Tucker’s Grove by Kevin J. Anderson Read Free Book Online Page A

already!” A few scattered gunshots rang out down below as the Sioux made use of the rifles they had taken from dead soldiers. “ They missed him. He ’ s got the water, and he ’ s coming back up!”
    “ In his state, Kenner probably wouldn ’ t feel the bullet even if they did hit him.” Barrett said to Edgerton. Blood dried around the spectacled man ’ s lips. Self-consciously, Edgerton wiped his mouth.
    “ Is Darby to the creek yet?” Edgerton asked.
    “ Can ’ t see him.”
    Kenner appeared at the top of the bluff and handed two bri m ming water pots to the dumbfounded Captain. “ Don ’ t just stand there! Get me two more pots — come on!” The captain scra m bled to obey.
    Impatient, Kenner picked up a large rock and hurled it over the bluff rim into the night. At that moment a shooting-star bla zed overhead, and it seemed almost as if Kenner had thrown it as well.
    Kenner snorted. “ Ain ’ t anybody else coming?” He grabbed two more pots and scrambled down the steep trail again. More gu n fire bounced and skittered along the creekbed below.
    “ Darby ’ s com ing up,” Tucker announced. A few moments later, the other man lurched over the rim carrying a canteen filled with barely a cup of water.
    “ Good thing those Sioux are lousy shots.” Darby gasped. Edgerton noticed a bleeding wound on the man ’ s arm where a bull et had grazed him. “ I ’ m not going down there again.”
    “ They ’ re just toying with us,” Barrett mumbled. “ Cat and mouse. Isn ’ t it fun?”
    Tucker gasped. “ That idiot! Kenner ’ s down there, up to his knees in the water, jumping up and down and cussing at the I n dians!”
    “ What the hell!” Edgerton, Barrett and Darby knelt beside Tucker, searching for the burly man somewhere below. The gunfire had stopped, but in the fresh silence they could hear the quiet patter on stone as the Sioux shot arrows.
    Below, Kenner stop ped shouting, still defiant. His large body jerked, twitched, and fell backward into the water.
    The captain stood at the rim of the bluff. “ Is anybody going to go down and get him? See if he ’ s still alive? Or, for the sake of mercy, rescue his body from th e Indians? You saw what they did to the ones we left behind this afternoon.”
    “ Why don ’ t you go get him, Captain?” Barrett asked. “ He fetched your water.”
    “ He was your friend,” the captain snapped.
    “ I ’ m not going down there again!” Darby insisted.
    “ He wasn ’ t my friend,” Barrett said.
    “ You ’ re not making me do it!” Tucker whined. “ I ’ m too scared. If you threw me over the edge, I wouldn ’ t even fall down there ’ cause I ’ m so scared.”
    Edgerton mumbled, “ He wasn ’ t my friend either.”
    ³
    “ It ’ s ironic, even laughable now. But at the time we could i m agine no greater terror than that night on Reno Hill… . Our i m aginations have grown since then.”
    — Lieutenant Edgerton ’ s journal.
    ³
    In the back of my mind I always knew this war to be far more than a mere conflict between two armies. No, it was a battle of trained soldier against painted warrior, civilization against bloodthirsty savagery, modern military techniques against a r row and tomahawk.
    By all rights we should have won!
    Perhaps civilization just doesn ’ t belong here.
    Ther e are those who claim the Sioux have a right to commit their atrocities, but you would be hard-pressed to find one such man among the survivors of Reno Hill, the ones who watched in the settling dust of a bloated afternoon as Sioux women ran over the batt l efield, slitting the throats of wounded troopers. Or as warriors stripped and mutilated the bodies of our comrades so that — as the Sioux believe — the spirits of the fallen enemy will find no peace in heaven.
    Before any man tells me the savages have a right t o do this, I will tell him to go back and look at the graves, to reflect for a moment that not one unmutilated body lies buried there,