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

“That’s what I said,” Miles snapped, watching the approach of that lone warrior. “These hostages will guarantee me that Sitting Bull will keep his word.”

The dark, chertlike eyes of all the Lakota leaders glowed with sudden hatred when Johnny translated the soldier chief’s demand.

“No,” Bruguier said when Miles repeated his demand for hostages.

“Sitting Bull says no?”

From the corner of his eye Bruguier saw the lone warrior kneel behind Sitting Bull, carefully parting his blanket so that he could slip a rifle from it. He slid the weapon beneath the buffalo robe the Hunkpapa chief had pulled about him, then rose slowly and moved back to rejoin the other horsemen as they continued to mill about, inching their ponies closer and closer.

Johnny declared, “The chief says he will never turn over his friends to the soldiers to keep while his people hunt. This is their land. These are their buffalo. You and your soldiers are not welcome here.”

“Those warriors!” Miles suddenly growled, rising from his knee and stuffing his hand inside the flaps of his coat. “Tell them to get back—Now!”

Eyes wide with apprehension, Bruguier translated the soldier chief’s warning as more and more of the chiefs began to chatter excitedly as soon as Miles got to his feet. Almost as one, the rest of the soldiers all put their hands beneath their coats.

Furious, Miles said, “You send all these warriors away. Only the chiefs can stay. Only the men who were here when we began the talk. Tell them that! Tell them right now before there is bloodshed!”

Sitting Bull remained cross-legged on the ground, his face refusing to register the tensions simmering around him. Yet in his eyes smoldered the anger Johnny could not fail to recognize.

The chief said, “Tell the Bear Coat soldier that these are my people and I will not send them away. I want the soldiers to leave my country now, leave it for all time.”

As he listened to Bruguier’s translation, Miles shifted his hat on his head nervously. Then, pulling his hand from inside his coat, he slapped his gloved hands down on his thighs and replied stiffly, “That’s just about it, then.” He slowly turned rubbing his knees from having sat so long on the cold ground.

“Where is the white chief going?” Bruguier asked, confused.

“Clearly—there is no more use in our talking,” Miles replied over his shoulder as the other soldiers began to move off with him, all very wary and watchful. “We’ve been at this for many hours. Back and forth, with no good result. You tell Sitting Bull that we can continue our talk tomorrow.”

After asking the Hunkpapa chief for a response, Johnny said, “Sitting Bull says he will talk with you tomorrow.”

“Good,” Miles declared with a gush of finality. “I think it would be wise of you to tell Sitting Bull to consider his remarks overnight. Best for him to think on the sad consequences if he chooses to continue making war.”

By this time the sun had fallen halfway to the horizon from midsky. The day was rapidly growing old as Sitting Bull and the rest got to their feet, took up their blankets and robes, and turned away while Mile’s escort strode back to the soldier lines. When the soldiers turned about and began to march west, back toward Cedar Creek, most of those mounted warriors who had remained close during the parley chose to follow the soldiers at a distance. Along the crest of the nearby ridges the horsemen slowly shadowed the blue column, flanking the soldiers as they countermarched nearly five miles and eventually went into camp for the night.

“Are the soldiers leaving us be?” asked Black Eagle that night as all the Lakota leaders held an angry council.

“No,” declared Rising Sun. “They marched away in that direction so they could be in a better position to charge us when we move north, following the buffalo on our way to Fort Peck.”

“Yes,” Sitting Bull agreed as the council fell quiet. “My heart cannot believe the soldiers are leaving our country as we told them to do. They are not to be trusted.”

“Perhaps we should consider going in to the agency when this hunt is over,” suggested Small Bear.

“The reservation holds nothing for me,” Sitting Bull said. “Only unhappiness and empty bellies. Here … here in the buffalo country is where our men hunt and our women cure the hides that shelter us. We can never do that living at the white man’s agency.”

For a long time that night the leaders argued back and forth on what to do until one of the camp police, the akicita, came in to report that a few of their ponies had broken away, and in going after them some of the young men had discovered that their camp was being watched by many soldiers who had secreted themselves in the surrounding hills and bluffs.

“We must attack those soldiers at early light!” screamed an infuriated Standing Bear.

Other voices took up the call. “These soldiers mean to make war on us!”