The Independent Bride (29 page)

“We found a lot of cartridge shells, especially where Tibbolt’s men would have “been holed up,” Collier said. “Apparently he was prepared for trouble.”

“Any signs of blood?” Bryce asked.

“Not there, but we found plenty of it elsewhere. It looks like Tibbolt’s men may have been too tough for the Indians to handle.”

“Did you find any footprints?” Bryce asked.

“Lots of them. Some hoofprints, too.”

“Unshod?”

“Yes.”

There went his last hope there was another explanation for this attack. “Show me,” Bryce said.

Collier led him to a deep gully with a sandy bottom. Several horses had been left there. Bryce beckoned to the Indian scout who rode with him. “What can you tell me about these footprints?”

“Six horses,” the man said after several minutes of careful study.

Bryce had expected more.

“Not Indian ponies,” the scout said.

“How can you tell?” Bryce asked.

“Look,” the scout said, pointing to perfectly preserved hoofprints in the damp sand. “Nail holes in hoof. Shoes been pulled off.”

Bryce got down on his hands and knees to study the footprints. He wouldn’t have noticed it himself wouldn’t have been able to see it if the sand hadn’t been wet when the attack took place, but there were barely discernable mounds of sand in the hoofprints that showed that at some time at least several of the horses had been shod and the nails pulled out. Bryce breathed a sigh of relief. If the scout was right, white men disguised as Indians had attacked Tibbolt and his men. He would have to go to the reservation.

“Mount up.”

“What are you going to do now?” Abby asked.

“We’re going to the reservation.”

“I’m coming, too.”

“I figured you were,” Bryce said.

Abby didn’t know what she’d expected the Indian reservation to look like, but what she found shocked her. There were no wooden structures, though one soldier at the fort said he’d seen the wood the government purchased for the Indians. There was no schoolhouse, no hospital, no warehouse where supplies could be kept. The Indians all appeared to live in their own tepees amid the squalor and filth that came from a large number of people and animals living in the same location for an extended period of time. She saw only a few children, all without clothing. Everything they had appeared to be old and tattered, mended, or broken beyond repair. She saw a few old women but no men.

“I thought the government had promised to take care of these people,” Abby said to Bryce.

“It did. They receive supplies each month.”

“What kind of supplies?”

“Clothes, beef, dry goods, farm implements, seed, animals, everything they need to be able to give up their traditional life.”

“These people can’t have been getting enough to eat,” Abby said. “Look. You can see those children’s ribs.”

“I’ve seen their dogs on the plains hunting for prairie dogs and other rodents,” Lieutenant Collier remarked. “They look like living skeletons.”

“Why isn’t Hinson’s office here instead of in Boulder Gap?” Abby asked.

“He’s allowed to have his office wherever he likes,” Bryce said.

“Look,” Collier said, pointing to a place in the distance where Abby could see men riding around a corral shooting arrows into, and rifles at, cattle. It appeared that most of the women and children were gathered nearby.

“It looks like the beef arrived,” Bryce said.

“What are they doing?” Abby asked.

“They’re pretending to hunt the cows as they would buffalo,” Bryce explained. “They ride around shooting until they’re all dead. Then they strip the carcasses and feast. They’ll probably eat everything in a couple of weeks and then have nothing until the next shipment arrives.”

“Why doesn’t someone explain that they ought to kill one or two at a time? That way they won’t have to eat it all to keep it from spoiling.”

“I think they’re too hungry to wait,” Bryce said.

Abby was surprised to see Russ Tibbolt and three other men who looked like cowhands with the Indians at the corral.

“I see you survived the attack,” Bryce said after he’d dismounted and introduced himself and Collier.

“Did any of your men get hurt?” Abby asked.

“Just a graze that doesn’t amount to much,” Tibbolt said.

“Did you lose any cows?” Bryce asked.

“One killed by a stray bullet,” Tibbolt said. “We butchered it and brought in the meat. They ate every scrap of it last night.”

Abby looked to where the Indians had stopped shooting at the cows. They all appeared to be dead. “Couldn’t you convince them to kill just a few at a time?”

“My job was to get the beef here. It’s no concern of mine what they do with it.”

“About the Indians that attacked you—” Bryce said.

“They weren’t Indians,” Tibbolt said.

“How can you be sure?” Abby asked.

“I know how they live. I know how they fight. Those weren’t Indians.”

“Our scout agrees with you,” Bryce said. “He says someone had recently pulled shoes off those horses.”

“I’d say you’ve got someone who doesn’t want the Indians to get their beef,” Tibbolt said.

“Or doesn’t want me to have the contract,” Abby said.

“Looks like you’ve got a problem,” Tibbolt said to Bryce.

“It’s not my problem. The Bureau of Indian Affairs is under the Department of the Interior. The army has no authority here.”

“It’ll be your responsibility if the Indians leave the reservation,” Tibbolt said. “If they’re starving—and they look pretty damned close to it to me—they’ll leave it sooner or later.”

“Come with me,” Bryce said to Tibbolt. “I want to talk to the chief.”

“You speak their language?” Tibbolt asked.

“No, but we have a scout who can translate.”

Abby followed as they went in search of the chief, who turned out to be a handsome man, younger than Abby had expected, with a broad, sturdy body. He didn’t look happy to see the soldiers. He had a heated conversation with the scout before he translated for Bryce.

It turned out the chief was angry his braves had been accused of attacking Tibbolt. He said none of them had left the reservation, even though they hadn’t seen the agent in more than three months and hadn’t received their monthly supplies since last summer. He said his people were hungry, had no warm clothes, and had no implements or seed for the crops they were supposed to plant to provide them with food. He said if it hadn’t been for the beef, his people would have starved. He complained about the ranchers who continued to graze their cows on reservation land, homesteaders who settled near the best water. He wanted to know why the Great White Father in Washington had continued to break all his promises, yet expected the Indians to stay on their reservation, to wait patiently for supplies that never came, and never raise a hand against a white man no matter what he did.

Bryce promised to talk to the agent. He assured the chief he didn’t believe they had attacked Tibbolt. He said if the chief heard anything about white men disguised as Indians, he was to send a message to the fort, but under no circumstances was he to leave the reservation.

“You’ve got to force Hinson to give the Indians the supplies promised to them,” Abby said to Bryce when he’d finished speaking to the chief.

“I told you, I have no authority over him,” Bryce said. He was just as frustrated and angry as Abby over the situation. “The army has asked repeatedly for authority over the Indian Bureau, but Congress continues to deny it.”

“Then what can we do?”

“I’ll speak to Hinson, but it will be more effective to file a written complaint against him. It will be slow, but it might trigger an investigation, even his removal.”

“He’s a brutal, selfish man. I’m not surprised he’s able to ignore the Indians. Well, now at least they have beef.”

“You’ll have to find someone else to deliver next month’s supplies,” Tibbolt said. “Even if I had the beef to sell, I wouldn’t put my boys through the danger of delivering another herd so soon. I don’t know who’s out to stop you, but I expect they’re the reason no one else will take on your deliveries.”

“Could you buy beef from one of the ranchers, then sell it to me?” Abby asked Tibbolt.

“Ma’am, I served time for killing a man who was well liked. When they see me coming, most of those ranchers meet me with a rifle and a promise to use it if I set foot on their property.”

“I’ll think of something,” Abby said.

Three days later Abby still hadn’t thought of a solution. Moriah came from the store into the parlor where Abby was working at her desk. One of the army carpenters had finished cutting out a window and Abby was enjoying the sunlight.

“You ought to give up the contract,” Moriah said. “Let someone else worry about it.”

“I can’t, not when the beef is all the Indians have. Bryce said me government promised to supply everything they needed. He says the money has been appropriated. It’s promised in the budget, but it’s not getting to the Indians.”

“I imagine Hinson is selling everything he can,” Dorrie said.

“He’s got to be,” Abby said. “The chief said they hadn’t received anything since last summer.”

“With all the mining going on, there’s a market for everything,” Dorrie said.

“I know,” Abby said. “I wasn’t impressed with the stores I saw in Boulder Gap. They’re all run by men, but it’s women who buy half the goods sold. I could steal half their customers in a year if I had the money to set up the kind of store I want to.”

“We’ve got enough to do running this store,” Moriah said.

“I don’t want to be stuck running this store for the rest of my life,” Abby said. “I want to expand, to grow. One day I’d like to open a store in Denver.”

“Gosh,” Dorrie said. “You’d have to be awfully clever to do that.”

“I am clever.”

“And brave.”

“Bryce says I’m brave, too.”

“I’d be more likely to say foolhardy,” her sister said. “You’ve got no business riding all over, especially not to an Indian reservation.”

“My husband says the Indians are an abomination,” Dorrie said. “He says no decent human could live like that.”

“They wouldn’t have to if they received the supplies the government promised them,” Abby said, her anger rising. “I’ve a good mind to write another letter to Washington.”

“I think three are enough,” Moriah said.

“It would have been better if you’d signed one of them,” Abby told her sister.

“I didn’t see the reservation.”

“I told you what it was like.”

“I won’t put my name to something I haven’t seen for myself.”

Abby had accepted her sister’s decision and hadn’t pressed her, but it would be better if more civilians would write. Bryce told her most people were afraid of the Indians and wanted them gone.

Bryce had written, but he said Congress thought the army wanted responsibility for the Indians so it could increase its control of the West Consequently, most members of Congress ignored the army’s complaints about the way the Indian Bureau was handling the problem.

‘Taking the Indians’ part may make the ranchers and farmers angry enough to boycott the store,” Dorrie said.

“I don’t see why,” Abby said. “The Indians were guaranteed those supplies so they could stay on their reservation and not be a danger to anyone. If they don’t get diem, they have to leave to find food. I don’t see why everyone isn’t clamoring for the government to give the Indians everything they could possibly need.”

“No one likes the Indians,” Dorrie said. “Most people wouldn’t care if they all died.”

“Well, I care,” Abby said, trying to hold back her anger. It wasn’t fair to get angry at Dorrie just because she said things Abby didn’t like. She had to learn to present her views in a manner that would encourage people to listen to what she said, not make them so angry diey ignored her opinions.

“What do you care about?” Bryce asked, entering the store and bringing the sunshine in with him.

Chapter Eighteen

“About the Indians,” Abby told him.

She wished he hadn’t come. Ever since the party, she’d been careful not to be alone with him. Her admission of weakness had led to the collapse of all her defenses. A little more encouragement and she’d be completely in love with Bryce McGregor. Since he was only interested in indulging in a brief flirtation until he got his new appointment, her only chance to keep a tight rein on her rebellious heart was to stay away from him.

But within the limited confines of the fort, it was impossible to avoid seeing him several times a day. And even when she didn’t see him, she had to listen to people talk about him. It seemed no one talked about anyone else. They discussed what he did during the day, what he
didn’t
do during the day, the orders he gave, and the orders he
should
have given. The men discussed the problems in the area and what they thought Bryce was planning to do about them. They speculated on who would take Bryce’s place and how that commander’s orders would agree or conflict with what Bryce had been doing.