Part 6 (2/2)

”Yes, sir,” he replied, a touch of pride in his voice, ”he was. I am named for Colonel Doniphan,--Alexander Doniphan Briscoe.”

”Indeed?” said the General, with evident surprise and interest.

He was silent a moment, then asked abruptly,

”Do you know anything about tactics,--military routine,--discipline?”

”I have been a clerk in the commissary department here for a year, sir,”

Al replied, ”and have become pretty familiar with the Government's methods of handling stores and more or less so with other matters of administration. Then I have studied tactics pretty hard, both in the book and in watching the troops at drill out at Benton Barracks.”

”H-m! That's good.” The General's voice became decisive. ”If you should go with me you would have to become a part of the expedition and submit to discipline the same as a soldier, even though you are not enlisted; and I understand you are too young to enlist. I can have no favored idlers around. We are going after the Indians and for no other purpose, and in order to be successful every individual must do his part. Do you think you could agree to do that?”

”I shall certainly obey orders and try to make myself useful,” responded Al, promptly.

General Sully swung around in his swivel desk chair and gazed abstractedly out of the window for a moment. Then he swung back again and looked at Al frankly.

”I may as well tell you,” said he, ”that it is against my policy to have any more civilians with me in the field than I can possibly help. Too many civilians mixed up in military affairs have nearly been the ruination of the United States during this Rebellion. At the same time, I like to have young fellows of the right metal; they are often more useful than old stagers. And I believe you'll do. A son of one of Doniphan's daredevils, especially a namesake of his, ought to be all right for courage; and moreover, General Sibley told me of the reports he heard of your conduct at Fort Ridgely. You see, I know more about you than you thought.” He smiled at Al's embarra.s.sed glance. ”I'll find a place for you somewhere, as a commissary's or quartermaster's clerk, probably. Come and see me again to-morrow or next day and I'll have it arranged.”

Al thanked him heartily and went away, feeling already a warm admiration for this firm but courteous soldier. The interview aroused in him more pleasurable antic.i.p.ation of the expedition than he had felt heretofore, and he found himself preparing for it and looking forward to it enthusiastically.

True to his promise, General Sully had a position arranged for him when he called next day, and one, moreover, upon whose duties he could enter at once. He quitted his work as clerk of the St. Louis commissary office only to continue it in the same place as a clerk for the chief commissary officer of the Northwestern Indian Expedition. Knowing that he was to be with them, General Sully's staff officers took an immediate interest in him, especially Lieutenant Dale, whose friends.h.i.+p proved not only increasingly pleasant but very helpful as well. Dale was able to give Al many suggestions as to how best to meet the problems and situations which constantly arose in his position. There was also a Captain Feilner, who treated him with much kindness. He was an officer of German birth who had risen to his position from the ranks of the regular army and was now General Sully's chief topographical engineer.

For six weeks every one in St. Louis connected with the expedition was busily occupied in getting supplies together and in s.h.i.+pping several hundred tons of foodstuffs, clothing, camp equipage, and ammunition on steamboats which were going up the Missouri on the Spring high water to Fort Benton, Montana, the outfitting point for the newly discovered gold district in that Territory. These goods were consigned to Fort Union, the chief trading post of the American Fur Company, at the mouth of the Yellowstone River, where a depot was to be established so as to have supplies ready for the troops when they should reach that point, as it was planned they should do, after marching overland from the Missouri to the Yellowstone. Many hundreds of tons more were loaded on the eight steamers which General Sully had chartered for the exclusive use of his army, and on them were carried also a great quant.i.ty of building materials for use in the two forts which were to be erected, one on the upper Missouri and one on the Yellowstone. Few troops were to start with the fleet from St. Louis, because General Sully's men were either scattered in the several forts and cantonments along the river in Dakota where they had spent the Winter, or were to meet the boats at the village of Sioux City, Iowa; while a large column from General Sibley's command was marching from Minnesota straight across the high prairies of Dakota to join the rest of the expedition at Bois Cache Creek, nearly opposite the mouth of the Moreau River.

CHAPTER VII

UP THE MISSOURI

On the last day of April the long preparations were finally completed.

The eight steamers lay along the Levee with flags floating from their forward peaks and the black smoke pouring from their funnels. A great crowd had gathered on the river bank to watch the departure; and while drays and wagons rattled over the cobblestones and long lines of negro roustabouts ran back and forth across the gang-planks of the steamers, carrying on board the last packages of freight, Al stood at the boiler deck rail of the _Island City_, General Sully's headquarters boat. He waved his hand and smiled, more cheerfully than he felt at that moment, to his mother and Annie and Uncle Will, who stood in the wide doorway of the wharf-boat below, looking up at him. Now that the final moment had come, Mrs. Briscoe's heart was torn at parting with her boy, who had so loyally and unselfishly devoted himself to her wellbeing since her husband's death. But she bore it as bravely as a good mother always bears such trials, smiling brightly at him through her tears as the head-lines were slipped from the _Island City's_ bow and her great stern wheel began slowly to revolve. Al, his own eyes misty, watched his mother until in the distance she became blurred with the crowd. The steamer swung gracefully out into the swift current of the Mississippi, described a wide, sweeping curve to the middle of the channel, and then, rounding up stream at the head of the majestic line of her consorts, forged up past the smoky city on the first mile of the long journey into the Northwestern wilderness.

Until the cheering crowd on the Levee was quite blotted out by distance and intervening steamers along the bank, Al stood at the rail looking back. When at last he turned away, with a strange feeling of depression and loneliness, he found Lieutenant Dale standing behind him.

”Come, boy,” said he, slapping Al's shoulder, ”brace up! We are going to have a great time this Summer, and you'll be mighty glad you came. I know it's hard leaving your folks. I felt just the same way less than three years ago when I marched off from home to Was.h.i.+ngton and the first Bull Run. But it does no good to feel blue over it; you'll come back again all right, anyway. Get busy; that's the best remedy for blues. Are those last goods that were brought on board checked up yet? No? Well, you better go down and check them, hadn't you?”

Al acted on the suggestion, and by the time he was through, the fleet had entered the mouth of the Missouri and was approaching St. Charles, a picturesque little old city straggling up over the rugged, wooded hills on the north bank of the Missouri. The boats did not stop at the town, but continued running until nearly dark, when they laid up for the night at Penn's Woodyard, four miles above. Excepting in high water, when the channel is broad and deep, it is very unusual for boats to run at night on the Missouri owing to the danger of striking snags or going aground on sandbars. Next morning, after replenis.h.i.+ng their fuel supply at the woodyard, they started at daylight and ran without mishap or halt, excepting to take on wood several times, until dusk found them just below the mouth of the Gasconade River, where they again tied up to wait for daylight.

In the Spring of 1864 there had been little rain in the Missouri Valley, and the river was very low for the season, a fact which greatly disturbed General Sully; he foresaw that the trip would probably be painfully slow and that he would not be able to reach the Indian country until so late that the campaign would have to be a hurried one. Early next morning, at the mouth of the Gasconade, they encountered the first of the obstacles which they had been dreading. As is usual below the mouths of tributaries, where the eddy created by the muddy current of the main river coming in contact with that of the tributary causes the mud and sand to sink to the bottom, a sandbar here extended across the Missouri's channel. The _Island City_, in the lead and running near the south sh.o.r.e along the base of the bluffs, notwithstanding the caution of her pilot, stuck her bow into it and stopped short. Al, who was in the main cabin, ran forward as he felt the boat s.h.i.+ver and careen and looked down over the bow.

”Why, we've stuck fast!” he exclaimed to Captain Feilner, whom he found standing by the rail. ”What will they do now?”

”Send out a boat and sound for a pa.s.sage,” the Captain answered.

Even as he spoke, Alexander Lamont,--or, Alex Lamont, as he was usually called,--the tall, bronzed captain of the _Island City_, leaned out over the rail and shouted up to the hurricane deck above,

”Lower away the yawl, there! Step lively, now!”

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