Heaven and Hell (30 page)

"What do you think the chances are that it will happen, Father?"

"Poor," DeSmet said. "Greed too often conquers a godly im 190

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A Winter Count 191

pulse. But that does not defeat me or discourage me. I will strive to bring a peaceable kingdom till God calls me home."

Three roads carried most of the traffic west of the Missouri. The old Overland Trail to Oregon followed the valley of the Platte, with a newer branch, Bozeman's Trail, veering off to the Montana gold fields.

The Santa Fe Trail ran southwest to New Mexico. Lying between the northern and southern routes, the Smoky Hill Road followed the river along a generally westerly route to the Colorado mines.

In May of '66 the Jackson Trading Company met another white man while still thirty miles south of the Smoky Hill. The man drove a covered wagon, wore braids, and had cut the hair over his forehead in bangs, then greased it so that it stood up. He was fat, with a face that reminded Charles of a Father Christmas who'd just come off a week's binge. He greeted the traders cordially and invited them to camp the night with him.

"No thanks. We're in a hurry, Glyn," Wooden Foot said, not smiling. He signaled his companions to ride on. Once past the wagon, Charles looked over his shoulder and reacted with surprise at the sight of an Indian girl, fourteen or fifteen, peeking at them from the back of it. He had an impression of prettiness ruined by too much eating; the girl had the multiple chins of a woman of middle age.

"Surely was obvious you didn't like that man," Charles said.

"Competition, is he?"

"Not for us. He peddles spirits and guns. Name's Septimus Glyn.

Worked for the Upper Arkansas Agency a while. Even the Indian Bureau couldn't stomach him. He sneaks around sellin' what he shouldn't, and every season or so he picks out some young girl, honeys her up with promises, gives her the jug till she grows fond of it, then takes her away with him. When she's no good for anything but whorin', he sells
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her."

"I saw a girl in the wagon."

''Don't doubt it." Disgusted, Wooden Foot didn't turn around to verify it. "Must be a Crow. He's cut his hair Crow style. They're a handsome people, but he'll ruin her looks 'fore he's done, the no-good whoremaster.''

Charles watched the wagon receding on the rim of the gray plain and was glad he hadn't been forced to socialize with Septimus Glyn.

When he saw Willa Parker, he must tell her that not all whites exploited the Indians. Jackson didn't. Neither did the Jesuit priest. He hoped that little bit of information would be pleasing. He found himself wanting to

Please her.

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192 HEAVEN AND HELL

They reached the Smoky Hill route with their forty-six ponies; all their trading goods were gone. Wooden Foot repeatedly said his new partner brought him luck.

They'd seen no white men other than Glyn south of the Smoky Hill. Once on the trail, though, they fought eastward against a tide of galloping cavalry troops, Overland coaches, emigrant wagons. One party

of wagons, driven two and three abreast, refused to allow them any clearance, and so the traders had to halloo their pack mules and ponies between the wagons, eating dust. Twice, oxen nearly trampled Fen.

Two valuable ponies ran away.

After the traders got through the wagons, they reined up. They looked as though they'd coated their faces in yellow flour. The dust made their eyes all the larger and whiter.

"Swear to God, Charlie, I never seen so many greenhorn wagons this early in the season."

"And the traffic's bound to make the Sioux and Cheyennes mad, isn't it?"

"You're right," Wooden Foot said.

Charles watched the canvas tops lurching west. "I had.a strange reaction when those wagons wouldn't give us room. All of a sudden I understood how the Indians feel."

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Thirty miles outside Fort Riley, Kansas, they saw the first stakes marking the route of the oncoming railroad. Every mile or so thereafter, they passed piles of telegraph poles waiting to be planted. One pile was nothing but ashes and charred wood. "The tribes are 'bout as partial to the talkin' wires as they are to settlers," Wooden Foot remarked.

They rode on. Weather-burned and toughened by his return to a life outdoors, Charles felt fit and very much in harmony with his surroundings.

His burned-out feeling was disappearing, replaced by renewed energy and a zest for living. If he was not yet healed, healing had begun.

The morning was warm. He cast off his gypsy robe, pushed up the sleeves of his long Johns and lit a cigar, noticing eight more vehicles coming toward them over the prairie. These turned out to be high-wheeled canvas-covered U.S. Army ambulances, each pulled by two horses.

Mounted soldiers formed a moving defense ring around the vehicles.

"Who the hell's this?" Wooden Foot said.

They ran their mules and ponies in a circle and waited. The ambulances stopped. A colonel jumped down and greeted them. A second officer hopped out of the lead wagon, a stringy fellow with a hawk face and bristly red hair mixed with gray. His face startled Charles more than his three stars did.

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"Morning," said the general. "Where have you gentlemen come from?"

"The Indian Territory," Wooden Foot said.

"We wintered with the Cheyennes," Charles said.

"I am on an inspection tour. What's their state of mind?"

"Well," Wooden Foot said, cautious, "considerin' that no one chief or village represents the whole shebang, I guess I'd say the tribe's mood is distrustful. Black Kettle, the peace chief, he told us he didn't know how long he could hold h"is young men back."

"Oh yes?" said the general, bristling. "Then I'd better talk to that redskin. If one more white man is scalped out here, I won't be able to hold my men back, either."

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After that he calmed down. Charles puffed on his cigar and exhaled blue smoke. The general gave him a keen look. "Did I detect a trace of Southern speech, sir?"

"More than a trace, General. I rode for Wade Hampton."

"An able soldier. You like cigars, sir." Charles nodded. "I do, too. You're welcome to a fresh one of mine while we cook up some food."

"No thanks, General. I'm anxious to head on east and visit my son."

"Safe journey, then." The stringy officer gave them a casual salute and he and the colonel returned to their ambulance.

As soon as they got the horses moving, Wooden Foot said, "You know that shoulder-straps?"

"Sure. That is, I've seen pictures. His bummers burned a whole lot of my home state."

"Lord God, you don't mean that's Uncle Billy Sherman?"

"Yes, I do. Wonder what he's doing out here?"

At Riley, they learned the answer. Sherman had commanded the Division of the Mississippi since shortly after Charles passed through Chicago. He'd shifted his headquarters to St. Louis, and then, in March, had persuaded Grant to create a Department of the Platte, to shrink the unwieldy Department of the Missouri and promote better management of both within the Division. This displeased John Pope, the commander

°f the Missouri Department.

There were inevitable Army rumors to go with the facts. The larger administrative unit would soon be renamed Division of the Missouri.

Sherman thought the Department of the Platte's commander, St. George Cooke, too old at fifty-six. He wanted Winfield Hancock, "Superb"

Hancock of Gettysburg, to replace Pope. He wanted Congress to authonze new infantry and cavalry regiments, assigning some of them to 194 " HEAVEN AND HELL

Plains duty, although it couldn't be done in time to help the 1866 travel season.

Charles got the idea that Sherman had strong, largely negative views
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about Indians, yet did not want to become involved in making policy that affected them. "Sheriffs of the nation," that was Sherman's definition of the Army's role. Pope was more of an activist. He had insisted that emigrant trains organize before leaving jumping-off points such as Leavenworth. Otherwise, he said, his regiments wouldn't be responsible for them.

At the sutler's, Charles picked up a letter from Duncan. "Why, he's a whole lot closer than when I left. They transferred him to Fort Leavenworth in January. Let's hurry up and sell those horses."

By the first of June all the animals were gone, having fetched just over two thousand dollars for the company. The traders rode east and, at Topeka, banked their money, each man keeping fifty dollars for personal expenses. On the winter count Wooden Foot painted three sacks bearing dollar signs. He and Charles shook hands, Charles hugged Boy, and they agreed to rendezvous on the first of September.

With a sly look, Wooden Foot said, "Bound anyplace 'sides Leavenworth?

Case I need you, understand."

"Oh--" Charles settled in Satan's saddle--"maybe St. Louis.

Have a barber work me over." His beard had grown long and thick.

"Take in a show. I met that actress, remember."

"Mmm, that's right. Nearly slipped my mind." Charles smiled.

"The saucy freethinker who doesn't give a snap if people scorn her for invitin' a gent to supper."

"That's the one."

"You been so impatient, I figured you had somethin' in mind. So it's that there Augusta."

Suddenly bleak, Charles said, "Augusta was my son's mother.

She's dead. I've never mentioned her name."

"Not woke up you haven't. You talk in your sleep, Charlie. I figured it was a happy dream. I'm sorry."

"That's all right."

"I want you to feel good. You're my friend. It was damn lucky we met up at Jefferson Barracks."

"I feel the same."

"Say hello to your youngster and don't get yourself kilt in no tavern fights."

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"Not me," Charles said, and rode away.

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A road ran due north from Leavenworth City to the military reservation.

Charles cantered along this two-mile stretch, passing neat farm plots and the headquarters of Russell, Majors and Waddell, a huge enclave of parked wagons, piled-up freight, penned oxen, noisy and profane teamsters. The river flowed along out of sight under the high bluff on his right.

The ten-square-mile post contained department headquarters, barracks and support facilities for six companies, and the large quartermaster's depot serving the forts to-the west. Col. Henry Leavenworth had established the original cantonment in 1827, on the Missouri's right bank near its confluence with the Kaw.

Jack Duncan's quarters were typical of Western military posts.

Spartan rooms furnished with an old sheet-iron stove and whatever furniture the occupant brought, bought, or built from crates and lumber.

Normally, the brigadier would have lived in smaller space--"Old Bedlam,"

the bachelor officers' quarters--but he'd ranked a married captain and thus moved him, his wife and baby out of married quarters, so that he and Maureen and Gus could move in. This happened frequently to junior officers; the term for it was "the bricks falling in."

Charles couldn't believe how much his son had grown since last autumn. Little Gus walked around Duncan's parlor so fast, swaying, that Charles was constantly starting to dive for the boy, to catch him if he fell. It amused Duncan.

"No need for that. He's damn steady."

Charles quickly saw this was so. "He doesn't know me, Jack."

"Of course not." Duncan held out his hands. "Gus, come to Uncle."

The boy clambered to his lap without hesitation. Duncan pointed t:o the visitor. "That's your father. Want to go to your father?"

Charles reached out to take him. Gus screamed.

"I think it's your beard," Duncan said.

Charles saw no humor in it. He struggled for over an hour to tempt Gus onto his lap. But after he finally did, he soon had him clinging to his thumbs and laughing as he bounced him up and down on his knee.

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Maureen appeared from the kitchen and expressed disapproval. Charles didn't stop.

Duncan leaned back and lit a pipe. "You look good, Charles. The life agrees with you."

"I miss Augusta and always will. Apart from that, I've never been happier."

"This Adolphus Jackson must be a fine fellow."

"The best." Charles cleared his throat. "Jack, I need to say something else about Augusta. Well, actually, about a woman I met in St.

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196 Heaven and Hell

Louis as soon as you want."

"Thank you, Jack." He beamed at Maureen, still hovering near and frowning over his rag-bag wardrobe, his tangled beard, his way of handling his son. Charles just ignored it.

"Life's too good to be believed," he said, gazing at his son, whose features had begun to favor his mother.

Duncan smiled. "I'm glad. We all went long enough feeling the other way in the late unpleasantness."

Up went the curtain. The players joined hands and stepped to the apron, Trump pulling the others along and then snatching off his woodcutter's cap. He waved the cap to acknowledge the applause, thus drawing attention from the others in the company. He unpinned his good luck chrysanthemum from his coarse tunic and tossed the wilted flower, more brown than white, into the audience. An obese man caught it, examined it, threw it away.

The company bowed again. Then Trump took a third, solo, bow.

The woman playing his wife exchanged long-suffering looks with Willa, who was prettily dressed in a high-waisted gown for her role as one of the young lovers. The play was Moliere's Physician in Spite of Himself, which had been "amplified and emended by Mr. Trump," according to

posters outside. It seemed to Charles, standing up and clapping hard in the front box at stage left, that the unraveling of the farcial plot about a woodcutter pretending to be a famous doctor had stopped completely at
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least four times while Sam Trump performed comic monologues that didn't sound like the rest of the play; one described hotels with peculiar French names. The largely male audience roared, apparently understanding some local reference.