by Jake Logan
Slocum didn’t answer. She must not have expected him to, because she continued, “So the next morning, when they’d finished with me and were out in the parlor, deciding whether they’d allow me to live or die, I crawled up out of that bed and found a couple of guns. Those boys were sure surprised, all right. Even after they were dead, they still looked surprised.”
She smiled at that, and Slocum felt himself shiver involuntarily.
Simultaneously, the baby let out a very loud burp, and she lowered him to her lap, saying, “There’s a good baby. Slocum, can you bring me his case?” she asked. “He’s wet. Or something.”
If it was “something,” Slocum was awfully glad that she was the one who was going to deal with it, and not him. He pulled the baby’s kit down from behind his saddle and handed it over.
“No,” she said, waving it off. “Just get me out a diaper.” She was already unpinning the cloth she’d just put on him a couple of hours ago.
“Sure. Lydia, I’m awful sorry you got treated so raw. I mean that.”
“I believe you do,” she said quite seriously. “Thank you, Slocum. My diaper?”
Slocum dug through the kit and pulled free one of the folded white diapers. And when he did, something came with it.
He handed Lydia the cloth, and reached down for the papers that had fluttered to the desert floor, separating as they fell.
“So anyhow,” she continued as she cleaned the baby’s backside on the old diaper, tossed it aside, and settled the new one beneath him, “I covered up Winston the best I could and shooed out the livestock, and you know the rest. That’s the long and short of it.”
Slocum hardly heard her. He was staring at the papers in his hands.
“Slocum?” she said. “What is it?”
Slowly, he folded the papers, then shoved his hat back with a thumb. “Lydia, I think we ought to be treatin’ little Tyler, there, with more respect.”
Lydia cocked her head.
“The way I figure it,” Slocum said, “he’s about the richest baby in the Territory.”
5
Ed Frame, brother to Charlie, hadn’t had much luck so far.
He’d seen a lone chestnut horse dragging the remnants of a harness and suspected it was the last of that poor Mr. Tyler’s team. He didn’t chase it down. He didn’t have to. The horse just stood there while he eased up to it.
Well, nobody could say he wasn’t a kindly man. He’d stripped the rest of the tack off it, and only then did he realize the reason the horse seemed so docile: Its hind legs were tangled in a loop of leather, and it couldn’t move.
So, using his pocketknife, he’d cut it free, and on top of that he’d given it some water. Not too much, though. He didn’t have a lot to spare.
The horse had followed him doggedly for about a half a mile after that. He’d had to make a run at it and whoop and holler before it took off the other way.
Anyhow, he was beginning to think that this plan of Charlie’s was no damn good. He hadn’t wanted to kill Mr. Tyler in the first place. Why, he’d been all for going back to the wagon with Tyler and seeing what he and Charlie could do to help.
But that Charlie . . .
Sadly, Ed shook his head. Charlie was always up for a little plan for making money, and the one involving the least amount of work always called to him the strongest. It was a character flaw, Ed guessed, although he’d never said as much out loud. After all, when your older brother told you to do something, you did it—if you knew what was good for you, leastwise.
Once Mr. Justin Tyler, late of Texas and bound for California, had stupidly poured his heart out to them—all about his troubles and his wife and his coming baby and his dead uncle leaving him a gold mine out in California—Charlie had been nice and poured coffee down him and fed him the last of their ham and fixings, then shot him in his sleep.
Charlie liked everything to be easy.
Not that Ed would have stopped him, let alone tried to. He’d learned long ago that you didn’t mess with Charlie when he had dollar signs in his eyes, or when he was in one of his moods. And that night, both those things were going on.
Right about now, though, Ed was thinking that maybe he’d just turn his horse around and head up north, toward Nevada. It would be nice to just leave old Charlie behind.
It would be a relief, actually. Sometimes he didn’t agree with what Charlie did, or what Charlie told him to do. Of course, he’d never said a word to Charlie. Mainly because he liked living.
He reined in his horse and sat there a few seconds, considering.
Then he shook his head again. “Nah,” he said to no one. “You can’t run out on Charlie. You can’t run out on your one and only brother. Besides, he’d probably run you down and slit your throat, anyhow.”
He clucked to the horse. He guessed he’d just head straight for Cross Point, and he also guessed he wouldn’t look too hard for that wagon. Hell, he’d probably already missed it, anyhow.
He sort of hoped that Charlie had, too.
He reined his horse to make a beeline for Cross Point and started off at a slow jog. No use in wearing his horse out, even though he had plenty of water. Hell, he’d probably beat Charlie—who was probably turning over every bush and cactus—to town by a couple of days, anyhow.
He had gone about a half-mile and was just breasting a low rise in the desert floor when he pulled up short. He reached for his spyglass, opened it, and held it to his eye.
“I’ll be double-damned,” he muttered, and took another hard look, just to make sure.
It was a leopard Appaloosa horse, carrying two people: a big man and a fair-haired woman.
No, cancel that. There were three people, because the woman was carrying a baby in her arms.
Now, this was just too much of a coincidence to let it slip by. How many babies could there be out here, smack dab in the hard, dead center of nowhere?
Their horse wasn’t moving very fast, just sort of ambling along at a walk. Ed supposed that those folks weren’t in much of a hurry, either. Probably taking it easy for the woman’s sake, if she’d just had herself a baby.
It beat him how some drifter had run across Mrs. Tyler and her baby, but it was a funny world. Too funny, sometimes.
Oh well. Charlie’d be right proud of him.
He sighed.
While he collapsed the spyglass and put it away, he tried to figure out just how to handle this new situation. He supposed he could just ride right up to them, all friendly-like, then try to delay them until Charlie caught up with them.
Charlie was always the better one at killing folks, after all.
And Ed? He didn’t have much stomach for killing women, especially mothers, and that fellow riding behind them on the Appy didn’t exactly look like he’d be any picnic to put away.
Maybe he’d be better off just to trail them from a decent distance. But then, what if Charlie didn’t catch up until after they’d hit town?
That wouldn’t be good. Not good at all, he thought with a shake of his head.
No, he decided. He’d best ride down there and act all friendly. Just good, old, salt-of-the-earth Ed Frame, that was him. Glad to do anybody in trouble a favor, yes, ma’am and yes, sir.
Putting on his best howdy-glad-to-meet-you face, Ed Frame started down the gentle slope and toward the travelers at a soft lope.
Lydia, despite all that had recently happened to her, found herself drawn to Slocum. This surprised her to no end. She would have suspected—no, sworn—that it would be a very long time indeed before she ever found herself attracted to a man again. Billy Cree and his friends had been animals, certainly. And before that, for two long years, Winston had only been a passable lover.
Now that she thought about it, Winston sometimes exhibited a little of that feral streak that Cree and his buddies hadn’t bothered to try to cover up.
No one could accuse her of being cold toward men in general after all that.
But somehow, without making one
single overt move, Slocum was worming his way into her lonely heart.
He’d been nothing but a gentleman since he first picked her up. She supposed he’d saved her life, really. She didn’t think the way she was feeling had anything to do with that, though.
Just listening to the tone of his voice when he talked to her or the baby, witnessing his self-assured manner, and watching his big hands on the reins had her as wet and slippery as algaed weeds in a forest pond. He made her feel like she hadn’t felt in too many years to remember, back before she’d married Winston, before she’d fallen into the trade. Why, he made her feel like a teenaged girl again!
Now wasn’t that strange?
Then again, not really, she supposed after further thought. Slocum didn’t strike her as the type of man she could settle down with. He wasn’t the sort that any woman could settle down with.
He just didn’t appear to be the settling kind, period. And of course, that had always been the type she was most attracted to.
Which explained why she was currently about to slip and slide right out of the saddle.
“We’ve got company,” he said, and the rumble of it startled her. She’d been looking at his powerful hands, feeling his strong arm wrapped around her, feeling his heartbeat through layers of clothing when she leaned back into him.
She twisted her head to face the direction in which he was looking, and saw a rider loping toward them. One of his hands was up in the air, waving.
Slocum stopped the horse and turned it around to face him. “Grab that baby tight,” he whispered in her ear.
She knew that he meant he might have to wheel the horse in a hurry, and she held little Ty more firmly in one arm, and grasped the saddle horn with the other.
The rider didn’t appear menacing, though. As he neared, she saw that he had a big grin on his face. He seemed awfully relieved to see them, in fact.
But behind her, Slocum had tensed. She glanced down to her right, and saw that his free hand was hovering near his gun, and that he’d already thumbed off the little strap that held it in its holster.
The rider whoaed his horse about ten feet out and said, with a big grin, “Howdy, folks! I sure didn’t figure to run across company clear out here!”
“Good afternoon, sir,” Lydia said, and behind her, Slocum grunted. She wished she could see his face.
“Where you all headed?” the man went on. He was youngish—maybe twenty-five or so—tall and fair, reasonably good-looking, and had a large and bushy yellow mustache.
“I’m goin’ to Cross Point, myself,” he went on, pointing to the east. “How long you folks been out here? You get caught up in that hellacious dust storm, same as me? Law, I thought me and my horse, here, would choke to death before it was over. Couldn’t see more’n a few feet!”
Then, before she or Slocum could answer any of his questions, he gave his head a twist and said, “Say! You folks got you a baby in there?”
Slocum didn’t answer that. Instead, he said, “We’ve been out a few days. I’m Slocum. This lady is Mrs. West.”
The blond man tipped his hat. “Pleased,” he said. “I’m Ed. Ed Frame. Happy to meet the both of you.”
“We’re going to Cross Point, too, Mr. Frame,” Lydia said, mostly to fill the empty air that Slocum’s silence left.
“Say, that’s great!” replied Mr. Frame, and then he added, “And just call me Ed, ma’am. You, too, Mr. West.”
“I ain’t Mr. West,” Slocum growled.
“No offense,” Ed said quickly. “I just figured, what with the baby and all . . . What’d she say your name was?”
“Slocum,” came his terse reply.
“That’s all of it?”
Behind her, Slocum grunted again.
Lydia couldn’t decide why Slocum seemed so skeptical of their new traveling companion and why he had only offered her surname in his introduction. Ed seemed a likeable enough fellow to her.
Unless . . .
She felt another soft gush of warmth between her legs. Why, Slocum was as attracted to her as she was to him! Of course he wouldn’t want a third wheel hanging around!
At least, that’s what she hoped it was.
But there wasn’t a blessed thing she could do about it. It was between the two men. So she just sat there in the saddle, holding the sleeping baby. No, that was the sleeping rich baby, she reminded herself. The deed to a gold mine, hidden in his diapers! Now, that was something, wasn’t it?
“You folks mind if I travel along with y’all?” Ed asked. He patted the water bag hanging from his saddle horn. “I won’t be a burden. Got my own water and my own grub. I’d sure admire the company.”
“Suit yourself,” Slocum said grudgingly. “We’ll be travelin’ slow.”
“Oh, sure,” Ed replied, rapidly nodding his head. “I understand. On account of the little one and all.”
Right about then, Charlie Frame was running across the place where Slocum had picked up Lydia.
Charlie, who was a pretty fair tracker, knew it was a woman because her shoe size was so tiny. Also, she didn’t make much of a dent in the dirt, so she couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred and ten pounds or so.
She’d been on foot when the man found her, and the two of them had stayed here for a while. They’d tossed away a used diaper, too, so he knew that the man still had the kid with him. It fluttered, clean side-out, caught on a thistle bush.
Then the woman—and probably the baby, too—had mounted up on the horse, and the man had set off toward Cross Point once again, leading his nag.
Charlie shook his head. “This goddamn sonofabitch is just too good to be true,” he muttered. “First he saves that baby, and now he’s rescuing stranded women and lettin’ ’em ride his horse. Christ on an ever-loving crutch!”
With a creak of saddle leather, Charlie stepped back up on his horse. “This do-goodin’ hombre is gonna be the death of me, yet,” he said as he nudged his horse in the ribs.
They started out on the trail once more.
6
Ed was about to give up on Slocum ever talking to him.
The woman? That was different. She was pleasant enough. Not exactly a chatterbox, but at least she was polite without making a fellow feel like some kind of interloper.
Which was, of course, exactly what he was.
He was getting worried, because they kept getting closer and closer to town, and there was still no sign of Charlie. Of course, he figured they’d have to camp. Even then, they might not get to Cross Point until the next night. Ed wasn’t exactly sure where Cross Point was, but if Slocum kept up this pace, they might have to camp two nights.
So Ed decided to put off killing Slocum until tomorrow morning. He did this with a great sense of relief. As he’d thought when he’d first sighted them, killing Slocum wasn’t going to be any picnic.
He’d decided to wait until just before dawn, when the big man was still sleeping.
That was the safest. And then he’d almost get himself a full night’s sleep. Ed could be right groggy if he didn’t get enough sleep. He was afraid that if he tried to wake himself up in the middle of the night to do a serious job of work, he’d be just as apt to shoot a rock or a bush as Slocum.
Also, waiting until morning would save a lot of crying and carrying on from the woman, too. Even Ed could tell that she was a little stuck on Slocum. It was just something about the way she sat there, riding in front of him. Something about the way she leaned back into him, but not too much. Something about the way she watched his hand on the reins.
He’d got just a peek at the baby, too. He had no idea people could be so ugly when they were fresh-born. The kid was all scrunched up in the face, and his head was kind of misshapen.
Mrs. West had explained to him that it was just from his “jaunt through the birth canal,” whatever that meant, and that his head would look normal in a few days. Ed didn’t believe her, though.
How could being born warp a baby’s skull, for crying
out loud?
Ed figured secretly that Mrs. West didn’t know a whole lot more about babies than he did, that being somewhere between zero and nada.
He chanced another peek over his shoulder, just in case Charlie had appeared on the horizon in the last five minutes. He hadn’t, though.
He said, “When you folks figure on stoppin’ to set up camp?”
It was late afternoon, after all. The shadows they cast as they moved toward the eastern hills were long and narrow.
“Right about now,” Slocum said, surprising him. “Let’s head over toward that pile of boulders.” He pointed.
“Fine with me,” said Ed, and smiled.
It figured that Slocum would pick the place with the most protection from the elements. And the most protection from Charlie. Even though he didn’t exactly know that Charlie was out there somewhere, hunting for that baby Mrs. West was hanging on to so tightly.
“It’ll feel good to stop,” Mrs. West said. She looked pretty tired.
She’d told him how she came to be out here—her man had died, she’d said, and she got lost in the storm while walking to town—and so he figured she had a right to be worn out.
“Yes, ma’am, it sure will,” he replied.
Slocum said nothing.
They were fairly close to those hills. Ed was glad they were camping here, before they got up into them, because he didn’t know that Charlie would be able to track them. Not that Charlie wasn’t a good tracker. He was very good. But Ed had been through those hills before a long time ago, and knew they were made up of hard ground and shale and granite, and didn’t hold a track worth squat.
If he had things his way, he’d have everything taken care of by the time Charlie caught up.
Well, everything except Mrs. West. No matter what ol’ Charlie said, Ed wasn’t going to kill her. No way in hell would he do that. Charlie could just handle that part himself.