L'Aigle solitaire is a comic book by Jean Giraud and Jean-Michel Charlier. The original French version was first published in Pilote magazine in 1964. Then it was published as a comic album in 1967. An English-language comic album was published in 1978 under the title Lone Eagle. This is the third episode of the Blueberry series and the third part of the First Indian Wars series.
Blueberry managed to go back to the US with Dick Stanton, who was a prisoner of the Mescalero. In Fort Quitman, he is assigned to escort an ammunition convoy from Dallas to Camp Bowie. Blueberry also wants to go to Camp Bowie to meet General Crook because he thinks the war between the Americans and the Apache can be stopped.
L'Aigle solitaire provides examples of the following tropes:
- The Alcoholic: O'Reilly, the quartermaster. He is always drinking. He is hiccuping when he meets Blueberry. In the end, Blueberry makes him promise that he will stop drinking, but he cannot keep his promise for long.
- Antagonist Title: Aigle solitaire ("Lone Eagle") is the real name of Quanah-One-Eye, the main antagonist of this episode.
- Big Damn Heroes: Blueberry and his men show up just in time to save the convoy when it is attacked by the Apache in the canyon.
- Brutal Honesty: Colonel Quitman is this, telling Blueberry that even if the Apaches have been unjustly blamed for a crime that things have gone too far for the war to be stopped, even more with the Natives being excited by their early successes, and telling Blueberry to not thank him for giving him the mean to go to Camp Bowie as it's a poisoned gift as the travel between Fort Quitman and Camp Bowie is very long and that the region is very unsafe. Blueberry himself does this to General Crook, telling him that it's them, the US Army who are in the wrong, and that the Apaches were wrongly blamed for the crime they were accused of.
- Let's Split Up, Gang!: Justified. First, Blueberry splits up the escort to send the Apache on a wild goose chase. A bit later, he stays behind the convoy with some soldiers to wait for the men who misled the Apache. So the escort is divided in three groups for some time.
- The Load: O'Reily's alcoholism and stupidity prove to be almost as dangerous for the convoy as Quanah's cunning. He constantly dismisses Blueberry's concerns about the Indians, completely trust Quanah despite Blueberry firmly telling him that Quanah is not to be trusted at some point, and totally falls in the trap in the canyon that Quanah leads him and the convoy into.
- The Mole: Quanah-One-Eye works as an Indian scout for the US cavalry, but he actually is an Apache chief and he lures the convoy into a trap.
- Pillow Pistol: Blueberry holds his gun when he sleeps. When a cavalry patrol finds him asleep, he draws his gun quickly and points it at the soldier who woke him up.
- Properly Paranoid: To make sure that Apaches aren't following them Blueberry splits the convoy and send a group of soldiers with wood planks leaving traces similar to charriots to lead eventual trackers on a wild goose while the soldiers remaining with the main convoy erase the charriots' traces. Also shortly after that piece of ham is stolen from the food reserve, which most of the soldiers quickly dismiss it as unimportant after an inconclusive investigation but Blueberry cannot stop thinking about it. While riding on his horse Blueberry eventually spots a group of vultures flying above a specific spot, something he initially tries to dismiss but his curiosity gets the best of him and he decides to investigate. His curiosity and suspicions are proven to be correct when he realizes that it's the stolen ham buried beneath rocks that is attracting the vultures and that there are stones put together in the direction of the path that the convoy is taking, a signal for the Apaches to know about the convoy and in which direction it's going. This discovery is what allows Blueberry to conclude that Quanah is an Apache spy as he's the only who could have done that as he had sent him to scout the land.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Colonel Quitman, the leader of the eponymous fort, is willing to listen to Blueberry about the war having been started for wrong reasons, and helps him go to Camp Bowie to makes his case before General Crook by making him the leader of a convoy, even seeming amused by Blueberry's hot-headness and stubbornness despite blunty warning him that it might be a lost cause. General Crook himself is this, accepting to listen to Blueberry and relucdantly accepting to halt his war plans to get an authorisation of the president to negociate with the natives.
- Red Right Hand: Quanah-One-Eye is one-eyed and he is the main villain of this episode.
- Riding into the Sunset: In the final panel, Blueberry rides into the sunrise.
- Shoutout: The final panel of the album is a reference to Lucky Luke. Blueberry rides into the sunrise in a similar way to Lucky Luke in the end of each of his adventures (Lucky Luke, however, rides into the sunset).
