William Johnstone - Eyes of Eagles

“I’m ready to go, Colonel.”

“Be sure and see Bowie before you leave. He thinks the world of you, Jamie. And Jamie... so do I.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“You better see him now, Jamie. Those moments in the plaza weren’t good for him. It was far too cold. He’s taken a turn for the worse.”

“Yes, sir.”

Bowie looked awful. But he was lucid. He took Jamie’s hand in his own big hand and smiled up at him. “You’re a fine young man, Jamie Ian MacCallister. It’s been my pleasure knowing you. Travis just left me. You’ve seen him?”

“Yes, sir. He ordered me out at dark.”

“Wise move. Travis seems to think Santa Anna will attack this night. I hate to have to agree with him...” Bowie tempered that with a chuckle. “... But I think he’s right.”

Bowie cut his eyes to Sam. “You think you could get him out, Jamie?”

“Yes. I believe so.”

“I ain’t goin’, Mr. Jim,” Sam said. “I done tole you an’ tole you. It’s time to hush up on it. Me and Joe done agreed on that.”

The two men chatted for a couple of minutes and finally Bowie smiled sadly at Jamie. “What else can I say, my young friend, except goodbye.”

Jamie again took Bowie’s hand and gripped it gently for a moment. “Give them hell, Jim.”

“I shall, Jamie. Godspeed, lad.”

Those few moments of speaking had so tired the man, he was asleep when Jamie gently released his hand and placed arm and hand back under the blankets.

At the door, Jamie looked back once at the sleeping Jim Bowie. He would never see him again. “Goodbye, Sam.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Jamie.”

* * *

At noon, the wind shifted, the sky darkened, and the temperature plummeted to below freezing. Strange weather for this time of the year. Those recently killed Mexican soldiers began to rapidly stiffen in all sorts of grotesque shapes on the bloody ground around the Alamo.

The wind became so violent, it whipped the dust up and for a time, the Mexican cannons were silenced. And not just from the dust, for the weather was most foul.

Jamie found Travis and said, “This is a good time for me. The dust is so thick out there the sentries will be half blind.”

Travis gripped his hand. “May God be with you this day, Jamie MacCallister.”

“And with you, sir.”

Travis drew himself up to full height and saluted Jamie. Jamie did his best to properly return the salute and then was gone, waving at the men as he headed for the irrigation ditch that ran under the walls.

The defenders of the Alamo watched him go and silently wished him Godspeed as the bitterly cold winds howled furiously and the swirling dust reduced visibility to nearly nothing.

Jamie had spent hours on the parapets studying the placement of troops, and knew where the Mexican army was the strongest, and where they were the weakest. It was really no big trick to slip through the lines. Outside of town, he alternately ran and walked to the Ruiz ranch. Some of Ruiz’s vaqueros spotted him and escorted him to the sprawling home.

Senor Ruiz greeted him warmly and took him to the fireplace. Over coffee, Ruiz asked, “The Alamo?”

“It’s still standing. Colonel Travis thinks the main attack will come this night.”

“The men?”

“They’re in good spirits. They know they’re going to die and have resigned themselves to it. Bowie is very sick. When I left his side, only hours ago, he had a brace of loaded pistols and his knife at hand. He’ll not go into death quietly.”

Ruiz shook his head and sighed. “A waste. Such a waste.”

“They don’t think so, senor. The men at the mission are prepared to die for what they believe in.”

“You will rest here for the night?”

“No. But thank you. I must be on my way.” He tapped the pouch. “These messages must reach their proper destinations.”

“I understand. Bowie’s horse has been well taken care of and is ready for the trail. I will have him saddled while you eat and relax.”

“ Gracias, senor.”

Ruiz did not ask where Jamie would ride first, and Jamie knew that was deliberate on his part. One cannot tell what one does not know.

But the food and the warm fire and the glass of wine took their toll on the weary young man. For days Jamie and the men from the Alamo had been battling intense cold and not enough food; they had been subjected to many hours of brutal cannon fire. Jamie’s buckskins were filthy and he needed a bath in the worst way. He did not want to stretch out on Ruiz’s couch, so he decided he’d nap for a few minutes on the rug; just for a few minutes only. Just for a few minutes. No more than...

Senor Ruiz returned and looked at the sleeping man with a knowing smile. He gently covered him with a blanket. So deep was Jamie’s exhausted sleep that he did not stir at the blanket’s warm touch. Ruiz ordered his servants not to disturb him. “Your messages can wait, young man,” Ruiz whispered. “Nothing you have in that pouch can change what is certainly going to happen to those brave men at the Alamo.”

He ordered the doors to the room closed and Bowie’s horse to be unsaddled and returned to its warm stall. “Sleep, young man,” he said. “Sleep.”

Forty-one

The Last Farewell Ninety Minutes of Glory

March 6, 1836

Santa Anna ordered his cannons to cease firing just before midnight and the men of the Alamo wrapped up in their ragged blankets and tried to get some desperately needed sleep.

Travis had counted his defenders. One hundred and eighty-two men. Two slaves, Sam and Joe. Eight women, and a handful of children. Travis ordered the brewing of the last of their coffee; actually more than half of it was chicory. Crockett jokingly said if they could find some, a few rattlesnake heads would give it some flavor, and if they could spare it, some gunpowder might help, too.

The women, just as exhausted as the men, cooked up the last of the food and the men ate and drank and then tried to sleep.

Less than three hundred yards away, the Mexican army had received orders to attack the Alamo at five o’clock that morning.

March 6, 1836, turned out to be bitterly cold and, until dawn, an overcast morning. It was so dark that seeing one’s hand in front of one’s face was nearly impossible. Many of the older men behind the walls of the mission were ill, having come down with pneumonia. Others struggled to sleep in the intense cold as numbed hands gripped rifles.

Travis could not sleep. He carefully shaved and dressed in his best uniform. Then he knelt down and prayed. What he prayed for is unknown but to God.

Santa Anna slept well and awakened refreshed at three o’clock in the morning. After a quiet breakfast, he dressed in his finest uniform, complete with decorations, and ordered his horse saddled and brought around to the front of the house where he and his new bride were staying.

“The cavalry is ready to mount, sir,” an aide told him.

“Good, good,” the general replied. “The infantry?”

“In place and ready, sir. They are all within rifle shot of the Alamo.”

“Excellent. The bands?”

“Ready to play, sir.”

“At my orders, I want them to play the Degüello.” The Fire and Death song.

“Yes, sir.”

“General Cos?”

“Ready, sir.”

Santa Anna shivered. “Get my coat. Damn this weather!”

With his warm coat around him, Santa Anna smiled, anxious for the Degüello to begin. He loved it. He’d loved the tune since he’d first heard its somber notes. The Degüello came from the Spanish word degollar, which means “to slash the throat” or “to behead.” To Santa Anna, the tune brought out the ancient beast in him. It hottened the blood. It was stirring.