Free Black Sun, The Battle of Summit Springs, 1869 by Terry C. Johnston

apprehension on his face, sizing up the soldiers who followed the pair out the gates.
    Cody settled, pulling his heavy collar up against the dawn wind. “Had my way—we’d have more along.”
    â€œToo many still hung over, Bill.”
    The young scout finally cracked a smile, his gray-blue eyes merry as he looked back at Donegan. “Not many like you and me, eh? We drank our share.”
    â€œAnd then some, Mr. Cody!”
    â€œAye, you goddamned Irish bastard!”
    They were of a kind, the sort who worked over a bottle until it hurt, yet still young enough that they rarely felt their liquor the next day, that head-pounding and queasy belly. All of that would come soon enough, Sharp Grover warned them like an austere uncle last night … in the end, the aging scout added, a man had to admit he was getting on in his years when he finally felt his cups.
    â€œLife’s short enough not to celebrate what little we got to celebrate,” Seamus repeated the sentiment.
    â€œOut here, life can just be too damned short.”
    â€œAll the more reason for a man to celebrate with his friends.”
    â€œYou know, Irishman—every day I get reminded why I liked you from the start.”
    â€œYou needed someone to drink with, Cody.”
    â€œNo,” and his eyes got that serious, cloudy look to their blue, like clouds suddenly soiling the sun-bright sky. “I just needed someone who understood that a man could have his fun and still be good at what he did. I needed a friend.”
    â€œI’m glad to know you, Bill Cody.”
    He held out his hand, and they shook awkwardly in the saddle. “Let’s make meat, Irishman.”
    For better than three hours the twelve hunted the draws and coulees of the rolling country north of Fort Wallace, dividing into three groups which stayed in sight of one another. Each band of hunters took with it a pair of the pack animals—big, black army mules, ugly as sin and twice that mean to the unwary. Yet it was one of those yellow-eyed brutes who brought the first warning to the hunters.
    Cody and Donegan had stopped atop a low hill, enjoying the shade beneath a small stand of trees to allow their horses to blow. Tom Alderdice and another scout, Eli Ziegler, squatted on the ground, smoking their pipes as Seamus cut a slice of chaw from his plug with the folding knife he carried in his boot.
    â€œYou still see ’em, Seamus?” Cody asked beneath his hat brim.
    He nodded, his eyes locating the other two groups inching over the rolling oceanlike landscape far to the left, working up and down through the broken countryside. Donegan turned when the big mule snorted and stamped the ground, pulling cautiously at the tree where Alderdice had tied it.
    The civilian got to his feet and ambled over to calm the animal. “What the devil got into you now?”
    â€œHe’s just a strange one, Tom,” Bill Cody said.
    â€œDon’t like the smell of civilians like us, I’ll bet,” Seamus joked.
    The mule’s eyes widened, its nostrils flaring as it pranced back from Alderdice when he again attempted to calm it. Then of a sudden, its ears twitched and laid back.
    Several gunshots drifted to them from the direction of the other groups, off more than a mile across the broken country now.
    â€œMaybe they’ve had some luck,” Seamus said.
    â€œâ€™Bout time,” Cody agreed.
    â€œWhat the hell?” Alderdice muttered as he stepped around the nervous mule, shading his eyes with a hand, gazing across the far prairie.
    â€œThey chasing something?” asked Donegan, watching the faraway dark specks. “Antelope?”
    â€œOnly one thing mules hate worse than civilians,” Cody grumbled, scrambling to his feet quickly. “Injuns.”
    â€œBy the Mither of Saints!”
    Donegan was on his feet in an instant, joining the rest as they peered across the landscape, watching the two other