Calamity by J. D. Jordan

Author:J. D. Jordan
Language: fra
Format: epub
Publisher: Endpapers Press
Published: 2016-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

TWELVE

Was a whirlwind, that next day was. The tribe was all activity, women and kids helping the men ready for war. And the weapons they had? Goddamn! Never was an army on Earth armed like them savages. Queerest mix of bows and rifles and Green guns you ever saw. And some of them weapons they took out of that ship? Hell, I’ve seen them in action and I couldn’t begin to tell you what they was. And right to say them Injuns didn’t plumb understand them guns, neither. But they knew which end was the business and where to aim them.

And before the sun was a hand span above the hills, that whole tribe was all on the move. East toward the Platte and bloodshed. Crazy Horse rode with me most of the morning, talking through the plan with me. Wasn’t no talking as clear as Red Cloud’s, understand, but was proper words, all the same. And all the while, that warrior kept eyeing that horse of mine. Of the Green Man’s, I mean. Reckon I caught him watching me a bit, too, when he figured I wasn’t looking. Seems a lot of men never saw one such as me. A girl what could keep up and fight and ride and curse with the best of them. A girl what ain’t trapped in some dress or some house or some bed. A girl what ain’t waiting on some man to do what she ought to her own damn self.

Was a little after noon a group of Cheyenne rode up. Seems them Grays was fucking with more than just the Lakota. Looking to make the whole West a bloodbath, them gray fellas was. Giving space-man guns to them savages so they could force the Union to pay top price when their time come. I reckon a Gatling doesn’t hold much water against guns like what these Lakota carried. And I reckon them Army boys would pay just about anything to keep them savages from getting revenge for a century of blood.

But riding with that tribe, on that eerie, silent horse, I’d my moments of pause. Got to wondering what I was getting these braves into. Was just one man I was caring about here—a green man what might already be dead. And here I was betting the lives of a few hundred braves against his one. I’d done seen these men with their women and their babes just the night before in camp. And here I was risking making a bone orchard out of them if my plan didn’t go off. But, goddamn, I’d have done just about anything to get my Green Man back. By hook or crook, I’d pull him from that gray fella’s clutches, even if it meant setting the Sioux nation afire. Even if it meant burning all the Wyoming.

So that night—the night before I faced the Gray Man—we camped a few hours’ ride from the fort. Was a steady stream of braves riding up to join us all day until there must’ve been a thousand or more warriors in that camp.

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