Across the Rio Colorado (17 page)

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Authors: Ralph Compton

BOOK: Across the Rio Colorado
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McQuade sighed and began punching the loads from the cylinder of his revolver …
M
cQuade spent more than an hour driving through and removing the arrows from Lucy Tabor and Odessa Bibb. Crowded as it was within the wagons, Maggie and Mary remained with him, cleansing and bandaging the wounds. As usual, the procedure took its toll, and wrung out, McQuade returned to the wagon. He had liked Hardy and Jason Kilgore, and their deaths had shaken him. Any man deserved a decent burial by his friends, and their bodies having been lost in the muddy North Canadian dragged him even deeper into the depths of despair. Returning to the wagon, Mary found him sitting on the tailgate, staring morosely at the ground.
“For a man who just spent an hour with two naked females, you're awfully grim,” she said, seeking to cheer him.
“I'm almighty tired of removing arrows, especially from naked females,” he said, without a trace of humor.
She was immediately sorry. Placing the medicine kit in the wagon, she boosted herself up on the tailgate beside him.
“It isn't the arrows, is it?” she asked.
“No,” said McQuade. “At least Odessa and Lucy are alive.”
“You're blaming yourself for what happened to the Kilgores.”
“Mary, there's a reason, a cause, for everything.”
“But you didn't know the Kiowa would attack while we were crossing the river.”
“No,” McQuade said wearily, “but I knew they'd take another swipe at us before we could get out of Indian Territory. The worst possible time for an Indian attack is during a river crossing. My God, why didn't I make allowances for that?”
“What more could you have done?”
“I could have stationed fifty men at the river,” said McQuade, “protecting each of the wagons as they crossed. They struck where we were the most vulnerable.”
“But if you had taken fifty men from their wagons, stationing them near the river, that would have left their wagons, their women and their children unprotected.”
“Bless you, Mary,” he said, putting an arm around her shoulders, “but I just can't help feeling that I could have—should have—done something differently.”
Mary said nothing, for Will Haymes was approaching.
“Some of us would like to have a service for the Kilgores,” said Will, “even though we … they … were lost. Would you and Mary join us?”
“Yes,” McQuade said.
“I'll get the bible,” said Mary.
It was a sad gathering, and it was done quickly, but somehow they all felt better for having participated. Afterward, there was nothing to do but wait for time and the whiskey to begin the healing process for Odessa and Lucy. While it seemed unlikely that the Kiowa would return, McQuade kept a double guard posted for the rest of the day, tripling it at sundown.
Half a mile upriver, the significance of the early morning attack by the Kiowa wasn't lost on Creeker and his men. In seconds, they had their weapons, and were prepared for an attack. The remaining fifteen teamsters were quick to follow their example.
“What's going on?” Hedgepith demanded, emerging from his tent.
“Indian attack downriver,” said Creeker.
“If you're considering riding down there,” Hedgepith said stiffly, “Don't.”
“If I could get there in time to be of any help, I'd go,” said Creeker. “It would be the decent thing to do, but you wouldn't understand that.”
“I understand that you'd be wasting ammunition better spent defending your own camp,” Hedgepith said. “Now put your weapons away and get these teams harnessed for the trail.”
The men eyed Hedgepith in disgust as he returned to his tent. Slaughter, one of the teamsters, turned to Creeker with a question.
“Since they hit McQuade's camp this morning, when do you reckon they'll be comin' after us?”
“Late today or early tomorrow,” Creeker replied. “We can't be more than a hundred miles north of the Red, and when we cross it, we'll be in Texas. If you aim to cross the Red with your hair in place, forget any orders you get from Hedgepith. Startin' tonight we better cut back to two watches, so's we got more men awake and ready. Today, when we take the trail, there'll be five of us ahead of the first wagon, and five behind the last. All of us will be watching for Indians. If you hear one of us sing out or fire a shot, rein up and hit the ground with your guns ready.”
“That makes more sense than anything I've heard since we left St. Louis,” Hansard said. “Suppose we elect you wagon boss an' tell Hedgepith to go to hell?”
“Leave Hedgepith alone, and let him think he's giving the orders,” said Creeker. “I got no ambition to be wagon boss. I just want to get to Texas with all my hair, and without any arrows in my carcass. We all got to work together.”
Quietly, without warning Hedgepith, they all vowed their support.
Nightly, when the camp was asleep, Lora Kirby slipped away to join Riley Creeker, and a few days after Hook's death, she had some truly astounding news.
“Hedgepith's in for a surprise, if he thinks Hook's saloon women are going to work in a Texas saloon,” she said.
“What are they goin' to do?” Creeker asked.
Lora laughed. “It's what they've already done. They've been slipping away at night, meeting some of the teamsters. Every last one of them—Mabel, Reza, Eula, Sal, Nettie, and Cora—has been spoken for, once we get to Texas.”
“I reckon them gamblers—Savage and Presnall—had better learn to dance,” Creeker said. “I swear, the sweetest part of this whole thing is goin' to be watchin' it all collapse around Hedgepith's ears.”
Creeker and his men split up, five riding ahead of the wagons, and five riding behind. They were trailing McQuade's party, which lessened the possibility the Kiowa might hit them from the southwest, but Creeker's eyes were constantly on the back-trail. But when the attack came, it was from the south.
“God Almighty,” Ellis shouted, “yonder they come!”
Remembering what Creeker had told them, the teamsters reined up and hit the ground with their guns in their hands. Creeker and his men were out of their saddles, and twenty-five men formed a line of defense the length of the strung-out wagons. The Kiowa, riding bunched, fanned out. It proved their undoing, for the defenders singled out individual targets, and after the first volley, more than fifteen Kiowa horses galloped away riderless. The remaining Kiowa whirled their horses and retreated.
“Anybody hit?” Creeker shouted.
“Hell, no,” said Slaughter. “We was ready for ‘em, an' shot first.”
Hedgepith stalked down the line of wagons, his eyes
on the jubilant teamsters. When he spoke, there was impatience in his voice.
“You men did your jobs, and there's no celebration in order for that. Now get back to your wagons and get them moving. Creeker, you and your men take your positions and keep your eyes open.”
With that, he turned on his heel and walked back to the lead wagon. Slaughter and the other teamsters had their hands near their pistols, but Creeker laughed. It proved contagious, and the men soon had the wagons moving again. Quietly, Creeker rode alongside each wagon, commending the men for their valiant defense. It solidified his unofficial leadership of the party, leaving Hedgepith in an even more weakened position than he realized. Creeker and his men rode warily, but they reached the bank of the Canadian River half a mile upstream from McQuade's outfit, without incident.
McQuade and his party had heard the shooting along their back-trail, and there was little doubt in anybody's mind as to the reason behind it. There was talk among the men, during supper.
“From the shootin', I'd say they put up a good fight,” Will Haymes observed.
“If they did,” said Ike, “it was in spite of Hedgepith, and not because of him. The man don't strike me as havin' much common sense.”
“Somehow I don't think they're depending on Hedgepith, when it comes to defense,” McQuade said. “Creeker and his bunch may have hired on as gunmen with Hook, but they have become something more than that. The frontier has a way of taking a man through the fire. He'll come out of it bigger, stronger, and tougher, or he'll bend and break.”
“This bein' the Canadian,” said Ike, “you figure we're maybe a week away from the crossin' of the Red?”
“Not more than ninety miles,” McQuade replied. “If nothing else happens to slow us down, we're not more
than a week away. I believe if we can get another two days behind us, the Kiowa will back off.”
“Then all we got to worry us is the Comanches,” said Gunter Warnell.
“Maybe,” McQuade said, “but we can't afford to let down our guard. I can't shake the feeling that the Republic of Texas has some surprises in store for us, and that most of them won't be pleasant.”
The night on the banks of the Canadian River was peaceful, and with all possible precautions, they crossed the river and rolled on toward the southwest. Another milestone would be the distant Red River, beyond which lay the land on which all their hopes and dreams rested.
In western Indian Territory, outlaw Gid Sutton and his five surviving men—Withers, Vance, Taylor, Paschal, and Byler—had established an outlaw stronghold. Following their devastating defeat by Chance McQuade's outfit, they had set about establishing another band of renegades more formidable than the first. Outlaws had come from Kansas, Indian Territory, Nebraska, north Texas, and from as far away as Colorado. After his ignominious defeat, Sutton had kept a man on the trail of the Hook and McQuade parties. Thus he had come up with a plan to enrich himself, and in so doing, get revenge. Sutton's companions were getting restless.
“Damn it, Sutton,” said Withers, “how much longer you goin' to hold off? We already got sixty men, not countin' ourselves. That's more'n we ever had before.”
“I wouldn't mind havin' a hundred,” Sutton replied. “We made a mistake, last time, not goin' after them supply wagons trailin' McQuade. Hell, there's a fortune in goods, just for the taking. Once we take them wagons, McQuade and his bunch will come runnin' to the rescue. That's when we cut 'em down, and I want enough men to do it proper.”
“This bunch ain't gonna set here on ready much longer,” said Vance.
“There's some things you ain't told ‘em,” Paschal
said. “I was close enough to see them twenty-five
hombres
just shoot hell out of attacking Indians, without losin' a man. We ain't goin' up agin a bunch of short horns. Them teamsters and the gun-throwers with 'em is every bit as tough as McQuade's party.”
“Just keep your mouth shut,” said Sutton. “These
hombres
don't have to know everything. Byler, tomorrow I want you to scout both parties, lettin' us know where they are. I want 'em across the Red and in Texas, before we move in. Then we'll be free of Kiowa.”
“But not of the Comanches,” Taylor said.
“Hell, Taylor,” said Sutton, “you want ever'thing handed to you on a silver plate? We git them wagons to Texas, we ain't all that far from them settlements along the Brazos an' the Rio Colorado. We ain't splittin' all the booty with these varmints for nothin'. They'll be ridin' shotgun, keepin' the Comanches off us, until we can convert them wagonloads of goods to cash.”
“I like that better than goin' after McQuade's outfit, just for revenge,” said Withers.
“Me too,” Vance said. “Revenge don't put no gold in my pockets.”
“Sutton's got the right idea,” said Paschal. “Them supply wagons is never that far behind McQuade's outfit. Once we go after them wagons, we'll have to fight McQuade's party sure as hell, revenge or not.”
“He's right,” Taylor said. “I was watchin' that day one of the bunch from the supply train met McQuade on the trail. Whatever their reason for the two trains travelin' apart, they're friendly to one another. I saw McQuade an' this other hombre shake hands.”
“Then don't let me hear any more complaints about waitin' for more men,” said Sutton. “We'll be needin' 'em. Besides, we got plenty of time. Every day we wait, them wagons will be that much closer to the settlements. That'll be one day less we'll have to wrassle with them.”
That quieted them. Sutton went to their supply wagon, and as he so often did, looked upon their arsenal of weapons
and ammunition. There were two kegs of black powder, a wooden box of empty whiskey bottles for use as bombs, and coil after coil of fast-burning fuse.
“By God,” said Withers, from behind Sutton, “it looks like we're goin' to war.”
“Maybe we are,” Sutton replied. “This time, we'll have some surprises.”
McQuade had kept the wagons traveling three abreast, although the terrain had turned stoney and irregular. One day after crossing the Canadian River, Ike Peyton's wagon slid a left rear wheel into a rut with enough force to snap the axle.

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