by Jake Logan
“Isn’t she kinda old for your taste?” Wink teased.
“Ho, maybe I could stand her if she was real rich.” Hurricane laughed until he shook.
They stopped at a crossroads store for lunch at noon. Several Indians lounged around the place and nodded to Hurricane. He and Slocum dismounted, hitching their mounts. She sat her bay and watched after them while they went inside.
The store was dark except for a few flickering candles that sent yellow light from behind shadowy goods and shelves. No one was behind the counter and they waited. Slocum wondered where the clerk might be and glanced around.
At last a middle-aged Indian woman came out. “We are closed today.”
Hurricane squeezed his eyes half-shut. “Why is the door open if you are closed?’
“To let some air in. It’s hot.” Her glare met his.
“You have candles lit?”
“So I can see your faces when you come in, and tell you we are closed.”
“Who died?”
“No one. This is my store—today I close it.”
“No sign.”
“Most of my customers can’t read a sign.”
“How do they know you are closed?”
“I tell them so.”
Hurricane shook his head as Slocum pulled on his arm. “She’s closed.”
“I know, she told me.” Hurricane turned back. “When will you be open again?”
She shrugged. “When my headache you gave me leaves.”
“Dumb Choctaw,” he grumbled under his breath as they went outside.
“What is wrong?” Wink asked in a stage whisper.
Slocum shook his head. “Hurricane met his match in there.”
“How?”
Busy watching Hurricane shake hands with the loafers, he mounted and shook his head. “I can tell you later. The store’s closed ’cause the owner has a headache he caused.”
Wink chuckled. “What’s he doing now?”
“Maybe organizing a protest against her.” Slocum stepped into the saddle.
The bowlegged medicine man came back and nodded as he remounted. “Two miles farther down this road a white man owns a store. He is open.”
When they were beyond hearing, Hurricane twisted and looked back. When he turned back, he said, “That boy called Nickel was here this morning.”
“Where is he now?” Wink said, standing in the stirrups and frowning at him.
“They didn’t know. Said he was looking for some guy slept with his woman.”
“Nickel have a woman up here?”
“Maybe she has him—those guys laughed when that one told me someone slept with her. She must sleep with a lot of men.”
“No idea what her name is?” Slocum asked.
Hurricane shook his head. “I didn’t want him to know we were looking for him.”
“Good. Any of the others around here?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t want the word out too loud.” Turned in the saddle, Hurricane looked back through the post oak woods that lined the way, and then when he settled in his saddle, he shook his head. “I may give her a worse headache.”
“How can we find him?” Wink asked.
“I will find where he sleeps.”
“Good.” She settled in her saddle and nodded as if satisfied.
“What’s the plan?” Slocum asked he old man.
“We make camp at the next crossroads and you be a cattle buyer. I’ll scout out where he might be.”
“What’ll we do with the cattle?” she asked.
“Drive them out and sell them,” Slocum said. “We won’t lose much money and it will make a good cover.”
“May even make some money.” Hurricane laughed. “Slocum can be plenty tough trading.”
Barlow’s Corners was in a wide, flat mountaintop meadow. The storekeeper was white and shook hands with the two when they came inside. From his neat store to his well-goomed appearance, Slocum considered Silver Barlow a sharp businessman. In his thirties, he had two breed sons in their teens and an Indian wife, Mona, who greeted Wink—and they had lots to talk about.
“You can pasture the cattle you buy for ten cents a week. The boys will herd them.”
“Six bits a day be enough pay?” Slocum asked the oldest one, called Arrow.
He smiled. “How many drovers you need?”
Slocum laughed and held up two fingers.
“We will be ready when you are, sir. Thank you.” Arrow said, and the boys went off.
Mona fed them rich beef stew and homemade sourdough bread for lunch. After the meal, Slocum bought some canvas and rope. Barlow told them where they could set up camp close by and also use a corral for their horses and mules. The two of them made a shade and fly with the canvas and rope, using trees and some poles. Then they cut back the brush until they had a camp.
When Slocum looked up from his finished ax job and stretched his back muscles, the setting sun’s red glare was in his eyes. The smell of Wink’s cooking filled his nose, along with the pungent oak-smelling cooking fire.
“Where’s Hurricane?” he asked, dropping on a wood block seat.
Bent over her Dutch oven, she looked up at him. “He went to see about her headache, he said.”
Slocum yawned. “Okay, what’s for supper?”
“Biscuits. I borrowed some starter. Making enough for breakfast too. Some beef, some potatoes and fresh green beans Mona gave me.”
“I’m ready.” He laughed and rose stiff. “I better wash up.”
She brought a kettle of hot water and carried it over to put some in the wash pan. “You think he’ll learn where Nickel is?”
“Anyone can learn something from these people, he can.”
“Good.” She stared across the yellow brown meadow that stretched far to the west and up the side of the far mountain.
“It won’t be easy,” he said and threw his arms around her. “Obviously, the gang’s split up.” Hugged tight to her, he nuzzled her neck under the curls.
“Guess that means we have time to play?”
“After supper,” he said and cupped her breasts under the shirt.
“Ah, you are weak from all the work.”
“No, but right now, I’m starved.”
“All right, just so you aren’t giving other women headaches, I’ll feed you.”
Slocum laughed and hung his arm over her shoulder going back to the campfire.
8
The old man must have learned something—he wanted to move on, the cattle deal was off and they were headed south. They rolled up the canvas and packed the mule before sunup and were started out on what Hurricane called the Texas Road. Slocum knew any road headed south was called that, as they were in reverse called the Kansas Road, which did not mean more than that a traveler who kept going would get to those places. The hills became higher and the country rougher as the day wore on for the three of them.
The streams were rock-lined and the water flowed over them clear. They passed several homesteads with cooking smoke and small plots of sun-dried corn stalks—some of them already bundled in shocks. Naked brown children peered at them and black cur dogs barked at a safe distance. Sometimes women looked in their direction from hanging wash; others stopped to peer tossing out wastewater from the door frames of their log homes.
Several wagons clattered along with a hard-eyed Indian man holding the lines. He looked them over while his woman, beside him, applied a whip to the thin mismatched horses jogging stiffly with a jingle of harness. They met and passed several others, and were forced to get over so the wheeled carriages could use the ruts cut between the seed-headed grass. Slocum always nodded or touched his hat brim, and never expected a gesture in return from the stone-faced men. Hurricane acted like the others were invisible.
“Guess you don’t know any of them we passed,” Slocum said, looking back as the last rattling rig went north.
“They are Choctaws mostly. Why should I speak to them? You speak to every dog you s
ee?”
“No.”
Wink chuckled and shook her head, riding on the far side of Slocum. “But they’re your people.”
“Not mine, mine are Cherokee.”
“But I thought all Indians were brothers?”
He frowned at her. “Who said that?”
“I’m not sure—may have been a white man.”
Hurricane nodded as if satisfied she knew her own answer.
“We can stop for lunch at the next flat place with some feed for the animals,” Slocum said.
Hurricane and Wink agreed.
She fed them dry cheese, crackers and some pepper jerky. Seated on the ground under an ancient oak, serenaded by crows, they washed down lunch in the strong south wind that swept some of the midday heat away.
“We can stop at Jetter’s Store tonight,” Hurricane said.
“When will we get there?” she asked, seated beside Slocum in the grass.
“After dark.”
“How much farther?” she asked.
“Maybe twenty miles.”
“Is that the area where you think some of them might be?” Slocum asked.
“Malloy may be around there or farther down.”
Slocum nodded and she did too.
The moon wasn’t up, and the stars gave little light after twilight. Hurricane led the way, and they hurried as fast as they dared. Slocum was beginning to wish they’d simply stopped earlier and set up camp, but Hurricane acted determined to get there.
When they finally dismounted at the hitch rack, dim lights glowed in the small windows of the store building.
“Ho, Jetter,” Hurricane shouted, before they stepped on the porch.
“Down!” he shouted at the metallic click of a gun. A barrage of red-flamed gunshots came from the store’s open doorway. With her still in the saddle, Wink’s bay went to bucking. Slocum fired one shot at the doorway. Then realizing the danger to her, he ran after her shouting, “Get off! Get off him.”
She hit the ground facedown and he was beside her. “Keep down. You all right?”
“I . . . I’m fine. What happened?”
Beside her on his knees, with a pistol in his hand, he tried to appraise the situation. “We rode into a trap.”
Sounds of horses and confusion behind the store reached him.
“Stay here.” Slocum was on his feet; his purpose was to get a shot at them. He rushed around the building and emptied his six-gun after the shadowy figures fast disappearing into the night’s arms.
“She okay?” Hurricane asked, joining him.
“Says she is.” Slocum reloaded his Colt with bullets from his gunbelt.
“Good. Better see about Jetter.”
“Was that our welcome?” Slocum asked him as she joined them and he hugged her shoulder. “Too damn close.” He slapped the six-gun back in his holster.
“Real close,” she said with a shudder and they followed Hurricane inside.
“Those sumbitches knew too much about our business,” Hurricane grumbled in the room’s darkness. “Some gawdamn Choctaw must have told them we were coming here.”
Feet stomping on the floor made them both draw their guns. Hurricane lighted a coal oil lamp, and Slocum saw a gray-headed man and a younger Indian woman bound and gagged behind the counter.
“Who did this?” Slocum asked, ungagging and then untying the woman.
“They were three of them,” she managed, trying to get her breath as Hurricane freed the man.
“That damn Nickel Malloy was the leader. Peter Two-horse and that Lanny boy were with him; they came in and jumped us. Said they were going to kill some guys who were after them,” Jetter said as Wink led the missus aside into a shed attached to the building.
“He’s been acting the big shot around here for several days. Trying to get some more to join his gang.” Jetter, a thin man in his fifties, looked around to be sure they were alone before he spoke again. “I’d sent word to the U.S. marshal at Fort Smith a few days ago about him and his activities.”
He dropped his elbows on the counter and shook his head as if to clear it. Then he shouted at the side room. “Betty, you all right?”
“I’m fine, Ira,” she said, sweeping her black hair back from her face and peering at them from the doorway. “Your woman and I are going to fix some food. She said you had not eaten yet either.”
Slocum thanked her and she returned to the living quarters.
“Where’s he buying his whiskey?” Hurricane asked, wrinkling his nose. “It’s stronger than the gunpowder smell in here.”
“Maybe at Fred’s Ranch.” Jetter turned his palms up.
Hurricane nodded as if he knew the place. “Fred keeps some ugly whores and sells bad whiskey there.”
“We better check that out come daylight. I’m going to go find our horses,” Slocum said.
“Need a lamp?” Jetter offered.
“I’ll know more later. Moon’s coming up. Better go see if I can even find them.”
“I’m coming too,” Hurricane said and joined him.
The sorrel and two mules were grazing less than fifty yards away from the store. Hurricane took the two mules back to unload. Slocum tightened the cinch and threw his leg over Red.
“I’ll go look for her horse.”
“Be careful—they might sneak back.”
“I will.” He reined Red around. No telling how far the bay had gone. He rode out the tracks going north in the last direction he’d seen the horse take after tossing her. Sticking to the moonlit road, he hoped that the bay, having been with the sorrel so long, would nicker or give a sound to him out of the dark shadowy post oaks. But nothing showed up after the first two miles, so he decided to wait until daylight.
When he loped up, Wink rushed out to check on him. “You all right?”
“Yes, but no horse.” He dismounted and she hugged him. “We’ll find him after daylight.”
“Better wash up and come eat,” she said to him.
“Fine.” Hungry enough to eat a bear, he wondered about Nickel and his plans in the future. Obviously their identity was blown. How had they known Slocum was coming after them?
She hugged his arm. “I was sure scared when the shooting started.”
“What did I tell you, this is a damn tough business.”
You’re right.” She released him so he could wash up on the porch. “But next time, I’ll be more ready—I know what I did wrong.”
“What’s that?” he asked.
“I forgot the pale face of my son when I first saw him that day.”
He shook his head and put down the towel. “More to it than that.”
She shook her head and then swept the curls back as they entered the store. “You’ll see.”
Dawn came in a humid mist. Slocum found the bay, saddle and all, standing grazing with the others when he went out to check on them. He caught him and slipped a rope around his neck—the reins were broken, but he looked sound and the saddle fine. The bay hobbled just in case, Slocum took the headstall back with him to the store for new reins.
“Bay’s back,” he said, meeting her on the porch.
“Good. I was worried he might have really run away.”
“All you worried about was you’d have to ride a mule.”
She laughed and shook her head at his teasing. “Yes, that too.”
After breakfast, he had completed the bridle repairs and the threesome was ready to ride to Fred’s. Their camping things tucked under the tarp for their return and the pack mule hobbled so he wouldn’t follow them, they rode out with Jetter’s warning to expect some tough ones to be there. The lonesome braying of the left-behind mule trailed them.
They rode over a pass, mid-morning, the day’s heat rising. A free wind swept Slocum’s face as they paused to let their horses get their breath. He took Wink’s reins as she dismounted and excused herself to seek some relief in the privacy of the brush.
“We close to the ranch?” he asked Hurricane.
“Good. You think they’re there?”
His dark eyes narrowed to slits as he studied the land beneath them. “Who knows where such wolves will rest at.”
“I guess you’re right. Vast country.”
“We will know soon.”
“Good.” He handed Wink the reins. “We’re close to the place.”
“Good.” She remounted, and they set off down the trail.
Slocum checked the loads in his Colt and reholstered it, satisfied it was all right. He turned and nodded to Wink, then paused to see the hard set in her face. The night before’s experience had obviously not turned aside her determination—so she was tough enough for whatever lay ahead.
They came through some cut-off timber, and Hurricane pointed to the east. Slocum could see a cedar-shingle roof and nodded. “That it?”
“He usually has a lookout on the roof.”
“We better go on foot from here.”
Hurricane agreed and they dismounted. Horses hobbled, they moved to the north, the shorter man in the lead and Slocum behind Wink, all three of them on edge as they hurried through the brush and a few spindly trees spared the ax. In minutes, they squatted on the border of the clearing and studied the corrals and back of the new log house.
“No guard on roof,” Hurricane said under his breath.
Slocum nodded. “We need to run off the horses. Then they can’t escape if they’re here.”
“I can do that,” she said.
Hurricane looked at her. “You may have to shoot one of them.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I can do that too.”
“Don’t close your eyes,” Slocum said and put his hand on her shoulders. “When you turn the horses loose, they’ll descend on you.”
She nodded.
“Turn the horses out and then get on the far side of the corral.” Slocum felt uncertain about the decision, but certain he couldn’t protect her forever in her determination to get the killers. “We’re going to try and stop them.”
“Let’s go,” Hurricane said, his double barrel at the ready.
Slocum nodded to her and headed after the Cherokee. They went past the chimney and headed for the porch on the front. When he looked back, she had already gone to release the horses. Pistol in his fist, he followed Hurricane around the building, and a man seated in a rocking chair jumped up. The rifle across his lap clattered to the floor.