Slocum 421 (4 page)

They left Fort Hayes an hour before the sun rose. A nip in the air, harness jingled and leather squeaked as the draft animals hit their collars and strained to move the loaded wagons. A few had little to haul, but they were hitched to younger horses who needed more training. Half were mule teams that brayed a lot. Slocum wished they were all mules, but besides being more expensive they were hard to find. And most that were for sale would kick a man's head off, and he didn't need to tend to anyone kicked in the head—usually they never got their right mind back and posed a real problem for those tasked with caring for them.

In those things in Trent's saddlebags, Slocum had read the letters from his wife, who lived with her parents on a farm in western Iowa. In her letters, she had been concerned about his health out there, and the dangers he faced. She wanted him to come back home to farm and stop his treasure hunting so they could have family and a life together. One letter, Slocum recalled, addressed her concern about Trent dealing with the congressman's son. She had doubts about anything to do with that man. Trent should have listened to her.

Slocum sent her a note telling her that her husband was dead and had no things of value that Slocum could send on to her.

A week later they set up on the bend in the Arkansas that was marked on the map. Slocum began to search the area with Murty riding on the back of his horse. One day riding close to the river he spotted a rusted old Spanish spur imbedded in the sand. He let Murty down and then dismounted to recover the once very ornate spur. It was corroded by rust and grime, so he found a rag and they polished the spur with sand and water.

“Well at least we found their spur, huh?” She giggled and shook her head. “Way off up here, I bet that they were horny bastards when those Indians killed them.”

“This happened way before wagons even used this route. Maybe over a hundred years ago.”

She looked around and across the shallow river. “But where did they bury their treasure, huh?”

Big question. He had only one answer. “Have you ever witched for water in your life?”

“No. But I've seen it done back in Iowa. Why are you asking me that?”

“I don't have any power with a peach branch in my hands, but if you do, we might find it?”

“How do you figure that? You don't need water.”

“I was at a party in Biloxi once before the war, and a woman took a peach-branch fork and found a lost ring with it.”

Murty scowled at his words. “Aw, I don't believe that could happen.”

“You don't know what you have not tried.”

“Who has a peach-tree fork out here?”

He pointed at his chest. “I do.”

“Where you get that at?”

“People have thrown out pits all along this trail for years, and two days ago I cut a few along the river that had sprouted up. “Want to try one?”

“Sure, but it won't do nothing for me.”

“Wait and see.”

“You think they buried them right here?”

“Hell, darling, I wasn't here. But we found a spur here and we may find a treasure here.”

“Okay, get the branch.”

“Coming right up.”

She shook her head at him like she thought he was crazy. Then she giggled. “I don't know about you at times, big man. You can come up with some real strange ideas.” Rambling on about how she didn't believe there was any magic in a peach tree—she waited.

When he returned, she held the small fork in her hands out in front of her and began to stride across the sand in the new wool-lined boots he'd had made for her. Out of nowhere she screamed and dropped the stick like it was on fire. Then she started backing up like she'd seen the devil himself or a rattlesnake, until she bumped into him and he caught her.

“What in the hell is wrong, woman?”

She hugged him tight. “Oh, my God, that damn stick turned in my hand and then I saw a strongbox down there.” Her whole body was trembling as she clung to him and pointed in the direction she had backed away from.

“I've been in spooky deals—b-but never this weird.”

“Well the thing is now we need a shovel.”

She was still having spasms of chill-like symptoms. “I'm too shaky to try and ride a horse. I'll sit down here while you go get a shovel. I'll be right here waiting.”

He charged off on the gray, grabbed a shovel from the camp, and rode back to her in a hurry. When he got back, she was still seated hugging her arms and acting like she was freezing. The sun was too hot for that reaction.

On her feet she ran to him and stood shaking her head in dismay. “Where do you think I got that power?”

“You always had it. The peach fork brought it out in you.”

“I damn sure ain't telling anyone but you about it. They'd lock me up if my story was exposed.”

He dug for an hour in the soft sand. She began to speak discouragingly about the whole deal. “It probably was all a fluke. Nothing down there, is there?”

Then his shovel struck something hollow.

She jumped up. “What is it? What is it?”

He was standing in the hole tossing the sandy material up on the ground beside her in a large pile. At last he unearthed a metal-bound chest. The dryness out there had preserved the wood from rot. A large lock swung on the hasp when he put the heavy box on the ground and climbed out.

“Oh my God.” Her hands pressed to her face, she stood shaking all over. “Looks just like I saw it brand-new.”

Kneeling beside it, he used his pistol butt to bust the lock open. She joined him, mumbling about everything at once. The lid was stuck, but he finally pried it open, and the tarnished multiple-sided coins appeared.

“They ain't worth nothing. No one in their right mind would take one of those old things. Shoot, we did all this work for a box full of goddamn junk.”

He took out his rag and polished one of the coins in his fingers until a golden hue shone in the sunlight. He heard her suck in her breath.

“Aw sweet Jesus, they are sure enough real gold coins. Holy Christmas, we are rich. You crazy galoot, you found us a fortune.” She was hugging and kissing him like a wild woman. “Oh, I am going crazy. I can't wait to get you in bed tonight. I'm going to really take you to the end.”

He was covering the hole as fast as he could. “Go cut some sagebrush with my bowie knife. This needs to look like I never disturbed it.”

“Right, we have to conceal all this, don't we?”

“Right.” His back muscles were beginning to ache from all the heavy digging.

“Where will we hide it?”

“In the false wagon bed under the floor in your wagon.”

“Good, you show me. It will be safe there. Now tell me why was all this money way out here in the first place.”

“Before Thomas Jefferson bought this land, the Spaniards owned it. They may have been taking all of this to what is now St. Louis. The French got the land back, but Napoleon sold it to finance his wars.”

“You think there is more here?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think I could find it?”

“Yes.”

“That really scares me worse than having bad dreams.”

“We need to be careful. There is enough here to be the target of a mutiny of men or a robbery.”

“How will we get it back?”

“We can sneak back to camp while all the men are gone hunting. I've heard several shots, so they have work out there. Meanwhile we will hide it.”

“Good. You are so wonderful.” She hugged his neck and kissed him.

He recovered the peach fork, then led the horse. Seated behind the cantle, she held the heavy box ahead of her on the saddle. They made it back undiscovered and hid the heavy loot in her wagon. He planned to bury the empty box later somewhere else. That would have to do for the time, but there were all sorts of things that bothered him about the safety of their treasure.

Did anyone else come with Trent out there to Fort Hayes? No mention of it in his wife's letters, but did the congressman's son have a search party? As far as Slocum knew, no one had shown up to claim Hampton's body and handle the funeral. He understood that the funeral man had sent a bill to Miles's father in D.C. for his burial costs.

A highly placed congressman like that could sic the U.S. marshals or Pinkerton men on Slocum, to find and arrest him on murder charges. One more damn good reason for him to keep his head down. He'd better back get to killing buffalo. It soon would be too cold and wintry to do much. He also needed to go see about trading some of the newly arrived whiskey for hides.

There were usually some squaws who would come to trade for food when they learned of any camps around close. Though there'd been none so far, one day they'd show up. Slocum could trade for some wolf pelts in full winter fur that would sell well. Also mink and ermine furs, along with the fierce badger skins. It all depended how many tribes were this far west. He knew many tribesmen were down on the Canadian River because winters were a little milder down there and that meant more buffalo, but the area bordered on the Comanche range, and they were too deadly for Slocum to risk being around.

 * * * 

Hunting went well until the first big snow drifted in. Then they fed their animals grain sparingly until they could paw for grass under the snow cover. It was weeks before they could go back for more treasure hunting. From a wandering trader, Slocum bought a pack mule to carry the loot back home.

But before the snow really set in, Murty had covered lots of the riverbed ground with a peach branch, to find only old flint musket works and barrels, the stocks long rotted away, spurs, and some steel spear heads—but no more boxes in that area.

Five Indian women came to trade furs for food at their camp one afternoon. Slocum issued them one bottle of whiskey and told them in sign language that they would owe him three buffalo hides for it. They nodded.

Two days later they came back with six horses and their travois loaded down with buffalo hides and furs to trade for more food and whiskey. At that price Stowe would show a real good profit from his winter work. Diego was off with his three men cutting down trees on an island, for firewood. With the hard freeze on the river, they hoped to get the wood out and back to camp, where the supply was getting low. They each carried a rifle, and Slocum had told them to be alert at all times.

They returned that evening and told him that they had a good stockpile cut up and thought the ice was thick enough to hold up horses and a wagonload of firewood to bring it closer to camp. The ice was eight inches thick where they drew water for the animals and themselves from the river.

Hunting was slowed down by the weather, but more squaws, from different tribes, came to trade for—“with-ski.”
That was how they pronounced it. One squaw, he knew, had gone away and then slipped back at night to treat some of Slocum's men on her back under the covers for something in trade, maybe for some blankets. There was no trouble; Slocum was amused that life went on as usual even out on the frozen prairie, miles from civilization. He had the lovely Murty to giggle with him in his bedroll at night anyway.

Then a thaw came in February. In the South, where he was raised, they called it oat planting time. He and Murty went back and tried a new place to search for more treasure. They recovered two more treasure chests that day and secured the coins in her wagon. Then he hauled off the empty chests and destroyed them so no one would recognize them.

So far he felt their treasure recovery was going well. There was no telling the value their find amounted to, but the haul was much larger than he'd ever imagined. More squaws came to trade, but he could see that their horses were poor from eating only willows. It was the Indians Achilles heel in the north country. Their horses, in a bad winter, almost starved. Some did, and the ones that survived had to have six weeks of grass to even recover. The southern tribes, like the Comanche, didn't have that handicap, with open grasslands for their horses to graze all winter.

One snowy day, an entire tribe came and pitched camp nearby. It was snowing slantways, and the north wind was cutting through hard. Slocum told everyone to stay with his gun. They had a stout sidewall tent for their meals, and two stoves.

A chief came and talked peace and how he wanted to trade more hides for whiskey. The tent soon was full of tribesmen, women, and children, plus Slocum's men.

Murty went to cooking on top of the metal stove all the buffalo meat she had on hand.

Some of the men ran outside and took an axe to a frozen carcass that they'd dragged in to get her more meat. Soon some of the Indian women began to help her.

She showed them how to pound thawed meat slices tender with her special hammer, then flour them and fry them in boiling lard. The results, passed around to the men, made even the Indians grin. She also made bear tracks in another fry pan of hot melted lard. Cooled some, she broke them in half and fed them to the delighted children. It took two hours to fill everyone. The Indians went back to their tepees when the women got them set up. Slocum never knew how they did it in the howling wind, but he knew from experience that Indian women were as strong as most men.

Escatar spoke to him when the Indians had left, about how many guards should be posted.

“Three? What do you think? They act friendly, but that can change like the wind.”

Slocum's man agreed. “Where will you sleep?”

“In her wagon, if you need me.”

He nodded. “They were damn sure hungry for her fried meat.”

“It was a treat, like the bear tracks.”

“Yes. But it will be a long night.”

Slocum agreed. He and “Giggly” were soon in their cocoon of blankets to get ready to sleep.

“I am so damn tired from cooking and cooking I don't think I could do much for you.”

“Sleep. You did extra well. I can wait.”

“Good.” She snuggled over on her side with her butt to him, and he curled around her. The first time in nine months they had missed having sex. Whenever they would get into bed, she was ready and nothing stopped them, cycle or whatever. But he had to agree he wouldn't miss it this night with all those Indians so close around them and him thinking about all the danger they might pose, even though there were women and children with them. He slept on edge that night.