A Cold Day in Hell: The Dull Knife Battle, 1876

   Johnny Bruguier stared into the darkness and tried to imagine how those soldiers felt—knowing they were surrounded by more than the night. He wondered if any of them had been with Reno’s men months ago: surrounded, bleeding, chewed up, and thirsty as they waited for the rising of the summer’s sun. If there were any of Reno’s men with these soldiers, their hearts would be small and frightened this dark night.

Knowing that the warriors of Sitting Bull and Gall had them encircled once more.

Out of the darkness, where the fire’s light did not reach, emerged a warrior who came up to touch Johnny on the shoulder.

“The Bull wants to speak with you,” the man said quietly before he pointed off in a certain direction and sat down at Johnny’s fire, joining the other men, who talked in low tones of the day’s fighting.

Bruguier rose and went briefly to stroke the neck of his pony. The bay was a gift from Sitting Bull, who had named it Hohe Horse. In return Johnny had given the chief a Winchester rifle.

As he set off, he knew where he would find Sitting Bull and the rest of the war chiefs. But what would they want of him, Johnny wondered as he moved through the darkness, between patches of firelight where the hundreds of warriors sat through the night, waiting for the coming of the sun when they could renew their attack on the soldiers’ wagon train. Why had they called him?

If they ask me to help them figure out the heart of these soldiers, what am I to say?

Surely these Lakota can see the soldiers are not about to give in, to turn back the way the others did five days before. When Sitting Bull had led the bands across the Elk River a day before discovering that first train of soldier wagons, they had been looking for buffalo. The herds were great, and the beasts were fat. It was to be a good hunt—allowing the women to put away more than enough meat to last the winter as they did their best to avoid the white man.

“You have come, Big Leggings,” said the Bull as he motioned for Johnny to come join the group ringing the cheery fire where women passed pots of coffee among them all. The great chief’s most important advisers were all there in their blankets and robes: No Neck, Bull Eagle, Red Skirt, and Pretty Bear.

“What does Sitting Bull want of me this cold night?”

“Sit. Have some coffee to warm you. Then we will talk.”

Bruguier took his cup of coffee, holding it beneath his chin to feel the steam, enjoying the warmth of it between his two hands. He took a sip, then asked, “How is White Bull’s wound?”

“A soldier bullet tore through his left arm this afternoon before the fighting ended. The bones are broken and may not heal right. But already as the sun was falling—he talks of wanting to fight the soldiers again tomorrow.”

“There are many in this camp who want to continue the fight tomorrow.”

Sitting Bull looked pensive as he replied, “More fighting, is it? All we wanted was to be left alone. When it came time to cross to the north bank of the Elk River, our scouts told us soldiers were huddled in their camp to the east of us,* and that the Bear Coat had his soldiers building their log lodges west of us.† It was the right thing to cross between them to reach this country so rich in buffalo.”

Around them, many of the elders and old warriors grunted in approbation of the Bull’s words.

Then the chief continued, saying, “After we put meat away for the coming time of cold and took many hides for the women to work through the winter moons, we always go north to the white man’s Fort Peck where we can trade with the Yanktonais Lakota and the Red River métis.”

“For more guns and bullets, yes,” Johnny agreed.

Sitting Bull sucked on his lower lip a few moments, staring at the fire before he said, “These soldiers are in our country. We try to stay away from them, but they come to our country, Big Leggings. We want only our country and to be left alone—but the soldiers come and trouble us in our hunting, trouble us in what our people have done for many, many winters on this buffalo ground. So it was that Gall and our warriors attacked the wagon train and drove it back the day after we crossed the Elk River. So it was that we again attacked the next wagon train yesterday.”

Johnny wagged his head, saying, “I don’t understand why the soldiers haven’t turned back as they did the last time we shot their mules and made things hard on them. We have them outnumbered. Maybe it is the far-shooting soldier guns.”

The chief glanced across the fire at the war chief who had lost two wives and three of his children in Reno’s attack on the Greasy Grass that past summer. “My friend’s heart still burns to kill more soldiers.”

“It always will burn,” Gall replied. “I don’t think there is enough soldier blood to quench how my heart burns with hate for them.”

Sitting Bull nodded, looking back at Johnny to say, “At dawn Gall wants to lead his warriors against the wagon soldiers once again.”