Young Sherlock Holmes_ Fire Storm - Andrew Lane [79]
‘He heard Matty and me talking about Edinburgh before we even set off,’ Sherlock said nervously. ‘He had some kind of listening tube in the cottage.’
‘Ah.’ Crowe nodded. ‘Clever.’
‘He kidnapped Rufus on the train,’Matty added, ‘and then he kidnapped me and Sherlock, but we escaped.’
‘Escaped?’ Crowe’s face twisted into a grimace. ‘Ah doubt it. He let you go.’
Matty was affronted. ‘Sherlock broke the legs of those two men – Fillon and Payne.’
Crowe shrugged. ‘If that enabled him to follow you here, Scobell would consider that a small price to pay.’
‘He was torturing me for information,’ Sherlock pointed out. ‘It would have been easier just to keep on torturing me until I talked rather than trade two of his men for the information.’
Crowe didn’t look any less angry, but his hand moved away from the pistol. ‘Perhaps,’ he conceded. ‘Are you sure you weren’t followed here?’
‘Very sure,’ Sherlock said firmly.
‘What’s so bad about this Scobell bloke?’ Matty asked. ‘Apart from the fact that he likes hurting people. There’s blokes in this country who like hurting people. Can’t imagine this Scobell is much worse.’
Sherlock nodded in agreement. Matty’s words put him in mind of Josh Harkness, the blackmailer whom Mrs Eglantine had been working for. Harkness had been a nasty piece of work; could Bryce Scobell be that much worse?
‘There’s a load of different examples ah could give you,’ Crowe replied, ‘but ah’ll let one suffice.’ His eyes seemed not to be looking at Sherlock, or any of the others, but to be fixed on something that only he could see. ‘Scobell was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Confederate Army. He weren’t right in the head, even then. Ah don’t think there’s a word for what he was, what he is. Not evil, exactly, but he don’t have emotions like guilt, or regret, or shame like the rest of us. He don’t even feel things like anger or happiness. He just seems to sail through life with a complete indifference to anythin’ except his own survival. He’s convinced that he’s the most important thing in the world, and that everythin’ else exists to make his life easier an’ better.’ He sighed heavily. ‘Ah first heard about him when he was sent to deal with an uprisin’ among the native tribes. They’d taken advantage of the confusion surroundin’ the War Between the States an’ they were attackin’ families, settlers, anyone they could isolate an’ kill. Scobell was under the command of Colonel John Chivington at the time, and they were sent with a troop of militia to stop the Arapaho an’ the Cheyenne from mountin’ these attacks.’
Virginia came into the room with a tray containing five glasses and a plate of oatcakes. None of them had even seen her leave, so caught up were they in her father’s story. She gave the beer to Crowe and Rufus Stone, then passed glasses of water to Sherlock and Matty. Everyone helped themselves to the oatcakes.
‘This was about five, six years back,’ Crowe went on. ‘Chivington used to be a pastor in the Church, but his forbearance for his fellow man didn’t extend as far as the Indians. He hated them with a passion most men reserve for scorpions an’ rabid dogs. Scobell, his second-in-command, didn’t hate them, but he regarded them as a lower form of life that didn’t belong in his world. Between the two men there wasn’t a single friendly thought. Under Chivington and Scobell, the militia attacked not just the Cheyenne and the Arapaho but the Sioux, the Comanche and the Kiowa as well.
Crowe sipped at his beer. Nobody broke the heavy silence in the room.
‘The Indians were gettin’ the sharp end of the stick,’ he continued, ‘an’ they decided they wanted peace, so a meetin’ was arranged with the authorities. The Indians left the meetin’ thinkin’ they had a peace treaty, but nothin’ had actually been signed. Few days later, a chief named Black Kettle camped his people near Fort Lyon. They weren’t doin’ anybody any harm – they was just followin’ the buffalo along the Arkansas River. They lived off the buffalo, you see – used them for meat, for clothes,