The woman nodded. “Then she’ll need all the attention and love we can give her.”
The lieutenant felt awkward and clumsy. “Well, please carry on, ma’am.”
He turned on his heel and walked away, glad to be gone from there and the concerns of womenfolk.
After he’d seen his wounded and dead carried into the hospital, Stryker had Trooper Ruxton taken to the guardhouse and then dismissed the detail. Before entering the headquarters building, he untied a new Winchester from the saddle horn, then gave his horse over to the care of Trooper Kramer. He heard the young soldier tell Hogg that the frog in his pocket was still alive, though it was exhibiting definite signs of being down in the mouth and he confidently expected the creature would bite the dust before nightfall.
“Keep checking on it until dark, boy,” the scout said. “As any doctor will tell you, the frog cure is the sovereign remedy for asthma and it has never been known to fail.”
Stryker watched Trooper Kramer leave. Was it only his imagination or had the boy’s breathing sounded easier? Then another thought hit him hard: Why the hell did he care?
But he did. And that gave him pause. It was something to think about . . . later.
A couple of loungers propped up the timber poles that supported the headquarters’ porch. The younger man was a drover in from one of the surrounding ranches with a supply of beef. The other was a scout Stryker had seen hanging around the fort. Long John Wills was nearly seven feet tall in his moccasins and sported a magnificent red beard that hung all the way to the crotch of his greasy buckskins. He had a vague reputation as an Indian fighter and a more definite one as a ladies’ man.
“Seen you ride in, Lieutenant,” he said, “bringing in dead and wounded, an’ all. Run into Apaches?”
Stryker nodded. “West of here.”
“Ol’ Nana’s out.”
“Yes, so I heard.”
Wills inclined his head. “See the tents over yonder?”
“I saw them as I rode in.”
“Two companies of the Twenty-third Infantry. Them boys are green as can be and their major is a little feller who looks like he’s about twelve years old. All the cavalry, including the Second, is being sent to Fort Bowie.”
“Then the Twenty-third has been ordered here to guard the fort?”
Wills smiled. “Never was a truer word spoke, Lieutenant.” He looked over at the tents, then threw up his hands. “God help us all.”
“Colonel Devore inside?”
“He is, with that major I told you about. I think his name is Hayes . . . Haynes . . . something like that.”
Stryker put his hand on the door, but Wills’ voice stopped him. “Lieutenant, Colonel Devore is right testy today. He’s sore about losing his cavalry.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
After the oppressive, dusty heat of the day, the inside of the adobe felt cool, its windows shuttered against the blaze of the sun. An elderly corporal sat at a desk to one side of the door to the colonel’s office.
The man rose to his feet and saluted when Stryker entered, his eyes darting everywhere, unwilling to settle on the contorted mask of the lieutenant’s face.
“First Lieutenant Stryker’s compliments to the colonel, and ask him if now is convenient to make my report.”
The corporal seemed relieved that he no longer had to meet the lieutenant’s eyes. He knocked on the colonel’s door, stuck his head inside and repeated Stryker’s words.
“Send him in,” Devore said.
Stryker stepped inside, the Winchester hanging loose at his side.
Colonel Michael Devore sat behind his desk, a grizzled, medium-sized man of forty-five who had begun his career as a cavalry private at the outbreak of the War Between the States and had risen through the ranks to brevet brigadier general.
Devore was no spit-and-polish soldier, but a fighting man who understood the limitations of light cavalry in Indian warfare but used its flexibility and speed of movement to full advantage. He knew his men, loved the desert and admired the Apache as a skilled guerilla fighter.
He also looked another man directly in the eye, as he did now to Stryker.
“You’ve been through it, Lieutenant.”
Stryker nodded. “Yes sir, some.”
Devore waved a hand. “Meet Major Hanson; he commands the infantry you must have noticed when you rode in.”
Hanson was blond, boyish and small, wearing a neat tunic that somehow had not gathered a coating of gray desert dust. Stryker suspected the major had carefully brushed his uniform before meeting with his formidable superior officer.
After registering the initial shock that Stryker’s appearance always caused, Hanson stood and gave the lieutenant a surprisingly firm handshake and a friendly grin. Like Devore, he sought eye contact.
Stryker and Hanson made the usual polite exchanges expected of officers, “Welcome to Fort Merit, sir,” and “Delighted to be here, Lieutenant,” but Devore cut it short. “Since he’s going to be directly involved in the defense of this post, Major Hanson should listen to your report, Lieutenant.”
Using as few words as possible, Stryker told of the attack on the Norton and Stewart stage and the massacre at the ranch. He then described the action in the arroyo and the murder committed by the mutinous deserter Sergeant Miles Hooper.
“And this man, Trooper Louis Ruxton?”
“In the guardhouse, sir. He’s charged with inciting a mutiny.”
“I have a short way with mutineers, Lieutenant, especially in wartime.” Devore’s face hardened. “I’ll convene a court-martial for later this afternoon, to be followed immediately by the firing squad.”
He rose and took the Winchester from Stryker’s hand. “You’ve done well, Lieutenant. This is from the arroyo battle?”
“Yes, sir, one of six we took off the Apache dead.”
“And you suspect Sergeant Rake Pierce supplied these?”
“Yes, sir, I do. New guns and new ammunition.”
“Well, it’s possible. But last I heard he was in the Madres.”
“I think he may be closer,” Stryker said. “With Nana out and joined up with Geronimo, this is where the market is for his guns.”
“The consensus of opinion is that Nana will leave the territory and raid deep into Mexico, Lieutenant. That’s why the cavalry, myself included, is being recalled to Fort Bowie. We will pursue Nana and Geronimo and make sure they remain south of the Rio Grande.”
“Nevertheless, sir, I believe that Pierce is somewhere in the Cabezas Mountains. If he is out of the picture and the Apaches can’t get guns and ammunition, Nana will be forced to return to the San Carlos.”
Devore’s smile was barely a twitch of his lips under his mustache. “There’s nothing personal in your request, of course?”
“You know it’s personal, sir. I make no secret of it.”
Seeing the confused look on Major Hanson’s face, the colonel said, “Mr. Stryker and Rake Pierce have a history. The lieutenant’s last detail before he was to be transferred to Washington was to bring Sergeant Pierce from Fort Bowie to here to be court-martialed for desertion.”
“Sir, with all due respect, do you feel this is necessary?” Stryker asked. He suddenly felt vulnerable, like a man, naked from the bathtub, who walks into a surprise party.
“Lieutenant, your face speaks volumes, and I think Major Hanson should be aware of the reason,” Devore said. “He’s too much of a gentleman to ask, but he will soon be in command of this post and he has a right to know what kind of man Pierce is, and indeed, what kind of man you are.”
Then, damn you, let me tell it, Colonel.
“Major, it was drawing on to dark when I left Fort Bowie, so we camped for the night close to Silver Strike Spring. Somehow Pierce got out of his shackles—maybe one of his friends at Bowie had passed him a duplicate key—I don’t know. Anyway, he grabbed the gun of the other escort and shot him dead. He also wounded me. Then he took the shackle chain and swung it back and forth across my face, screaming that I’d never put those irons on him again.