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long columns of infantry strung out on either side of the rutted trail. Here and there a mule was hit, calling out in its dying with an ear-splitting bray. The team was immediately ordered out of column as other wagons moved around and the procession continued while the teamsters and soldiers descended on the wagon to cut the dead and dying mules out of harness, then urged the remaining members of the team back into line during this slow-moving, deadly game of leapfrog. Despite the losses and their snail’s pace, as the morning waned and became afternoon, Miner refused to stop.
    “That would mean us having to square the wagons and fort up, just for the sake of a short stop,” he grumbled. “No—we’ll keep pushing for Clear Creek, something on the order of eight miles. Go pass the word that the men have permission to eat while we’re on the march.”
    The autumn sun hadn’t fallen far from midsky when three of the lieutenants loped to the head of the column and presented their case to an increasingly anxious Captain Miner.
    “There’s more of ’em than we can handle come dark, Captain,” Lieutenant Nickerson said.
    Miner growled, “How many do you figure we’re facing?”
    After glancing at the others, Lieutenant William Conway replied, “Five, maybe as many as six hundred warriors, sir.”
    The captain seemed to shudder at that, then stoically said, “Their numbers won’t make much difference come dark. I’m certain they’ll break off their attack by dusk.”
    “Even so, Captain—we may not have enough of the mules left by morning to push on for Tongue River,” Smith observed.
    “Then what?” Miner growled, turning on the lieutenant.
    “I figure we’ll be forced to fort up and take ’em on till General Miles figures out we aren’t coming.”
    “How long could that be, gentlemen?” Miner asked. “Worst case, that is.”
    They muttered and chewed on it. Then Smith broke the stalemate.
    “Longer than we have ammunition, sir.”
    Miner was nettled, the crow’s-feet at his eyes deeper than normal. “What are you proposing, then?”
    “Turn about and countermarch, sir,” Lieutenant Kell suggested.
    “Back for Glendive?”
    “Yes, Captain,” Smith agreed. “I suggest we do it while we’ve got ammunition to make that countermarch. We get bogged down by forting up—they’ll keep us holed up till we run out of ammunition. I say let’s get back to Glendive while we can.”
    “But we’re expected at Tongue River with these supplies,” Miner grumbled within his five-day-old beard. “Those supplies don’t get there—”
    “Sir, begging your pardon for the interruption,” Smith pressed on. “We fort up, run out of ammunition, and get overrun, we lose these supplies to them Sioux … meaning they’ll never get to the Tongue River troops anyway. But if we break off here and skedaddle back to our cantonment, I figure we can convince Colonel Otis to beef up our escort and make another go of it.”
    “How much of the stock have we lost?” the captain demanded gruffly.
    Benjamin Lockwood answered, “They’ve run off with more than sixty-some mules already … and wounded that many more, sir.”
    Miner cogitated on that for some time as his officers stood in silence. All around them the noncoms kept the men firing by squads—for the most part able to keep the swarming warriors at a safe distance from the column. The Sioux were clearly showing a healthy respect for those Long Toms, darting in here and there, but scampering out of range just in time as a squad came forward, dropped to a knee to aim, and fired. On one side then the other, at their front then at their rear, the enemy horsemen were making things more than ticklish for Miner’s escort. The situation was growing downright scary.
    “We get bogged down here, we’re pretty well cut off here, wouldn’t you say, gentlemen?” the captain asked.
    “Yes, sir,” Smith agreed. “So what’s it to be, Captain?”
    He slapped his