The big range, p.10
The Big Range, page 10
“Our orders are to destroy the village. Send a squad out to round up any stock. There might be some horses around. We’re to take them in.” Lieutenant Imler waved an arm at the thirty-odd skin-and-pole huts. “Set the others to pulling those down. Burn what you can and smash everything else.”
“Right, sir.”
Lieutenant Imler rode into the slight shade of the cottonwoods along the creek. He wiped the dust from his face and set his campaign hat at a fresh angle to ease the crease made by the band on his forehead. Here he was, hot and tired and way out at the end of nowhere with another long ride ahead, while Captain McKay was having it out at last with Gray Otter and his renegade warriors somewhere between the Turkey Foot and the Washakie. He relaxed to wait in the saddle, beginning to frame his report in his mind.
“Pardon, sir.”
Lieutenant Imler swung in the saddle to look around. Sergeant Houck was afoot, was standing near with something in his arms, something that squirmed and seemed to have dozens of legs and arms.
“What the devil is that, Sergeant?”
“A baby, sir. Or rather, a boy. Two years old, sir.”
“How the devil do you know? By his teeth?”
“His mother told me, sir.”
“His mother?”
“Certainly, sir. She’s right here.”
Lieutenant Imler saw her then, close to a neighboring tree, partially behind the trunk, shrinking into the shadow and staring at Sergeant Houck and his squirming burden. He leaned to look closer. She was not young. She might have been any age in the middle years. She was shapeless in the sack-like skin covering with slit-holes for her arms and head. She was sun- and windburned dark, yet not as dark as he expected. And there was no mistaking her hair. It was light brown and long and braided, and the braid was coiled around on her head.
“Sergeant! It’s a white woman!”
“Right, sir. Her name’s Cora Sutliff. The wagon train she was with was wiped out by a raiding party. She and another woman were taken along. The other woman died. She didn’t. The village here bought her. She’s been in Gray Otter’s lodge.” Sergeant Houck smacked the squirming boy briskly and tucked him under one arm. He looked straight at Lieutenant Imler. “That was three years ago, sir.”
“Three years? Then that boy—”
“That’s right, sir.”
Captain McKay looked up from his desk to see Sergeant Houck stiff at attention before him. It always gave him a feeling of satisfaction to see this big slab of cross-grained granite that Nature had hewed into the shape of a man. The replacements they were sending these days, raw and unseasoned, were enough to shake his faith in the Service. But as long as there remained a sprinkling of these case-hardened old-time regulars, the Army would still be the Army.
“At ease, Sergeant.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Captain McKay drummed his fingers on the desk. This was a ridiculous proposition. There was something incongruous about it and the solid, impassive bulk of Sergeant Houck made it seem even more so.
“That woman, Sergeant. She’s married. The husband’s alive, wasn’t with the train when it was attacked. He’s been located, has a place about twenty miles out of Laramie. The name’s right and everything checks. You’re to take her there and turn her over with the troop’s compliments.”
“Me, sir?”
“She asked for you. The big man who found her. Lieutenant Imler says that’s you.”
Sergeant Houck considered this behind the rock mask of weather-carved face. “And about the boy, sir?”
“He goes with her.” Captain McKay drummed on the desk again. “Speaking frankly, Sergeant, I think she’s making a mistake. I suggested she let us see the boy got back to the tribe. Gray Otter’s dead, and after that affair two weeks ago there’s not many of the men left. But they’ll be on the reservation now and he’d be taken care of. She wouldn’t hear of it, said if he had to go she would too.” Captain McKay felt his former indignation rising again. “I say she’s playing the fool. You agree with me, of course.”
“No, sir. I don’t.”
“And why the devil not?”
“He’s her son, sir.”
“But he’s—Well, that’s neither here nor there, Sergeant. It’s not our affair. We deliver her and there’s an end to it. You’ll draw expense money and start within the hour. If you push along, you can make the stage at the settlement. Two days going and two coming. That makes four. If you stretch it another coming back, I’ll be too busy to notice. If you stretch it past that, I’ll have your stripes. That’s all.”
“Right, sir.” Sergeant Houck straightened and swung about and started for the door.
“Houck.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Take good care of her—and that damn kid.”
“Right, sir.”
Captain McKay stood by the window and watched the small cavalcade go past towards the post gateway. Lucky that his wife had come with him, even on this last assignment to this Godforsaken station lost in the prairie wasteland. Without her they would have been in a fix with the woman. As it was, the woman looked like a woman now. And why shouldn’t she, wearing his wife’s third-best, crinoline dress? It was a bit large, but it gave her a proper feminine appearance. His wife had enjoyed fitting her, from the skin out, everything except shoes. Those were too small. The woman seemed to prefer her worn moccasins anyway. And she was uncomfortable in the clothes. But she was decently grateful for them, insisting she would have them returned or would pay for them somehow. She was riding past the window, side-saddle on his wife’s horse, still with that strange shrinking air about her, not so much frightened as remote, as if she could not quite connect with what was happening to her, what was going on around her.
Behind her was Private Lakin, neat and spruce in his uniform, with the boy in front of him on the horse. The boy’s legs stuck out on each side of the small improvised pillow tied to the forward arch of the saddle to give him a better seat. He looked like a weird, black-haired doll bobbing with the movements of the horse.
And there beside the woman, shadowing her in the midmorning sun, was that extra incongruous touch, the great granite hulk of Sergeant Houck, straight in his saddle with the military erectness that was so much a part of him that it would never leave him, solid, impassive, taking this as he took everything, with no excitement and no show of any emotion, a job to be done.
They went past, and Captain McKay watched them ride out through the gateway. It was not quite so incongruous after all. As he had discovered on many a tight occasion, there was something comforting in the presence of that big, angular slab of a man. Nothing ever shook him. He had a knack of knowing what needed to be done whatever the shifting circumstances. You might never know exactly what went on inside his close-cropped, hard-pan skull, but you could be certain that what needed to be done he would do.
Captain McKay turned back to his desk. He would wait for the report, terse and almost illegible in crabbed handwriting, but he could write off this detail as of this moment. Sergeant Houck had it in hand.
They were scarcely out of sight of the post when the boy began his squirming. Private Lakin clamped him to the pillow with a capable right hand. The squirming persisted. The boy seemed determined to escape from what he regarded as an alien captor. Silent, intent, he writhed on the pillow. Private Lakin’s hand and arm grew weary. He tickled his horse forward with his heels until he was close behind the others.
“Beg pardon.”
Sergeant Houck shifted in his saddle and looked around. “Yes?”
“He’s trying to get away. It’d be easier if I tied him down. Could I use my belt?”
Sergeant Houck held in his horse to drop back alongside Private Lakin. “Kids don’t need tying,” he said. He reached out and plucked the boy from in front of Private Lakin and laid him, face down, across the withers of his own horse and smacked him sharply. He picked the boy up again and reached out and set him again on the pillow. The boy sat still, very still, making no movement except that caused by the sliding motion of the horse’s fore-shoulders. Sergeant Houck pushed his left hand into his left side pocket and it came forth with a fistful of small hard biscuits. He passed these to Private Lakin. “Stick one of these in his mouth when he gets restless.”
Sergeant Houck urged his horse forward until he was beside the woman once more. She had turned her head to watch, and she stared sidewise at him for a long moment, then looked straight forward again along the wagon trace before them.
They came to the settlement in the same order, the woman and Sergeant Houck side by side in the lead, Private Lakin and the boy tagging at a respectful distance. Sergeant Houck dismounted and helped the woman down and plucked the boy from the pillow and handed him to the woman. He unfastened one rein from his horse’s bridle and knotted it to the other, making them into a lead strap. He did the same to the reins of the woman’s horse. He noted Private Lakin looking wistfully at the painted front of the settlement’s one saloon and tapped him on one knee and handed him the ends of the two straps. “Scat,” he said, and watched Private Lakin turn his horse and ride off leading the other two horses. He took the boy from the woman and tucked him under one arm and led the way into the squat frame building that served as general store and post office and stage stop. He settled the woman on a preserved-goods box and set the boy in her lap and went to the counter to arrange for their fares. When he returned to sit on another box near her, the entire permanent male population of the settlement had assembled just inside the door, all eleven of them staring at the woman.
“… that’s the one …”
“… an Indian had her …”
“… shows in the kid …”
Sergeant Houck looked at the woman. She was staring at the floor. The blood was retreating from beneath the skin of her face, making it appear old and leathery. He started to rise and felt her hand on his arm. She had leaned over quickly and clutched his sleeve.
“Please,” she said. “Don’t make trouble on account of me.”
“Trouble?” said Sergeant Houck. “No trouble.” He rose and confronted the fidgeting men by the door. “I’ve seen kids around this place. Some of them small. This one now needs decent clothes and the store here doesn’t stock them.”
The men stared at him, startled, and then at the wide-eyed boy in his clean but patched skimpy cloth covering. Five or six of them went out through the door and disappeared in various directions. The others scattered through the store, finding little businesses to excuse their presence. Sergeant Houck stood sentinel, relaxed and quiet, by his box, and those who had gone out straggled back, several embarrassed and empty-handed, the rest proud with their offerings.
Sergeant Houck took the boy from the woman’s lap and stood him on his box. He measured the offerings against the small body and chose a small red flannel shirt and a small pair of faded overalls. He peeled the boy with one quick motion, ripping away the old cloth, and put the shirt and overalls on him. He set the one pair of small scuffed shoes aside. “Kids don’t need shoes,” he said. “Only in winter.” He heard the sound of hooves and stepped to the door to watch the stage approach and creak to a stop, the wheels sliding in the dust. He looked back to see the men inspecting the boy to that small individual’s evident satisfaction and urging their other offerings upon the woman. He strode among them and scooped the boy under one arm and beckoned the woman to follow and went out the door to the waiting old Concord coach. He deposited the boy on the rear seat inside and turned to watch the woman come out of the store escorted by the male population of the settlement. He helped her into the coach and nodded up at the driver on his high box seat and swung himself in. The rear seat groaned and sagged as he sank into it beside the woman with the boy between them. The woman peered out the window by her, and suddenly, in a shrinking, experimental gesture, she waved at the men outside. The driver’s whip cracked and the horses lunged into the harness and the coach rolled forward, and a faint suggestion of warm color showed through the tan of the woman’s cheeks.
They had the coach to themselves for the first hours. Dust drifted steadily through the windows and the silence inside was a persistent thing. The woman did not want to talk. She had lost all liking for it and would speak only when necessary, and there was no need. And Sergeant Houck used words with a natural and unswerving economy, for the sole simple purpose of conveying or obtaining information that he regarded as pertinent to the business immediately in hand. Only once did he speak during these hours and then only to set a fact straight in his mind. He kept his eyes fixed on the dusty scenery outside as he spoke.
“Did he treat you all right?”
The woman made no pretense of misunderstanding him. Her thoughts leaped back and came forward through three years and she pushed straight to the point with the single word. “Yes,” she said.
The coach rolled on and the dust drifted. “He beat me once,” she said, and the coach rolled on, and four full minutes passed before she finished this in her own mind and in the words: “Maybe it was right. I wouldn’t work.”
Sergeant Houck nodded. He put his right hand in his right pocket and fumbled there to find one of the short straight straws and bring it forth. He put one end of this in his mouth and chewed slowly on it and watched the dust whirls drift past.
They stopped for a quick meal at a lonely ranch-house and ate in silence while the man there helped the driver change horses. Then the coach rolled forward and the sun began to drop overhead. It was two mail stops later, at the next change, that another passenger climbed in and plopped his battered suitcase and himself on the front seat opposite them. He was of medium height and plump. He wore city clothes and had quick eyes and features small in the plumpness of his face. He took out a handkerchief and wiped his face and removed his hat to wipe all the way up his forehead. He laid the hat on top of the suitcase and moved restlessly on the seat, trying to find a comfortable position. His movements were quick and nervous. There was no quietness in him.
“You three together?”
“Yes,” said Sergeant Houck.
“Your wife, then?”
“No,” said Sergeant Houck. He looked out the window on his side and studied the far horizon. The coach rolled on, and the man’s quick eyes examined the three of them and came to brief rest on the woman’s feet.
“Begging your pardon, lady, but why do you wear those things? Moccasins, aren’t they? They more comfortable?”
She looked at him and down again at the floor and shrank back farther in the seat and the blood began to retreat from her face.
“No offense, lady,” said the man. “I just wondered—” He stopped. Sergeant Houck was looking at him.
“Dust’s bad,” said Sergeant Houck. “And the flies this time of year. Best to keep your mouth closed.”
He looked again out the window and the coach rolled on, and the only sounds were the running beat of the hooves and the creakings of the old coach.
A front wheel struck a stone and the coach jolted up at an angle and lurched sideways and the boy gave a small whimper. The woman pulled him to her and on to her lap.
“Say,” said the man, “where’d you ever pick up that kid? Looks like—” He stopped.
Sergeant Houck was reaching up and rapping a rock fist against the top of the coach. The driver’s voice could be heard shouting at the horses and the coach slowed and the brakes bit on the wheels and the coach stopped. One of the doors opened and the driver peered in. Instinctively he picked Sergeant Houck.
“What’s the trouble, soldier?”
“No trouble,” said Sergeant Houck. “Our friend here wants to ride up on the box with you.” He looked at the plump man. “Less dust up there. It’s healthy and gives a good view.”
“Now, wait a minute,” said the man. “Where’d you get the idea—”
“Healthy,” said Sergeant Houck.
The driver looked at the bleak, impassive hardness of Sergeant Houck and at the twitching softness of the plump man. “Reckon it would be,” he said. “Come along. I’ll boost you up.”
The coach rolled forward and the dust drifted and the miles went under the wheels. They rolled along the false-fronted one street of a mushroom town and stopped before a frame building tagged “Hotel.” One of the coach doors opened and the plump man retrieved his hat and suitcase and scuttled away and across the porch and into the building. The driver appeared at the coach door. “Last meal here before the night run,” he said, and wandered off around the building. Sergeant Houck stepped to the ground and helped the woman out and reached back in and scooped up the boy, tucked him under an arm, and led the way into the building.
When they came out, the shadows were long and fresh horses had been harnessed and a bent, footsore old man was applying grease to the axles. When they were settled again on the rear seat, two men emerged from the building lugging a small but heavy chest and hoisted it into the compartment under the high driving seat. Another man, wearing a close-buttoned suitcoat and curled-brim hat and carrying a shotgun in the crook of one elbow, ambled into sight around the corner of the building and climbed to the high seat. A moment later a new driver, whip in hand, followed and joined him on the seat and gathered the reins into his left hand. The whip cracked and the coach lurched forward and a young man ran out of the low building across the street carrying a saddle by the two stirrup straps swinging and bouncing against his thigh. He ran alongside and heaved the saddle up to fall thumping on the roof inside the guardrail. He pulled at the door and managed to scramble in as the coach picked up speed. He dropped on to the front seat, puffing deeply.
“Evening, ma’am,” he said between puffs. “And you, General.” He leaned forward to slap the boy gently along the jaw. “And you too, bub.”
Sergeant Houck looked at the lean length of the young man, at the faded levis tucked into short high-heeled boots, the plaid shirt, the brown handkerchief knotted around the tanned neck, the amiable, competent young face. He grunted a greeting, unintelligible but a pleasant sound.
