Cries from the Earth (51 page)

Lunging a half-dozen steps farther up the slope, the lieutenant saw how the cleft quickly widened into a ravine. From where he stood, it sure as hell appeared that the ravine would make an easier go of their ascent to the summit.

If not, then the ravine would be as good a spot as any to hunker down and hold off this war party till more help came up the canyon from below.

“C'mon, men!” he yelled, waving them on.

After stuffing his hand into his saddle pocket and removing the last of his pistol cartridges, Theller slapped the lathered animal on the rump and sent it clattering back down the slope toward the onrushing enemy horsemen, parting the warriors.

“Grab your cartridges!” the lieutenant hollered as he waved them toward the brushy cleft. “Grab the last of your ammunition; then take cover in the ravine!”

The seventh man almost didn't make it. A bullet kicked up a clod of black earth at his feet, splitting his boot sole and knocking the soldier off-balance. Skidding onto his belly, the trooper crabbed the last three yards into the ravine to join the others. There he sat up, dragging one leg over the other thigh to inspect the bottom of his boot. The heel had been shot off, a narrow groove in the sole deep enough to expose the bottom of his grimy sock, which was starting to turn pink with oozy blood.

“Ferget your goddamned hoof!” one of the others bellowed as the warriors lunged off their ponies and immediately spread out behind the skimpy brush downslope.

In moments the soldiers could hear the Nez Perce creeping up on either side of the ravine.

Completely stunned at how quickly they had been surrounded, Theller gazed up at the shadows flitting along the top at either side of the ravine. He prayed they had enough brush in here so that his men would not be exposed if the warriors crawled up to the edge and began firing down—

A bullet slapped the man next to him, driving his head backward with an audible snap of his neck. After slamming back against the wall of the ravine, the soldier fell facedown, the entire back of his head a bloody, dirty, grass-choked pulp.

“Sell your lives dearly, men!” Theller rallied them. “Make every damned bullet count!”

Only as long as their cartridges held out—

At the ravine entrance another man pitched onto his back, writing in pain, dying noisily while Theller and the other five shot at anything that moved: a shadow, a sound, even a whisper of the warriors crawling up just beyond the mouth of the ravine.

Then another flopped at Theller's feet, clutching his shiny red neck in both hands, gurgling, gurgling …

Twisting about at the scraping noise, the lieutenant saw the barrel of a gun appear over the side of the ravine twenty feet away. He fired his pistol at it, kicking up enough dirt near the barrel that the warrior retracted his weapon.

Theller twisted around, hoping to find that they could work their way farther back into the ravine where he and the four would have better protection until reinforcements showed up. Maybe back in the ravine they would even discover a path that would lead them all the way to the summit of White Bird Hill by following the bottom of this deep erosion scar. And once up there they would drop over to the Camas Prairie, which would take them all the way into Grangeville and Mount Idaho—

But his heart sank as he realized this ravine was going nowhere. Less than fifteen feet from where he crouched against the wall, the ravine ended abruptly. A three-sided box. And the warriors were pressing hard, nailing down the last boards of their coffins.

He watched the skyline, shooting at anything that moved at the lip of the ravine, any tufts of grass or a branch that rustled while the red bastards screamed their bloody oaths.

Theller heard the men fall, one by one: some grunting, some yelping a high-pitched feral note of pain. And he could tell as they went that there were fewer and fewer of their Springfields booming. Much more noise from the warriors' Winchesters—

Three of them popped up in front of him suddenly as he brought up his pistol and snapped off a shot.

Watching the bullet's impact spin one of the warriors around and back from the entrance to the ravine, Theller was jerking the pistol toward its next target as he thumbed back the hammer—only to see the puff of smoke and tongue of fire burst from the muzzle of the next warrior's rifle. It was a Springfield carbine too.

The blow felt like the kick of a mule at first, hurtling him back against the end of the ravine. His legs started to lose all feeling, but he did his best to push himself up against the wall of grass and earth at the back of the ravine. Did his best to stand as he finished thumbing back the hammer, aimed it again, and pulled the trigger.

It clicked.

They were slipping toward him cautiously at a half-crouch as he frantically pulled the hammer back again, then aimed it at the first one who was grinning broadly at him.

His pistol clicked on a second dead chamber.

When the muzzle of another warrior's carbine spat flame, Theller felt himself shoved back into the end of the ravine so far that he was sure he was being buried by some massive, powerful fist. Propelled against the grassy wall, he sank slowly, his legs unable to support his weight any longer. The back of the ravine had become the end of the line for him.

Looking up, blinking through the sweat and dirt clouding his vision, he watched the fuzzy form take focus as it stepped closer. Lieutenant Theller stared at the warrior who held the muzzle of his soldier carbine just inches from his eyes, then fired a third … and final bullet.

Chapter 40

Season of
Hillal
1877

After wiping out those eight soldiers in the brushy ravine, Yellow Wolf helped his friends strip the white men of their weapons and what few unused bullets they had left among them. The ground around the dead Shadows was littered with empty cartridge cases. Still, only one of the warriors had been slightly wounded in their ravine skirmish.

Some of his friends laughed at how these white men were such poor marksmen with their firearms!

Yellow Wolf stayed with the war party when they left the ravine, turning back down the slope toward the sound of renewed shooting. Evidently there were still more soldiers who had not yet made it to the mouth of the canyon. More enemies to kill somewhere below—more weapons to take and still more glory to make!

A half-mile down the ridge, Yellow Wolf topped a low crest to discover how most of the soldiers were racing from the valley by a route different from the one they had used in making their advance on the village. While the small group of soldiers he and the others had just wiped out in the ravine had been fleeing the battlefield at a point farther north along the base of the ridge, Yellow Wolf could now see how most of the white men were escaping along a more western route, clinging to the foot of the high bluff.

The rest of Yellow Wolf's friends were spreading out rapidly as they approached these last remnants of the enemy, charging their ponies in a broad phalanx toward that ragged blue line of soldiers angling across the steep hillside.

But … just then Yellow Wolf heard gunfire reverberate from the valley behind him. Had they been mistaken? Were there still some soldiers pinned down near the burial hill where for many, many generations the
Nee-Me-Poo
had laid their dead to a final rest? Yes, he spotted it then—a bit of gunsmoke puffing from a clump of brush and rocks. And farther on down the gentle hillside he could see several warriors firing back at the brush. They must have some of the Shadows pinned down!

With an exuberant whoop and jabs of his heels, Yellow Wolf set off to have himself some more fighting. He raced his pony straight for the rocks and skimpy brush where he had seen the puffs of smoke. Perhaps he could flush the white men into the open with his bravery run!

On the slope ahead two warriors suddenly stood, waving him off, shouting. But he could not hear their words for the pounding of his pony's hooves. They signaled their arms in warning, but already it was too late. Almost on top of the enemy, Yellow Wolf realized that the white men were hiding in two places on the hillside. While skirting around the rock barricade where he had spotted the first gunsmoke he had carelessly pointed his pony right for the second group of Shadows.

Just as he was starting to slip off the side of his pony to put the animal between him and the soldiers, one of the Shadows popped up from the brush, leveling his rifle at Yellow Wolf. Yanking hard on the pony's reins, the warrior vaulted off, landing hard. He rolled on his shoulders and was pulling the bow from the quiver at his back even while he clambered onto his feet.

The soldier's muzzle smoked. In that instant when he did not feel any pain, Yellow Wolf knew the white man's bullet had missed.

Immediately gripping the end of his bow in both hands, the warrior whirled the weapon through the air and hurled it against the side of the soldier's head. Stunned, the Shadow fell backward, but still his hands fumbled at the rifle's action.

Two more soldier heads popped up from the other rocks no more than five or six pony lengths away. As quickly, four other warriors were racing up to join him. One of them fired his rifle at the soldier Yellow Wolf had knocked down. The white man tried to rise on his elbow after he was shot, then collapsed and died without another sound.

Freeing a war cry from his raw throat, Yellow Wolf dashed straight for the boulders where he had seen the other two heads appear. As he neared the edge of a low depression where the pair had taken refuge, the young warrior attempted to slow himself. But his moccasins slipped on the wet grass and he went down, sprawling backward, continuing his slide over the edge of the depression, spinning toward the soldiers. He landed right in front of the white man who yanked his rifle down, aiming it at Yellow Wolf, then fired point-blank.

But the bullet smacked into the wall of the shallow depression beside Yellow Wolf's ear. Maybe the Shadow missed because he was so surprised to find the warrior falling in on his hiding place.

The moment that bullet slammed into the ground, the young warrior lunged out on instinct and seized the soldier's muzzle as he heard the approach of running feet. For long, desperate moments Yellow Wolf and the soldier wrestled for that rifle while the other white man in the depression struggled to feed a cartridge into his weapon. When that second soldier brought his reloaded rifle up to point it at Yellow Wolf, a shot rang out. Followed by a second.

At his feet both soldiers lay bleeding, dying within their nest of rocks and brush. As he knelt there above them, Yellow Wolf's heart was pounding like never before. Above him at the lip of the depression stood two
Nee-Me-Poo
friends. The muzzles of their rifles smoked. They had saved his life.

“There's another enemy!” someone shouted from behind them.

His two friends dove out of sight.

Twisting immediately, Yellow Wolf saw another soldier rising up within the nearby cluster of rocks, aiming his rifle right at him. Even by dropping to his belly, the soldier would still have a shot at him!

Bolting over the lip of the depression, Yellow Wolf flung himself to his feet and sprinted away, dodging side to side so it would not be easy for the white man to shoot him in the back. He heard a gunshot but dared not stop until another warrior called out his name.

“
Teeweawea
threw a rock at the soldier,” Going Alone said. “It hit the Shadow on the head. Then we shot
him.
”

“Come on!” cried Five Times Looking Up, standing on the far side of the depression. He was signaling frantically to Yellow Wolf and the others. “There are two more still alive and fighting in those trees down there!”

He looked down at the pale faces of the white men, then at the carbine near his foot. Now he had a soldier gun!

After stuffing his bow back into its quiver, Yellow Wolf dragged the cartridge belt from beneath one of the dead men, shoved a bullet in the captured carbine, then followed the rest who crept off to finish those last two Shadows who had not managed to escape the battlefield with the others.

There would be no prisoners this day.

*   *   *

“About bloody time you got here, Sergeant!” Parnell roared at Michael McCarthy as he and the one other soldier who had just survived their retreat from the breastworks came riding up. “Couldn't bring you any help,” he explained, gesturing toward what few men had remained behind with him—only nine. “You see for yourself how badly this bloody retreat is going for us.”

“For a time there,” McCarthy huffed breathlessly, “didn't think I'd ever see your smiling face again, Lieutenant!”

“We'll hold these buggers back, by gawd,” Parnell vowed. “But to do it I need you to take charge of the line, Sergeant.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Hold this road if you can and block those red buggers from flanking us,” the lieutenant ordered, quickly gazing up the ridge where the rest of the battalion was streaming. “I'll take the point of our advance. See what I can do to bring your outfit some help.”

“Very good, sir,” McCarthy agreed. Counting himself and Parnell, now there were twelve of them—a grimy, red-eyed, bone-weary, bloodied dozen. “We'll hold the line.”

In moments the sergeant had his men spread out in good order across the gentle slope that rose against the high ridge flanking the valley on the west. Three yards and no more, he had given the order; that's how far apart they were to position themselves in a skirmish line as they slowly, slowly retreated. These ten soldiers were the last out of the valley. Make no mistake about that.

There simply was no more fighting, not any rifle fire, not a lick of noise coming from the creek bottom. Any soldier who was going to make it out had already gotten at least this far to join Parnell. The rest were … were—

Suddenly the warriors sprouted right out of the ground behind them and were throwing everything they had against his thin line.