Under the Sweetwater Rim (1971) (8 page)

They must move with extreme caution in going down the trail. He had no thought of trying to surround the renegades, simply of hitting them a staggering blow.

Surrounded, they would put up a hard fight, and Dev- ereaux doubted that his men were up to it. Good men, most of them, but not as seasoned as the renegades, by all accounts. It must be a quick, hard blow, and let them try to fight their way out of it, or run.

Scatter their horses if possible.

He still had not been able to capture a member of the band, but it might work out tonight. He needed information, needed it badly. Kelsey . . . suppose this was Kelsey? If it was, he should capture or kill him at all costs, but he thought Kelsey would not be so far west. Turpenning came up through the darkness and put out the remaining coals of the fire. Turpenning was always careful.

"All right, Cahill," Devereaux said. "No noise now. Turpenning, you lead off."

Here and there was a faint rattle of accoutrements, a shuffle of feet, and the column moved out. No matter how long he served, Devereaux thought, he would always feel an excitement about these night moves, the men silent, grave, moving to their horses and getting into their saddles, their bodies blotting out the stars as they passed.

With only Turpenning ahead of him, Devereaux rode into the night. They dropped off the rim, going down the trail slowly. At the bottom they forded Beaver Creek and waited there for the column to file down the mountain and assemble. By trail it was almost a mile from here to the bench on which the enemy lay, a mile of steady climb.

Turpenning and Halleck now went ahead. A few minutes only and Turpenning was back.

"Don't like it, suh. Looks too quiet an" peaceful up there. All sleepWill, like. One man settin' beside the fire."

"Cahill," Devereaux said, "take twenty men and move off to the left, form a line, and be ready to move in. Corporal Chancel, take ten men to the right. We'll give them a chance to surrender, but if there is any move either to resist or run, open fire."

He waited while the men filed off into the night.

With the remainder of the force he moved up the center.

Suddenly Devereaux heard a man scrambling over rocks, running and gasping. He turned sharply to reprimand him but the man clutched at his arm. "Major! It's a trapl The Lieutenant said-was He was interrupted by a wild rebel yell from somewhere out in the darkness, and in an instant a dozen torches flared and were thrown into stacks of prepared branches. Instantly the flames caught, soared, and as the light burst over the scene, there was a thunder of firing. A bullet tugged at Devereaux's sleeve. On his right a man staggered and fell.

"Fire at will!" he shouted, his voice ringing out clearly. Coolly, he walked to the partial shelter of a lightning-struck tree, drawing his pistol as he went.

Turpenning, he noticed, was flat behind a rock, firing with coolness. Corporal Chancel, further to his right, had brought his ten men up to the shelter of some tumbled rocks and was directing their fire toward targets picked by the stabbing flame from guns.

Chancel would do, Devereaux told himself, for Gogarty's replacement. With his own pistol he held his fire. Suddenly a flame stabbed to his left and he lifted his gun and fired, holding low and a little to the left of the flame. He heard the clatter of a fallen rifle, and then as suddenly, the firing ceased.

For a moment there was stillness, and then he heard movement on Cahill's flank, and a sudden burst of firing. Then silence. The bonfires were burning brightly now, showing the whole area in bright relief.

"They've pulled out, suh," Turpenning said.

"Hit us, an' then ranl" "Corporal,"

Devereaux called to Chancel, "sweep the area. Bring me any prisoners, give me a count on the wounded and dead" "Yes, sir."

Major Devereaux walked toward the nearest fire. He had been outguessed, but he was sure his men had not come off badly. From what he had been able to see, they had reacted well, standing up to the surprise and the fire with courage and discipline. And he had learned something more about the character of his enemy-ashrewd, daring, and capable man.

As the fire burned, he waited. Cahill was the first to report. "He was ready for us, sir, as you saw, but I think we surprised him, too. From the disposition of his men I believe he expected us to come right down the trail he followed. As it was, he had to face most of his men about and he was never able to bring most of his rifles to bear."

Corporal Chancel came up. "Area clear, sir. Their horses were held in readiness to run.

We lost one man, and three wounded, none of them stretcher cases."

"What about the other side?"

"One man dead, sir, and we have two wounded prisoners."

Devereaux pointed toward the position at which he had fired. "Check over there, Chancel. You may find another."

Chancel went into the rocks, gun ready, then turned. "Yes, sir. One here, sir. Bullet went in under the collarbone. No exit wound."

Two then. Two less-four, counting the prisoners. It was not much, considering what remained. And the renegades had pulled out in good order. It took a strong man to enforce discipline like that on a band of outlaws. Kelsey . . .? A possibility. If it was Kelsey that meant serious trouble. "The prisoners, sir? You wish to talk to them?" Cahill led the way to them. The two men had been placed near a fire. One of them was stretched out on the ground, obviously in bad shape. The other was sitting up.

The one who lay on the ground was scarcely more than a boy, and Major Devereaux felt his face grow tight. He had never had a son, but somehow seeing a boy suffer hit him hard.

The other man was partly bald, with mutton-chop sideburns, and he had quick, mean eyes. He had been shot through the upper leg, a flesh wound and possibly only a minor wound.

The boy was suffering, but he was silent, his eyes wide open, looking at nothing. Devereaux turned to the enlisted man who stood close by.

"Private, get Marly up here at once, will you?

That boy needs help."

"What about me?" the other prisoner demanded.

"I'm shot too."

Devereaux ignored him. "When Marly comes up, have this boy moved down to the other fire, and take good care of him."

He started as if to walk away, but the prisoner spoke up again. "You bought yourself plenty of trouble, soldier boy," he sneered. "You're doin' just what we expected, an' my boys will be back."

Devereaux turned and looked at him coolly.

"You think so? Do you think they will come back when there's so much at stake? In any event, it will do you no good."

He turned to Cahill. "Have one of the men bring up a rope, will you?" "A rope?" The prisoner's voice was shrill. "What are you talkie' about? You can't hang met"

"Why not?" Cahill fell in with the act.

"We've got a rope, and there are plenty of trees"

A man came up the draw leading two mules, heavily packed. "Major, I saw a chance, sir, an' grabbed these. Figured we might be able to use the rations, sir."

Major Devereaux glanced at the mules, then at the lean, raw-boned young Irishman who was leading them. "You're Gerrity, aren't you? How did you get the mules?"

"Well, sir"-the Irishman hesitated-"we was closin' in, and there was this little draw . . . like a ditch, it was, and it came into my mind to follow it.

I was thinkin' they had to have horses somewhere, an' this draw seemed to be talon' its way roundabout, sir.

An' I come up to the horses. There was a mighty lot of them, but these two mules were on the end, like, an' we bein' short of rations-was "I see, Gerrity. That was good thinking."

"Look herel" the prisoner protested. "You can't hang mel Kel-was He broke off sharply.

Cahill glanced at Devereaux. "Maybe if he told us all he knows about that bunch we could take him along with us, sir."

"No. Certainly not. We can't be bothered with prisoners. We haven't time for them, nor the men to guard them. Get on with it."

"Wait!" The man was desperately frightened now, as they had intended him to be. "I'll talk! I'll tell you all you want to know."

"Tell us?" Devereaux turned on him with contempt. "What could you tell us? That you're a thief and an outlaw? That you're a murderer of women and children? We know that."

"Nol Now listen! I can tell you who our chief is, an' what he's figurin' onI I can tell you-was "Your chief?" Devereaux shrugged. "Another thief like yourself . . . no more"

"That's what you think!" the man blurted. "He's Reuben Kelseyl" So . . . there it was.

Major Devereaux took a cigar from his pocket and lit it. "Of course. We have known he was operating in this area, but ineffectually. If that's all you have to tell us, forget about it."

Obviously upset by the poor effect of his news, the man looked right and left, as if seeking some way out, but there was none. "You wait! You just wait until he gets that money. He knows right where he can get rifles enough for the Injuns. Then you'll see!" Devereaux took his cigar from his lips. "So that is what he hopes to do. It is a foolish idea. Rifles are not easy to come by these days."

"He knows where they are, Kelsey does. He knows where he can pick up a thousand rifles . . . brand newl And he knows what the Injuns will do to get "em. You think you've got the world by the tail!

Kelsey will have those rifles an" he'll wipe out ever' fort this side of the Mississippil"

Lieutenant Tenadore Brian had no illusions about what their chances were of making Fort Bridger, but he also knew what had to be done.

They moved out at once, following the Indian trail north to Burnt Gulch. The man he had sent back to Reuben Kelsey would find him, and deliver his message. What Kelsey would do then depended on the man's mood. Ten Brian and Reuben Kelsey had been companions as boys, in their escape from a wagon-train massacre, and in the long trek back to Fort Laramie. Kelsey might choose to ride off and leave them alone, just for old time's sake. But Brian did not believe he would do anything of the kind. It was simply one more card he had to play, and as for the man telling where they were, Kelsey already had a good idea, and by the time he had the news they would be far from there, anyway.

It was high-country travel, meaning they had to move a little slower, and be careful of their horses.

The altitude was over eight thousand feet, and at Sweetwater Gap, toward which they were pointing, it was well over ten thousand, he had heard.

They skirted Indian Ridge, and pointed toward a conical mountain ahead of them. Reaching it, they turned west again and came to a lake. The mountain terrain around them was beautiful, the air was cool off the peaks, where there was still snow. He knew he was taking a long chance, for the pass at Sweetwater Gap might be closed by snow, and if so they must turn back or try for one of the other passes further along the ridge of the Wind River Mountains.

On the shores of the lake, Brian pulled up and dismounted. "We'll rest the horses," he said.

Glancing back, he saw West and Dorsey in conversation. Schwartz was already lying down, hat over his eyes, taking advantage of the rest. Ironhide came up to Brian. "What is the direction from here?" he asked. "I am not sure. Of these mountains I know a little, but only a little." "We'll go west. We'll cross the Roaring Fork, skirt some pothole lakes, and follow the Middle Fork of the Popo Agie back into the gap." He paused.

"There may be snow in the gap"

He went over to where Belle and Mary were seated on a drift log near the lake shore, and squatted on his heels by them. There was rich grass everywhere, gay with flowers of a dozen varieties. "I could love this if it weren't for the circumstances,"

Belle commented. "I've never been so high before."

"Love it anyway," Brian said.

"There are always dangers, even when you believe them to be far away. Men have lived with both danger and beauty from the beginning."

"I did not know you were a philosopher."

"Nothing of the kind. But when a man lives with a gun beside him, he comes to savor every moment if he has any sensitivity at all. The trouble is that most of us live in anticipation or in memory, never in the present moment. There must always be times like this when you just sit still and listen, feel, see. You live longer and live infinitely better."

Mary listened to him, her eyes on the country to the south. He seemed so calm, so perfectly in control. Was he this way always? Her father had often said that you never really knew a man until you saw him under fire, or at least under stress.

She had heard some of the stories, for on a small army post it is hard for a man's past to be a secret, and much of Ten's military record was known. He had fought in many places, and must have known girls in most of them, but he had not married . . . at least as far as anyone knew. After a few minutes he got up and walked back along the line, checking the horses. West was waiting for him, his face still as always, his gaze frankly suspicious. "Which way do we go from here, Lieutenant?" "We'll go west."

"Away from Major Devereaux's command?"

"Yes." Brian paused, recognizing the man's worry. "I believe Kelsey's men are between the Major and ourselves. I think the Major is fully occupied, and perhaps he has turned back.