''Bring Me His Ears'' by Clarence E. Mulford (story reading txt) 📖

At first Woodson flatly refused to run, sneeringly reminding his friends of the lack of cooperation he could expect from the very men who needed law and order and leadership most. He knew by bitter experience that the captain of a Santa Fe caravan had no real authority and that his orders were looked upon as mere requests, to be obeyed or not, as the mood suited. He was obdurate in his refusal until a split occurred in the other strong party and resulted in a disgraceful fight among its members, which was kept from having disastrous results only by the determined interposition of the more resolute members of his own party. This caused the two smaller factions to abandon their own candidates and throw themselves against Wardell, and resulted in the overwhelming election of the man best suited for the position.

His first act after grudgingly accepting the thankless leadership was to ask for a list of the men, wagons, and pack animals, and he so engineered the division of them that each section had as its lieutenant a man whom he could trust and who did not lack in physical courage so much needed to get some kind of order and to keep it. The great train was divided into four divisions, at the present to join so as to march in two columns; but later to spread out and travel in divisional order of four straight columns abreast, far enough apart so that the width of the whole front roughly would equal the length of a column.

Next came the arrangement of the watches, the most cordially hated of all caravan duties. In this train of nearly ninety wagons there were nearly one hundred and eighty men physically able to stand a guard, and no one who was able to stand his trick was let off. The captain preferred the regular and generally accepted system of two watches, each of four squads, which put one squad on duty for three hours each alternate night; but there were so many men for this disagreeable task that he allowed himself to be over-ruled and consented to a three watch system, six squads to the watch, which put one watch of nine men and a corporal on duty for two hours every third night. Almost any concession was worth making if it would arouse a little interest and a sense of duty in this very important matter of guarding the camp. The corporal of each squad arranged to shift up one tour each time their squad went on, which would give no one squad the same hours for its successive tours of duty. Nothing could have been fairer than this, but there were objectors in plenty. Each one of the kickers had his own, perfect plan. Some wanted smaller squads with the same number of watches so that each tour of duty would be less; some wanted two watches and smaller squads, to the same end, both of which would have caused endless changing of the guard, endless awakenings all night long, with practically continuous noise and confusion. Captain Woodson, having abandoned the regular and tried system so as to let the men feel a sense of cooperation, flatly refused to allow any further changes, and in consequence earned the smoldering grudges of no small number, which would persist until the end of the trail and provide an undercurrent of dissatisfaction quick to seize on any pretext to make trouble.

For the division officers he chose the four men he had in mind, after over-ruling a demand for a vote on them. As long as he was responsible for the safety of the caravan he declared that it was his right to appoint lieutenants whom he knew and could trust. The bickering had fresh fuel and continued strong all day, and it would last out the journey.

Arranging the divisions so far as possible to put friends together, with the exception of some of the tenderfoot parties, they were numbered, from left to right, as they would travel, and he was careful to put the more experienced plainsmen on the two outside ranks and, where possible, the better drivers in the two inner columns. These latter had a little more complex course to follow in case of sudden need to corral the caravan. For corralling while traveling in two columns, he instructed the drivers to follow the wagon ahead and to stop when his own wagon tongue came even with the rim of the rear wheel of the wagon he was following. In case of corralling in face of danger, they were to swing their teams to the inside of the leading wagon, so as to have all the animals on the inside of the corral; in ordinary camping they were to swing their teams in the other direction, so the animals would be ready to graze outside of the corralled wagons. They were to pay no attention to direction or to sudden inspirations, but were blindly to follow the wagon in front of them and to close up the gaps. The leading driver of each column would set the curving track which would bring the wagons into a great ellipse or a circle while moving in the two column formation.

The first and fourth columns were commanded by Jim Ogden and Tom Boyd, while the two inner columns were under a trader named Haviland and a sullen, mean-tempered trader of Independence and a warm friend of Schoolcraft. His name was Franklin, and while his personal attributes were unpleasant and he was a leader of the Schoolcraft element, he was a first class caravan man and had proved his coolness and resourcefulness in many a tight place. His appointment also served in a measure to placate the rebellious element, which nursed the thought that it could do about as it pleased in its own column. Whether they were right or wrong in this remained to be seen. While the two column formation was in use the first and second divisions made up one of them; the third and fourth, the other. To Tom's delight he found that the Cooper wagons had been assigned to his own division; but as an offset to this two wagons belonging to gallivanting tenderfeet had been placed directly behind them. It was not pleasant to think of these dandified city sports being so close to Patience Cooper all the way to Santa Fe. Like many men in love, he was prone to discount the intelligence and affections of the loved one and to let his fears threaten his common sense.

The first great watch went on duty at seven o'clock that night, more for the purpose of breaking the men in to their work than for any need of defense, for no Indian troubles, despite the rumors afloat in Independence, were to be looked for so far east. There was a great deal of joking and needless challenging that night and very little attempt to follow instructions. An Indian likes nothing better than a noisy, standing sentry; but this savage preference hardly would be shown in the vicinity of Council Grove. Woodson knew that discipline could not be obtained and that every man would do as he pleased until the encampment received a good scare, but his own sense of responsibility impelled him to make an effort to get it.

The next day was passed in resting, in placing the wagons in their order of march, and in drilling the drivers in caravan tactics; and that night the guard was as noisy as it had been the night before. The squad which went on duty at one o'clock contained two tenderfeet and between them they succeeded in shattering the monotony.

A quarter of an hour after the guard had been changed tenderfoot Number One thought he heard a sound and saw a movement. He promptly challenged and fired in the same instant. His weapon was a double-barreled fowling piece charged with buckshot, and there was no doubt about the deadly efficiency of such a combination when the corporal found the carcass of a mule with a hole in it nearly as big as a hat. The camp was thrown into an uproar, guns flashed from the wagons to the imminent peril of the rest of the sentries, and only the timely and rough interference of a cool-headed trapper kept the two four-pounders from being fired. They were loaded with musket balls and pebbles and trained on three wagons not fifty yards from them. Orders, counter orders, suggestions, shouts for balls, powder, flints, caps, patches, ramrods, and for about everything human minds could think of kept the encampment in a pandemonium until sense was driven into the panicky men and the camp allowed to resume its silence.

Tenderfoot Number Two heard and saw an Indian approaching him and fired his pistol at the savage. This took place near the end of the same guard tour. Only his fright and the poor light which made his wobbling aim all the more uncertain saved the life of his best friend who, restless and lonely, was going out to share the remainder of the watch with him. Again pandemonium reigned and weapons exploded, but this time the cattle stampeded in the darkness, doing the best they could with their handicap of hobbles.

At dawn the caravan was astir, the blast from the bugle not needed this time, for almost every man had animals to hunt for and drive in, and as a result of this breakfasts were late and the whole day's operations were thrown out of step. Finally after all the stampeded animals had been rounded up and the morning meal was out of the way, and things done at the last minute which should have been done the day before, preparations were started to get under way. Mules and horses broke loose and had to be chased and brought back; animals balked and kicked and helped to turn the camp into a scene of noisy confusion. Several parties found that they had neglected to cut spare axles and forthwith sallied off to get them. Others frantically looked for articles they had misplaced or loaned, one wagon being entirely unpacked to find a coffee pot and a frying pan which someone else later discovered at the edge of the creek where they had been dropped after they had been washed, their owner having left them to get a shot at a squirrel he thought he saw. The forehanded and wiser members of the caravan took advantage of the delay and turmoil to cut an extra supply of firewood against a future need, add to their store of picket stakes and also to fill their water casks to keep them swelled tight beyond question, against the time when the much dreaded dry stretch should be reached.

At last from the captain's camp the well-known summons of "Catch up!" was heard, and passed on from group to group along the creek. Those who had not yet hitched up their teams, almost at every case old hands at the game who were wise enough to let their animals graze until the last minute, now exultantly drove in their teams and filled the little valley with the rattle of chains, the clicking of yokes, the braying of indignant mules, and their own vociferations. Soon a teamster yelled "All's set!" and answering shouts rolled up and down the divisions. At the shouted command of "Stretch out!" whips cracked, harness creaked, chains rattled and wagons squeaked as the shouting drivers straightened out their teams. "Fall in!" came next, and the teams were urged into the agreed-upon order, the noses of the leaders of one team close to the tailboard of the wagon ahead. The second and third divisions, falling in behind the first and fourth, made two