by Logan, Jake
He answered her unspoken question as he looped one end of the rope around a boulder.
“They’re working in the mine. They don’t care about the boys.”
“I can’t fit,” she said. “I tried it, and I’m too big.” She stood and started stripping off her skirts.
Slocum stared at her and moved to stop her.
“If I have to go down naked, I will, to save them.” She finished stripping off her skirts and then shucked her blouse so she stood dressed only in a thin shift.
“Leave your shoes on,” he said. “You’ll skin up your feet otherwise. You’re going to need to dig your toes into crevices on the way back up.”
“I’m depending on you, John.” She let him wrap one turn of rope around her. If the need to reach her son hadn’t been so pressing, she would have enjoyed the feel of Slocum’s hands moving over her barely clad breasts as he tied the rope. She gave him a quick kiss that tasted of sweat and grit, then stepped back into the rock chimney.
She almost fell the entire way. If it hadn’t been for Slocum’s quick jerk, she might have plunged down a full fifteen feet. The rope bit into her ribs, then abraded the skin under her arms.
“Randolph! I’m coming.”
“Ma, we can’t move. The rock’s piled on top of us.”
“What about Billy?”
“Dunno. He’s still breathin’, but he ain’t awake. Hurry, Ma, hurry!”
“I’m coming real quick now.” She turned her feet sideways and slid down another foot before getting stuck.
Marianne sucked in her breath and held it. She slid over rough rock and then cried out when her feet kicked free. Hands shoved hard against the rough wall, she lowered herself another few inches, then called up to Slocum, “More slack. I’m almost there, but you’re holding me back!”
She let out a whoop of glee when she fell the final few feet into the mineshaft. It was too dark to see more than a few inches. The light coming down the narrow chimney afforded little illumination, so she dropped to hands and knees and gingerly felt her way.
“Talk to me, Randolph, so I can find you.” Her hand touched hot, sweaty flesh.
She recoiled, then gently reached out and traced over the face. Billy McCarty. She had found Billy, and Randolph was right. The boy was knocked out but still breathed regularly. He couldn’t be too severely injured. By feel she started moving the rocks atop him.
“Ma, I can see you silhouetted by the light. Billy’s right in front of you.”
“I can feel where the rocks are holding him pinned,” she said.
Fingers groping, she scraped off skin as she began shoving away rocks covering the boy’s lower body.
“Looks like you got him free, Ma.”
“I’ll see if John can’t drag him to the surface.”
She dug in her heels, glad that Slocum had suggested keeping her shoes on. She skidded and slid on the rough floor until she found purchase, then scooted Billy to a spot under the rock chimney. She took a quick turn around his body and fastened the rope under his arms with a granny knot.
“Can you pull Billy up?” she called. Her voice echoed and sounded strident. She cleared her throat and tried again, pitching her voice lower. Having Slocum think she was scared bothered her greatly. No matter that she had been through worse, and he had seen her then.
“Pulling. You keep him lined up so he doesn’t get caught on any rock, and we’ll have him out in a minute,” came Slocum’s confident words.
She held the boy’s feet together as he slumped in the rope sling, then began a jerky, halting rise to the surface. Marianne dropped back to hands and knees and crept forward until she reached her son.
“I been doin’ some diggin’, Ma,” he said. “I got one big rock I can’t move. Other ’n that, I’m clear.”
“Why’d you do a crazy thing like running off to work in a mine?”
“The money, Ma. I wanted to give the sheriff money so he’d forget about lockin’ you up.”
“Sheriff Whitehill set bail at one hundred dollars. You and Billy’d have to work for two solid months to get enough.” Her fingers slipped under the heavy rock. A quick heave budged it, but not enough. “Or was there more?”
“Well, see, Ma, Billy said there’d be all kinds of silver nuggets in the mine and—”
“You were going to steal the silver, weren’t you?”
“It was for you, Ma. I had to do somethin’ an’ what else could I do?”
“Lend a hand. Three, two, one, heave!”
The rock slid away. Randolph cried out in pain.
“I think it’s busted. My leg’s broke.”
“There’s no way I can set it here, even if I knew how. I saw your pa set a leg once, but I don’t know how to do that. You’re going to have to grit your teeth.”
Randolph cried out several times, ripping away at her heart. She finally got him to the air vent, where Slocum had dropped the line again. Marianne closed her eyes and steeled her heart against Randolph’s piteous moans as Slocum dragged him up to the surface. She sat and shook. She had done it, though. She had rescued the boys.
“Marianne? You ready?”
The rope dangled down. She looped it around her body, made her way up the chimney, and finally popped out onto the rocky ground. She sat up and realized her thin shift had been tattered by the rough chimney walls, leaving her almost naked. Somehow it didn’t matter. Slocum had Randolph stretched out on the ground, flat on his back as he examined the leg. Billy lay a few feet away, still unconscious.
“What can I do to help?” she asked.
“This is just like the time I set Joshua Timmins’s leg when he busted it falling out of that tree back in Georgia,” Slocum said.
“He didn’t want his pa to find out he had played hooky,” she said, details bursting on her.
“Randolph’s leg is about the same. A clean break. You grab hold of him under his arms, and I’ll pull his leg.”
“Pull my leg,” Randolph said weakly. “This is gonna be funny?”
“Keep thinking that,” Slocum said.
When they were in position, Marianne looked up. Slocum nodded once. She leaned back, pulling hard on her son’s arms as Slocum applied pressure directly on the leg. There was a grinding sound, then the boy screamed. Slocum sat back, released the leg, and looked satisfied.
“All fixed?” Marianne asked.
“Just like Joshua’s, only I didn’t have your good help then. He had to hang on to a tree himself while I pulled it back into place.”
“Jesus Christ,” came the choked exclamation.
She looked over her shoulder. Billy struggled to sit up. He stared at her.
“You’re nekkid!”
“Damned near,” she said, grinning. Having the boy seeing her so disheveled hardly bothered her. She took more than a little pleasure in the way Slocum looked at her for the same reason now.
There was a big difference between boy and man. And Marianne intended to give Slocum his reward for saving the two from the mine. She seemed to be doing that a lot—and it suited her just fine.
22
“The good thing about Randolph having a broken leg,” Marianne Lomax said, “is that he’s not likely to go running off with Billy on some crazy adventure.”
Slocum had to laugh. The boy sat on the front porch of the hotel, his leg splinted up and a crude crutch beside him on the board floor. The fracture hadn’t been bad, and Slocum had done a good job setting it, or at least that’s what Doc Fuller said. From what he had seen of the doctor, Slocum doubted Fuller would lie about a medical condition, even to placate a worried mother.
“You think having a busted leg will slow him down if he takes it into his head to listen to Billy?”
“That William McCarty can charm the rattles off a snake,” Marianne said.
“Mig
ht be why there are sidewinders,” Slocum said. He was pleased that this brought not only a smile to her lips but a genuine laugh. She had been too somber since they had returned to Silver City.
“I want to get out of here for a while, John,” she said unexpectedly.
“You want to move? Sheriff Whitehill would have something to say about that since we’re both suspected of murder.”
“That’s not what I meant. Besides, the sheriff is out of town now that his deputy got back from serving process.”
“Dan said he made close to five dollars evicting a rancher who hadn’t paid his taxes.” Slocum tried to keep the bitterness from his voice but couldn’t. That smacked too much of what had happened to him back in Georgia.
Back in Georgia. He looked at Marianne and saw her in profile. The strong chin, the fine bones, the intelligence and determination in her, all made him remember Georgia. They had been so young then. Time had added more than years to both of them.
He looked from her to the boy, leaning back in the chair and whispering furiously with Billy. What they talked about was something of a mystery. Boy things. Slocum looked back at Marianne. Just as he and Marianne had talked about boy and girl things. Back in Georgia.
“You need to take a break, too. Get away from town.”
Slocum blinked. He had been thinking about his past, something he seldom did.
“Jack and I used to go camping up in the hills just to be alone. I want to go there with you, John.” She saw his hesitation and misinterpreted his quick look at Randolph. “He’ll be fine. As you said, he’s not going to run far.”
“I suppose I ought to let Dangerous Dan know, or we’ll have the law on our trail.”
“He’s like Harvey. He’ll know I wouldn’t go anywhere without intending to come back as long as Randolph is here.” She paused, then said in a lower voice, “He knows that about you, too.”
“I’ll talk to Dan. You rustle up some food.” Slocum stood and walked away, an uneasy feeling gnawing away at him. He tried to decide what caused it but couldn’t. More than once on his way to the jailhouse, he stopped, looked around, but seeing nothing, continued on his way.
In the jail, Dan Tucker sat in the sheriff’s chair, but unlike Whitehill, he wasn’t poring over a newspaper. He rested his head on crossed arms and snored like he was sawing wood.
Slocum slammed the door and brought the deputy bolt upright, eyes wide. To his credit, he didn’t reach for his six-shooter.
“What brings you by? You lookin’ for a place to sleep?”
“You already took it,” Slocum said.
“Don’t let Whitehill know. He gets all riled.”
“Where’d he go?”
“North. Maybe to Santa Fe. He didn’t tell me. I asked around and that’s the only way I found he was out of town. Just tole me to keep the peace.”
“Marianne and I’ll be leaving town for a spell. Be back before sundown.”
“Storm’s building up west of town. You go far, you might get caught.”
“Would that upset you much if we didn’t get back until tomorrow, if the storm breaks?”
“I know you, Slocum. You’re ’bout the most honorable man I ever met. You give me your word, and that’s all I’ll need.”
“Done,” Slocum said. “And look after the boy.”
“Done,” Tucker echoed. “I might toss him in the clink, just to be sure I know where he’s at.”
“Don’t let Marianne hear you say that. She’s a wildcat when it comes to defending that boy.”
Tucker looked at Slocum hard, then said slowly, “You are, too. ’Spect you heard this before, but that boy is your spittin’ image.”
Slocum laughed it off, shook hands with the deputy, and went to the stables to fetch his horse. Not for the first time, he wished he had money enough to buy some gear. If he was going to ride all over the New Mexico countryside with Marianne behind him, a saddle would make the travel easier. Might be the pony would prefer it, too.
He led the horse back to the hotel, where Marianne was speaking with Randolph. From the expression on the boy’s face, he was trying to convince his mother he didn’t want her to go and, when she did, would be on his crutch and hobbling into trouble the instant she was out of sight. When the cat’s away, the mice will play. Billy stood at the end of the boardwalk, not quite rubbing his hands together in anticipation, but damned close.
“Ready?”
“All ready, John.” Marianne looked back quickly at her son, then jumped onto horseback, letting Slocum ride behind her this time. She clung to the picnic basket.
As they reached the outskirts of Silver City, Slocum said, “He’ll be all right.”
“What? Oh, I wasn’t thinking about Randolph at all,” she said. She looked back, twisted about, and gave him an awkward kiss. “That’s what I was thinking on.”
“Only a kiss?” he teased.
“Oh, a bit more.”
“Such as?”
“Why, I was wondering if you knew how to pitch a tent.” She reached behind her and pressed her hand into his crotch. “Well, I have my answer. Can we ride a bit faster?”
“You won’t say that when we get to your special campground.”
Her laughter rang true, giving Slocum more pleasure than he had experienced in a month of Sundays. Making Marianne happy sparked something in him, different from the way it had been between them in Georgia, but better.
Somehow, words after this weren’t necessary. Slocum was lost in his own memories and thought Marianne was, too. She didn’t have to give directions to her special campground. All she needed to do was lean this way or that, and once on the trail, they reached the spot quickly.
Slocum spotted a fire pit immediately and stopped beside it. His quick eyes took in the area. A tent had stood nearby, and from the crushed grass now recovering amid the undisturbed, it had been at least a month since anyone had stayed here. He looked around when Marianne lifted her leg high and slipped to the ground with a dull thump. She set down the picnic basket.
“There’s the tent Jack brought up here. He said it was a mighty expensive one, though I could never see it.”
Slocum took the time to fasten his horse’s reins so it could graze but not run off. He went to the pile of canvas and lifted. The tent had a hole or two in it. Most striking was the heavy support pole. He hefted it. His fingers circled it and barely touched. He guessed it was a good four feet long and two inches in diameter.
“Texas Jack didn’t want the tent collapsing,” he said dryly. “This would hold up a full-sized circus tent.”
“Oh,” Marianne said, grinning from ear to ear, “that’s not far wrong. We had a real three-ring show underneath more than once.”
Slocum dropped the pole and stepped over the tent.
“Why do we need a tent when we have the clear blue sky as our roof?”
“Because one of us will get a naked butt roasted in the sun,” Marianne said.
“There’re trees all around. We don’t have to stay in the middle of a meadow.”
“Should we have lunch first?” Marianne asked. “Or are you going to pitch your tent?”
She began unfastening the top buttons on her blouse, exposing milky skin. Another couple buttons allowed the swell of her breasts to show and entice him. He began responding.
“I don’t mind eating first,” he said.
“The tent. That tent,” she said, pointing to the lump of canvas and wood. “We can decide what to do under it.”
Slocum gave in to the inevitable. It took him longer to put up the tent than he expected because of the thick pole. It had been poorly chosen. A sapling half its size would have worked better. A small breeze turned the minor chore into a job that would have had him cursing if Marianne hadn’t been discarding a piece of her clothing with every advance he made on pitching the t
ent. The stakes went into the ground, ropes were pulled, and the huge pole steadied.
“It’s roomy inside,” she said, pushing past him. She dropped a blanket Slocum had brought onto the ground, but he hardly noticed.
Marianne had shucked off all her clothes except for thin bloomers. The day was warm, and she sweat enough to plaster the cloth against her curves, outlining every turn and swell, every hollow and delightful terrain on her lower body begging to be explored. She turned, causing her breasts to jiggle about slightly.
“We’re out of the sun,” she said, indicating the canvas above them.
“And I see where I want to be in,” he said, moving to her.
He reached down and pressed his palm into her crotch. Sweat had soaked her bloomers but a different sort of moisture dampened his hand here. She moaned softly and reached for him.
They kissed, pressed together, and slowly sank to lie side by side on the blanket. Slocum never noticed the tent above. Sky would have suited him as well because she was what he sought. He peeled the bloomers down, revealing the fragrant thatch between her legs. She propped herself up on her elbows and looked down at him.
“Go on, John. I’d like you to—oh!” Her legs spread wide as he pushed his head between willing thighs.
He lapped at her nether lips, then thrust his tongue out to wrest a new sob of joy from her. Sucking hard at the tender flaps, he lifted her off the ground. She shoved herself down into his face. He began moving his tongue in and out slowly, licking up the juices leaking from her insides.
Then he went blind and deaf. Her legs clamped down on either side of his head, holding him firmly in place. But he had no desire to go anywhere else. Not at the moment. He used his tongue as he might have his other organ until Marianne rocked from side to side, her desires pushed to the breaking point.
And then she cried out, arched her back, and finally sagged down. Her legs released him. She looked down at him, a small smile on her lips.