The small group nodded their assent.  “Lieutenant Hodgson, pass the word to Captain French.  We shall leave as soon as we are formed up.”  Reno, standing in the stirrups, called out at the top of his voice, “Mount up.”

 

Hodgson left at a dead run to find French.

 

Reno, surprisingly calm, knew that they were facing complete annihilation.

 

The skirmish line outside the timber was now abandoned as the soldiers entered the clearing, in search of their horses.  Following them, the Sioux were now concealed among the trees and firing at close range.

 

Reno rode to the south end of the clearing, beckoning Bloody Knife to accompany him.

Behind them Moylan yelled, “Men, to your horses.  The Indians are in our rear.”

 

The clearing became a maelstrom of activity as harried cavalrymen sought their mounts, while their officers, at the top of their voices, urged them to form up by company.

The rattle of firearms constant, the clearing filled with a light fog of gunsmoke.

 

Reno stopped ten yards from Company M, where the first line of four cavalrymen awaited orders to move out.  Turning to Bloody Knife, Reno asked, “Can we make it to the river?”

The scout made no reply.  Pointing toward the spot where they had just reentered the clearing, Reno attempted to indicate his meaning using hand signals

 

At that moment several rifles roared at the edge of the clearing.  Reno whipped his head around in time to see Private Lorenz, at the front of M Company, reaching up to clutch his throat.  The private’s chin and the front of his neck were drenched in blood as he struggled to breathe.  The bullet having hit him in the back of the neck and come out his mouth, he went limp and, rocking forward in the saddle, fell to the ground.  Someone called out, “We’ve got to get out of here, now!”

 

The major turned back, looking into the face of Bloody Knife.  The scout took a breath to speak and suddenly there was a sickening-wet sound.

 

Reno was blinded.

Feeling his face covered with a warm, sticky liquid, Reno wiped his hand across it.  Something hard and jagged rolled between his cheek and fingers.  Blinking, he slowly regained his sight.  Looking down, he saw his hand covered with brain matter, blood, and bone chips.

 

Time stopped.

 

He heard nothing.

 

I've been hit, he thought.

 

Then, dropped back into the present by the sound of another eagle bone whistle from the edge of the woods, he closed his eyes in alarm and frustration, attempting to calm himself.

 

Hearing his own pulse, the major clenched his teeth.  His breath came in short gasps; his heart now raced.

 

There was no pain.

 

Reno finally saw Bloody Knife on the ground, the top of his head a bloody mass.  Overwhelmed and thinking that he must help the scout, he heard himself say, “Dismount.”

 

Bloody Knife's riderless horse galloped away, across the clearing.

 

Bloody Knife lay at the major’s feet.  Bending down beside the scout, he finally realized that the man was beyond help.

 

Reno’s thoughts clearing, the sounds of battle and the passage of time resumed again for him.  His ears filled with a crackle of gunfire, men yelling, and horses screeching.  His nostrils filled with the smells of blood and gunsmoke.  Looking past the column into the timber, the major saw the shadows of hostiles, aiming their rifles into the clearing.

 

They're right on top of us.

 

Pulling himself back up into the saddle, he shouted, "Mount up.”  The urge to flee was overwhelming.  Dear God, let’s go.  Dear God, let's get out of here.

 

Accompanied by the intermittent sound of eagle bone whistles, Reno turned his horse to the front of the column and yelled out at the top of his voice, “Any of you men who want to save yourselves, follow me!”

 

Spurring his horse, he rode at a full gallop through the clearing toward the front of the column.  The major drew his pistol and, waving it over his head, repeatedly called out, “We're surrounded.  Draw your revolvers and follow me.”

 

His mount accelerated, entered the surrounding timber and brush at full speed, Reno leaning forward on the horse’s neck, the arm that carried his pistol in front of his face.  Racing through the timber, he felt tree limbs and brush whip his arms, chest, legs, and uncovered parts of his face.

The sound of snapping brush and breaking branches was now replaced by the pounding of his horse’s hooves—he was through.  The river, a few hundred yards ahead, snaked out from the left in front of him and then back again.  He reined his horse to the right until he was on a course to ride around the oxbow without crossing the river.

 

Reno glanced down at the valley floor passing under him.  His horse’s breathing and hoof beats produced a rhythmic thudding and rush of air.  He looked back to his left and saw the column emerging from the timber.  Turning to the right, he felt his stomach twist.  Hard-riding Sioux braves were almost abreast of him, two hundred yards off.  We’re cut off from original fording point.

 

The bluffs across the river were too steep to climb.  If trapped against them, they’d be chopped to pieces.  The major panned his eyes back and forth across the river, until he saw a small coulee that emptied into a triangular flat spot, thirty yards wide.  The channel was too narrow to accommodate more than one horse at a time.  But Reno, out of time, decided it would have to do.

 

The major's horse stopped abruptly at the river’s edge, the water five feet below, down a steep bank.  Thinking, Not the best place to ford, Reno spun his horse around to face the plain.  Hundreds of mounted warriors threatened to head off his beleaguered battalion.  The panic-stricken cavalrymen, racing for their lives, were driven toward Reno’s position.   No choice, concluded the major.

 

He spurred his horse until it leaped out over the river.  He felt water splashing above his boots.  To his left, several warriors on the opposite bank, hundreds of yards away, approached from the village.

 

Reno’s horse climbed the muddy bank onto the small wedge of flat ground between the bluffs and the river.  Turning his mount, he watched the battalion’s approach.