutenant fired a shot and missed him he was sure he was bullet-proof; but Bayard's bullet killed him so quick that he hardly had time to feel disappointed."
"I don't know but what it was best, after all," remarked old Tom, "seein' that the Injun had to be killed, for an officer to do it, for after that shot the Kiowas started on the war-path an' caused the loss of a good many lives of innocent people an' give the troops a whole lot of trouble an' hard service for a year or more afterward. Ef it had 'a' been an enlisted man fired that shot he'd 'a' been court-martialled an' punished, more'n likely, instead of being honored. So I guess Peck lost nothin' by it, for Bayard was sharply reprimanded an' had to do a whole lot of explaining to get out of trouble for that little job. As to the killing of Pawnee bein' the real cause of the Kiowa outbreak, that was the idea that some fool people back East got of it; but none of us ever believed that, for we knew from the actions of ol' Satank an' his band for some time before that, they was bound to go on the war-path with or without provocation, an' they seized on the killin' of one o' their chiefs as an excuse for turnin' loose on the Pike's Peak emigrants an' others along the road."
"You'll remember," said Jack, "that I wasn't with you the next summer on the Kiowa expedition, for I'd been left back at Fort Riley, in the hospital, but I know Peck an' you"—speaking directly to Tom—"was both with Major Sedgwick's command in this part of the country when Peacock was killed; an', as I've heard two or three different stories about that affair, I'd like to know the straight of it. Tell me jist how it happened."
"Well, sir," began old Tom as he raised up and began whittling another pipeful of tobacco, "I can give you the straight facts about that scrape, for I got 'em from Charley Rath an' the sick man—you know at the time Satank killed Peacock there was a man sick in bed in the ranch that the Injuns never touched, an' he was the only one of Peacock's men left alive, 'cept Wild Bill an' John Adkins, an' they was away from the ranch somewhere. After peace was made with the Kiowas an' they got to comin' around to the Walnut Creek ranch to trade ag'in, Charley Rath was runnin' it, an' he got all the particulars about it from the Indians who was with Satank when he killed Peacock. So I think I got it pretty straight.
"You'll remember that we—that is, Major Sedgwick's command of four companies of First Cavalry from Fort Riley—had been chasin' the Kiowas' round over the plains all summer, but hadn't been able to get a fight out of 'em 'cept that little scrimmage our detachment of forty men under Jeb Stuart had with Satank an' a little bunch up north of Bent's Fort, where we killed eight of 'em an' captured all their women an' children an' packs.
"Captain Sturgis, with four companies from Fort Arbuckle, had also come up into this country on the same errand as us—huntin' the Kiowas—an' he'd had better luck, for he caught 'em up on the Republican Fork an' had a nice little fight an' killed a whole lot of 'em.