The Red Hills (10 page)

'Get out, Silas,' she yelled. 'Get out and go and play with yourself while you look at those pictures of women and dogs!! That's what you really like, isn't it?'

Keeping a careful watch on Menges, Crow stepped back to one side and started to get dressed, turning his eyes to Simpson, framed in the entrance to the tent. He didn't speak to the Trooper. Just looked at him.

Simpson backed quickly out and the tent flap fell closed shutting the three of them into the stuffy darkness.

'Go away!!' Realizing that her husband wasn't going to kill either of them. Was too shocked or too drunk. And that realization suddenly brought out all her hatred in a flood of screaming bile that must have been audible to the entire camp.

'Crow's a real man, Silas. Not a fumbling dog like you who spends in his breeches and then goes to sleep. A man!!! With the engine of love of a man. Not that pathetic little shrimp you hide away.'

The husband and wife seemed oblivious to Crow and he managed to get dressed, still holding the Purdey in case Menges decided to go for the pistol.

'Shut up, Angelina,' said Menges, quietly, hands drooping at his side, swaying like a man in the last stages of exhaustion.

'Oh, you'd like that, wouldn't you? Well, I've had enough of shutting up for your foul mouth and fouler mind. In the morning I shall pack and leave for Fort Buford, if you will be kind enough to arrange an escort. From there I shall go back to my parents and we will never ever meet again in this world.' He opened his mouth to reply but she hadn't yet finished her outburst. 'For all I have suffered I shall enjoy eternal celestial bliss while you, Silas Menges, will surely burn forever in the flames of Hell!!'

She clambered to her feet and began to wrap her dress about her, ignoring both Crow and her husband.

'Angelina!' Menges howled the name like a coyote, taking a step to put himself directly in front of her. Crow swung the scatter-gun towards him but the officer's hands never lifted at all.

The woman smiled at her husband. It wasn't a nice smile at all. She lowered the dress and showed him her body.

'There. That's what Crow enjoyed with me. Not just tonight. Lots of times, dearest Silas.'

It was a foolish lie but Crow didn't bother to challenge it. There wasn't really any point.

'He was
so
good, Silas. So wonderful as a lover.'

'No.'

'Oh, yes Silas. There, look at my body that you have always reviled. It is the last time you will ever see it.'

With a lightning gesture she pushed her fingers into her own groin, slapping her husband across the face with it, smearing Menges's cheeks with the evidence of her adultery.

The Captain never moved, face white as parchment, eyes told slits that froze on his wife. Not making a move to wipe the mess from his plump cheeks. Not even watching her as she pushed past him and left the tent.

Crow followed her, never turning his back towards Menges.

'Goodnight, Lieutenant Crow,' said the Captain, quietly remaining in the tent.

Alone.

The next morning was beautiful. A bright sun bursting up from a red horizon to the east, hanging in a sky of clearest blue, unspoiled by a single cloud.

Crow was up and dressed by a little after five-thirty, buckling on his saber. The way that Menges had been talking earlier in the previous disastrous evening it had seemed that he was going to try and revenge his defeat by the Sioux as soon as possible.

'Morning, Lieutenant,' said Sergeant McLaglen, a clean white bandage round his wounded arm, saluting as Crow emerged from his own tent, blinking in the bright morning light.

'Morning, Sergeant. We sent out a patrol round about dawn?'.

'Sir?' replied McLaglen, puzzled.

'I heard bridles and hooves. Sounded like a patrol.'

'Didn't hear it, Sir. Oh, the Captain's compliments and would you and Mister Kemp attend on him as soon as possible. Sorry. I mean as soon as convenient.'

Crow was amazed. 'Menges actually put it like that?'

'Surely did, Sir. And it's surprised I am by it, after the dreadful shenanigans last night. The Captain seems as mild as milk this morning.' He paused and dropped his voice. 'We all heard the... you know, Sir? I thought you should know that it was the sneaking little bastard, Simpson, that ratted on you and the lady.'

Crow nodded. 'Can't say that it surprises me over much, Sergeant. I guess that little soldier's goin' to get it from someone real soon. Maybe me.'

McLaglen grinned, his face crumpling into a mass of seamed lines like a relief map of a desert. 'Or maybe me, Sir,' he said, touching the butt of his pistol.

Menges was pacing up and down outside his tent when Crow marched up and saluted him. Lieutenant Kemp was huddled in his chair looking uncomfortable but it wasn't clear whether it was because of his stomach disorder or because of hearing, like everyone else in the unit, the amazing public row between the Captain and his wife.

'Morning, Crow,' said Menges, favoring him with a smile. A smile that seemed genuine. Something had happened that had put the officer in a good mood. And that worried Crow.

'We movin' against the Indians today, Sir?' he asked Menges, deciding that if the previous night wasn't going to be referred to then that was all right with him. But the smile on the face of the Captain would, if anything, make him guard his back even more carefully.

'I believe we are, Mister Crow. And I have created a plan that will enable you to use your skills to their best advantage.'

Again the smile. A glitteringly friendly smile that split the chubby face. For the first time Crow realized that the man's sanity might be questionable.

Kemp looked up at Menges. 'I'd be obliged if there could be a chance for me to engage in action against the hostiles, Sir,' he said.

'My, oh my,' said Menges softly. 'Regular fire-eater all of a sudden, Mister Kemp. Still, I believe we shall be able to help you out. We will all move, including wounded, at noon.'

Crow wondered about Angelina Menges. Would she be coming with them? He didn't care that much and he certainly wasn't going to risk a confrontation with the Captain by asking him.

As it happened he got the answer anyway.

A moment or two later Menges sat down in another of the folding canvas chairs and stretched out his legs, smiling like a man who has just completed a most satisfactory meal at the end of a perfect and enjoyable day.

'You have noticed that my wife is not here with us on this fine morning, Mister Crow?' It wasn't the sort of question that needed an answer and Crow kept silent. 'I felt that what the lady needed was to go away from here for a time. Perhaps for a long time.'

As they were surrounded by the Oglala and their allies, Crow was puzzled by this. And so was Lieutenant Kemp.

If she has gone with an escort, how can we have enough men to tackle Crazy Horse, Sir?'

'Good question, Mister Kemp.'

McLaglen stood there, face reflecting the struggle passing through his mind. 'Sir?'

Menges was having a good time of it. 'Yes, Sergeant McLaglen? What can we do for you?'

'I believe that the patrol that went out this morning was only two Troopers.'

'Yes.'

'But... then that was not the same patrol that accompanied Mrs. Menges?'

'Yes, it was.' The Captain was hugging himself with delight at his own cunning.

Then... ' the question that trembled on McLaglen's lips was so awful that the Sergeant couldn't bring himself to frame it to Captain Menges.

Kemp stood up, snapping to attention. 'With your permission, Sir?'

'Granted, Lieutenant.'

'Mrs. Menges has gone to Fort Buford?'

'Correct. Is that all?'

Then Crow knew. Knew with a sick certainty that the man was mad. Knew with the same bitter anger what Menges had done to punish his wife for shaming him.

'With two men?' Kemp's voice cracked in disbelief.

'Correct again, Mister Kemp. Now if that is all then .?..'

'By God, Captain, but that is not all!!'

'What does this mean, Mister Kemp? My wife expressed a most earnest wish to leave this unit. I am sure that you heard her. Did you not hear her?'

'Yes, but...'

'No damned "buts" from you. Or from any man here!! I am the officer commanding this unit and while I live I do what I want with my men. And with that whorin' slut of a fuckin' bitch that used to be my wife!!!!'

His voice rose to a scream and spittle bubbled from the thick lips, dribbling into the dust. Kemp took a step back from his anger, still not able to believe what Menges had done.

'You sent her to Fort Buford with only two troopers as escort? You know that the trail is lined with Oglala. They will all be killed. Your own wife!'

'I will not hear another word about it from you, Lieutenant Kemp,' said Menges, dropping his voice again, looking up to see that every soldier in the camp had stopped whatever he was doing and was listening, gape-mouthed, to the scene. 'Not another word or I shall have you wagon-wheeled with a bayonet between your jaws. Mister Kemp. Not a word. But, I would be interested to hear from you, Mister Crow.'

'I have nothing to say.'

'Nothing?'

'Nothing that I would wish to say to you, Captain.'

Menges smiled. That same lunatic grin that split his face across from side to side. 'I order you to tell me what you think of what I have done, Lieutenant. Trooper Simpson!'

The small, thin-faced soldier appeared from behind the tent, stopping in front of the Captain. 'Trooper Simpson. One of the few loyal spirits in this den of insubordination and treacherous conspiracy. I have just ordered this officer to give me his opinion of my actions. If he refuses I shall have him arrested and you will be the witness to that.'

'Indeed I will, Captain Menges. Indeed I will.'

Although he didn't know it, the Trooper had signed his own death-warrant as far as Crow was concerned.

After a long pause the lean man spoke, picking his words like a man taking fruit from among the spines of a saguaro cactus.

'You choose to use this way of removing your wife, then that is your affair and I care nothing about it.'

'Nothing, Crow?'

'Nothing at all, Sir. But I think it wrong that you should sacrifice two of your men to satisfy your hatred of your wife and to secure her death.'

The silence stretched to breaking-point and on past it.

McLaglen looked as if he was going to speak out and turned it into a cough, while Kemp's face paled beneath his tan and he looked away across the rolling grass of the Dakota prairie.

Crow tensed himself, ready to draw on Menges, watching the private soldier, Simpson, as well, suspecting that he would prove a back-shooter. But neither of them moved.

'I will recall that, Mister Crow. Perhaps we shall talk of this after the coming battle against the Indians. Or perhaps we will not. Perhaps we should meet again in, let us say one hour. Then our tempers can cool. But I am sure that you are wrong about my wife. I shall be going to Fort Buford and I am sure that I shall meet her there. But you, Mister Crow... I don't think that
you
will ever see her again.'

As it turned out, Menges wasn't right.

Not completely...

Crow could easily have deserted.

Cut his losses and ridden off on the big black stallion, with his guns holstered and his dark clothes on his lean frame. Both McLaglen and Kemp spoke to him separately and urged him not to stay for what they both thought would be suicide.

Kemp put it shortly and simply to him, snatching the chance after they had heard what passed for a briefing from Menges.

'He has murdered Angelina, Crow. Now he plans to complete his revenge with you. You and ten men are to be the bait in his trap, but I don't believe that he will follow on as he has said to save you. And I will be helpless with McLaglen in the rear. When you are dead he will come sweatin' in at the gallop and weep that he was too late and your name will be mentioned in his dispatches for your bravery against desperate odds. Menges can afford to be generous over your scalped and mutilated corpse.'

It was the longest speech that the young Scots officer had ever made since Crow had met him, and he was touched by the man's concern.

'No, but I thank you for it. I am not truly like many men, Mister Kemp. I see my path laid out before me. Some would call it "destiny", but I call it only what I must do.' He paused. 'And I must do it.'

'You will be dead by the time the sun sets. Or tied to a Sioux lodge-pole while their squaws work on your helpless body.'

Crow shook his head. 'I do not believe that. I have been in places and seen what you describe but...' he hesitated as if he regretted lifting an edge of the curtain on his past.

'No, Mister Kemp. I think that this will be a good day for fighting. Perhaps what the Oglala call a good day to fight and a good day to die. Brave men to the front and faint hearts to the rear.' His voice slipped from its normal calm and his black eyes glittered in the bright sun. Kemp looked at him through new eyes, wondering if what Menges had said wasn't true. There did seem something of the Indian in Crow.

The briefing had been short, in the presence of Trooper Simpson.

First McLaglen, and then Kemp were called in and spoken to on their own.

Finally, it was Crow's turn.

Menges sat behind his travelling desk, papers and sketch maps scattered over its top. Simpson stood at the side of the tent, face impassive, listening and saying nothing.

'I give you ten men, Mister Crow. You will ride along this trail, here,' pointing at the biggest map. 'I believe that Crazy Horse will attempt to lead you on into another ambush. You will follow at your best speed. When you encounter superior forces I will be close enough to hear and I will come... to your rescue. Mister Kemp will hold a further five or six Troopers in reserve against a need to cover our return. That is all, Mister Crow, unless you have some questions for me?'