The women, including Eudora and Faith, did not return his smile. Even after only twenty or so miles, most of the women had discovered that this journey was going to be rough.
They had no idea how rough.
The women got their first taste of river crossings at the Kansas. It was running slightly high due to spring rains, and the crossing was rough and for a few, very wet. Some of the women fell off the wagons and into the drink.
“What the hell are you doin’, Preacher?” Steals Pony asked, riding up. “There is fine crossing only a few miles south of here.”
“I know it,” Preacher replied. “But I want any quitters to start hollerin’ now, whilst they can give it up and still get back to Missouri.”
“But we’ll have to cross the Soldier and the Vermillion on this route,” Snake said.
“Damn sure will.” Preacher’s tone was firm. “I want to shake down this train right off. If they all can stick it out over the next few days, we’ll know what we’ve got.”
“You’re a hard man, Preacher,” one of the locals he had hired back in Missouri said. “But I see why you’re doin’ this. I better get over there and help with the ropes.”
“No, you won’t,” Preacher stopped him. “This crossin’ ain’t nothin’. The water ain’t even hub deep. Let the women handle it. We showed ’em how. Now it’s up to them. I want their muscles hardened up whilst we’re still in more or less friendly country. You local boys ain’t never seen no mountains like we’re gonna have to cross. I want these women tough ’fore we hit ’em.”
The women began to toughen up, and many of them also got mad. They stood on the bank and watched the men sit in their saddles, staring at them, not lifting a finger to help. Those women who had been raised on farms, or, in Eudora’s case, on the coast, and were used to hard work chuckled at the other ladies, smiled at each other, and simply went to work.
Many of the women would not cook for the men that evening, much less speak to them. But other women held no hard feelings, so the men got fed. Eudora smiled across the fire at Preacher as he ladled out stew into his pan.
“You didn’t win any popularity contests this day, Captain,” she said.
“I didn’t plan on winnin’ no prizes. What I plan on doin’ is gettin’ you ladies through to the coast. We ain’t hit nothin’ yet, Eudora. It’s been a cakewalk so far. But these gals will be a hell of a lot tougher when we get there than when we left. Bet on that.”
“I have no doubts about that, Captain. None whatsoever.” She tossed him a huge chunk of bread. “Just baked. Enjoy.”
The following days plodded on and passed uneventfully. By the time the women had crossed the Soldier and then the Vermillion, they knew how to cross rivers—at least small ones—and asked no help from the men. It became a matter of pride to the ladies. And that was what Preacher had been hoping they’d develop.
Despite himself, knowing that the awful, terrible worst was yet to come, he began to feel proud of these women. These women wasn’t no shrinkin’ violets. They were women wanting a new start in a new land, and they were willing to work for it.
They were about three days south of the Little Blue when Steals Pony came galloping back to the train and up to Preacher.
“Indians! Sauk, Fox, and some Winnebagos, Preacher. They’ve come down from the north for their annual spring hunt on the plains.”
There were only very minor differences between the Algonquin tribes such as the Fox, Sauk, Winnebagos, Ojibwa, Ottawa, Illinois, and Miami. Sometimes several tribes would band together for the great spring hunt on the plains. Only a few tribes did not make the trek southward for buffalo, among them the Potawatomi and the Ottawa. They really didn’t have to, for their own country was abundant with moose and deer and bear. Most of those northern tribes combined the planting of crops with hunting.
“Are they friendly?” Preacher asked, not yet halting the wagons.
“Well…they were not unfriendly. But we have to remember that this is their great religious time, too.”
“Yeah,” Preacher agreed. “Manitou. And Manitou can make them unpredictable as a tornader.”
To many Indian tribes, Manitou was all the forces that were present in things—men, rocks, trees, the wind…everything. Manitou also was the controlling hand in their destinies, and if they felt the power of Manitou within them, the Indians’ temperament could be violent.
“Pass the word, Steals Pony. Tell the gals to haul out them rifles and shotguns. Make sure that hair is danglin’. We’re gonna circle for the afternoon and put on a show of force for them.”
Preacher rode up to the lead wagon.
“Savages, Captain?” Eudora asked calmly, no fear evident in her voice.
“Yep. And a bunch of ’em, too. Begin the circle, Eudora.”
“Aye, aye, Captain. If the savages want a fight, we’ll give them one.”
Preacher smiled. For a fact, he’d damn sure hate to tangle with Eudora Hempstead.
6
Preacher sent scouts out to keep an eye on the Indians while he sat his saddle and watched the wagons slowly circle the driven livestock. He’d had the women practice this move, and they did it perfectly, without panic. He rode up to the wagon that had Faith, Gayle, and Wallis in it.
“Don’t worry too much about this bunch,” he told the women. “They’re not gonna risk gettin’ killed and leavin’ their families without no means of food. If they do come close to us, Miss Faith, what you’re gonna see is all that’s left of the Great Lakes tribes. And I mean this is it. They really ain’t been a force to reckon with since Black Hawk and his Sauks and Foxes was cut down back in ’32 as they tried to swim the Mississippi.”
“Then why are we doing this?”
“’Cause you just don’t never know about an Indian. They don’t think like we do. Their values ain’t the same. I’m not sayin’ they’re right or wrong; they’re just different. I ’spect once they see how big a force we are, they’ll ride on. But they might come back tonight and try to steal horses or oxen, or maybe take a scalp or two. You just never really know.”
Faith was scribbling furiously on a tablet.
“Y’all fetch your weapons and get behind cover. I’m goin’ out to confer with them.”
“Pretty sorry-lookin’ bunch,” Ring remarked, when Preacher rode up.
Preacher looked at the gathering of Indians about a quarter of a mile away. And as he watched them, he knew this bunch would give them no trouble. Even at this distance, he could tell that many of the men were old by the way they sat their ponies. “Get all the men up here,” Preacher told Ring. “Rifles in hand. Line up along this ridge. I think that’ll be all we have to do. And put that damn Rupert Worthington right here next to me. I don’t want him startin’ nothin’.”
The twenty-five men, all carrying rifles, lined up in a single line on the ridge, each man about five feet from the next.
“Are they hostile?” Lieutenant Worthington asked, his eagerness for battle obvious in the question.
“No, boy,” Preacher told him. “They ain’t hostile. They’re just old and tired and beat down in spirit and wore out. That’s all. And I ain’t gonna take what pride they have left away from ’em. Stay here. Steals Pony, Snake, let’s ride.”