So poor little Fort Wallace, alone amidst the burning or freezing plains, last post of the line to protect the road to Denver, was in sore straits.
[154]
The telegraph was two hundred miles east, at Fort Harker; even the stages had stopped running, save at long intervals12, in pairs, when a guard of soldiers could be furnished; dispatches and supplies had been interrupted. Now the bad rations13 were rapidly growing worse, and scurvy14 and cholera15 were aiding the Indians. The scurvy was caused by lack of fresh meat and of vegetables; none of the doctors knew just why the cholera appeared; it seemed to come from the heat and the ground.
The condition of plucky16 Fort Wallace worried the general much. Succor17 must be brought in, of course. His own column had arrived pretty much exhausted18 by long marches; but he decided19 to take one hundred of the better mounted men and make a forced march to Fort Harker, for supplies. Captain Barnitz had not been able to spare any men for that purpose.
To Ned this was the most exciting march yet. It must be made mainly at night, for coolness and to evade20 the Indians. All the stage route from Wallace to Harker was said to be closely watched by the Cheyennes and Sioux. The stations were abandoned; or else the men had collected in their dug-outs, entered by underground passages from the station-house or the stable.
To approach these dug-outs, especially at night, was no pleasant matter. The first appeared as only a low mound5 of earth dimly outlined against the dusky[155] horizon. In fact, the scouts21 must get off their horses and stoop against the ground, to see it. On slowly filed the column—and as the next thing that happened, out from the mound spurted22 a jet of fire—another—two more; and to “Crack! Bang-bang! Crack!” bullets hummed viciously past the general, and Captain Hamilton (who commanded the column), and Ned himself.
“What’s the matter there?” sung out loudly the general and the captain. “We’re friends! White men! Cavalry!”
“Bang! Bang-bang! Crack!” And more bullets.
“Get your men out of here quick, captain. Those fellows are crazy,” directed the general. “Send somebody forward to parley23, and tell ’em who we are.”
Lieutenant24 Tom Custer volunteered.
“You’d better crawl,” advised the general.
Colonel Tom advanced, in the dusk, toward the low mound beside the station buildings. Presently he had disappeared; he was crawling. “Bang!” greeted him a shot.
“Hello!” he hailed. “Don’t shoot. We’re cavalry, I tell you.”
“Come in close then; stand up an’ show yourself, if you’re white,” retorted a voice.
“I’m coming,” answered Tom. “I’m Lieutenant Custer of the Seventh.”
The lieutenant arrived, and the column, listening,[156] could hear him earnestly explaining. Now from the dug-out a light flickered25, and the lieutenant shouted to the column to come on.
The dug-out held five station-men. They were waiting, on the outside, and even in the starlight they were sombre-eyed and haggard.
“What’s the meaning of this, sirs?” demanded the general, angrily.
“Well, cap’n, you see it’s this way,” explained the leader, a huge man with great full beard reaching to his waist. “We thought you was Injuns, an’ we ain’t takin’ any chances, these days.”
“But you heard us hail you in good English.”
“Certain we did; but that didn’t prove much. No, sir-ee. There are Injuns who speak as good English as you do, an’ that’s one o’ their latest tricks. They’re up to every sort o’ scheme, cap’n; an’ while we’re sorry to shoot at you, lettin’ strangers get near at night is too risky26 a matter. Speakin’ English don’t count with us fellows. We’re on to that Injun trick.”
Therefore every occupied stage station must be approached with great caution. Besides the station dug-outs, the negro infantry27 posted in squads28 along the route to protect it had their dug-outs, too. These were of a more military nature than the station dug-outs, and were styled “monitors,” after the Monitor which fought the Merrimac, during the Civil War.
The negro squads first dug out a square hole about[157] breast deep, and large enough—say fifteen feet or more square—to hold them all. About the rim29 they piled up the dirt and sod; and from side to side they laid a roof of planks30 covered with more sod. Then they cut small loop-holes in the low walls, and ran a tunnel out a short distance, with a trap door. And they were well fixed31. They could not be touched by fire or arrow or bullet.
These queer fortifications, like huge squat32 mushrooms upon the flat surface of the bare prairie, did indeed resemble a “cheese-box on a raft.” At one of them, when the column arrived, the five negro soldiers under a corporal were bubbling with glee.
“Yes, suh,” narrated33 the corporal, to the general and anybody else who could hear, “we done had a fight. But ’twarn’t a fight; it was jes’ a sort o’ massacree. After we got this heah monitor ’bout finished, a whole lot o’ Injuns come ridin’ along. Reckon dey must have been five hunderd or five thousand. Fust t’ing dey see, dey see dis ol’ hump a stickin’ up. Don’t know what it-all means. No, suh. Got mighty34 curyus. We-all lay low, an’ let ’em look an’ talk. Dey got so curyus dey couldn’t hold off any longer, so dey rode in, cranin’ an’ stretchin’ laike chickens. When dey come right close, ‘Gin it to ’em!’ say I. ‘Gin it to ’em!’ An’ we did gin it to ’em, out the loop-holes. We gin it to ’em, an’ when dey skadoodled we gin it to ’em some more, an’ kep’[158] ginnin’ it to ’em till dey’s out o’ range. Hi-yah-yah! Dey shore was scared.”
And—“Hi-yah-yah!” shouted in laughter his five privates.
“Good!” praised the general. “How many did they leave on the field, corporal?”
“Well, dey didn’t leab no one on the field, gin’ral,” answered the corporal. “But I reckon we mus’ have killed ’bout half, an’ other half was nigh scyared to deff.”
The general was in a great hurry to reach Fort Hays, where (as all supposed) was Mrs. Custer; and to reach Fort Harker, where could be obtained the medicines and the food for suffering Fort Wallace.
At Fort Hays was found no Mrs. Custer, or Miss Diana, or black Eliza. But all heard about a sudden flood from Big Creek35 which had drowned several soldiers and had almost swept away the tent and the women together; after that, the general’s household had been sent back to Fort Harker, because Hays was not considered safe for them. Here at Hays were waiting letters from Mrs. Custer, and the word that at Harker the cholera was raging deadly.
Now the general was much alarmed; and leaving Captain Hamilton and the company to rest a day at Hays, with Lieutenant Cook and Captain Tom Custer and Ned and two soldiers he pushed on for Harker. The march from Wallace to Hays, 150[159] miles, had been made in fifty-five hours; the ride from Hays to Harker, sixty miles, was made in eleven and a half hours—which was pretty good, considering the long ride that had preceded.
Mrs. Custer was not at Harker. She and Miss Diana and Eliza had been forwarded on to Riley, for Harker was no place in which to stay. So from Harker the general also hastened to Riley—but Ned did not go. Suddenly he felt ill; and the surgeon said that he had the cholera.
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1
outskirts
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| n.郊外，郊区 | |
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2
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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3
barricades
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| 路障，障碍物( barricade的名词复数 ) | |
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4
mounds
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| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
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mound
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| n.土墩，堤，小山；v.筑堤，用土堆防卫 | |
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6
betokened
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| v.预示，表示( betoken的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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7
warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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8
sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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9
picket
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| n.纠察队；警戒哨；v.设置纠察线；布置警卫 | |
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10
wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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11
cavalry
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| n.骑兵；轻装甲部队 | |
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12
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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13
rations
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| 定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量 | |
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14
scurvy
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| adj.下流的，卑鄙的，无礼的；n.坏血病 | |
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15
cholera
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| n.霍乱 | |
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16
plucky
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| adj.勇敢的 | |
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17
succor
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| n.援助，帮助；v.给予帮助 | |
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18
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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19
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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20
evade
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| vt.逃避，回避；避开，躲避 | |
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21
scouts
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| 侦察员[机，舰]( scout的名词复数 )； 童子军； 搜索； 童子军成员 | |
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22
spurted
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| （液体，火焰等）喷出，（使）涌出( spurt的过去式和过去分词 )； （短暂地）加速前进，冲刺 | |
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23
parley
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| n.谈判 | |
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24
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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25
flickered
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| （通常指灯光）闪烁，摇曳( flicker的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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26
risky
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| adj.有风险的，冒险的 | |
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27
infantry
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| n.[总称]步兵(部队) | |
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28
squads
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| n.（军队中的）班( squad的名词复数 )；（暗杀）小组；体育运动的运动（代表）队；（对付某类犯罪活动的）警察队伍 | |
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29
rim
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| n.(圆物的)边，轮缘；边界 | |
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30
planks
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| （厚）木板( plank的名词复数 )； 政纲条目，政策要点 | |
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31
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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32
squat
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| v.蹲坐，蹲下；n.蹲下；adj.矮胖的，粗矮的 | |
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33
narrated
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| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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34
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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35
creek
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| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
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