William Johnstone - Eyes of Eagles

About eight hundred Mexican troops were killed that late afternoon, and over six hundred finally taken prisoner when the blood lust had cooled and the men began to take stock of what they had done.

Houston, in great pain, lay on blankets and took reports from his commanders. He had lost eight men and had nineteen wounded.

“Santa Anna?” Houston questioned.

“Gone.”

“Not far,” Houston said. “Order patrols out and tell them to look for a man dressed like a peasant or a common soldier. He’s an arrogant bastard, but he isn’t a fool.”

Santa Anna was no fool, but he had a lousy sense of direction. He got lost and wandered around in the night like a goose. Not only that, but he lost his horse and was on foot. Instead of heading for his own army, located about forty miles away, on the Brazos, he turned and walked straight back toward the killing fields of San Jacinto. That night, a patrol picked him up and by daylight, he was standing in front of Sam Houston. Santa Anna was one scared man, but still full of bluster.

“I demand to be treated as befitting a man of my rank,” he said.

Houston told him, quite bluntly, where he could put his demands.

Nobody had ever suggested that to Santa Anna, but it sure got Santa Anna’s attention real quick. He stood trembling with fear and indignation.

Houston added, “You’re damn lucky I don’t have you shot on the spot.”

Santa Anna was sure now that he was a dead man.

But Houston spared General Santa Anna, feeling that the man was much more valuable to him alive than dead. He made Santa Anna write out a letter, acknowledging Texas’s independence from Mexico, and also had him put in writing that from that moment on an armistice between Texas and Mexico was declared.

Houston’s men didn’t like it; they wanted to hang Santa Anna right then and there, but Houston was firm on the matter: Santa Anna would be spared.

Santa Anna also wrote out a message to be delivered to his troops at Fort Bend and Houston sent two men to deliver the message. The same day the message was received, nearly five thousand Mexican troops began packing up and pulling out of Texas.

“I may go now?” Santa Anna asked, considerably humbled by the experience.

“Not yet,” Houston told him.

Santa Anna would be held prisoner, albeit treated well, for almost seven months, to make sure that Mexico kept its promise, then he was released. For all intents and purposes, the war was over. Texas was free of Mexico’s domination.

Forty-eight

Jamie’s recovery was long. But under the care of family and friends, he soon began to show signs of improvement. Slowly his strength began to return and by midsummer, he was taking walks around the cultivated fields in the Big Thicket country. He sent one of the Nunez boys down to Galveztown, or Galveston, as some were now calling it, with a note to the newspaper editor there, telling him of the dispatch pouch he had left the Alamo with, and of the messages carried therein. The editor did not come himself, but did send a friend to talk with Jamie. The man did not believe Jamie’s story, dismissing his claims. Had Jamie been fully recovered from his wounds, the man would have returned to Galveston with a busted jaw, along with other contusions and abrasions.

But the owner of the paper, while interviewing Santa Anna at a later date that summer, was startled to learn that Santa Anna himself remembered the tall young man with the courage of lions, as Santa Anna put it. The editor made a note of it and mentally vowed to visit the Big Thicket country to personally speak with Jamie Ian MacCallister.

As for Jamie, Kate watched him recover and noticed that his gaze often turned longingly to the west.

“We’ll be leaving soon,” she told her circle of friends.

“ What? ” Sarah blurted. “Leave? And go where? And why?”

“I don’t know exactly where,” Kate admitted. “West, I’m sure. I know Jamie.”

“But, this is your home!”

Kate smiled and cut her eyes to Hannah, who had said nothing. She, too, knew Jamie, and Kate’s announcement had come as no surprise to her.

“We’ll all go,” Hannah said, causing Swede to swallow his chewing tobacco.

Sam remained silent. Like Kate, he had seen the signs of restlessness growing in Jamie. Jamie had not confided in him, but Sam knew the Alamo had changed Jamie. He could not know to what degree, only that it had.

By August, Jamie had fully recovered and announced that he was riding south to meet with the editor of the paper at Galveston.

“I have to try,” he told Kate. “I have to try to get Bowie’s message to the public. It’s important.”

He had never told anyone what Bowie had written. But he knew every word by heart.

The owner and editor believed him, but without at least some modicum of proof, he felt he could not publish what Jamie had memorized.

“Those are Bowie’s words, sir,” Jamie told him. “And Crockett’s words and Travis’s words. It’s important for the sake of history that they be recorded and preserved.”

“I agree, young man. Wholeheartedly. And as you see, I’ve written them down, word for word, just as you told them to me. Maybe someday But not this day.”

Jamie returned to the Big Thicket, a bitterly disappointed man. Moses Rose knew Bowie and Travis and Crockett had given him messages, but Jamie could find no trace of the man. Louis Moses Rose had dropped out of sight.

* * *

Little Wolf, like Jamie, had recovered from his wounds. The Shawnee had dragged himself into the brush and lay like a wounded animal for several days. He was in the brush when the patrol came along and found the bodies of the dead. But Jamie was not among them. Little Wolf was now consumed with hatred. It was what kept him alive. The patrol had not buried the dead, and that infuriated Little Wolf. That the whites would allow Indian dead to be left for the scavengers was unthinkable to Little Wolf. It showed how unfeeling they were. The fact that he had left a dozen or more of white bodies to rot under the sun or be eaten by animals did not enter his mind.

Little Wolf did not have the strength to bury his father and his friends. He tried, but could not. He prayed that his father would forgive him. Little Wolf did not try to return to his mother’s village, far to the north.

As he slowly healed, Little Wolf had only one thought in his mind: to kill Jamie MacCallister.

* * *

Jamie rode into San Augustine and bought a wagon from an American who had just emigrated from the States. Along with the wagon, he bought six big Missouri mules. It was October 1836.

“We’ll leave in the spring,” he told Kate.

“Everyone is going,” she replied.

Jamie was not surprised.

Jamie rode to the Nunez family’s cabin and told a very startled Juan he was giving his land to him. “You’re a good farmer, Juan. You’ll treat the land well. Be happy.”

Egg came to see Jamie one last time. The huge Cherokee, now out of a job since Texas had declared its independence from Mexico, shook hands with Jamie.

“What will happen to you now?” Jamie asked.

Egg smiled. “I will survive. I shall live quietly in this land of swamps and forests. Soon no one will remember Egg.”

But Egg would not survive to live out his remaining years in peace. He and the remaining band of Chief Diwali’s Cherokees, including Diwali’s son, were massacred on the banks of the Upper Brazos River in 1839, while trying to flee to Mexico.

Jamie watched Egg walk toward the swamps. He felt he would never see the man again. Jamie owed Egg a great deal; probably his life.

“Egg!” Jamie called.

The Indian stopped and turned around.

Jamie made the sign for brother. Egg smiled and returned the gesture, then stepped into the gloom of the swamp.