Slocum and the Thunderbird (15 page)

He found a road and considered following it. He spat some grit from his mouth when he came to the conclusion that satisfying his curiosity about what lay ahead didn't cut it. He had freed Erika. He had to look for Alicia's pa, even if he only reported to her that the man had died in the explosion.

As he turned west off the road, a dark shadow swept past him.

“Son of a bitch!”

Slocum went for his pistol, dragged it out, and turned to look behind when a powerful blow caught him on the side of his head. He got off a shot. Then he tumbled to the ground, stunned. The last thing he saw before he blacked out was a pair of boots covered in feathers crash down hard a few feet away.

Slocum groaned and tried to move. For a moment he thought the creaking sound came from his joints. As his eyelids flickered open, he saw that the rawhide strips securing his wrists to wooden poles driven into the ground had made the noise. He strained. His muscles bulged, but the leather strips didn't yield any more and only cut savagely into his flesh.

The fog cloaking his brain blew away when he realized he was stripped to the waist and strung up like a hog in a slaughterhouse. His legs were similarly tied to the poles. Craning his neck, he saw he was in the foothills. The poles had been sunk deeply enough that no amount of jerking about budged them. Tied spread-eagle like this made him vulnerable to any attack. That Mackenzie hadn't killed him outright sent a chill down Slocum's spine.

The smoke he had created setting fire to the saloon to cover his escape had done more than he'd intended. During bright daylight, Mackenzie wouldn't reveal his secret of gliding down to slash and kill in the guise of the thunderbird. But Slocum had hidden his attack with clouds of smoke, and that had done him in.

Futilely jerking at the rawhide only cut deeper into his wrists. Blood oozed from the abrasions. If enough soaked into the leather and it dried, the strips would contract, causing the tension to increase. Slocum doubted his arms and legs would be pulled from their joints, but he already experienced considerable pain. More and he might black out. The only thing in his favor was the sun being lower in the sky. Autumn robbed it of its summer fierceness.

Death from exposure wasn't likely in his future, though. Mackenzie had stretched him between the poles for a reason.

Even as he strained at his bonds, Slocum heard distant cawing.

Mackenzie!

“You crazy son of a bitch!” he shouted. “You're not fooling me. I know you stuck feathers on your body, but you're no thunderbird!”

The cawing sounds turned to mocking laughter. Mackenzie moved about in the rocks somewhere behind and above him. Slocum tensed his right arm and leg, hoping to loosen the post on one side. Only his flesh gave.

He looked up when a shadow rushed past him. Mackenzie banked as wind snapped the cloth stretched on the metal poles strapped to his arms. The powerful shoulders and arms bulged with the effort of holding the fake wings in place. Slocum saw that no amount of flapping would make Mackenzie fly like a bird. All he did was glide and swoop like a buzzard circling on rising hot air.

In spite of himself, Slocum watched the phony bird bank again and then touch down a dozen yards away. Mackenzie jerked and collapsed the ten-foot wings, folding them awkwardly. He lumbered forward. Slocum had seen expressions like this before on men driven crazy. Eyes wide and a touch of drool sneaking from his lips, Mackenzie hopped and bobbed about as if he were a real bird.

“You're not much of a rooster,” Slocum said. Goading Mackenzie led in one direction—to his own death—but he had to change the rules of the deadly game being played out. Tied up as he was, Slocum could do nothing. Let Mackenzie kill him. But the man might make a mistake and let Slocum fight back.

“You're going to be a gelding before I'm finished.” Mackenzie reached out. Six-inch talons on his left hand looked rusty with dried blood. “Do you cringe in fear? You will!”

A talon raked down Slocum's bare chest, then worked lower to prod into his groin. Try as he might not to react, Slocum moaned as the talon dug deep.

“Does that excite you? Some men find it irresistible.”

“You're not a rooster,” Slocum said. “You're a capon. This is what you do rather than screwing a woman—because you can't perform.” It was a pitiful jibe, but Slocum was getting desperate. White-hot pain stabbed into his chest; a mere twitch of Mackenzie's other talon would castrate him.

“Oh, I've had women. The one you released. Erika. She is quite taken by me.”

“She never said anything like that when I was—” Slocum cried in pain as Mackenzie raked his chest and left behind four deep gashes.

Mackenzie danced about, flapping his arms and sending the wings to their full extension. He cawed and cackled and might have been some Indian brave doing a war dance. Slocum watched through eyes tearing from the pain. He caught his breath as Mackenzie danced closer, then lashed out with the talons strapped on his right hand.

The iron claws passed close to Slocum's face. One tip opened a small scratch just under his right eye. The blood trickled down and left a salty taste in his mouth. He spat at Mackenzie but missed. The bird-man danced away, pretending he was airborne and circling and diving on fleeing prey.

“Was it only the mercury that drove you loco?” Slocum called to Mackenzie as he moved out of his field of vision. “You crazy from that or were you always this way?”

“I dream,” came Mackenzie's voice from behind Slocum and above his head. He had climbed into the rocks to once again take wing. “I read. I'm well educated, you know. I saw the plans for wings and knew that was my destiny.”

“You think you really are a thunderbird?”

“Of course I am!”

A talon raked Slocum's scalp as Mackenzie soared from his perch and tried to get lift under his wings. He misjudged and crashed to the ground a few yards in front of Slocum. The only weapon Slocum wielded was ridicule. He laughed at how Mackenzie fumbled about, trying to get to his feet. The wings turned him clumsy.

“Everything you care for will be stripped from you,” Mackenzie said after regaining his feet. “Erika? I'll find and kill her.” He slashed the air with both sets of talons. “The women you have helped escape from my town? I'll have my way with them and then kill them, too.”

“What about Rawhide Rawlins?” Slocum took a shot. Mackenzie showed no recognition.

“I'll gut your horse, I'll—” Mackenzie suddenly stopped his taunting and stood straighter. He cocked his head to one side, dislodging a few of the feathers glued to his scalp.

Slocum watched them flutter to the ground. No wind blew. The only sound Slocum heard was the dripping of his blood onto the rocky ground, but Mackenzie listened intently. Then he raced off, again disappearing from the narrow area Slocum could see.

From the scraping noises, Mackenzie worked his way into the rocks behind Slocum so he could swoop down from on high. But he had given up his torment too quickly.

“What is it, Mackenzie? You running away?”

His words echoed into the distance. Then he heard what Mackenzie already had. Steady hoofbeats approached. Slocum swung his head around to keep the blood from blinding him. The ponies coming directly toward him weren't ridden by cowboys or Mackenzie's gang.

Sioux.

Slocum knew he would receive no more mercy at their hands than at Mackenzie's. Argument would fall on deaf ears. He tensed and tried to pull free again. All he accomplished was cutting off the last of the circulation in his hands. He sagged, then looked up when he heard a commotion among the braves.

Unlike the Sioux party he had found in the maze of canyons, these showed no fear as Mackenzie swooped down at them, screeching like some berserk eagle. Quick, sharp words passed from the war chief to the others. As Mackenzie glided overhead, the chief yanked out a coup stick and swung it at the flying man. The tip of the stick hit a wing, sending Mackenzie spiraling away.

Slocum hoped it would ground him. From the rifles coming to bear, Mackenzie would die from a dozen leaden slugs if he touched down. Somehow, he swirled around and remained aloft. The war chief let out a battle cry and chased after Mackenzie, whacking at him with the coup stick. Mackenzie caught an air current and edged up out of reach, but not out of range. The Sioux opened fire.

Slocum saw part of the cloth on one wing tear away, but Mackenzie wasn't deterred. He banked and dived on an Indian whose courage failed him. He stopped firing and tried to wheel his horse about and flee. Iron talons raked along his back, ripping through a hide vest and sending ribbons of blood sailing through the air.

Mackenzie's arms bulged with the strain of pulling out of the dive. More bullets sought him, but he'd had enough of the fight. Rising on a freshening breeze, the bird-man soared and left the Indian war party far behind.

Slocum saw one Indian vent his anger in Mackenzie's direction, then turn and spot him. The Sioux brave rode closer. Slocum sagged, motionless. The worst that could happen was the Indian leaving him dangling from his bonds. A bullet through his heart would put him out of his agony, but Slocum hoped for more by playing possum.

He smelled the brave's sweat and the horse's lather. Moccasins crunched on the ground yards away. Slocum forced himself not to respond even when the Sioux poked him with his rifle. He couldn't keep himself from bleeding. Dead men didn't bleed, so it would be apparent he still lived if the Indian bothered to notice.

Slocum heard a whistling sound. Eyes closed, he could only imagine the steel-bladed knife coming toward his head, his chest. He winced as the knife tip drew a bloody line along his right forearm and nicked his thumb. The brave said something in Sioux he did not understand, then Slocum was all alone.

Waiting as long as he could, Slocum played dead. When he no longer heard the sounds of horses, he chanced a quick look. The Sioux had taken off.

“Find the son of a bitch and kill him for me,” Slocum muttered. He spat blood, choked, then forced himself to raise his head. It proved harder than he'd expected. Blood had dried on his scalp and neck. His face had turned into a bloody mask and any twitch cracked it.

It took him several seconds to realize what had happened when something banged into his nose. The pain working its way down from his shoulder into his right hand brought him out of his daze. The brave had cut the rawhide strap holding his right hand. He had automatically brushed his face, but the hand lacked feeling and he had thought he'd been hit with a meaty club.

Wiggling his fingers brought some circulation back into his hand. The strap around his wrist still cut to the bone but persistence won out. His fingers could grip again. Turning painfully, he grabbed the strip holding his left hand. The force of both left and right hands against the leather caused it to come untied from the post.

Again Slocum's victory proved dangerous. Legs still tied wide apart, he fell straight forward and crashed to the ground. At the last instant he got his arms tucked against his chest and broke the fall. The jolt still made him gasp with new torment rattling through him.

When he had regained some strength, he forced his way back until he could sit and look at how Mackenzie had bound him. Using both hands and kicking hard, he ripped out first one and then the other thong holding him. For several minutes, all he could do was sit and stare. If the one binding hadn't been cut by the Sioux brave, he would have died. Maybe not today but certainly tomorrow.

The Sioux weren't any friends of his, but he owed them for the strange kindness one had done for him.

Getting to shaky feet, Slocum looked around. As far as he could see in front, only rocky terrain and occasional flat stretches reached out to the wall of mountains in the distance. He didn't recognize where he was, but he doubted it was too far from Wilson's Creek. Mackenzie lacked the patience to drag him too far. Besides, wearing the thunderbird wings kept him from too much ordinary activity. Slocum doubted Mackenzie would shed the wing apparatus, bring him to this secret killing place, then don the wings again. More likely he had draped Slocum over his saddle and led the horse here before climbing onto the rocks to get altitude to take flight again.

He walked around the rocks, found a narrow path, and took it to the top of the rocks immediately behind where he had been tied. From the scratches on the rock, Mackenzie had climbed here before launching himself into the air. Slocum looked away from the posts below to a spot some distance behind him.

“You're dead, Mackenzie. You're a dead man now.”

He had located his horse, shirt, and six-shooter. After dressing and settling his pistol on his left hip, he felt ready to take on a pack of wildcats.

Or a thunderbird.

The closer Slocum rode to Wilson's Creek, the edgier he got. The town might have been a thing alive, a malevolent beast waiting for him to enter and be devoured. The smell from the burned wood had new odors added to it. Some weren't unpleasant. The fire he had set using the whiskey gave a heady tang to the evening breeze, but another odor turned his stomach. During the war he had come across too many fallen soldiers burned to death to ever forget that stench. Whether the citizens of Wilson's Creek burned dead bodies or added to the funeral pyres with live ones gave a speculation Slocum became increasingly reluctant to discover.

He fervently hoped the Sioux war party had tracked Mackenzie and killed him for offending their gods. As cunning as Mackenzie had proven in the past, Slocum had to believe he had returned to the town. If so, the death blowing on the night wind might be laid entirely at his feet.

At his talons.

Slocum touched the ebony handle of his Colt, wanting Mackenzie squarely in the sights. If the Sioux had failed to kill him, Slocum wanted that pleasure.

The road he had found came from the north into town. He headed directly around the edges of what passed for civilization in Wilson's Creek and rode to the mines. Erika hid out somewhere. He wished her nothing but a safe escape. Rawlins, if he was anywhere, might be in the mines or at the mystery project north of town. Linc Watson definitely was in the mine—had been. Slocum had promised Alicia he would rescue her pa, if “rescue” fit what had happened between them. She'd extorted his cooperation with a promise of directing him to Rawhide Rawlins. Not for the first time Slocum wondered if she'd lied to him about even seeing his onetime partner.

He finally decided it didn't matter. Freeing Watson and as many others as he could was worthwhile all by its lonesome. Anything that upset Mackenzie and enraged him made Slocum happier. Rubbing his still sore wrists and aching from the deep cuts on his body every time he moved gave Slocum a constant reminder of Mackenzie and his thunderbird disguise.

The ore-crushing plant worked to reduce the ore to dust. Shackled prisoners turned cranks and moved conveyor belts of the crushed gold ore into the amalgam plant. Huge pillars of steam rose from the boilers where the mercury-gold amalgam was reduced, separating out the gold and returning the mercury to a liquid state to be captured and reused. No matter the destruction in the town, the plant never closed, the ore conveyors never slackened their pace—and that meant the mines were once more disgorging ore.

The dynamited shaft looked the worse for its collapse, but hard work had reopened the tunnel into the side of the mountain. The narrow rails disappeared into the hillside and two empty ore carts had dumped their load at the end, almost ten yards from the mine's mouth.

He dismounted and led his horse to a spot where it wouldn't be seen. Only then did he return and examine the carts. He put one foot on a rail and felt vibration from deep in the mine. Another cart rumbled and rattled its way out with a heavy load of rock.

Waltzing into the mine held no appeal for him. Trying to kill the guards one by one was a fool's errand. From what he suspected about Wilson's Creek, everyone was nervier than a rotted tooth. The slightest hint of anything wrong would bring down the wrath of a small army on his head.

Slocum hiked to the guard shack where he had seen those off duty sleeping earlier. The tiny bunkhouse was empty. He slipped in and lit a lamp to get a better look around. A big key ring hung on a nail near the door. He took it down and examined the half-dozen keys. All looked identical.

He worked one off and tucked it into his coat pocket. As he went to return the key ring, he stopped. On impulse he took a second key and slid it into the top of his boot. Only then did he replace the ring.

He blew out the lamp and returned to where the two ore carts rested at the end of the track. Snatching up a tarp, he crawled into the cart nearest the mine and pulled the cloth over him. Hunkered down in the dark, rough metal cutting at his already lacerated body, he waited.

The vibrations coming up from the wheels grew stronger. He almost cried out when a sudden impact against the side of the ore cart jostled him around.

“Dump that ore. The crusher crew will pick it up. Get all three of the empty carts back into the mine. There's a lot of debris that needs to be moved out right now.”

Muffled complaints were met with the sound of a fist hitting flesh.

“You shut that pie hole of yours. The boss wanted double the production this week, and we're behind. Ain't even one shift and we're behind.”

A second blow and then Slocum's cart rocked. For a moment he thought it was going to topple off the tracks, but then new grating sounds told him the third cart already retraced its way into the mine. Seconds later, he was tossed about as his ore cart clanked after the other one.

He chanced a quick look out and saw only the intense blackness of the mine's belly. He was being pushed into the mine where he wanted, but a sense of helplessness hit him hard. At any instant a guard might pull back the tarp and find him. Or the shackled miner might see the chance to curry favor with his captors and turn him over. Clutching his pistol, Slocum endured the long trip into the mountainside. When the cart stopped, he had to be ready to act.

The cart stopped sooner than he'd anticipated. He waited a moment, then pushed back the tarp and sat up, his six-shooter swinging about as he sought a target. He was alone. Faint yellow light flickered a few yards back along the tracks. A guard beat at a miner with his fists, then added a kick to the man's midriff as he sank to the floor.

“You don't work, you don't get fed.” The guard stalked away, leaving the miner doubled over, clutching his belly.

Before Slocum's finger curled back far enough on the trigger to end the guard's life, he disappeared in the darkness. Getting out of the ore cart proved more difficult than it should have. Slocum ached all over and some of his fresh wounds still oozed blood, plastering his shirt to his body. More than this, the roof was so low he had only a couple feet of room between the cart edge and overhanging rock.

He snaked his way over, lost some skin as he went, then fell hard to the ground. The miner moaned and looked in his direction, then held up a miner's candle to better illuminate Slocum.

“You're not a guard. You got a number on your forehead. I think.”

Slocum involuntarily touched the spot where he had written the number. He had forgotten about it until now.

“I'm looking for Linc Watson. Where is he?”

“Watson? Oh, yeah, Watson. I remember the name now. He's working the next drift.”

Slocum went to the man and pulled him to his feet.

“You want out of here?”

“You touched in the head? Of course I do!”

“Help me find Watson, and I'll get you out of those irons.”

“You do it first.”

Slocum understood why the miner had no reason to trust anyone. Considering the man's sad condition, Slocum knew he could keep him from bolting and running.

“We work together and the three of us will be drinking whiskey under the night sky,” Slocum promised.

“You have to shoot them off? The chains? Or you got a drift pin? You can pry the shackles off that way. Ain't nobody can pick the lock. Too many have tried.”

Slocum fumbled in his pocket and pulled out the key. He shoved it into the keyhole and twisted hard. For a heart-stopping instant, he thought it hadn't opened the lock. Then a dull click signaled the lock giving way.

“You done it. You got me out of the chains.”

Slocum was almost bowled over when the man hugged him and began to cry.

“We can't stand here lollygagging,” Slocum said. “We don't get out of this hellhole without Watson.”

The freed miner pointed back down the tunnel, his hand shaking with emotion. Tears ran down his cheeks. Slocum thought he was going to hug him again.

“I'll hunt for him. You stay here,” Slocum ordered. The man nodded and wiped his nose with his dusty sleeve. “Get the ore cart and push it to the branch in the tracks.”

“It's not full,” the man said.

“It will be when it leaves the mine,” Slocum said.

The miner wasn't beyond understanding Slocum's plan. His head bobbed up and down as he went to push the cart. Even empty, the ore cart was almost more than the man could handle. Mackenzie didn't feed his slaves well and treated them worse.

Slocum reached the branch. The one he had been sent down was virtually empty with all the activity where he had to free Linc Watson. He rubbed his forehead, hoping to obliterate the numeral there. Visitors to Wilson's Creek weren't allowed in the mines. Only slaves and guards. However much of the white number he removed had to do. He pulled his hat low on his forehead and walked boldly down the tracks.

Four miners fitfully used their picks on a vein of quartz. A guard sat on a keg of Giant blasting powder picking his teeth with a long, slender-bladed knife. He didn't even look up as Slocum swept past. And he didn't make a sound as Slocum got a step behind him, whipped out his pistol, and swung it hard. The barrel connected with the back of the guard's head.

Slocum pushed the man to one side and looked around. The miners didn't even notice. Fights between guards might be common or perhaps the workers' wills had been completely sapped and they no longer cared. It didn't matter to Slocum. He used their lethargy to his advantage to go deeper into the mine.

In a small niche hacked out of the rock, he found more blasting powder. The temptation to lay a few feet of black miner's fuse and blow it, completely destroying the mine, passed quickly. Trapping Mackenzie's unwilling miners would be as savage as the guards trying to do the same rather than letting their slaves help put out the fire in town.

Farther into the darkness, Slocum saw a guttering candle.

“Watson?”

The light shifted. The miner turned and looked in his direction.

“You came back,” Watson said in amazement. “I didn't think you would.”

“After the guards dynamited you inside the mine, I thought you might be dead.”

“But you came back for me, even thinking that.” The man's pick clattered to the floor as he shuffled toward Slocum. “Alicia must be really persuasive.”

“Yeah, she is,” Slocum said, not bothering to mention how he had helped Erika escape before coming to the mines. “You see my partner? Name's Rawhide Rawlins.”

“Not heard that name. There haven't been new miners for a couple weeks, not that I've seen.”

“Come on,” Slocum said. “I cold-cocked a guard. If another finds him, all hell's going to be out for lunch.”

“There are a half dozen now,” Watson said.

Slocum hesitated. He hadn't seen but the one guard.

“Are there other shafts?”

“One branches off to the left. And this one. It's the main source of the ore now.”

Slocum stopped beside the powder magazine. He used the butt of his six-gun to smash in the top of one wooden cask, then spilled the blasting powder all around. He picked up the small cask and backed toward where he had slugged the guard.

“You can't blow everything up,” protested Watson. “There are innocent men in here, unless you're fixing to save them, too. Are you?”

“No,” Slocum said. Then he dropped the almost empty cask, fumbled for a lucifer, and remembered he had given the tin to Erika. Sudden commotion made him look over his shoulder in the direction that would take them to freedom.

“There he is! See? I told you!”

Slocum recognized immediately the voice of the miner he had freed. Whether he had been caught by the guards or had run to them begging for his freedom didn't matter. Four gunmen blocked his way out of the mine.

“You don't want me to light this,” Slocum said, thrusting out his six-shooter. The muzzle blast would send out enough sparks and hot lead to ignite the powder.

“The powder. Look at what he's done. A trail of it runs back to the magazine!” Linc Watson cried.

The effect was what Slocum had hoped for. The guards began backing away.

“Keep going,” Slocum called. He held up his pistol. He could never win a shoot-out, but he threatened mass death with a single shot.

Three of the guards continued to retreat but one showed some gumption.

“You ain't gonna blow us all up. You'd die along with us.” He lifted his rifle and aimed at Slocum.

Slocum had to push the bluff even farther. He cocked his six-gun, made a dramatic move, and shoved the muzzle down as if to apply it to the gunpowder. The last thing in the world he expected was Watson rushing forward, driving a bony shoulder into his gut, and knocking him backward away from the powder trail. Slocum landed hard on the floor, the six-shooter discharging with an ear-shattering roar. He tried to aim it toward the blasting powder for a second shot.

A boot crushed down on his wrist until he dropped the gun. Then the guard kicked the pistol away. In the flickering light from a few miners' candles, Slocum looked up into the muzzle of the rifle held in unwavering hands.