Jas. Watson's story

[elisabeth]

Yes please -- I'd love to hear more about it!

[Jas. Watson]

Ah, Where to begin....

This might take a while so I probabably should break it up into several messages...maybe that will give you an opportunity to comment on some of it. I have discovered some exerpts in electronic mode so perhaps I can transfer them to here so you can see what my writing style is like. It is a 'Gothic Romance'.

So to begin. Here is just an encapsulation of the storyline without much detail. You have to remember this was written for the romance crowd and not a history readership--there was no inkling of anything to do with Little Bighorn etc. You will see things here that the readers didn't of course.

********
A dusty rider comes into town. He is obviously an ex-soldier, wears an old blue cap, has military pistol and belt, and rides a really done-in looking sorrel horse with some pretty bad scars with a military saddle. This is James Watson.
He stops in a soloon looking for work? and manages to rescue a damsel in distress by ultimately shooting some thug that had killed her brother etc. etc. (nothing special about this scene, it's just to get them introduced). Her name is Mary Lavella.
After the smoke clears they want to talk (she wants to hire him to work on her place now that her bother was killed--he's looking for something useful to do) and they decide to get something to eat. But he need to have his horse seen to first.
The liveryman notices the scarred horse has army brands and wonders if it's stolen, the ex-soldier says the army wouldn't want the horse (the wounds) and besides the army thinks it's dead.
He pays with a new five dollar bill that is crisp but badly wrinkled and torn (he used a similiar one in the saloon) and it is noticed. The hostler remarks 'you're kind of hard on your money'--he says that's exactly how I got it. But Mary had seen his other ones.
As they walk away, Mary askes about the money and he gets really definsive saying he didn't steal it--no one at all is missing it or looking for it, but doesn't say any more.

There follows a bit of boy meets girl stuff mostly from her point of view as she begins to feel for the guy...she finally lays it on the table that she -really- needs a man to help fix her place up now that her brother was killed...and would he care to come home with her. He agrees only to get cleaned up and rested--but he knows he cannot stay even though he is attracted to her, because when she finds out what he really is, that would end everything.
The reader definitely realizes that Jim has a major guilt trip (of course you know what it's about, but the reader does not).
Anyway, they drag the poor old army horse (who's in bad shape but Jim won't get rid of it--and she wonders why) and ride her horse double slowly back to her place--she and he think a bit along the way and go through a lot of the gothic romance stuff wherein mystery and attraction compete.

Once there, he cleans up, they have a couple 'near misses' at kissing and so on (I won't bore you with the details because you are more interested in the LBH aspect of the story rather than the romance that the readers are going for.
Eventually Jim falls asleep after he's all cleaned up. She wants to brush off and clean up his nasty clothes a bit and discovers his wallet on the floor.

At this point I will interrupt myself because I have gone on so long already, and also to see if I can find and forward one of the exerpts so you can read a little of it for yourself (if I can find it). I've left out a lot of detail here that only the romance readers would follow, as so far it's pretty much a boy meets girl western romance with only a little bit of mystery--the torn up money, the nasty horse, and the man himself....
But with picking up his clothes and a little snooping it begins to get interesting from your standpoint. Only please remember, this is a gothic romance and not history, so please don't laugh--too hard.

Stay tuned.

[Jas. Watson]

An excerpt...the contents of the wallet:
This is where he plot begins to thicken. Yet I was surprised that only one critic realized at this point that 'Jim' might have had something to do with Custer. (to me it was a 'no-brainer' at this point)

**********
Mary could see what at a glance seemed to be almost a hundred dollars (a considerable sum) in bills almost all of which had been torn in some way, all of them crisp, but badly wrinkled. There were a few other typical items usually found in a man's wallet: used Railroad tickets, receipts and so on.
She wasn't really a snoop so she didn't look and merely stuffed them back into the wallet. The carte-de-visite photograph, naturally, she did notice. It was of a very young woman, almost too young looking, with light colored hair done slightly out of date in the manner of the middle 1870's. Unlike the money it showed hardly any wear, only the normal wear one would expect from something being carried in a wallet for almost five years. She looked to see if there was a name or inscription on the back but there was only the photographer's name and trademark: "~J. Morrow~ Bismark, Dakotah Terr." No story there. But the thing that did catch her eye, and though she was not a snoop, she could tell that the little folded note meant something to Jim. It
had been folded and refolded so many times that it was about worn out. Mary felt that if she was going to be around this man, for a while at least, she ought to know something about him more than the few things he has said about himself. So she couldn't help but look...
It was written on a page torn out of some kind of pocket diary or notebook. The words were in pencil, hastely scrawled as if under some kind of duress.
The note:

Cooke,
As soon as you receive this have the men fire two volleys as a signal. Then charge south--is only way out.
I have four companies that will support you when you charge.
Will wait for your signal.
Benteen

This little ragged slip of paper obviously meant something to Jim, even more than the girl in the photograph, because it was evident that he had read and reread it many times--for how long she had no idea because there was no date on it, but it surely had come from his army days. She suspected that it also must have something to do with the inner anguish that she could sense about the man--the anguish that seemed to keep him from leading a happy life or settling down. She thought of his spending the whole night after the shootout in the saloon in silence, unable to comfort her when she needed it most--a tormented man. Then she remembered his kiss of last night--no it was
only this morning; and of his remark that he should have done it right off--or never have done it at all...which did he mean? She also recalled how he often spoke about his amazement in the fact that there was only one saloon/hotel in Cedar Springs--one would almost certainly think he sounded like a person who would like to open another...but she didn't think he ever would, he would just drift; living off that money...where did he get it? He
didn't steal it, he was adamant about that--or at least what he had said was "no one is missing it or looking for it"...not quite the same.
Regardless of however he got it, now that he does have as much as he seems to, why does he still ride such a broken down old horse and saddle? Almost certainly he had purchased his old army horse--he said as much at the livery stable...no, he actually said "as far as the army knows, he's dead"...again, not quite the same.
Could he be a deserter? If he was, she doubted that he'd still be wearing so much of his old army stuff, and he'd certainly have gotten rid of the horse then. And also he didn't have that furtive look that people who had to look over their shoulders had. No, he seemed a decent sort, the type who would rescue and care for a woman in distress--someone she hadn't minded bringing
to the house; but then at other times he seemed kind of distracted, more like a drifter who couldn't settle--one who is always running from his past.
What was his past? What would it take to put it (whatever 'it' was) to rest?
She couldn't help but to feel that if she could only somehow find out what it was that haunted him so, she could help him lay it to rest so he could go on with his life; otherwise she felt that he would only continue to drift--tormented by that 'something' in his past.
She could wonder all day, but that wouldn't solve anything.
She quickly put the note back into the wallet and the wallet and vest up on the chair while Jim slept on.

*********
You see my basic premise here (even if the readers did not). It is what if Benteen had answered Cooke's note and acted as as the Benteen detracters would have had him act?
(Lots of poetic license here though--but remember it was written as a gothic romance, not history)

[Jas. Watson]

So to contuinue. Later on he wakes up, and when he makes moves to leave because he says when she finds out about him she'll want him to leave, and he couldn't bear that so he'd rather leave willingly. She gets mad at him for not having confidence in her but he says something to the effect that he imagines she thinks he's one of those fine upstanding men that all women dream of--one who is there when you need him, won't let you down, will rescue you in a pinch, and all the rest of the good things that people depend on another for "Well I'm not
that kind of man at all." he says. She gets mad and says she can take care of herself thank you.
They have a rip-snorting argument--he says she's just hungry for a man on the place because it is a wreck and she can't do for herself--and he's not remotely interested in doing the ranch thing (his real reason is of course that when she finds out his past she'll hate him).
She accuses him of irresponsibilty and all that just running from the past and not living life any more...and he doesn't fight it--he mutters something about letting people down--and in something a lot more important than a woman with a broken down ranch. He let the finest man he ever knew down...and so many men, he says.

After a bit of that she runs outside. Later he follows with a change of heart. (lot of detail left out here for the sake of this synopsis) He's been thinking about the money he knows of. He explains that there is MUCH more where it came from but he never wants to go back--ever. But now they realize that that money could be put to purpose that could help them both. He begins to come to terms with her--and a little bit with himself.
Ultimately much against his better wishes she persuades him to go after all that money, wherever it is.

They pack and begin their trip. My descriptions are pretty accurate because I have myself ridden that country often. I placed this story somewhere west of present day Buffulo, Wyoming and describe things seen coming down out of the Big Horns, up past present day Sheridan, Wyoming and on up into southern Montana (still nobody caught on yet it seems).

The trip starts out happy, but she begins to notice a strange thing. Jim's horse is unbelievably frisky and really wants to go--a funny thing for a horse that was lame only a day or so ago. But what she notices first is that his old wounds and scars are looking a lot worse. She remarks about it but Jim changes the subject.
As they camp they discuss the money of course, and he talks of wanting to open a saloon called 'Fiddler's Green'. She asks about the funny name and he tells of the place where soldiers go after they are killed.
As they travel he begins to get more and more morose, and less willing--he keeps saying that the money is haunted, and one night he admits frankly that is is scared to go back there. But Mary keeps bolstering him up and keeping him going on.
However, Mary is beginning to really notice abd be concerned with Jim's old horse--his coat is getting duller and the old wounds are now beginning to open and ooze--and yet the old horse is ever more spirited and almost frantic to get on.
It started to creep her out, though, when she had begun to realize that the further they went, the worse the horse looked--but also the more eager and frisky he got--something was wrong with him....
She also notices Jim himself is beginning to seem more strained and gaunt looking.

Finally they arrive....

I have the excerpt of my description of what they saw which follows....I hope I am not boring you with all this...remember you asked.

[Jas. Watson]

The part you've been waiting for.....(an excerpt)

*********

Finally they crested a ridge and Jim pointed down at a wide flat valley and turning toward her said "We're here".
That was all he said as they silently rode down into the broad valley.

When they made their way toward the belt of cottonwoods on the far side of the valley Mary noticed that they were riding through what had at one time been an Indian village. She could see the circles on the ground where the tipis had been, and occasionally some old rotting lodgepoles and other debris. (Note: Old tipi rings can still sometimes be seen even to this day in some places such as the old 'buffulo jump' near Hamilton, Montana.)
At the far side of the valley they crossed a small stream about 30 or 40 feet wide and started up a large draw. As they rode well up into the coulee they saw the first skeletons.

Mary felt unease when they came upon more further up. They weren't exactly skeletons, more like just heaps of bones. They had long since come apart and were laying in small heaps or scattered about, sometimes men and horse bones mixed.
They went up the side of the draw and came to a low crest where there were what seemed like dozens more skeletons, and when Mary looked ahead she could see many, many more! She was staggared. Had never seen anything like this!
She moved her horse up closer to Jim and looked at him as they continued down a long ridge. Jim looked grim and kept his eyes straight ahead, and she could see his jaw move as he was gritting his teeth--this was hard on him.
She looked around wildly and could see that there were more and more of them on either side, some had stakes driven into the ground near them for some reason, some where in large piles, others off by themselves.

"How...how many of them are here?" She finally got the courage to ask.
"They say there are two hundred ten," he answered, "but there are two hundred nine."
As she digested this she began to notice other things. Her horse kicked an old rusty flattened canteen and some other things. She began also to notice the occasional rags of blue cloth sometimes mixed in with the bones--one even had the shreds of faded sergeant stripes on the sleeve--these are soldiers! She turned again to Jim to ask him, but just as they approached a high spot on the ridge that had a pile of logs on its summit, he all of a sudden said "Ah", jumped down off his horse and stood next to a particular heap of bones.
He stood there for a while looking down at the skull which had had its top smashed in like so many of the others, just staring at it.
"Well, I've finally come," he said as he reached for his wallet, "far too late to make any difference at all..." Then he did a strange thing; he pulled that ragged note from his wallet, held it for a moment, and let it drop from his fingers. The breeze moved it and it caught for a moment on a sage branch and fluttered away....
Mary could remember what that note had said--Addressed to someone named 'Cooke' it said something about signaling and charging south as the only way to escape--and that the other soldiers were going to wait for the signal before helping. Then with a jolt of sheer horror she realized WHY it had been in Jim's wallet...he had never delivered it!!! These men all...all had
to die...because of Jim!
She must have made some kind of gasp or other sound because Jim said "Yes, so now you know...." Then he did a creepy thing; he picked up the skull and held it up to her face, and said, "Mary, see that gold tooth? Meet First Lieutenant W. W. Cooke, General Custer's adjutant."

*********

One of the critics took me to task because that this could not be an accurate description, that the army would have buried all the men. I won't have to comment here about that.
I patterned my description off the photographs and period descriptions, some of which you might recognize.
Of course I took poetic license with Cooke's skull, but had to make him recognizable.

More to come....

[Jas. Watson]

At first Mary thinks Jim was paid off to do this horrible deed, but gradually she gets him to tell his story as they sit right there among the scattered bones--a strange place to be relating
the story of their deaths, surrounded by the dead themselves, but neither of
them seemed to notice the irony of it at all.

Watson's story:
He told of the plan of General Custer to attack the Indian village
("Village? Hell! It was the greatest concentration of Indians ever seen in this country!" Jim said) from both the north and south at the same time.
Then told how the south attackers were all but decimated while Custer himself unknowingly went right into the thickest of them. Jim had been in 'C' troop with Custer's column. Coming down Medicine Tail Coulee his horse had gone down. He was never sure just why, but in any event, he found himself seperated from the main command.
After several near escapes he finally made his way back to the southern column just as the survivors had taken refuge on a bluff. By then everyone knew that Custer had taken on more than he could handle. Some of the officers were for trying to go to Custer's aid and others saw the folly of it. Captain Benteen asked Watson if he could get a message to Custer to have them fight toward the southern force which would meet them halfway...and hopefully effect a rescue--it was their only chance.
Jim confessed to Mary that he, even then, had strong misgivings...he doubted anyone could get through. But Capt. Benteen asked him to try and Watson had always thought of Benteen as the finest officer he had ever served under, so
he reluctantly agreed.
So, with the note to Adjutant Cooke, off he went. They swung around to the east and tried to get to Custer from that way. When he reached a higher rise of ground (where state route #212 is today), he could see that Custer's men were getting overwhelmed--they were being scattered and cut down piecemeal...he felt no one could get through that. Just then the
Indians saw him and a large bunch came after him. [His horse] got three bullets and a war lance in him and was sinking fast.
"At that moment," Jim related, "I could have gone either way: toward the men on the ridge--with the message...and certain death, or...away from them...and save myself." He paused for a long time and finally said in a low voice, "You, of course, can see which way I chose". Then he said, "And I've been living with it ever since. I KNEW those men, Mary!"

After he ran to the eastern hills he was afraid to try to get back to those still fighting in the south.
A day later he did think of trying to go back; maybe try to say that his horse had gone down or something. He rode over to the battlefield and saw what was there...all dead and horribly mutilated. That's when he realized that he couldn't ever go back. He would be listed with the dead on that hill. As much as he had liked the army, it was the end of it for him--he was a coward.

The money? That was a typical Custer thing, Jim went on. The troops hadn't been paid for over six months. When the paymaster finally came Custer wouldn't let him pay the men at Ft. Lincoln because he was afraid they would spend it having too good a time and miss the march. So he had the paymaster accompany the column and pay the men all that back pay in the field where they couldn't spend any of it until they returned. Obviously they would never return...and Jim found their pay blowing around the field among the bodies because the Indians didn't know what money was. An entire regiment's back pay for six months! Sure, the Indians ripped a lot of it up just like they destroyed most everything else the soldiers had, but they still left most of it to blow in the wind.
Maybe it was just instinct on his part, Jim recalled, but he had set about gathering up as much of it as he could easily get, and stashed it where it could stay for awhile until he could ever come back for it...but he never did return for it...he couldn't, until now. And even now, surrounded by all these bones, he wasn't so sure he should have, except that Mary deserved to have some future, bought and paid for by all these dead.
"I never should have come back," he told Mary, "It's as if the dead don't want to let me leave...again." His haunted eyes looked about him over the old battlefield and Mary could see even more how ragged and gaunt he looked.
He didn't at all seem well.

Finally he stood. "Well, let us do what we came here for. It's down this way".

*******

[Jas. Watson]

So he leads her down to the rivers edge and under a washed out bank hanging in some cottonwood roots are a dozen or so rotten cavalry saddlebags stuffed with shreds of bills. She lightly talks about having a bunch of jigsaw puzzle work to do to match up the pieces of bills in order to use them (Jim had only taken the more whole ones) but by then he is almost beside himself with fear? She is too excited and amazed to notice...although she does remark about him looking not at all well and being kind of sickly looking.
They recover the money but by then it is about dark. Jim -really- wants to move on, but she talks him into camping right there near the river not at all far from the bones. She is so happy and so in love by this time that she is blind to what is happening.
They tie their horses up next to their camp, his horse has gotten over its friskyness and only stands very quietly. They light a fire and she tries for the inevidable romantic interlude--she is happy and in love, and so wants to care for him and use the money to help him get over his being haunted.
It doesn't work--Jim is not at all well, by now is obsessed in fact. He leaves the fire and goes for a walk and after a while she happily falls asleep.

The next morning she awakes--no Jim. Then she sees his horse is nothing but a mouldering pile of bones....and Jim had walked back up that hill.

----

I had originally thought to have him had some token of her love--to be found during the 1985 archaelogical dig, but figured the story as written was sappy enough as it was.
But as I say, it was well received. I attribute that to the fact that it was for the Romance readership rather than a historical thing.
Mine was the only entry that didn't end in 'forever after' love. Actually a bit of a horror story in fact. I didn't think it would be appreciated but naturally here in my synopsis I left a lot of the main schmalzy stuff out as you are only interested in the historical LBH stuff and not the main romance part which is what the story was about. It was really more about the two of them falling for each other, only for her to lose him in the end; how their greed under the guise of 'doing good' was their undoing.

I am glad I was able to find a few excerpts on electronic mode and bring a couple of them here so you could see some of it even though this was written a number of years ago.

So, now that I have bored you no end with it, what did you think of my romantic 'what might have been'?

I'd apprecite any comments.

[clw]

I want you to know that I'm a half hour behind on my evening chores because I have sat here and read every word of this!

Great premise!

[elisabeth]

Me too -- except it's an hour, and the morning chores!

I love that kind of ending. Beautiful. And what a terrific premise. Watson is such a figure of mystery, saying nothing when Thompson said so much, that he just cries out to have his part in events reinterpreted ...

Amazing that nobody caught onto the Custer connection, because you've played very fair with the reader, dropping in the clues at judicious intervals ...

And I do like the moral ambiguity, too. I suppose in a romance you've got to "like" both characters, but there's just enough of a suggestion that Mary's as flawed as he is, and that she's to blame for the unhappy ending ...

Nice stuff. Thank you so much for taking the trouble to post it!

[Jas. Watson]

Why thank you both! I am glad that my scribblings have given you an hour or so of entertainment. I do not claim to be any kind of writer, and that was my first real effort (with Romance?? Who'd of thought?), but the one thing that came out of it was a real fascination with the person of Jas. Watson. I have since sort of by default picked up that identity as a nom de plume and among the cavalry reenactors and forum people (as here for example)...yet I have learned so little about the man...and would so like to learn more.

I am very glad to hear that you both think that mine was a good workable premise and that you thought it 'hung together'.

Thanks,
SW~

[elisabeth]

Yes, it's kind of surprising that so many other enlisted men come through with at least a hint of their characters, or an anecdote, or a snippet of remembered dialogue, or something -- while Watson's just a name. Still, there's something to be said for a tabula rasa ... Leaves you free to imagine anything you want!

[Jas. Watson]

And I sure did with this case! But maybe it might be something for the Benteen bashers to chew on.

SW~

[clw]

Well, I did enjoy it SW -- very much. Ghosts, romance and mystery all revolving around the LBH? What a facinating combination!

[Tricia]

Jas--

Great, great start ... and I'm a sucker for gothic romance. I happen to be sponsoring a historical fiction contest at the Arkansas Writers' Conference this year, and would love to see you enter it--as well as anyone else at this board who tinkers in fiction. You won't win much money if you win, but it is a national competition and generally well-regarded when pitching to agents/editors. You need not attend the conference to compete, it's something like $10.00 to enter as many categories as you wish. PM me if you'd like a link to the conference site, eh?

Hope to see your m/s soon!
Leyton McLean

[Jas. Watson]

Thanks all, but I couldn't. I don't think my stuff is that good.
But that was just the sort of thing that caused me to write my story in the first place--and I was going up with some published Romance authors--it wasn't a 'win' sort of thing, just for critique. But as I mentioned, my little effort was well received...as well in fact as some of the more published authors. (Surprised me!)

I too love historical mystery.