Philip Dampier's Blog

Shootout at the Spring

Episode Twenty-one

Marshal Pennington addressed the group of men lying in the grass beneath the trees, “There will be no fires lit. I encourage every one of you to secure what food you can. There may be some jerky left at our fire, and we are willing to share. Hopefully, you didn’t come this far without provisions.

“As soon as you are able, see to your horses and then mount up. As soon as it’s dark, we’re headed due east out of here. Before we get to the Missouri, we’ll turn southeast and head for Fort Pierre. It will, without a doubt, be a cold night, but the wind will be at our back for aways.”

“You gone travel all night, Marshal? We’re plumb tuckered out,” the sheriff responded.

“I’m putting as much space between the Sioux and my party as I can. You want to stay here and fight the Sioux or stop after a bit and see if they follow you, that’s your business. Those going with me need to be ready when darkness falls. We ride out one behind another, and we will make no noise. Do you understand? No talking, no smoking, no foolishness.”

The sheriff drew closer to Chad and held his voice down.

“I got the arrowhead out of Pearson’s shoulder but I’m not sure he can ride all the way to Fort Pierre. He can’t use his right arm and hand to control his horse, that’s for sure. The jolting isn’t going to do that wound any good, either. He’ll bust that cloth bandage open and lose a lot of blood.”

“He’s your responsibility, sheriff. I’m responsible for Deputy Ben, and Lance, my prisoner. You men rode out hell-bent for leather and now you’ve got a mess. I’m sorry. You might be able to hold these Sioux off for a day or two. I’ll tell the fort and they can send help to you then.”

“What about my posse member out there on the prairie? Aren’t we gone try to get his body?”

“I’m not risking my life or my deputy’s life for something that you could have avoided. Stay here, and if you live, get the body. We’re leaving come dark with or without you.”

Low murmurs and whispered swear words followed the marshal’s comments. Chad left them alone to figure out what they wanted to do. He knew it would be a disaster to stay where they were. They would soon be out of food and water and at the Sioux’s mercy. He also knew there was little of that godly commodity among Sioux who had been riled up.

Like a slow-moving fog, the dark spread from east to west, eventually hiding the trees, the spring and the rise on the other side of the spring. Lance was sitting on his horse, which was attached to Chad’s saddle by a ten-foot lead rope. Ben was mounted behind him, and following him was Old Joe, his mule.

Chad could hear murmuring among the posse and twice he heard Bill Pearson cry out. He remembered his own experience at the spring with a wound and felt sorry for Pearson. The sheriff was right, Pearson would not do well with an all-night ride, but on the other hand, he wasn’t going to fare well staying there surrounded by angry Indians without food and water.

This was rough country and unforgiving to careless mistakes, whether yours or someone else’s. No one in their right mind stirred up trouble with Indians, especially the Sioux.

“What do you think, Ben?” he asked the former Buffalo Soldier.

“I think we better go while we can unless we want to wind up with our scalp hanging in the wind on some brave’s tipi.”

Chad nodded. “Well, you know more about Indians than I do, but I sure don’t like the odds of staying here surrounded by angry Sioux in spite of Pearson’s situation. We need to move, let’s do it.”

Chad did not wait for the moon to appear in the darkened sky but urged Buck toward the east as soon as his eyes adjusted to the less-than-dim light. Once they were a mile or two away, he would welcome any heavenly light so they could better see the terrain.

Nancy

Nancy lit a lamp and began a second search of the small house in the hope of finding something that needed to be done. She looked at the calendar she had been marking. Just a couple of days now, and she would know one way or another. She wasn’t yet sure how she felt about it. If she were pregnant and Chad didn’t come back, what would she do? She missed her mother, and she missed Chad. The loneliness, coupled with the question of pregnancy, was overbearing.

She straightened the borrowed magazines for the third time. She looked for dust to wipe away, anything to occupy her mind, but she could find nothing. She had done everything already. She sat by the table with the lamp and picked up a magazine she had tried to read before and then laid it back down. She unfolded the telegram and briefly scanned it for the umpteenth time. Then she chose the book that had belonged to her mother.

The page after the frontispiece of the Bible had a brief family tree. She traced her mother and father’s name with her finger. There were no pictures of them stored in boxes or trunks, only in her memory. She saw their faces as she touched their names and felt a comforting warmth spread through her arm and shoulder and into her body. She felt for the worn black ribbon that lay flattened in the scriptures and opened the book to the marked page. It was in Psalms. Her eyes fell upon the fourth verse of the twenty-third Psalm. The ribbon had lain there for a long time.

She thought about how often her mother had sought that particular psalm. She was sure her mother could have found the place in the dark with just the feel of her fingers. She had not needed a marker any more than she needed to actually read the words. The twenty-third Psalm was inscribed on her mother’s heart. She wondered, in a moment of hindsight, why she wasn’t as familiar with the verse.

She read it out loud to herself, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” The thought came to her: I don’t need work; I need God. It’s what my mother would have told me. I’m embarrassed that I’ve left Him out of my struggle.

She walked over to the calendar and wrote in day ten, “Trust in God.”

Full darkness came, and Nancy read on, finding verse after verse telling of God’s care for His people. Her head snapped up with a jerk. She had fallen asleep reading. She smiled, closed the worn leather Bible, and placed it on the table. Using the flickering lamp, she made her way to the bedroom, where she did not bother to undress but crawled under the covers and immediately went to sleep.

Chad

Chad did not look behind him, but he could tell from the sounds of hooves and grunts that the entire party was following his lead and evacuating the grove. If the Sioux returned the next morning or even later that night, they would find their quarry gone. Maybe they would just lick their wounds and go look for a herd of buffalo. He personally had more than enough killing for one day.

The moon did finally come out, and with it, the stars. It was a clear night, and while the moon was only half full, there was enough light to ride by. What a timely blessing, Chad thought, and he was sure Parson Linwood would agree.

The clear sky, in combination with the growing wind, ensured a drop in temperature as each hour passed. The small group of horsemen had drawn their coats close and huddled their bodies tight under them and they thanked God that the wind was behind them and not in their faces.

It became more difficult to stay awake as the hours passed; every now and then, one of the posse members slid off their horse to land in the tall prairie grass. Chad called a halt, while the rider was helped back on his mount. No one spoke or commented. It was miserable enough without sarcasm.

Three hours before daylight, it became necessary to turn south, which put the wind on their right quarter. It was then that the serious groaning began. Chad did not groan, but he felt the chill on his body, and his lower limbs were losing their feeling. It was doubtful they could continue much further in the open, especially the men who were nursing injuries. It was also getting rough on the animals; they all needed to be rubbed down and dried off to survive in the bone chilling wind.