Slocum and the Comanche Captive

by Jake Logan

  “Gracias, patrón,” Estelle said, and slipped off Diamond’s rump.

  The two sisters fell into talking about the storm as he short-loped off to camp. On the go, he shrugged off the slicker, which was getting too hot to wear in the rising heat. Relieved at his first sight of the camp, he rode on in to be met by an anxious-looking Mary.

  “Everyone is all right, but we thought we might blow away. How are the others?” Mary asked.

  “I haven’t seen Heck. Grande Juan lost his horse and Estelle took a spill. She and her horse are fine.” He spotted Tomas. “You and Juan hitch up a cart. We have a steer with a broken leg that we need to butcher.”

  “Sí, patrón.” The youth shouted to his cohort and they rushed off for the horses.

  “Rosa and Gato can go with you,” Matilda said to Slocum. “They know how to butcher. Help me get them some knives and a saw.” She stopped. “And make them be careful with the hide. No holes in it. We can always use the leather.”

  “I will,” Slocum said. He swung down, pulled his pants out of his crotch, and stretched his tight back muscles. Been a real close call. Their losses could have been much worse.

  “Bring me back the skull too,” Matilda said, coming out with her hands full. “I want his brains to tan it with.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Slocum said and chuckled. She wasn’t wasting anything.

  Rosa looked bored when she came out of the women’s tent still dressing herself. Obviously, she had been sleeping. Gato was a small, swarthy girl, perhaps older than she appeared. At the sight of him, she turned away and slid to a place behind the tailgate of the big cart where she could not be seen. With a fearful look in her eyes, she always hung back at the sight of him.

  When the boys brought the smaller cart up with one horse in the shafts, Rosa made a face. “Shit! We’ll all have to walk home if that steer’s meat weighs anything.”

  “Shut your mouth, girl,” Matilda ordered. “You want to walk back home?”

  “No, but—”

  Matilda, with her hands full of knives and the stones to sharpen them, frowned her into silence. The utensils were stowed in a wooden box, and Matilda told the girls and Tomas she wanted all of her knives back. Juan brought a hatchet to chop the bones. When he put it in the cart, Rosa demanded that he lift her in too.

  He bent over and hugged her around the top of her legs. She giggled as he strained and finally, red-faced, the youth hoisted her butt up on the bed of the cart. She teased him with her bare foot while he regained his breath. Gato took no chance at being squeezed by Juan. Like a squirrel, she scrambled up the wheel spokes and into the vehicle, then sat in the front under the spring seat and folded her arms defensively over her small bustline.

  Juan jumped on the tailgate and Tomas clucked to the horse. Matilda gave one more order, walking beside the cart, telling them to keep the meat clean. “No sand on it!”

  “I’ll be back,” Slocum said to Mary, still wondering about Heck. Strange he hadn’t shown up. Slocum booted Diamond after the cart. The horse dropped his head, blowing hard from being weary. He’d be all right—this would be quick work.

  Mary waved and they were off. He recognized Paco coming at a long lope and rode out to meet him.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Heck is bad hurt. His horse fell and rolled on him. He wants to talk to you.”

  “Why me?”

  Paco shook his head, looking very serious.

  “Should we take the cart for him?”

  “No.” Paco’s face showed the seriousness of the matter. “He won’t live long.”

  “Let’s ride then.”

  They raced their horses northward. The soft ground gave under their ponies’ hooves and they churned up the land. Slocum had a million questions clouding his mind. What did Heck need to tell him? They sped faster, and soon saw the crew, with their hats off, gathered around a body on the ground. Too late.

  Slocum slid to halt, and stepped off even before Diamond stopped. He ran over and fell to his knees beside the crumpled Heck. They’d made a bed of their saddle blankets for him. A small smile was in the corner of Heck’s mouth, and he coughed deep, staring bleary-eyed up at Slocum.

  “Key in my boot—safe deposit box in the Texas State Bank . . . Fort Worth—you—you—can have it all . . .”

  “Heck? Heck?”

  But Heck’s head had slumped to the side. His blue eyes glazed over. He’d gone on to his own outfit. Slocum swept his hat off and looked hard at the clear azure sky overhead. Never even knew his last name. Left him something in a safety deposit box in Fort Worth—what was it? Damn life could be tough for the living.

  12

  The funeral for Heck was at sunrise. Among his few things, Slocum had found a letter addressed to Heck Allen. The letter was about a deed and came from a lawyer in Dallas, who said Heck’s claim had been upheld and the land was his— but there was no deed. Maybe there was something in the deposit box to answer Slocum’s questions.

  “Dear Father,” Slocum began, “we’re sending our pard Heck Allen to your place in the sky. We don’t know much about Heck. He always carried his part of the load with us. You couldn’t ask more than that of any man. And he sure treated everyone in the outfit square. We lost him, Lord, with all of us trying hard to keep the herd intact. Keep him in the palm of your hand, Lord. Amen.”

  Rosa cried the hardest. Matilda and Vonda had to carry her back to the tent—one girl under each of her arms. Grande Juan, the widest-built man in the outfit, handed Slocum a shovel.

  “You toss in the first shovelful. We’ll do the rest, Señor.”

  Afraid to say much himself, Slocum nodded hard, tossed in the first load of dirt, thanked the man, and gave him back the shovel. Mary led Slocum away. Not that there were many places to go. She took him over the rise and they sat side by side on the blanket she spread for them. They listenedto some meadowlarks and quail out in the greasewood that smelled more pungent in the rain-washed air.

  “He ever say what he’d do with his share from the drive?” Mary was rattling some small rocks from one fist to the other.

  “Only thing he ever said to me was he was going to Mexico and stopped by our camp.”

  “He didn’t have much money on him. Thirty dollars? Something close to that. How far could he go?”

  “He wasn’t worried. Never asked for any money when I hired him.”

  On his back, Slocum stretched out and shook his head. “There’s a secret there. We may never learn the answer.” He rolled over on his side and propped his head up with a crooked arm. “Shame, wish I’d asked him more.”

  “That key you got out of his boot might be the answer.”

  Slocum agreed, wondering how all the pieces fit.

  She scooted down and lay on her back beside him. When she turned enough to look over at him, a knowing grin spread over her face. “I didn’t forget the blanket.”

  He reached over and rubbed her tight stomach under the blouse. “No, you did good.”

  “I figured you needed a powerful distraction.”

  “I can sure use one.” He looked down into her brown eyes and smiled.

  “Good. So could I.”

  He turned to her and pulled up her skirt until his hand was underneath it feeling her silky leg. She moved closer to him as he worked his way to the top of her thighs. Soon his hand cupped her mound and the stiff pubic hair. Her legs fell apart and he moved to kiss her as his finger sought the seam. She raised her knees and spread them further apart in the bright sunshine. The tip of his middle finger teased her clit. It began to swell, and his actions shortened her breath. From head to toe, her entire body began to tremble in passion’s arms.

  Her mouth fell open and she began to moan. She reached down to clutch his hand to recover her breath. Then, swallowing deep, she released him with a shudder. His probing finger soon found her cunt and slipped through the lubricated gates. He began to ream her tight ring, and her soft moans turned into sharper cries and she pul
led him to her in desperation.

  “Now! Now!”

  He fought down his pants to his knees and moved over her. His near-rigid dick swung like a long thick bamboo pole. Filled with need, he guided the nose in her and she shouted, “Oh, yes!”

  His butt yearned to be as deep as he could go inside her. His knees were confined by his pants—there was no time to remove them—only drive on and on. The walls inside her began to contract. In wild abandonment, she tossed her head and clutched him. Harder, deeper, deeper, until the nose of his dick reached the bottom and she cried out. As she arched her back for him, he felt the explosion in his tubes that burned like fire going out the skintight head that felt blown apart by the action. They collapsed in utter fatigue. The wind blew over them as they half-slept in each other’s arms still connected.

  In a while, they awoke side by side with him still inside her. With a grin at his discovery, he began to pump his half-hard dick into her. She pulled him over on top of her again and widened her legs for his deeper entry. He pounded away until at last the needles in his butt became sharp hot injections and he came in a great surge.

  “I was married three years,” she said, sitting up to straighten her clothing. “We had this—but never . . . Can I tell you the truth—I’m so ashamed of it.”

  “I won’t tell anyone.” He lay on his back rebuttoning his pants.

  “One of those Comanche boys was the first one in my life ever made me drunk doing it.”

  “Shame, wasn’t it?”

  “Oh, I about went crazy. How could I? Me enjoying an Indian raping me. He wasn’t much more than fifteen. He didn’t have a big—organ either. Oh—” She used her hand to sweep the hair back from her forehead and shook her head about to cry. “God, is that so bad?”

  He hugged her tight. “Why question it? A boy woke up the woman in you.”

  “But it was rape. He never kissed me. All he wanted was my body.”

  “Still, he woke something inside you.”

  “What is it? That first night with you—you did it to me and I thanked God that night that more than a savage could make me feel like that.”

  Slocum shook his head. “There is something lies inside most all women, and if a man can kindle the right fire in her, she’ll glow.”

  “No, it’s more than that. It’s fire and brimstone. It’s being so dizzy that you’re drunk. Wantonly, I mean, you do it—oh, I recall John had a mare once in heat and she went crazy. That afternoon, he finally took her to the neighbor’s stallion and he bred her three times. John was worried the stud horse might die he got so exhausted, but she came home switching her tail for more. Wanted more, can you imagine?”

  “What about you?”

  She wiggled on the blanket and laughed. “I can’t get enough.”

  He kissed her and raised up to look around. “We better go to camp and join the rest of them.”

  “Oh, well—”

  He pulled her to her feet.

  Matilda served them some fire-braised loin cut off the steer and frijoles. When it was washed down with some fresh coffee, Slocum began to feel alive again. The lawyer’s letter and key secured in his saddlebags, he went back to work riding Roan. The former stud horse acted up some under the saddle, but soon struck off in a fast trot.

  An hour later, he found Paco looking over the herd. He reined the big horse up. Roan gave a sharp cry at Paco’s gelding, and it backed away from the sharp challenge before Paco could stop it.

  “Whoa, stupid,” Slocum said and set Roan down hard with the bosal. “How’s it going?”

  “We’ve started unyoking up here. Must have added a hundred head today. It’s going good.”

  “We need to get all the cattle we can and head north.

  There is lots of grass up around Fort Worth if we can’t winter them at Mason.”

  “How many head do we need?” Paco asked.

  “A thousand would be nice. Eight hundred is all right.”

  “We get all the yokes off the cattle here and the ones we unyoked up there, we might have that many. What’s on your mind, amigo?”

  “Comanches. They’re all over here. We have women and men to worry about. Closer to the army, we should be better off. I ain’t no bluebelly lover, but everyone should be safer there.”

  Paco agreed. “Sí, we got lots of horses, supplies, and women, all the things Comanche wants.”

  Two days later in the early morning, Slocum rode by Heck’s grave and dismounted. The crude cross the boys made from crate lumber wouldn’t be there for long. Shifting winds would further erase the signs. With the outfit on the move to the next location, Slocum took a last moment to tell his friend good-bye. He dismounted and dropped the reins at the graveside.

  They’d not been together long, but Heck wouldn’t be easy to forget. Not many men on the frontier didn’t have an agenda of their own that meant they came first and the rest could get by on their own. Not many men didn’t scoff at the ideas of others with better ideas of their own. Slocum dropped to his knees recalling the last moments of Heck’s life.

  “Lord, take good care of him. I want to see him again in that big sky pasture. Amen.”

  Mary had ridden up, and sat the bay horse a few yards back, waiting for him.

  Slocum replaced his hat, set the stirrup, put a boot in it, and swung on board. He gave her a nod that he was ready.

  “Guess you’ve lost many good friends. War and all,” she said softly, riding beside him.

  “Too many.” Way too many good ones.

  13

  The cattle gathering went smoothly the next few weeks. The rain had filled many natural tanks, and the new green growth mixed well with the dry bunchgrass. His tally book boasted nine hundred head. No sign of any Comanche. The notion that they had not been around made Slocum a little easier. But not a bloody sundown went by that he didn’t consider that somewhere out there some bucks around a council fire were hatching plans to make a raid on the whites in the east.

  One midday, Paco and Slocum squatted on top of a mound. Their mounts were busy chomping grass through the bits in their mouth. The herd spread out over acres.

  “We’ve close to a thousand head by my tally,” said Slocum.“That’s plenty of cattle for us to move and winter. We’ll need some more supplies. I’d like two good wagons to haul all of our things—we are all scattered out with oxcarts and the things we move with. All we need is a few travois and we’d look like Injuns.”

  “How much we owe Goeserman?” Paco asked.

  “Five hundred.”

  “How much more money must we have to get there?”

  “A thousand dollars, I figure, to get us up there.”

  Paco narrowed his good eye to look at him. “Whew, can we find that much cred-it?”

  “We have the cattle. Big steers. We’ve cut out all the cows.”

  “Sí, what will become of them? The cows that are branded?”

  Slocum shifted his weight to the other leg. “I figured you could come back and build a ranch around here and they’d start your herd.”

  “They would be half yours.”

  Slocum shook his head and then looked at the dirt. “No, I have ridges to ride over. Places to see. I can’t set any roots.”

  “I am a simple man, but even I can count this many steers are worth something in Missouri. Lots of money.”

  “Mary will need some to start over too.”

  “Sí, and the vaqueros will need work later too.”

  “You’ll need a registered brand of your own.”

  “It will be a star—estrella.”

  “That’s up to the brand registry. It may be taken.”

  Paco nodded. “I let you worry about the business part.”

  “Hire yourself a young bookkeeper. They don’t cost much more than cowhands.”

  “Really—how can I hire him? I have no money.” Paco turned up his calloused brown palms and shook his head.

  “We can find one in Fort Worth.”

 
“But the money?”

  “Let me worry about that. I need to scout us a route north tomorrow. We need to move on to winter quarters up at Mason like the colonel planned.”

  “Sometimes, mi amigo, I wonder if this is really happening. I am the son of a peon. My father worked hard day and night for a patrón on a large hacienda. One day my father died and they turned my mother and my brothers and sisters out. We had to move and live like lizards in the desert.”

  Slocum smiled at him. “You have not done half bad. He would be proud of you. Estrella Hacienda, that would be nice.”

  “I told my wife Camille in Mexico when I saw her last that God had sent you to me.”

  Slocum shook his head. “No, he sent us to be together. I’ll scout ahead. Tell Mary I may not be back until tomorrow.”

  “God be with you, amigo.” Paco clapped him on the shoulder and looked very seriously at him from his good eye. No more words were necessary.

  After he and Paco parted, Slocum rode his buckskin Pacer north on his search for their way to Mason. He soon moved into a land of dead black mesquite trees. Snags that marked the country before him stood like head markers in a cemetery. Once a forest of trees had dotted the land, but drought had killed them and in the dry air they’d stood for years, maybe centuries, since they’d died. They lent an eerie look to the landscape, along with expansive beds of prickly pear with many dead pads on the shriveled plants.

  The portion of lower Texas where they caught the cattle was desolate enough, but this land looked like a place for the dead. He had hoped to find some water, but nothing looked promising. Simply riding across this land for hours had depressed him—the lack of stock water complicated his plans. A two-day drive to water looked like the next option, if he could even find a source that close by. Such a push would be hell on the people and livestock as well.

  Then a spot of green in the distance lightened his thoughts. He set Pacer into his high-stepping gait, and soon the view of the thin line of cottonwoods eased his mind some. They meant water. Reining the buckskin up, he noticed signs of a small Indian village along the watercourse. Damn, he’d have to detour around this place—go further away from them or have problems. What tribe were they?