Slocum and the Hellfire Harem (9781101613382) (15 page)

22

Slocum woke up in full daylight and cursed himself for wasting time and risking his hide with coyotes who would have liked nothing better than to sink their teeth into his leg or arm or head.

He spent a few minutes slowly unfolding himself from being huddled tight, trying to conserve heat. It had been a cold night, and since he'd had to travel light and fast, he'd left his gear hidden in the barn back at the little abandoned farm. And that meant no blanket or extra clothes. He stomped heat back into his good leg and massaged around the wound on his other leg to get his circulation flowing. No time for a campfire. Instead, he drank deeply from the canteen, then topped it off at the stream. The water made him cold, but he hit the trail and rubbed his arms on and off until the sun warmed him.

At mid-morning, he noticed a sudden lack of sound—no light bird chatter, no squirrels, even the breeze seemed to have dissipated. And then he heard a low, rasping sound, as if a fat man were walking along slowly, exhaling with each step he took. He'd been moving along at a decent pace, but had taken care to move as quietly as possible, not scuffing his boots on rocks, keeping to the softer spots, just in case the Bible-thumper or his son was prowling about. But now, with this new sound, Slocum slipped in among the trailside tree growth and boulders.

He crouched in silence, his rifle cocked, his pistol ready to be grabbed. The chuffing, sawing sound grew louder, closer, and then, across the trail and up a bit, he saw the massive honey-colored head of a grizzly. No wonder all the other animals had piped down. The thing looked to be a big male, small ears, shoulder hump wagging with each forceful step; the claws, curved surgical implements fully four inches long, wobbled with each step. The nose, almost as if it were a living creature all its own, roved left and right, sniffing for something to eat. This thing was death on four legs.

Slocum knew he was screwed. The beast, on all fours nearly chest height at the shoulder, would render him close to death with a single swipe from one of those forepaws. The creature looked to be in good health, and Slocum knew that shooting a rattlesnake was one thing, but a bull grizz? These things were born killers, instant to anger and, pound for pound, as tough as a wolverine but a whole lot bigger.

He'd have to get in a heart shot, then pray for a quick end. He considered shooting out the beast's eyes, but that would only make it angrier. And outrunning it wouldn't have been possible even if both his legs had been sound and in good shape, but he stood less than no chance of outrunning the grizzly with one pin ailing. No, his only chance was to sit tight, hope like hell the thing passed him by. He also wished he'd done some hunting on the trip and had more meat—a rabbit, anything that might satisfy this brute should it decide to sniff him out.

And then that's what it did. As it lumbered across the road, Slocum held his breath, kept perfectly still. He still had some broiled rattlesnake he'd been saving for later in the afternoon, but it looked like that time would not come. He heard his own heart thumping inside his head, felt his tongue and the inside of his mouth dry up as if he'd been dragging himself across the desert for days. Drops of sweat collected on his eyelashes. He didn't dare blink, so close did the creature seem. His eyes stung with sweat, with the urge to blink, drops clung to his nose tip, and crawled down his three-day beard, feeling for all the world as if he were a-swarm with lice.

He tried to calculate how long it would take him to open the cloth sack of snake meat swinging at his side. He figured he had about six pieces left. It was obvious the bear smelled food, and wanted it. That big black nose twitched and leapt side to side, up and down. The lower lip wobbled as the bear stepped ponderously forward, cautious and sniffing with each advance.

Slocum's hands grew tighter on his weapons, and he vowed to not go down without a fight. He also knew he might well be a goner, never again to know the warm, soft embrace of a woman, the clink of poker chips, the
punk!
of a cork popping out of a whiskey bottle, the bawl of cattle on a long drive, the singular sensation of riding the range alone . . .

And then the bear sniffed and grunted one last time, and padded down the road from the direction Slocum had come. He guessed it had already eaten recently. As he watched the great bear's backside waddle off westward, Slocum uttered a few words of thanks for whatever creature it was that had made a meal of itself for the bear.

He waited a good long time before he dared creep back to the roadway, then he hotfooted it toward his destination, despite the throbbing in his leg. The ache was just one more reason, he decided, to let those ungrateful men know exactly what he thought of them. It was a good couple of miles more before he slowed down on the neck swiveling as he checked his back trail for the grizzly. He knew from experience that they were wily trackers and would stop at nothing, distance be damned, to get at their prey.

Despite the bear episode, he saw by the height of the sun that he was making good time, and would be back at the farm by late afternoon. Just enough time to rest up, then hit them hard. A plan was slowly forming in his mind. He just needed the unwitting assistance of the sunburned men.

23

Just about the time he heard his stomach growl—he still hadn't tucked into the last of the snake meat, but had chewed two pieces of jerky—he smelled the light tang of wood smoke. Was someone else out traveling the road? It wasn't yet dark, too soon in the day for most travelers to make camp. Was it the Bible-thumper and his clan? Surely they would have made it back to their farm by now, unless they'd been forced to stop. Maybe the wagon had given out again. Slocum slowed his pace, checked his weapons, and advanced low, holding tight to the trailside shadows that grew longer with each minute as the sun descended to his back in the western sky.

Then he heard the throaty nicker of the Appaloosa. The horse had been with him long enough that he recognized the beast's sound. He was sure the horse was puzzled over this strange turn of events. It must be Judith, then, thought Slocum. And it occurred to him that she had taken neither his saddle nor his bridle. He'd seen her on the other mount the day before, and tough she did a serviceable job riding, she was no natural to the saddle. He reckoned she'd be sore by now.

And just off the road ahead, there stood Judith, standing with her backside bent toward the paltry flames of a small fire, rubbing her thighs and hips. He stepped into view, but it was the horse's nicker that gave him away.

Judith said, “Oh!” and spun to face him, clawing at her twin six-guns, but Slocum already had the drop on her. As she stared at him through the mask of anger, he thought he detected something else, relief maybe.

“No, no, no . . . horse thief. You leave those shooters right where they are, holstered and secure. Unbuckle that gun belt and toss it over here.”

She did as he said, started to speak, and he cut her off. “I don't want to hear a damn thing, sister. I'll do the talking and I'll let you know when I want to hear from you.”

Despite this, she said, “You won't shoot me. I saved your life.”

“Oh, you did, did you? And by the way, I didn't give you permission to speak. Now back away from the fire and sit on that rock, hands on your knees.” He snagged her gun belt and slung it over his shoulder. The horse stood hipshot tied to a tree a few feet away, so he went over and rubbed his neck. “Nice hackamore, Judith. Who taught you to do that?”

She scowled at him, then looked away, her eyes narrowed.

Slocum laughed. “Right, I forgot to give you permission to speak.”

She turned back on him. “I don't need your permission to do anything!”

“Hush up a bit or we'll both be in the soup faster than you can say ‘Holy Bible.'”

“Sorry. But we're still a couple of miles from the farm.”

“I know. I was there, remember? I'm the one who—”

“Yeah,” she said. “You're to blame for all this, you know. You're the one who cut them free.”

“I prefer to think of it as saving their lives. Though I will admit having come to regret that decision. Not one of my shining moments, come to think on it.”

She said nothing.

“Well, I'm glad to see there's some milk of human kindness in you.” He sat by the little fire and stretched his legs out, careful to keep his Colt's grip angled to the front of his belt, in easy reach. He kept the rifle and her gun belt on the ground at his other side, well out of her reach.

Her stomach growled and she crossed her arms over her belly and looked at her feet. He saw her cheeks redden.

“You hungry, Judith?” he said, untying the sack from his belt. “You won't believe what I had to go through to get this—and then keep it.” He tossed a chunk of the cooked meat in her lap.

She snatched it up and stuffed the entire thing in her mouth. After she'd chewed for a while, she said, her mouth half full, “It's good, what is it?”

“Finish it off, then I'll tell you.”

She stopped chewing, stared at him, those green eyes narrowing again.

“You keep doing that, they're liable to stick that way. Then you'll go through life looking ticked off at every little thing.”

“Maybe I am. And I asked you, what is this meat?” she said, chewing slower, the meat bunching in her cheek like a chaw of tobacco.

He finished his mouthful. “Snake.”

She stopped chewing again, and her stomach growled. She swallowed the meat. “Can I have a drink from your canteen?”

He passed it to her. “So, are you going to tell me just what you're up to?”

“Why should I?”

“Because if you don't, I'll paddle you sore and drop you off at the doorstep of the farm. Though I'm sure that's nicer treatment than you'd get at the nearest town for horse theft.”

“You wouldn't do that.” But the statement rode up at the tail end, as if she wasn't so sure about him.

“Judith, I have about had enough of you, your family, this valley, the whole works. I want my horse, then I want to go away, far away from you all. None of you make any sense. Your mother wants to go to California, has wanted to for years, and when she finally gets up the nerve to leave that crack-minded father of yours, she encounters hard luck and buckles under to him again. I'm the only man who has probably ever been kind to you women and you tie me up, then steal my horse!”

Despite his order to her earlier to keep her voice down, Slocum found himself growling at her, his voice beginning to shout. He took another bite of snake, chewed, then leaned forward and said, “You give me one good reason why I shouldn't dump you with them and leave. One good reason.”

She looked at her dusty boots again. “Because I love you.”

“No,” he said in a low voice. “No, Judith. You only think you do. You're too good for the likes of me, ma'am. You're special, you're young and full of the promise for the future. Besides, you're too young to be engaging in such acts. There's nothing wrong with them, mind you, but I'm an adult and so are your sisters. Don't be in such a hurry.”

“Ruth said the same thing.”

“Ruth's a wise woman. Look, the last thing you do if you care for someone is tie them up and steal their horse.”

She looked at him with red-rimmed eyes. “We . . .” She looked down again. “I did it to save your life. I know what Papa's like, and . . . I was going to say ‘the others,' but it's only Pap and Zeke left now, ain't it? But trust me, they would have killed you. Look what they did to Luke. Don't you see? You wouldn't have ridden away. Like I told you before, you're too good a person for that. You would have stayed and fought them, and they'd have killed you. So we did the only thing we could think of to save you. We knocked you out, then I had to figure out what to do with your horse. I hid. I was only going to tie it in the trees, but the men came storming in sooner than I expected. I wanted to help Mama and the others, but I froze. I couldn't think straight, not after they done that to Luke.”

He rested a hand on her shoulder. She felt so thin and small. “You did the right thing, Judith. Don't worry.” Then he lifted her chin and looked at her wet eyes. “You said ‘we' before. Don't you think you should tell me the whole truth? If we're going to be working together, that is.”

He handed her gun belt back without taking his eyes from hers. Finally she nodded. “Okay. It was Mama's idea. We all, well, she convinced us, after you shot Pete to protect me, and what with Ruth wounded, Mama was worried it would all end badly, with us all shot up. She said we could choose another time to fight, another time to leave. It would be harder in the future, but at least we'd be alive. Ruth and the twins were for it, and the children, well, they don't know their elbows from their behinds. They just want a sugar tit and a warm bed . . .”

Slocum smiled, nodded to encourage her.

“So, she somehow said she was going to send word to Papa and the boys that we were giving up. But Ruth and the twins and me . . .” She looked down again, picked at her dirty fingernails.

“So how did you knock me out? I don't recall taking a knock to the head.”

“That was Mama. She put wolfsbane in that coffee she brung you.”

He thought back, remembered its odd, bitter taste. “Isn't that some sort of poison?”

“Yeah, but she only used a little. It's an herb she dries. For medicines. You take too much, you can kill a body, but a little of it and you'll doze off for a good while.”

“I know,” he said, rubbing his neck. “I suppose I should be grateful I didn't wake up naked, tied to a fence.”

She half smiled. “We all didn't want no harm to come to you. But we knew you'd get to scrappin' with Papa and the boys, and we were just sure they'd kill you and we didn't want that at all. It ain't your fight, Mr. Slocum.”

He looked at her shining face a moment, then said, “I appreciate that, Judith. I really do, but I think you're selling me short. I have been known to hold my own in a scrap or two. But thanks just the same.” He got up. “We better fetch more wood. I think we can risk a bigger fire. If what I know about your pa is true, he won't come at us until nightfall—if at all. He might be too busy . . .” He let the thought die there, wishing he'd kept his mouth shut.

“About as busy as you were with Ruth again, huh?”

He dropped his armload of wood by the fire and sighed. “Judith, I—”

She just winked and shook her head. “That's all right—she can't help it. Besides, Mama's right. Men are all the same. Even the good ones.”

“Yeah, well, she may be correct in that assessment. I suppose it's true in my case, too. But you just wait a good long while before you verify it for yourself, you understand?”

Her smiled faded. “If they get me back there, I reckon I won't have that particular luxury.”

Slocum's gut grew cold. He'd almost lost sight of the real reason for seeing that these women were freed from Papa Tinker's preachy grasp. He was a poisonous man who'd infected his own sons, and was working on a new generation of the same. He'd encountered such families in the past, but had done his best to steer clear of them. None of them had wanted to change their plight, but these women were different. Despite long years of abuse, the mother showed a strong backbone and had passed that to her daughters, too. But they needed help to make the final leap, help he knew now that only he could give.