Slocum 421 (6 page)

“Thanks all of you for saving me. If I can ever help you—”

“No, you have helped us all with our jobs. I will take the outfit out in a few weeks for Stowe. Murty sends her love. She says she will go back to Iowa.”

“Thank you, men.” He pulled on the gloves they'd brought him and started for his horse and mule.

Someone with a post had smashed out some spokes in the buckboard wheels. In less than ten minutes the marshals' horses were in tow and the men were ready to ride west. Perfect clockwork precision, and Stowe had a good crew to go back to work for him. Murty was going back to Iowa. Slocum would damn sure miss her sweet ass.

He rode north, busting drifts with the gray horse, the black mule tracking with him, as the daylight began to break through the clouds and the snow was over. By noon the south wind joined his back, and the white mess had begun to melt into a slushy mess. He avoided any signs of life and was well on his way to the Republican River and a place where he could rest for a day or two. He sure needed his strength back to go much farther on.

After two days of hard riding and fording two swollen smaller rivers, Slocum was nearing the rolling land south of the Republican. He camped in a grove of cottonwoods that night. And a whiskered man in buckskin dropped by his fire and asked to join him.

Slocum offered him a can of peaches and warned him they might still be frozen.

The old man refused his offer, saying he had plenty of jerky of his own. The visitor said his name was Oslo Johansen and he'd been trapping all winter for mink ermine and prime wolf hides.

“I got enough to get some supplies and make it another year. I had me a one-eyed squaw all winter, but she run off just before the last big snow. She tanned a few elk hides. I'd sell you one for ten dollars if you'd want one.”

“I always wanted an elk-skin jacket. Folks say they keep you warm and never smother you when the weather turns hotter.”

“They are nice if you can find a seamstress. I have one. This hide has only one bullet hole in it.”

“Go get it. I may have the money on me somewhere.”

The old man made an effort to get up, and on the second try he made it to his feet. Slocum got the money out of one of the pockets in his money belt and snapped it back shut. Damn, Stowe had really packed it full of money. No telling how much he had. He hoped Murty had the gold money, but that might take months. Stowe paid her for cooking each trip, so she should get by. She'd spent little on herself with him—he'd done most of that for her. He shook his head, satisfied that she'd be fine without him.

“Here it is.”

“Why, Oslo, this is a wonderful piece of leather,” he said, admiring it. The tanning job was so good he could hardly believe it had once been an animal's coat. Snow-white, it might not be the best color for him now that the marshals wanted him too, but he'd have it made into a garment he could wear.

He paid the man and put the elk skin in his pannier.

“I don't guess you're a drinking man,” Oslo said when he came back.

“Whiskey, but I don't have any in my bags right now.”

“I'll wait. I know an old German down the way here makes some good stuff. Just been so long since I had anything to drink my tongue's about swollen.”

“Where will you summer?”

“Oh, up in the mountains where I can eat trout, hang a small deer, and eat it before it rots. Might jerk an elk if I find a squaw to help do it.”

“Sounds neat.”

“It beats living in a town or plowing crops.”

Slocum agreed. But he had more than mental reasons for living out here. He was on the move to avoid the law.

That night he slept well, and the old man was gone when he awoke near dawn. Strange men wandered the West. Most were friendly and no threat, but crazed killers wandered there as well, men no one knew who murdered helpless individuals for sport and were gone again. The danger always existed in remote places.

The snowmelt had the Republican swollen when Slocum reached it, and he and his animals took the ferry that an old black man cranked across for twenty cents. The wind was from the north, and it sought him riding northwest through the grassy rolling hills.

 * * * 

He reached the Bar N J in mid-afternoon. Dressed in men's jeans and a plaid wool shirt showing her fine breasts' shape under it, Jenny Nelson came out smiling in the doorway. “Where have you been hiding, old man?”

“Oh, places. Looks like spring can't come soon enough around here.”

“It sure can't, can it? Get in here and drink some fresh coffee I just made.”

“Well my animals can wait a little longer.” He caught her in his arms and kissed her. She was a tall woman in her mid-thirties; strong as an ox but very feminine, and they'd had a longtime relationship.

“How has it been going?” she asked him, and her arm on his shoulder, they went inside her log house. The smell of something sweet baking found his nose when she set him in a chair.

Her coffee was Arbuckles' and real smooth. “All right, I guess. How are things going with you?”

“Good. I have a nice set of steers we've wintered. They will be great next summer to market and will keep us in the business. Lots of work to hay them, but my boys are good hands. They've grown a lot since you were here, and they've gotten good at breaking horses. We've sold some. I just fear that homesteaders will shut me out of steer raising in the future. Oh, and I have been promised delivery late this summer, from a reliable man, of two hundred more light steers to winter.”

“It sounds like you and those boys are getting along great.”

“We are. Vance is now sixteen and Tom is fourteen. Yes, we sure are, and they will be excited to see that you are here when they get back. They'll want you to help and tell them how they are doing on their horse breaking.”

“I will do my best.”

“My boys know about our affair. I won't hide it from them unless you feel uncomfortable about it.”

“I don't feel uncomfortable ever with you.”

“Good. Let's put your animals up. What have you been up to?”

While they stowed his panniers and tack in the harness room, Slocum told her about shooting Hampton in Fort Hayes and the results. He left the treasure part out but told her about his hearing, the plan to send him to Leavenworth Prison, and his eventual escape.

“Oh well, you are no stranger to being on the run, are you?”

He kissed her and held her tight to his body in the barn alleyway. “Hell, no.”

“If it was warm enough, I'd take you up in the hayloft like we did years ago.”

“I have some fond memories of that loft and you.”

“So do I, Slocum.”

“I am surprised you haven't found a man by now.”

“Some came by. But they wanted to rule my boys like some stern schoolteacher. I couldn't stand that.” She frowned and in a harsh mimicking voice said, “‘Them boys need their asses busted twice a day.'” Then she shook her head. “I didn't need them.”

“No. And I'll be careful not to be that bad.”

She gave him a shove. He knew he could not stay there long, but he aimed to enjoy some time doing things around her ranch.

The boys were coming back from feeding hay to the herd, driving a hayrack with two big black Percheron horses jogging in the jingling harness for the home place.

“Hey, Slocum!” Tom shouted from beside his older brother, who was driving the empty hayrack.

“Our man is back. See her smiling, Tom?”

“Yeah, so am I.”

They stopped at the barn and jumped down to hug him and shake his hand. The reunion was good, and the boys were certainly in top physical shape.

“Say,” Vance said. “We need to fork on some hay for tomorrow. Join us and we can talk.”

“He just got here,” their mother said, looking hard at them for wanting to work him so soon.

“We won't kill him, we promise,” Tom said, and they all laughed. Tom turned away and went for another pitchfork for Slocum to use.

Slocum scrambled up on the bed, and Tom was back, handing him a fork. And then they were all on board with the big horses headed for the remaining stacks.

“We had a great summer stacking this hay,” Vance said.

“And we've worked our asses off this winter feeding it back. We had hoped to have four stacks left for next year, but the way this year is going, we will only have two.”

“You guys are doing a man's job here.”

“We have money in the bank, and we'll have a good bunch to sell next summer.”

“That's super.”

“We are breaking some horses. Two are teams and three are saddle horses. These two wasn't very well broke when we bought them, and they are dandies now.”

“Great horses.”

Pulled in broadside to the stack, Tom tossed Slocum the fork and went off the side. “We have a ladder out back. Vance can stack it on the wagon as fast as we can fork it down.”

They fell in trying to cover Vance up, but he was a handy at his job and the rig soon was piled high and loaded. They jumped aboard and rode back to the headquarters. The boys laughed and teased Slocum about coming to see their mom instead of them.

“That isn't even hard to answer. Hell yes.”

The big horses were stalled, and they showed him the other teams they had and were breaking.

“That buckskin pair we wanted for her buckboard, but man, they were tough to break. They're still rowdy.”

Slocum nodded. “Vance, they will be the toughest team you ever own and the best. Mark my words.”

“We almost sold them, but we had a vote and when Mom said not to, we voted with her.”

“You guys are lucky. She's a great lady.”

“We know that. Where are you headed?”

“Oh, somewhere.”

“You ever get tired of riding all over?” Tom asked.

“Not really.”

“Tomorrow, we can feed them and then you can give us some tips on these horses we're breaking,” Vance said.

“Whatever you guys have to do is fine with me.”

In the house and washed up, he could smell the various foods Jenny was cooking in the kitchen.

“Hey, we're glad you came,” Tom whispered. “We'll really get some great food.”

The boys and Slocum were all laughing.

“What's so funny?” Jenny asked.

Slocum hugged her shoulder where she stood over the cooking range. “You don't want to hear it.”

He and the boys laughed some more about it.

 * * * 

After the meal, they played cards for matches. Vance won big-time in draw poker. Finally the boys went upstairs to bed after banking the stove. Slocum and Jenny sat on the couch and kissed until she led him off to her bedroom. They undressed and she put on a knee-length nightgown, He wore a nightshirt she had for him. Under the covers, they soon were busy making love. Different than his last, giggling partner, her body meshed with his, and they soon reached a high that fell off into more kissing. He slept until she woke him before dawn.

“Tonight,” she whispered in his ear and kissed him sweetly. “You never lose your touch to arouse me. I know that you are on the run again. But thanks, Cowboy, for stopping—you really please me when you do.”

Then she quickly dressed in the darkness and went to start breakfast. He got up and dressed, then went outside in the cold and pissed. Spring must not be coming this year. Many years they had broken the garden and planted potatoes and cabbage by this time.

 * * * 

Jenny went to town later in the week and returned upset. “They don't look like you, but they have reward posters in the post office and even one nailed on the Collins store, out front. I tried to ignore them, but they have a five-hundred-dollar reward on them for you, dead or alive.”

“That's the most valuable I have ever been. Anyone talking to you about me?”

She shook her head. “I don't think anyone has put you and me together much in the past five years. Your visits since then have all been sweet but short.”

“I don't want to bring you any harm. I'll shoe my animals tomorrow and ride on.”

“We can help you do that,” Vance said. “I hate for that to happen, but I am concerned someone may connect you to us. Five hundred dollars is lots of money today, and someone could rush out here to get you.”

“I agree. Well it has been a nice visit with you, Jenny, and both you guys. You really are growing up into men.”

“Slocum, we may have been little, but I recall what you did for Mom after they shot Pa. We'd not be living on this ranch and having what we have if you hadn't cleaned up that bunch of outlaws that ran over this country back then.”

Tom nodded. “That Jim Blocker shot Pa in the back to get her for himself. But she wasn't taking him on a bet. And I can recall being scared enough I pissed in my pants. You don't ever forget that. And you've come by many times, to help and teach me and Vance how to do things. Hell, we'd hide you in the storm cellar if we had to.”

“That congressman lost a prodigal son, and he blames all that on me. They didn't want me to have a fair trial. It was all set up to railroad me into a hanging. I may never clear my name from this frame-up, but there's not much I can do but keep them shagging my tail till they get tired of it.”

“It's damn shame though,” Vance said between bites of his pancakes dripping with sugar syrup. “But come back, we'll feed you.”

Their mother shook her head, looking close to tears. “Slocum knows he's always welcome here. He's the man.”

Then Jenny rushed off, and both boys dropped their chins. Vance finally said, “Don't worry. It is always like that when you leave. We can comfort her after you ride on.”

 * * * 

They worked horses all day after haying the steers. The cattle all looked good, and many were licking the hair on their sides, a sure sign to Slocum that they were gaining weight. The black horse was three and soon to be part of a matched team. The mare was two, and while she was more brown than black, they'd make a good farm team.

“Whoever gelded him did it wrong,” Slocum told the boys. “It won't ruin him, but he still thinks at times he's a stallion. A summer of mowing hay will drain some of that out of him.”

Tom agreed. “That's real important how you castrate a horse, isn't it?”

“Yes it is. How old was he when they cut him?”

“This past spring.”

“Then he'd probably bred some mares, or tried to, before he was cut.”

“Some old man did it before we bought him.”

The gelding had his head high, and the strong wind flagged his wavy mane. His whinnying made his whole body shake.

“Keep working with him. He'll soon discover his balls are gone,” Slocum said in a teasing tone.

Both boys laughed

“Glad he didn't get mine,” Vance said and laughed. Tom agreed.

 * * * 

Next day they reshod his gray and the mule. It had warmed up, and most of the snow was gone except in the deep shady spots. A wonderful special final night in bed with the amorous body of Jenny, her long legs and fine boobs to kiss and taste, had closed the curtain down on Slocum's visit. At dawn he rode off to the north, after kissing her hard and shaking her young men's calloused hands. He could have stayed there for a long time.