by Jake Logan
Maud glanced at the woods standing between her and Whoretown. She swallowed, finding her voice.
She said, “What’re you talking so loud for? They’ll hear us.”
From beyond the trees came a few shouts. “They can’t hear us,” Slocum said.
“What’re you doing, hanging around here for? Put some distance between us and the posse!”
“In due time.”
Maud quieted her rising unease by mentally clawing out his eyeballs and roasting him on a spit over a slow fire. She wrinkled her nose. The woods smelled of musk, rot, and decaying vegetation. Most of the trees were evergreens, big shaggy bulwarks providing near-impenetrable cover.
After what seemed like hours, but was probably just minutes, the posse finally turned away from them and headed south. Maud breathed a sigh of relief.
“It ain’t over yet,” Slocum warned her, but brought their horse back into the clearing once he was satisfied that the posse was long gone. Spurring the tired animal faster, Slocum tried to make up for a little lost time. He knew they were getting very close now to the other horse.
When it looked as if their mount had had about enough, Slocum spotted the deacon’s horse. They rode over to it and Slocum hopped off the lathered beast, helping Maud down after him.
His belly rumbled, reminding him that it had been a long time since he’d eaten anything, almost twenty-four hours.
Taking Maud by the arm, he walked her across the clearing, sitting her down on a large rock not far from the churchman’s horse.
“Your friends are probably on the other side of the woods, if you feel lonely,” he said.
“They’re not my friends now, thanks to you.”
“That’s right, and don’t forget it.”
“I’ve got a long memory,” she said meaningfully. “I never forget when somebody does me wrong.”
“Good. Then maybe you can start remembering something that’ll help me find the killer. Whoever stuck a knife in Dolores put a hurting on you too.”
“Sure did, because they tangled me up with you, mister.”
He went to the churchman’s horse, speaking softly to it, easily. It sidled away from him at first, as far as its tether would allow. But he gentled it fast, and soon it allowed him to stroke its sides.
“That’s the horse you stole from Deacon Mulch?” Maud asked.
“Uh-huh. Well, he can pray for me.”
“He’ll pray to see you hanging at the end of a rope.” The animal nuzzled Slocum, who said, “His horse likes me anyhow.”
“Mister, that’s the only friend you’ve got in this town.”
“That makes us even. I’m not too crazy about Bender myself.”
“Then leave.”
“I’ve got some business to take care of first.”
“Like you took care of Pierce’s men?”
“Could be.”
“Like you’re going to take care of me?” Her voice was strong, steady.
“I’ve been taking care of you. Where’d you be if I hadn’t done for those two on the porch?”
“That kind of help I don’t need. I can handle ornery cowboys without killing them. I have all my life,” she said, sounding tired.
“Maybe those two needed killing.”
She looked up. “You could say that about most men.” “Especially me, huh?”
“You said it, not me.”
“What do you suppose those two wanted, Maud?”
“What most men want, only they didn’t feel like paying for it.”
“They paid, but not in the coin they expected,” he said. “Funny, though. Pierce sure seems minded to clean up Whoretown. He poured hellfire on the Doghouse.”
“The saloon’s been a thorn in his side for a long time, ever since he came to Bender. The Doghouse crowd’s a bunch of drifters, rustlers, small-time outlaws ... troublemakers. But there was enough of them so Pierce couldn’t bull them around, ride roughshod over them like he does to everybody else in town.
“Or at least there was until you came along,” she added. “Thanks to you, Pierce had a reason to make a fight, and he had the law to help him get his killing done too.”
“Soon as the thorn’s out of his side, a couple of his guns come after you,” Slocum said.
Maud’s eyebrows knitted in a fierce frown. “What’re you trying to say?”
“Just thinking out loud. Maybe Pierce decided to clean up you too.”
“Why would he want to do that?!”
“I don’t know. I’m a stranger here myself.”
“For a stranger, you sure know a lot about what goes on in this town!”
“Not enough,” Slocum said. “I don’t know why Pierce wants to get rid of you.”
“He doesn’t!”
“Talk any louder and we can ask him in person.”
“He doesn’t,” Maud repeated, low-voiced but intense. “Pierce doesn’t come in my place, but some of his top men do. Engels, and Cal, and some of the others ...”
“Engels, that’s that big fellow who sides Pierce, right?”
“His bodyguard.”
“And Cal, that’s the one I stuck in the hand. What does he do?”
“He’s a wrangler on Pierce’s ranch.”
“Cal was there the night that Dolores got killed.”
“That oaf? He might be a good horse-breaker, but when he’s out of the saddle, he can barely take two steps without tripping over his own feet. He’s the last man to go sneaking around in the dark, doing murder.
“Besides, he was with Vangie all night,” she said.
“He wouldn’t need all night. All he’d need is a few minutes, just long enough to sneak upstairs ahead of me and hide in Dolores’s room, waiting in the dark for us to show—”
“Mister, if you knew Cal, you’d know how ridiculous that is. He’s not even one of Pierce’s hired guns, he’s just a wrangler. He’s no sneaking cutthroat, jewel thief, and mastermind, which he’d have to be to do all that you claim the killer would have to do.
“Anyway, Cal was downstairs in the parlor when you went upstairs with Dolores.”
“You sure?”
“Sure, I’m sure. You think I don’t know what’s going on in my own house on a Saturday night?”
“No, I guess you must, keeping track of business and all,” Slocum said, thoughtful.
“You’re damned right,” Maud went on, oblivious to his change in mood. “They’re all out to cheat me, whores and customers both!”
“You probably know where everybody is at any given time.”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” She was suspicious now. “What’re you getting at?”
“I’ve got an idea,” Slocum said.
Stony silence greeted his announcement. Maud folded her arms across her chest.
“You can get a girl by the hour or by the night, right?”
“Yes,” Maud said tightly, giving away nothing.
“And you’d know which is which. Someone who pays by the hour had damned better be gone when the hour is up. I can’t see giving away what ain’t been paid for, not even time.”
“Business is business. At least I give value for money. I’m not a thief,” she said, sniffing.
“Now, when a girl goes upstairs with a man, she takes him to her room, and stays with him the whole time. And when he’s done, she comes downstairs with him. You can’t have the man wandering around upstairs, maybe sticking his head into another room to see what’s going on. That’s obvious enough.”
“So? What’s your point?”
“Just this. The crime wasn’t discovered until morning, but that doesn’t mean the killer had all night to do it. He struck when I went upstairs with Dolores, at eleven o’clock. Give him a minute or two to get into the room ahead of us, and another couple of minutes afterward to get things squared away. Not more than five minutes at the most.
“Now, who was upstairs at the time?”
“You,” Maud said. “You and Dolores.”
/> “Who else?”
“Pauline and her banker friend, Murray. They’d gone up to her room an hour before.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s all that was upstairs at the time. This is a small town, mister. People get up with the sun and go to bed when it gets dark. Even on a Saturday night, eleven o’clock’s late. Except for the overnights—and we don’t get many of those—most of the customers have come and gone by eleven.”
“You were downstairs, counting the house. There were a couple of girls in the parlor, as I recall.”
“Berga and Sue. They were, uh, between engagements.”
“Where was Chase?”
“Downstairs the whole time. I see where you’re trying to go with this, but it won’t wash. I know Chase was in the parlor when you went upstairs.”
“How’s that?” Slocum asked.
“ ’Cause he was giving me hell for the liquor bills this month, saying I gotta start watering the whiskey. He and I were sitting pretty close to the stairs too, so we could both keep an eye on the comin’s and goin’s.”
“You sure you couldn’t have missed somebody? What if a girl snuck one of her favorites upstairs for free?”
“No way we wouldn’t have caught them. Chase likes to keep close tabs on his investments,” Maud said with a touch of bitterness.
“Okay, any more customers that night?”
“A couple of gents, by the name of Sim and Bailey, came right after you and Dolores went upstairs. They had a few drinks with Berga and Sue before going upstairs with them.”
“So how long before they went upstairs, you think?” Slocum asked.
“I don’t know. About an hour I suppose,” she said. “They stayed upstairs for an hour, then came back down and left right away. By that time Cal and Vangie had gone up. I let Sim and Bailey out, locked up again, put out the lights, and went to bed.”
“Sim and Bailey—that’s the last two?”
“Yes. Two respectable townsmen who’d faint if you so much as up and said ‘boo’ to them. By your own logic, it couldn’t have been them. They were downstairs while the murder was being committed, according to you.”
“Neither one could’ve gotten upstairs past you and Chase, huh?”
“Nobody could have.”
“What about Nedda?”
15
A storm was brewing. Out of the west, down from the mountains, came a flood of low dark clouds, streaming across the sky. Moonlit cloudy masses rushed east, churning, roiling, creating a sense of violent headlong motion. With them came great gusty winds, raw, damp, and cold. The smell of rain was in the air.
The stars were blotted out. The moon dimmed behind murky cloud veils, like a bright copper coin sinking into the depths of a river. Trees swayed, shaking their tops in the rising wind.
Slocum said, “Don’t say I never gave you anything, Maud. Now you’ve got a horse too.”
“A stolen horse,” she said. “Stolen from Deacon Mulch too!”
“ ’Tis better to give than to receive. I’m sure he’d agree.”
“Not when it’s his horse.”
“Come to think of it, he didn’t seem too overjoyed at that.”
Not more than a few hours had passed since Slocum had gunned down Lonnie and Sutton. After they’d rested a good bit, he’d herded Maud, and the horses, back along the trail by which he’d come, once again emerging north of the woods. He’d hefted Maud onto the back of the deacon’s horse, while he climbed up on the saddled mount. Now, they both had horses. Their destination: Nedda’s house.
Nedda lived alone, in a small house on the southern outskirts of town. Of course, Slocum couldn’t just openly ride up to it, not with all the small bands of mounted men patrolling the area. He had to get there by the roundabout route.
He retraced the route he’d originally followed earlier that day, when first making his covert approach to Whoretown. He and Maud struck northwest, angling across the railroad line at a deserted spot north of Bender, in the outer darkness beyond the glow of the town lights.
Then they cut around, going west, then south, circling around behind the back of Bender’s western environs. They rode in the lee of a ridge that ran parallel to the road south out of town. The ridge sheltered them from the worst of the chilly winds coming down from the mountains.
The dark was Slocum’s ally, hiding him in its restless shadows. That was why he dared to ride on the lee of the ridge, rather than on the windward.
Progress was slow, thanks to Maud. She couldn’t ride very fast, not when the only thing between her and her mount was a blanket spread across the horse’s back.
“Next time, make sure you steal a saddle too,” she said.
“I wouldn’t have thought you’d have any trouble riding bareback, Maud.”
“Ha-ha. When I ride, I get paid top dollar for it.”
“I’m sure you’re worth it.”
“You can be sure, friend.”
“You’ll get paid.” Slocum grabbed a fold of his shirt at his side, rattling the jewel pouch nestled next to his skin.
“It’s too much trouble for me to turn these baubles into cash, Maud. When our business is done, I’ll turn them back over to you.”
“Thanks a lot, considering that they’re mine to start with. What about my money?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Slocum said.
Her not having a saddle was a help. It prevented her from trying to make a getaway. She couldn’t ride fast without one, and if she made a break he could easily overhaul her. It kept him from having to watch her closely all the time. It slowed their rate of travel, but the need for stealth would have done that in any case. If they were chased, she wouldn’t be able to make much of a run. He’d have to decide whether to throw her to the wolves or stay with her and make a fight of it.
For now, he needed her. She knew her way around town, and he didn’t. He couldn’t have found his way to Nedda’s house without her. With her along, she was less likely to be sending him into a trap, not when the trap would be swinging shut on her too.
Once they were past the center of town, the houses were few and far between. What few there were stood sparsely scattered along both sides of the main road running south out of town. They were owned mostly by those who made their living in Bender and wanted a small piece of property of their own, or just wanted some elbow room where they didn’t have to live with their neighbors right on top of them. Most of them did a little farming or ranching on the side. The bigger landholdings were farther away from town, sited along the watercourses and grazing lands.
Maud and Slocum passed a couple of dark houses. It was a rural community where folks went to bed early. Or maybe they didn’t want to show lights for fear of attracting attention while a killer was somewhere out there, on the loose.
Or maybe the killer was somewhere in there, hunkered down inside one of those houses.
Maud was hunched forward on the horse, hands holding the reins and clutching the animal’s mane to maintain her precarious perch. She was huddled deep in the folds of her cloak, which was wrapped tightly around her.
Little puffs of vapor from the horse’s mouth faded into the cold night air. The wind swelled, sprinkling a patter of icy raindrops. Some fell under the back of Slocum’s collar, trickling down his back, raising shivers. He turned his collar up, pulling it tight against his neck. A few fat drops splashed on his bare head.
His shirt cuffs were pulled down as far as possible over his hands for warmth. The cold was making his hands stiff and slow, when speed could be the margin of difference between life and death. He held the reins in one hand, sticking the other inside his clothes to warm it up. That seemed to help. He switched hands frequently, to keep both of them supple.
He asked, “How much farther?”
Maud pointed to a house about an eighth of a mile away, on the west side of the road. “There it is. But this is the craziest idea I ever heard of.”
“We’ll see
,” Slocum said.
He pointed his horse toward the house, Maud doing likewise. They angled across weedy fields, dry grass rustling under the horses’ hooves. The ground, which had been soft and damp, was hardening up in the frosty air.
The house was a white box with a peaked roof. A light showed through the windows. Grouped near the house were a few outbuildings, a long gray shed and some shacks. There was no one in sight. The house stood off by itself, with no nearby neighbors.
Three riders came into view on the road, riding south out of town. Riding hard.
Slocum and Maud were about halfway to the house. Ahead and to the left was a stand of trees. Slocum pulled up alongside Maud, taking hold of her horse’s head harness. He didn’t want the horse getting away from him now with strangers approaching.
It wasn’t much of a stand. The trees were more like bushes, scraggly, with skinny trunks, the tallest not more than ten feet high. Still, it was some kind of cover, along with some tangled brush and a few big rocks.
The oncoming trio stayed the course, following the road.
“Did they see us?” Maud said, her voice hushed.
“I don’t think so,” Slocum said. He reached inside the saddlebag, hand resting on the shotgun stock, ready to haul out the sawed-off and start blasting at the first sign of trouble.
If the riders had seen them, they didn’t show it, continuing unswervingly on their southbound course.
As the riders neared Nedda’s house, the light went out. The riders reined in at the blacked-out house, swinging down from the saddle. They had drawn their guns. Two ran up to the front of the house, and the third went around to the back.
Maud was mystified. “Who are they? What do they want with Nedda?”
“Maybe they had the same idea I did,” Slocum said.
The house stood between Slocum and Maud and the two men who had gone to the front, hiding them from view. The third man darted around to the back, into the yard between the house and the outbuildings. Gun in hand, he darted up to the house, flattening his back against the wall beside the back door.
He was waiting for some signal. His dark form stood out against the white wall.