Slocum 419 (15 page)

Somewhere, behind them, rode the man in black.

Slocum.

A name that made his ire rise every time he thought of it.

He tapped his coat as if to reassure himself that he was still wearing his pistol.

If Slocum was on his trail, he knew he would need it.

Sooner or later.

Slocum knew that they were riding through a great gorge formed some 200 million years ago by the massive ice sheet that pushed up the mountains. Sometime during that ice melt, a mighty river had coursed through the Rocky Mountains and carved that gorge where Durango now stood. The only trace was the Animas River.

He also knew that he and Clara faced a sixty-mile ride in darkness to Pagosa Springs. The old wagon road cut through the mountains and into the gorge. He was sure he could find the road because it made a steep drop into the huge canyon. Up on the plain, they would be surrounded by snowcapped peaks that ringed the region. He remembered riding through that huge basin that seemed to have been swept almost clean by ancient glaciers that rumbled across the land, pushing up dirt and rock to form the Rockies, which now stood like silent sentinels over a once-ravaged land that had seen much violence in ancient times.

None of that knowledge gave him much comfort as he and Clara rode into the teeth of the wind that blew from the north, ruffling the river and peppering their faces with grit and a fierce, biting cold.

“It's going to get worse, Clara,” he said as they left Durango behind them and plunged into a darkness deepened by the steep walls of towering cliffs on either side of the bumpy uneven road.

Clara reached into a pocket of her coat.

“I brought a wool scarf,” she said, and flourished it like a banner that blew it almost level along her side.

“Better wrap it on,” Slocum said.

He pulled up his bandanna and made a robber's mask over his nose and mouth. It was not enough, but it was better than nothing.

“How far to Pagosa Springs?” she asked as she wrapped her face with the scarf.

“Sixty miles,” he said.

“Oh my,” she said and bowed her head against the brunt of the wind.

He didn't tell her that it would seem like more miles than that until they rode out of the deep gorge and onto the plain.

It gave him some comfort to know that Wolf and Hobart were probably wishing they were back in Durango, lying in warm beds, their blankets piled on top of them.

He had a high regard for the original white men who had trapped in the mountains during the cold of winter. And now, it was only late summer. The mountain men must have gone through hell to set their traps in freezing waters, build little log huts, and wade through waist-high snow to service their traplines. He had met some of the old-timers who had trapped marten, mink, and beaver, and they were all tough as hickory nuts, and wouldn't have traded their lives for anything. To them, the mountains were sacred, and civilization only a place where they could trade valuable furs for money to buy whiskey, supplies, and maybe the company of a white woman. The mountains were their own special realm where they reigned as kings, a place of magnificent beauty and plentiful game. In the Rockies, they had found sustenance and a peace that could not be matched.

“Stay behind me,” he told Clara. “That way, you won't get mashed by so much wind.”

“I'll take you up on that,” Clara said through chattering teeth.

So they rode single file up the trail with the wind whipping at their coats and burrowing through their boots and socks.

Slocum had to tie his hat down with a leather thong under his chin. He bowed his head to deflect some of the wind from his face. His forehead had turned into a frozen block of granite, and his fingers, encased in heavy gloves, were fast losing all feeling as the chill slowed the blood in his capillaries and searched under his skin for layers of fat and solid bones.

Above them, Slocum knew, deer and elk were feeding in the stands of timber, roaming through the phalanxes of pine trees, juniper, spruce, and thick brush, protected from the wind, on guard against marauding wolves and the packs of yelping coyotes. But there was no way up those steep cliffs to less hostile ground. They had to make their way through the gorge until they struck the road eastward to Pagosa Springs.

And high above them, too, mountain lions roamed the rimrock, sniffing for prey, bounding gracefully over huge boulders and crags like tawny shadows, silent and almost invisible.

A few miles from town, Slocum heard something.

He halted and held up his hand to stay Clara from advancing any farther.

“What is it?” she asked as she came alongside him and slightly to his rear.

“I heard a rock crack up on the rimrock,” he said.

“What?”

“Temperature. When it drops, some of those rocks and boulders get mighty unstable. The cold makes them shrink some, and if they are on soft ground, they can tumble.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“I've seen avalanches at night in some of these canyons. You don't want to be underneath one if a big boulder loses its footing and comes rumbling down the cliff.”

“No, I would think not,” she said.

They waited and Slocum listened.

There, he heard it again, the scrape of rock against rock.

He looked up toward the top of the high cliff and beyond, to the stars. The moon was just gliding into view above the tall pines in an inky sky. The stars seemed brighter from the bottom of the gorge, and the Milky Way was a brilliant tapestry of glittering diamonds so far away a man could not even imagine the vast distance.

Then there was a loud scraping sound, a rumble, ahead of them and atop the barren cliff.

“Here it comes,” Slocum said. “Duck your head.”

Clara looked up in the direction where Slocum pointed with his gloved hand, his arm outstretched.

She did not duck her head as sparks, brilliant and golden, erupted from the top of the cliff. A huge boulder rolled downward, leaving a fiery trail that ignited small bushes in its way. As it gathered speed, it set fire to the larger brush clinging to the cliff face. The boulder roared as it tumbled down the slope like some errant comet with a bright, flaming tail.

“My God, John,” Clara exclaimed.

They both watched as the boulder roared down the rest of the cliff face, bounded over the road in a fiery orange and yellow streak, and tumbled into the river. There was a mighty splash and a hissing sound as the boulder abruptly cooled and then split in two as it struck a rock in the streambed.

Slocum waited as the split rock settled and the silence returned.

“What a magnificent sight,” Clara said. “Was that an avalanche?”

“No. One big rock loosened up and came down. If it had been an avalanche, the whole top of the mountain might have come down on us.”

“Oh, my. Is it safe to go on?”

“I think so. Just keep your eyes open, if you can in this stiff wind, and I'll listen. Some pebbles could come down after that rock let loose, but they shouldn't harm us.”

“Are you sure?” she asked apprehensively.

“Don't worry,” he said and laughed.

They both heard a rattling above and ahead of them, as loosened gravel slid downward. But none loosened any more rocks and none reached the road.

They rode past the place where the boulder had put on such a fireworks display, and there were no more such incidents.

There was only the wind, and it chilled them both to the bone.

Clara was not so exposed as Slocum, but she could feel it. She was cold and miserable. She thought of warm places and warm times, and that helped her to deal with the cold. She looked at the back of the tall man and was glad he was right in front of her on his black horse. She trusted him and she had never trusted any man until then.

The years seemed to drop away from her as she gazed at Slocum's strong and sturdy back. Had she met him years ago, she might never have had to endure the humiliation and pain of those lonely, dreary years with Wolf Steiner.

But, she reasoned, the past could not be erased. They had not met and each had lived separate lives. Now Fate had drawn them together and there was a fullness in her heart that she had not experienced since she had been a child. She felt rich beyond measure to have made a friend in John Slocum. And finally fulfilled, since they had coupled together on his bed. She could still feel him inside her, still feel that swollen member plumbing deep into her womb, and she could recall the thrill of her many climaxes and the beauty of lovemaking that had made her feel, finally, like a real woman, a woman loved.

Slocum saw the cut in the road just ahead and breathed a half sigh of relief. He worked his fingers inside his gloves, hoping to restore feeling from the blood flow. He wriggled his toes inside his boots, glad that he had worn heavy woolen socks instead of the cotton ones he carried with him.

“There's the road to Pagosa Springs,” he said as he turned to look at Clara.

“Mmmm,” she mumbled. She shook all over from the cold and could not even form words from her frozen lips.

They turned up the road, and the wind subsided considerably. It was a long steep climb to the basin above them, but at least they were out of the bruising wind that they had faced head-on.

They rode for another hour after they had topped the crown of the road and made their way across a vast plain where mountains glowed in the distance with their snowcapped peaks.

A while later, Slocum slowed Ferro and approached an object at the side of the road. Long before he reached it, he knew what it was. He beckoned for Clara to ride up alongside him.

“Looks like a dead horse up ahead,” he said.

“I see something,” she said.

The wind still blew across the plain, but it was warmer and not as brisk.

Slocum slowed to a stop as they reached the horse. He looked down at it, and even in the dark, with the moon high above them, he could see the bullet hole in the horse's brain.

“Why, I know that horse,” Clara said.

“You do?”

“Yes. His name is Willie, and he belongs, belonged, to one of Wolf's men. Yes, that's Tom's horse. Tom Jessup. I wonder what happened.”

“Probably went lame on him,” Slocum said. “I noticed a hole back there in the road. I rode around it.”

“I never saw it.”

“But you followed me. Bad thing for a horse to go lame out here. Hold on a minute. I'm going to take a closer look.”

Clara shivered and clasped her arms around her as if that would help to warm her. It did not, but the illusion was there.

Slocum dismounted and with numb fingers dug out a box of lucifers. He shielded the match against the north wind and struck it as he bent over.

The match flared, and he examined the ground all around the horse. He saw boot prints and the hoof marks of two horses.

Easy to figure, he thought.

Wolf and Hobart had stopped here. The man named Tom Jessup had probably been reluctant to shoot his horse and Wolf had talked him into it.

The match went out and Slocum struck another one.

He walked back and forth, staring at the horse tracks.

One of the horses had taken on extra weight. Its hooves had dug deeper into the ground.

“Likely, your Tom is riding double. That'll slow Wolf some. But none of us are going to gallop across this piece of prairie anyway.”

“No. Not in this wind,” Clara said.

Slocum let the match die out and dropped its skeleton onto the ground. He climbed back up in the saddle.

“How far ahead do you think Wolf and Hobart are?” she asked.

“Wind's blowing sand and dust into those tracks. Two hours ahead maybe. Way more than an hour. Hard to read such tracks in the dark.”

“You're a good tracker,” she said.

“Fair,” he replied and spurred Ferro to set out along the road.

“We won't catch them tonight, will we?” she asked as she rode alongside Slocum.

“Not likely. Not unless they stop or make camp. And that's not likely either.”

“No, I supposed it's not,” she said. “Oh, John, I'm so glad I'm with you.”

“You're crazy,” he said. “You could be home in bed, warm and safe.”

“I'd rather be with you,” she said, and immediately wished she had not spoken those words. Slocum might get the idea that she was chasing him. “I meant . . .” she started to say.

“I know what you mean,” he said. “You want Wolf dead as much as I do.”

“Yes, yes, I do, John.”

“Be patient,” he said. “And stay sharp.”

“I will,” she said.

They rode on and the wind dropped. It was still very chilly, but Slocum began to get feeling back in his fingers and toes.

Slocum could not gauge the miles they had come, or the miles they had yet to go. But he knew he was on the right track. Somewhere ahead, three men rode and they were all headed for Pagosa Springs.

Distance was difficult to measure. He could see the shining white tops of the mountain range in the distance, but in the high mountain air, mountains always appeared closer than they actually were.

He looked over at Clara alongside him. She was a tough one, he thought. She would have made some man a good wife. She was made of solid pioneer stock, like the women who had come west with their men in covered wagons to settle and build homes, bear and raise children, grow food while their husbands hunted wild game. He had great admiration for such women, and when he looked at Clara's strong face, he knew she belonged in their company.

At another time and place, perhaps, he and Clara might have married and both lived different lives.

But he was what he was, and she was what she was.

There was no changing who they were, he knew.

For now, though, they were riding together and they both had the same wish. It was enough to form a bond between them in this time and place.

And he was glad that she was with him, and he with her.

That was enough, too.