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[Texas Rangers 02] - Badger Boy Read Online Free PDF Page A
Author: Elmer Kelton
not to tell Tanner. He did not want to cause his friend a conflicted conscience should the authorities press him with questions. He reached out his hand. "Be careful, Len. Don't let some Comanche lift your hair or some Yankee sharpshooter bring you down."
"Nobody's ever killed me yet."
* * *
He built a small fire in the bottom of a dry buffalo wallow, hoping it could not be seen from a distance. He did not need it for warmth but only for broiling a slice of hindquarter from an antelope his rifle had brought down. He made a poor sort of bread dough by mixing a bit of flour with water and a pinch of salt, then curling it around a stick to hold over the coals. He wished for coffee, but the war had made it scarce. Most Texans were substituting parched grain or doing without. He did not even have grain.
Before it was good and dark, when he was through, he would kill the fire. He doubted that conscription officers would be so bold as to prowl about this far from protection. There was always a risk that Comanche eyes might discover the flames, though he had seen no sign of Indians.
While he waited for his simple supper, the full weight of his situation settled upon him like a heavy shroud. He had not felt so achingly alone since he had buried Daddy Mike beside Mother Dora and turned his back on the Colorado River farm where he had spent his growing-up years. The ranger company had been a family of sorts, though its members came and went. Almost the only constants had been Len Tanner and Captain Whitfield.
His thoughts drifted to another family far away, and to the wisp of a girl named Geneva Monahan. Someday, if peace was ever allowed to settle over the land, he intended to marry her just as Tanner had suggested. Then once again he would have a family of his own. From here, and for now, that seemed a long time off.
He had ridden west from camp, intending to confuse anyone bold enough to trail after him. Tomorrow he would find a place where hard ground or thick grass should lose his tracks, then he would turn southward. To travel much farther west would take him to the escarpment marking the eastern edge of the staked plains, still the hunting grounds of free-roaming Comanche and Kiowa bands. To venture onto those broad plains alone was to flirt with death, either to wander lost and succumb to thirst or to be cut down by arrow or lance.
He was on or near what once had been Texas's Indian reserve on the Clear Fork of the Brazos River. The state and federal governments had set it up in the 1850s in hope of curbing Indian raids and encouraging the horseback tribes to become peaceable farmers and stockmen. Many of the less warlike had accepted, realizing they were about to he trampled under by an unstoppable horde of white settlers. But many Comanches and Kiowas had remained unrestrained and unreconstructed, invading and plundering the settlements at will. Rightly or not, frontier settlers blamed reservation Indians for much of the raiding. Their persistent protests eventually forced abandonment of the reserve. Its residents were given a military escort to new reservations north of the Red River shortly before war began between the states.
Rusty had been present at the removal, serving as a volunteer ranger. The haunting memory still lay heavily upon his conscience. He regretted the sad injustice of haste that did not allow the reservation Indians time to harvest their crops or even to gather their scattered livestock. They had tried the white man's road in good faith, only to be dispossessed because of acts committed by other Indians. Rusty understood why many formerly peaceable ones had later taken to raiding south of the river, or at least aiding and abetting those who did. Even so, it had been his job for most of four years to thwart them the best he could.
When he finished eating, he kicked dirt over the fire to smother it. It might have been seen despite his precautions. To sleep here was to court trouble. He rode
"Nobody's ever killed me yet."
* * *
He built a small fire in the bottom of a dry buffalo wallow, hoping it could not be seen from a distance. He did not need it for warmth but only for broiling a slice of hindquarter from an antelope his rifle had brought down. He made a poor sort of bread dough by mixing a bit of flour with water and a pinch of salt, then curling it around a stick to hold over the coals. He wished for coffee, but the war had made it scarce. Most Texans were substituting parched grain or doing without. He did not even have grain.
Before it was good and dark, when he was through, he would kill the fire. He doubted that conscription officers would be so bold as to prowl about this far from protection. There was always a risk that Comanche eyes might discover the flames, though he had seen no sign of Indians.
While he waited for his simple supper, the full weight of his situation settled upon him like a heavy shroud. He had not felt so achingly alone since he had buried Daddy Mike beside Mother Dora and turned his back on the Colorado River farm where he had spent his growing-up years. The ranger company had been a family of sorts, though its members came and went. Almost the only constants had been Len Tanner and Captain Whitfield.
His thoughts drifted to another family far away, and to the wisp of a girl named Geneva Monahan. Someday, if peace was ever allowed to settle over the land, he intended to marry her just as Tanner had suggested. Then once again he would have a family of his own. From here, and for now, that seemed a long time off.
He had ridden west from camp, intending to confuse anyone bold enough to trail after him. Tomorrow he would find a place where hard ground or thick grass should lose his tracks, then he would turn southward. To travel much farther west would take him to the escarpment marking the eastern edge of the staked plains, still the hunting grounds of free-roaming Comanche and Kiowa bands. To venture onto those broad plains alone was to flirt with death, either to wander lost and succumb to thirst or to be cut down by arrow or lance.
He was on or near what once had been Texas's Indian reserve on the Clear Fork of the Brazos River. The state and federal governments had set it up in the 1850s in hope of curbing Indian raids and encouraging the horseback tribes to become peaceable farmers and stockmen. Many of the less warlike had accepted, realizing they were about to he trampled under by an unstoppable horde of white settlers. But many Comanches and Kiowas had remained unrestrained and unreconstructed, invading and plundering the settlements at will. Rightly or not, frontier settlers blamed reservation Indians for much of the raiding. Their persistent protests eventually forced abandonment of the reserve. Its residents were given a military escort to new reservations north of the Red River shortly before war began between the states.
Rusty had been present at the removal, serving as a volunteer ranger. The haunting memory still lay heavily upon his conscience. He regretted the sad injustice of haste that did not allow the reservation Indians time to harvest their crops or even to gather their scattered livestock. They had tried the white man's road in good faith, only to be dispossessed because of acts committed by other Indians. Rusty understood why many formerly peaceable ones had later taken to raiding south of the river, or at least aiding and abetting those who did. Even so, it had been his job for most of four years to thwart them the best he could.
When he finished eating, he kicked dirt over the fire to smother it. It might have been seen despite his precautions. To sleep here was to court trouble. He rode