Chapter 5

The rest of the Apaches opened up as soon as they heard Black Wolf's shot. The majority of Apaches were not very good shots, since they had neither the proper instruction nor the ammunition for adequate practice. However, when the range was this short, under 20 yards, almost anybody could hit his target if he shot enough bullets at it. The Spencer carbine held 7 rounds, which was enough for even the least accurate of the attacking Apaches to hit his man at this range.

No soldier escaped, even the one riding drag. He was no fool and turned to run as soon as he heard the firing start. It was his bad luck that Black Wolf had stationed Snake at this end of the cut and specifically assigned the drag rider to him, since Snake was the best shot after Black Wolf among the attacking Apaches. Even he took 3 shots to do it, but Snake was able to prevent the escape of the drag rider, so the fort received no warning of the Apache raid, and Black Wolf's men were able to do the rest of their work unmolested.

The 9 riders and 3 drivers were killed before they had a chance to get off a single shot in their own defense. Several of the horses had been killed, but not all of them. Five horses and 6 mules survived the attack, so the Apaches were assured of plenty of meat for the next few weeks. This, alone, was a great reason for celebration, but the supply train carried items in the wagon of even more value to the war effort of the Apaches. Black Wolf had, indeed, selected the best time to hit the supply train.

Scalps were taken, of course, to mark the victory by the Apaches, but Black Wolf was not particularly concerned about that phase of the after-action activity; he forgot to take his scalp, and one of the other warriors had to do it for him. This prompted some good natured teasing of the war chief, of whom they were all justifiably proud. This was the kind of victory they had all expected when they had set off to war the previous spring, but had never seen. It took a 15-year-old tactical genius to show them the way to an easy victory which produced no casualties on their side. There would be a big celebration tonight at the village as many tales of the battle were told to the women and children.

As soon as things had settled down, Black Wolf directed that the bodies be stripped of every useful item and all such goods be brought to the lead wagon. While this was being done, Black Wolf made a quick survey of the goods being hauled to the outpost and was amazed at the quantity and variety of things to be found. Apparently, this was a major supply run, since there were enough weapons and ammunition to supply the whole camp, even the women and children, which gave Black Wolf an idea which he would later bring up to the council.

The three wagons contained extra clothes, something very useful now that the colder weather was coming on. There were entrenching tools, very useful tools for the Apaches, though not for digging trenches or fox holes. There were many tents which could be reworked to cover the walls of huts, the women would particularly appreciate them. There were blankets and cooking utensils, and a number of other items which the Apaches would find useful.

The food was of no use to the Apaches, since they were not used to it, and it would actually make them sick for this reason. The Apaches quickly dumped the useless items out of the first wagon and began loading it with the things they wanted from the third wagon. When Black Wolf said that the wagon was as full as they could safely make it, they did the same thing with the second wagon. With 10 men working on rearranging the wagon loads and 4 men butchering the dead horses to take the meat with them, they soon were ready to leave.

None of the Apaches knew how to drive a team of mules, so they resorted to walking ahead and leading the mules where they wanted them to go. Most of the Apaches were available to walk behind the wagons and loose horses and obliterate the trail they left as they returned to the village. It would be impossible to take the wagons all the way to the village, since the way became too rough at some distance away. Black Wolf planned to use the horses and mules as pack animals for the last of the trip, but even at that, some of the booty would have to be moved by people power. With that in mind, he sent Swift Runner to the village to tell Morning Mist to bring the women to meet them to help carry goods back to the village.

The Apaches had plenty of time to work, since the soldiers at the fort did not find out about the ambush until late the next day. This meant that Black Wolf had time to decide what to do to get all of the booty transported to the village and still keep its location a secret. Black Wolf knew that he had to assume that one of the Mescalero Apaches would be able to follow the trail of the wagons, so he had to mislead any potential trackers as much as he could. Once the wagons were empty, he had them filled with rocks to equal the weight of the goods they had been carrying. He then used the mules to haul the wagons well away from the village before pushing them into a deep gorge and leading the mules back to the village. He hoped that this would be good enough a ruse to hold off discovery until the winter had further weathered out the trail.

That night, there was a great celebration of the first real victory of the war against the Whites. Everybody knew that this was just the start of a long, hard fight, but it was wonderful to begin with such a complete defeat of the enemy. Nine months later, there was ample proof of the celebration in the village that night. Every woman who was interested was able to find a willing man to scratch her itch, so everybody slept well that night. Black Wolf, as the war chief of the successful battle, was particularly popular that night, but none of the men were slighted.

Black Wolf discussed his radical new idea with Morning Mist and convinced her that he had a good plan. Two days later, he brought it up in the council meeting and met a lot more opposition, but was able to convince even the most stubborn nay-sayer by the time he was finished. His plan was simple, but would require a lot of work to implement it. Black Wolf had presented the radical idea that the women be taught to use the rifles that they now had in surplus!

His rational was that the village had been overrun once, already, by the Army because there had not been anyone there to defend the women and children when the soldiers came. Black Wolf wanted to arm the women so that they could fight off the soldiers when they came the next time. Sure, it was likely that some of the women and children would be killed in such a fight, but they might win and prevent the soldiers from raping and killing all of them. Without guns, the women had no chance; with guns they had some chance. The argument was heated at times, but all of the men finally agreed that Black Wolf had the only possible solution to a nearly impossible situation. From the start, the only real argument against the plan was that it was not traditional, but Black Wolf won the day with his statement that no part of the new kind of war he wanted to fight was traditional.

When he had won his point with the council, Black Wolf went back to Morning Mist with the request that she pick 4 women to join her in being the first women to learn to use the new rifles. Snake was the most proficient with the Spencer carbine, so he was elected to be the teacher for the women. Black Wolf would come along for moral support, but Snake would do most of the training. Once Snake and Black Wolf were satisfied with the proficiency of these 5 women, these women would each train 5 more women; thus, every one of the women would be trained in a short time. The intention was not to teach the women to become hunters, but to be defenders of the village; this was agreeable to all.

Before the winter was over, Black Wolf also planned to start training some of the older boys with the rifles so that they would be ready to fight when they were old enough to join the warriors. He suspected that, if they started learning early enough, these boys would become more proficient with the rifle than their elders.

That first raid had been so successful that the men were agitating for another raid on the soldiers. Black Wolf wanted to maintain the enthusiasm for this new kind of fighting, so he agreed to find them another target. Several men suggested possible places to raid, but most of them were either too well defended or otherwise beyond their capability. Black Wolf had the long range plan of eventually working out some sort of peaceful accommodation between the Apaches and the Whites, so he wanted to confine their raids to military targets.