Thirty Years on the Frontier

V

THE SHADOW SCOUT

The bugle notes had died away, the cloud of battle smoke lifted from the valley and peaceful starlight shone over the rugged hills when a shadow crept out of a deep ravine and skulked into the valley of death and began dealing out retribution. Chief Dull Knife had much to say about it when he surrendered. He spoke in whispers when he referred to it, and he looked suddenly around, as if he feared it was softly stealing upon him to stab him in the back. Chief Gall’s braves had something to say about it when they surrendered, and when white men asked them who or what the shadow was, they shook their heads and whispered:

“We kill ’em all, but yet there is one left. It is a white man; there is blood on his face and clothing; he carries a sabre and two revolvers, and the night wind blows his long black hair over his shoulders. It is a spirit sent by the Great Manitou to watch over the graves of the white soldiers.”

White men saw the shadow, hunters, trappers and scouts who built their camp fires near that valley, through which the big mountain wolf skulked and prowled all night long, had felt the mysterious presence of the shadow or had seen it. They fled from their blankets at its soft step, and they had fired at it, and seen it glide off unharmed.

It was not a shadow of sentiment, but a being who sought vengeance for the butchery of the little band of heroes, for the brave comrades who grouped themselves about the noble Custer and fought to the death.

When the soldiers moved out of the valley, leaving so many graves behind them, the wolves rushed out from canon, ravine and den, to dig up the fresh earth and mutilate the dead. The shadow was there – a solitary, mysterious and vigilant sentinel to guard those sacred mounds. It screamed and gestured at the fierce beasts, it fired upon them with rifle and revolver and struck them with bright, keen sabre. The wolves ran here and there, from grave to grave, gnashing their teeth in anger, but the shadow closely pursued them. They formed in groups in the midnight darkness and waited for the shadow to tire out and fall asleep or go away, but it paced up and down over the graves, vigilant and unwearied, and daylight came to hurry the wild beasts to their lairs till another night.

Hunters and scouts had seen the sentinel-beat among the graves in the light of noon-day, when men could not be mistaken. The path ran from grave to grave, winding about to take in every one, and then it ran to the river and disappeared in a ledge of rocks. Scouts said it was a path beaten by human feet. The Indians said that a shadow or spirit alone could remain in that lonely spot, having only the company of wild beasts and the graves of the lonely dead.

Once when Red Cloud and a trusty few were scouting to learn the whereabouts of their white foes, they encamped in the valley for the night. The shadow stole among them as they slept, and when the fierce scream aroused the band from their slumbers, five of the red men had been murdered, each throat slashed across with a keen blade. The shadow stood and jeered at the living, who huddled together like frightened children. When they fled for their lives it pursued them with drawn saber, and one of them had a scar on his shoulder to prove he had been struck with a blade. Next day when a full band of Indians rode into the valley to solve the mystery and secure revenge, they saw no living thing. The bodies of the dead warriors were cut and hacked and gashed. Five of the poor cavalrymen whose brains had been beaten out had been revenged.

Before the crown of a single grave had sunk down, Crazy Horse started to cross the valley at midnight with his lodges. The shadow confronted his band and mocked them, and as the red men hurried along in the darkness, vividly recalling the mad charge of the cavalry, the strange shadow skulked along with the column and fired shot after shot into the band. They fired at it and rushed out to capture it, but it disappeared, as shadows do. Two squaws, a child or two, an old man and two warriors fell by the bullets which the shadow fired. From that time the red men avoided the valley as white men avoid a pest. They would not cross it or skirt it, even at high noon when the sunshine beat down upon the graves.

Texas Jack, the famous scout in the employ of the army, and a companion, in the late autumn of 1876 crossed the lonely battleground and halted long enough to see that the graves had not been disturbed. They saw the path of the sentinel leading from grave to grave. They saw the skeletons of the red men slain by the shadow. They saw the shadow itself. They were leaving the valley when their ears were greeted by a wild laugh, and from a bed of rank grass and dry weeds a quarter of a mile away they saw the shadow beckon them to come forward. The shadow was a man – a tall, gaunt, heavy bearded and long-haired human being dressed in rags that once had been an army uniform. He held up in the air and shook at them a carbine and a sabre, and when they galloped away, he sent a leaden ball whistling over their heads.

This was the last time this trooper was seen alive, no doubt he was bereft of reason, and believed himself called upon to avenge his comrades and so lurked in the valley, living like the wild beasts around him and missing no chance to strike a blow.

Some years later, when peace was restored and Crow Dog with his son and two warriors were hunting buffalo on the Little Big Horn, they were themselves pursued by a hostile party of Crow Indians. They took refuge among the shelving rocks along the river. Far into the deep recesses, where the waves and winds for centuries had hollowed out a chamber, they found a skeleton. By its side lay a carbine, two revolvers and a long cavalry sabre; about the neck was a delicately wrought chain with a gold locket attached. This and some other trinkets they carried away. After a lapse of fourteen years from the time Custer and his soldiers fell, these same Sioux Indians were again on the war path in the Bad Lands of South Dakota. Custer’s old regiment was there, too. Many of them had fought with Reno and Benteen on that fateful 25th of June, and by the chance of war it was a part of their command under Colonel Forsythe who fought the battle of Wounded Knee. Among them was Charles Wilson, the beardless boy, who rode away with Reno, whilst his friend Jim Bristow followed Custer. No longer a boy, but a bronzed and bearded soldier who had stood the chance of fate in many an Indian fight.

After the battle, when they were gathering up the dead Indians frozen stiff by a four days’ blizzard which raged with wild fury over the plain, there was found about the neck of a young warrior a locket and chain. Wilson curiously examined the trophy and found upon opening it, the photograph of Jim Bristow on one side and upon the other the sweet face of the girl who had promised to be his wife. The young brave from whose neck the locket was taken was found to be the son of Crow Dog, who had married into Big Foot’s band, and this blood-stained bauble, which had at last found its way into the hands of Bristow’s friend as he had intended when they parted, and all the circumstances connected with it, revealed at last the identity of the shadow-scout who kept the midnight vigils over the graves of Custer’s heroic dead; who when the chill blasts of the northern winter had come, had crept into his lair among the rocks and far from the cottage where the voice of love had pleaded so long for his return, with the smoke of battle still before his eyes, and with the shouts and shots of that dreadful day still ringing in his ears, had died alone.

Wilson stood by my side a week later as a heavy army wagon rolled into Pine Ridge agency bearing the body of Sitting Bull, the great war chief, who had directed and led the fight on Custer’s men. When the wagon halted, Wilson drew the canvas cover from the dead chief’s form and gazed long at the bronzed, cruel face, which even in death, was magnificent in the strong drawn lines of unrelenting hatred. There was a cold glint of light in Wilson’s eye as he took one last satisfied look at this dead monster of the plains and turned away to keep his word given fourteen years before to his comrade – Jim Bristow – the last survivor of that awful massacre on the Little Big Horn.

VI

INDIAN FIGHT IN COLORADO

Old “Daddy” Stephenson sat in the shade of the ranch house, squinting his one eye toward the north, the other eye having been shot out a few years before. His squaw was boiling the leg of an antelope in a pot that swung under a tripod of sticks nearby, when “Doc” Kinnie and Charley Hayes rode up.

“Here’s yer Injun,” shouted “Doc,” as he untied his lariat from a blanket and let the bloody head of an Indian roll on the ground near Stephenson’s feet.

The old squaw came over, took a look, and, uttering a long, doleful sound like the cry of a wounded wolf, ran inside and grabbing her blanket, started for the hills, chanting a dismal wail peculiar to her people when in distress.

“You fellows have played billy hell; you’ve killed my brother-in-law,” calmly remarked Stephenson as he refilled his pipe and again cast his one eye toward the north.

“And the best thing you can do is to hit the trail while you are wearing your scalps,” he continued after a pause of several minutes.

At that moment the old man’s half Indian boy and myself came up from the corral.

This incident furnished the cause for an ugly Indian fight which occurred on Rock creek, northeastern Colorado, on June 12, 1877.

“Doc” Kinnie, Charley Hayes and myself had come from Deadwood to Cheyenne as an escort for a stage coach carrying the Wells-Fargo express, when Stephenson offered us better pay to work on his cattle ranch.

Four days before the incident of the bloody head, Stephenson had missed seven head of cattle and had struck the trail of one Indian who had driven them off. He rode to the ranch house in high rage and offered Kinnie and Hayes one hundred dollars if they would recover the cattle and kill the Indian. In five minutes they were in their saddles riding to the point where Stephenson indicated the trail. I did not join them, as Stephenson insisted that two were enough. Kinnie and Hayes had no difficulty in following the trail of the stolen cattle and were close on them the next evening. Not caring for a night attack they went into camp, eating their bacon raw rather than make a fire. They were in their saddles at the first grey streak of dawn and within an hour came upon two Indians eating their morning meal in a canon, while the missing cattle were grazing five hundred yards beyond.

It was a complete surprise to the Indians, and in the melee that followed one of them was killed and the other made his escape. It then became a question of how best to prove to Stephenson that they had killed the Indian without the burden of taking him back.

Kinnie, who had been a medical student in Ohio before a certain escapade had caused him to emigrate to the west, suggested the amputation of the dead Indian’s head as the handiest way, and also suggested that they keep quiet as to the Indian who got away, lest the old man should only want to pay one-half of the promised reward.

Hayes stood guard while Kinnie cut and twisted the Indian’s neck until the head separated from the body. He then rolled it in the Indian’s blanket and carried it on the pommel of his saddle until the afternoon, when he rolled the ghastly trophy out on the ground in front of Stephenson and his squaw wife.

“Seems to me if I had your kind of relations I would pay a better price and get them all killed off,” said Hayes, as he returned from the corral.

This remark nettled Stephenson, who smoked his pipe awhile in silence. He then grew angry, ordered the three of us to hit the trail for Fort Morgan at once, saying that two thousand Cheyenne Indians would be down upon us as soon as his squaw could communicate with them. This we refused to do, as neither Kinnie nor Hayes, nor their horses were in condition for flight, besides the old man had not settled and we rightly guessed that he would like to get out of paying the one hundred dollars, as well as preserve his good standing with the Indians.

Later in the evening he was caught hiding a quantity of Winchester cartridges. That settled him. We knew then he wanted to see us slain, while he would endeavor to lay blame upon us. In five minutes he was bound hand and foot and laid upon a corner in the ranch house upon some blankets. The Indian boy was also bound and thrown into another corner for safe keeping. The log ranch house was then loop-holed and our horses were brought inside, also a quantity of hay, wood and water.

We were prepared for a siege. Kinnie and Hayes lay down to sleep, while I kept the first watch of the night. All light was extinguished and I constantly went from loop-hole to loop-hole, peering into the darkness for the approaching foe, while the old man lay upon his blankets, swearing like the old sinner he was. I lay down for some sleep in the after part of the night, leaving the others to watch.

It was daylight when I was awakened by rifle shots. They came from a hill upon whose crest rode forty Cheyenne warriors, bedecked in feathers and war paint and stripped for battle.

We made no reply to their shots, but led them to believe by our silence that the ranch house was deserted.

After pow-wowing for an hour, six of them began advancing cautiously. We waited they were within a hundred feet of the house, when our rifles emptied three of the saddles, and two more were riderless before the sixth retreating Indian reached the main party, which by that time was in commotion and had begun a circling ride around the ranch house to prevent our escape.

For the remainder of the day they kept well out of reach of our rifles, but when night had gathered they stole away their dead and wounded under cover of darkness. The next morning there was no sign of them. We were not to be caught, however, by such a ruse, having played the same game ourselves the morning before. We felt sure they would be reinforced within two days with an overwhelming force that could easily storm the house and tear it down over our heads.

Our only hope was to get away, and we held a council of war in whispers. The old man and boy had been released at intervals to relieve the pain of the cords, but not a word was said to them of our plans. When darkness again came we saddled our horses, stored a quantity of provisions in our blankets, strapped them behind our saddles and filled our canteens with water.

The Indian boy was then liberated and given these instructions:

“Creep along the banks of the creek until you come to the lone cottonwood tree, one and one-half miles distant, then fire six shots from a revolver. This will draw the Indians to you, when you can explain that we have compelled you to do this. If you fail to fire the shots we will kill the old man and charge through the Indian lines anyway.”

This command was delivered to the boy in a manner calculated to impress him with the earnestness of the threat, although it was not our intention to harm Stephenson, and yet the muzzle of a Winchester close to his head caused him to earnestly implore the boy to faithfully do as he was told.

From then the minutes dragged like hours. We watched anxiously from our loop-holes for the flash from the young Indian’s revolver. Twenty minutes passed, then thirty, and no shot was fired. Was he playing us false, or had he been captured by the Cheyennes, who in turn might set a trap for us. Thirty-six minutes passed, then a spark flashed in the distance and we counted six shots. This was the critical moment and every ear was listening for the sounds of horses’ hoofs. A few moments later we heard them, as they came out of the ravines. We saw them, too, as they skirted along the dim sky line. We waited a few minutes to give them time to reach the cottonwood tree and then led our horses out and rode rapidly away to the northwest, knowing that the clatter of our horses’ hoofs would mingle with those of the Indian ponies and might readily be taken for those of their own horsemen.

Our rifles were in our saddle holsters and our heavy revolvers were in our hands, as we rode in silence. Kinnie was in the lead, while Hayes and I rode behind side by side. Not a word was spoken for more than five hours, until day was breaking, and by the red glow of the eastern sky we saw away down the plains the camp fires and white tents of a troop of cavalry from Fort Morgan. Kinnie burst out into a long, hearty peal of laughter.

“What the deuce has struck you now?” asked Hayes.

“I forgot to give daddy any change back,” he replied, as he held up a well-filled pocketbook.

VII

A COWBOY DUEL

Tom Rawlins rolled out of his blankets from under the chuck wagon with the remark, “I suppose a man shouldn’t be late at his own funeral,” and walking over to the camp-fire, lit his pipe by the glowing embers.

Day was breaking, and by a solemn compact entered into with “Kid” Anderson the night before, he would be dead at sunrise.

A month before they had exchanged shots in a dance house in Ogallala, after quarreling about a woman. The two cowboys met in North Platte the day before, for the first time since the affair, and each swore the other should die.

Many of us who were friends of the two men divided into factions and crowded about the principals. The declaration of war having been made on both sides, neither could withdraw without losing caste, as such was the custom in the 70’s among the wild fellows of the plains, who put a cheap estimate on human life. Rawlins had seen four years’ service in the Confederate army, and at the close of the war had followed General Joe Shelby into Mexico and fought under the banner of Maxmilian. When Bazaine withdrew the French troops he secured his discharge and returned to Texas wearing the honorable scars of battle. “Kid” Anderson was inured to the life on the plains from his youth and had been in many an ugly Indian fight.

Someone suggested a duel, and no Indian ever conceived a more fiendish plan. Two Colt revolvers with handles exactly alike, one loaded, the other unloaded, were placed under a blanket with handles protruding. A silver dollar was tossed into the air, heads to win, tails to lose. The winner was to have the choice of the revolvers. If he drew the loaded one, he had the right to shoot the loser, who was to stand ten paces away with the unloaded weapon in his hand. Rawlins won the choice of revolvers and drew the empty one.

Anderson then spent a month’s wages buying drinks for the boys, and kindly gave Rawlins until sunrise the next morning to live. Rawlins accepted his fate with stoicism and returned to camp, rolled in his blankets and slept soundly. Inured to danger for years, he knew sooner or later the end would come, and so gave himself but little concern about it.

It was the spring round up and there were fifteen outfits in camp within two miles of North Platte, and the round up would begin as soon as two more outfits arrived.

The news of the plan and chance of fate by which Rawlins was to lose his life had spread from one camp-fire to another during the night, and created an intense excitement.

Rawlins was standing by the fire, when I. P. Olive, one of the largest owners on the range, rode up.

“Look here, Rawlins, suppose you had won, would you shoot Anderson down like a dog this morning?”

“Certainly I would,” he replied, “and he would not be the first dog I have killed, either.”

“This thing cannot go on,” said Olive, decisively. “If you men have got to kill each other you must do it in a civilized fashion. Your plan is too cold-blooded; it has given the shivers to the entire camp.” He then rode over to the “Double Bar” camp, where Anderson lay sleeping.

“Get up from there, you wild ass of the plains,” he shouted. “Rawlins is waiting to be killed. Are you going to do it?”