by Jake Logan
Slocum knew all about it—he’d been there as an army scout, a buff hunter and a drover. Southwest Kansas hosted the booming queen of the cow towns, Dodge City. It was situated on the north side of the dwindling Arkansas River that by late summer a man could piss in and raise the water level. Cattle shipping yards, whores—fat ones, thin ones, pretty ones, Mexican ones for the Latinos and black ones for anyone with two bits and a stiff prick—Dodge had been the Army’s supply point until the Cheyennes and the rest of the red devils were herded out of the area to make room for dirt farmers to starve. It served as the buffalo hide center for the scourge of hunters decimating the woolly bastards as fast as they could shoot them. The whores there in those early days were mostly diseased Indian wenches that serviced customers anywhere handy—on a stinging hide pile, in the back of a wagon, in the alley, and one Arapaho teen even took on six shooters in a row on top of a pool table in Scott’s Saloon one afternoon. Filthy, dirty, and the clap running out of their cunts in rivers down their dirt-crusted legs—many a black soldier cried every time he tried to piss and couldn’t, That no-account red bitch! And some hide hunter, equally afflicted, said worse.
But Dodge had cleaned up its act—no guns, no fucking whores in public, a brothel inspector who certified that the employees of each cathouse were disease free. They tried to run off the streetwalkers and close down the independents that didn’t buy a license and pay the “tax.” But Dodge still ran wide open night and day. Men still shot each other despite the gun law, and a young drover fresh up the trail from Texas could, after four months’ hard work, lose his virginity, his money and all else he owned in a few hours and turn up dead in a back alley.
Herds were spread out for miles grazing, waiting for the next cars to be spotted, a higher bid or the boss man considering running them up to Montana and a better market. Slocum and Wink rode around them. He asked a drover or two they met if they’d seen a cowboy on a paint horse. That usually drew a laugh—no self-respecting cowboy ever rode a paint horse. No, they had not seen him.
Slocum was beginning to wonder if Henny had given them the slip, when he came across Simms Wilson, an older trail boss he knew from his days on the drives.
“They ain’t kilt you yet?” Wilson grinned and then took off his hat for her with a nod. “You’re in tough company, ma’am.” He spat tobacco aside.
“I know,” she said and smiled.
“Your herd sold?” Slocum asked, holding his saddle horn and looking over the grazing longhorns.
Wilson shook his head. “I may need some blankets and a thick coat too. Market’s down.”
“Good luck. I’m looking for guy riding a paint and leading two other dinks he stole in the Nation.”
“Oh, bejesus, be bad to be hung for horse rustling, but for stealing a pinto—that would be a damn shame—excuse me, ma’am. My language ain’t too good after all this time on the trail.” He leaned over on the far side and spat again, wiping his mustached mouth on his sleeve. “Hey, come to think of it, he was in Dodge yesterday. I about forgot. What did he do besides steal them Injun horses?”
“Murdered several women and shot her son and husband in a robbery.”
“Hell, he needs hung,”
“He needs stopped.”
“Better go by the sheriff and all them marshals. They don’t like no gunplay unless it’s their own.”
“I’ll go see them.”
“Good. Hope you get him. And, ma’am, I’m sure sorry about your loss.”
She nodded that she heard him and they rode on.
Their horses in the livery, they took a hotel room and a bath. She wore her new dress and they ate in a fine restaurant. A tall man with a mustache, in a black suit, came over and nodded. “Evening, Slocum, didn’t expect to see you in these parts.”
“Virgil Earp, like you to meet Wink Trent.”
Virgil took off his hat and bowed to her. “My pleasure, ma’am.”
“Let him see that wanted poster,” Slocum said, and she drew it from her handbag.
“A gang held up her store over east of here in Kansas, shot her husband and son. One of their members is in Dodge or was yesterday. He was riding a paint he stole down in the Nation.”
“Murdered women?” Virgil frowned looking at the wanted sheet.
“He murdered one three days ago east of here. We buried her.”
“Cuts them all up?”
“Yes, did he murder one here?”
Virgil nodded. “Some dove last night, and it was a bad mess. I need to get word out to everyone. Thanks.” He handed the poster back. “Nice to meet you, ma’am.”
In a rush, Virgil hurried out the door and shouted to someone, but Slocum couldn’t hear him.
“Will they get him?” she asked.
“Maybe. We’ll stick around and be certain.”
“Good. That’s a nice bed up there.”
“I bet it is.”
The next morning the Dodge Gazette headlined the “woman killer” story. Henny’s three animals remained under surveillance in the Keystone Wagon Yard; the owner did not appear to claim them. Slocum shook his head—and furthermore he wouldn’t go back and get them either, if he could read. The biggest question was which way did Henny go, and without the paint he’d be much harder to identify. North, south, east, or west? Damn, Slocum wished he’d waited and located him before telling the law—Virgil Earp was the best one of the brothers, but even he had sent Henny rushing off.
How many more women would he kill? That’s what ate at Slocum’s guts. Each one would be on his conscience. Damn.
“What now?” she asked after he explained the whole thing to her at breakfast.
“We need a lead on where he went.”
“How do we get that?”
“Ask a lot of folks. You can try the stores and women. I’ll try other places. Even a hint would help—someone saw him last.”
It was past noon when they met back at the hotel room.
“You do any good?” he asked, turning when she entered the door.
“Maybe—a swamper at the store said he thought Henny left with some women in a wagon.”
“Which way?”
“West, I guess.”
“We should catch a wagon in a day if we ride hard. He say anything about them?”
“Not much. Said they had some big mules pulling it and they were from Missouri.”
“We better ride. He’s liable to kill all three of them.”
They threw their things together and hurried to the stables. Slocum hired the hand to help them load their horses and mule, and they soon rode west from Dodge. In a few hours, they met the great ball of fire in the west and decided to camp on the river before nightfall, out of fear they’d miss or go past the wagon in the darkness.
Before dawn, they broke camp and headed west again. The road followed the river like the railroad tracks did, and by afternoon, sight of the canvas top of a wagon in the cottonwoods had caused them to draw up.
“Be careful,” he said to her, and they turned off the road and headed for the campfire smoke.
“Hello the camp,” he said aloud, and a woman with a shotgun leveled at him stepped around from behind the wagon.
“Hold it right there,” she ordered in a gravel voice of authority. Strands of gray hair hung unpinned from the rest and her eyes were dark as coals.
“Is he here?” he asked.
“Who’s he?”
“Henny Williams, a skinny fellow—”
“No. You a friend of his?” She used the gun muzzle to punctuate her words.
“No, ma’am.” He motioned to Wink. “He shot her husband and boy.”
“Well, that scallywag done stole our good mules and ran off last night.”
“He hurt any of you?”
“Why, he’d tried, we’d’ve whupped his ass for him. That skinny roach—”
“Well, he’s murdered several woman. We’ll see if we can’t run him down and get your animals back.”
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p; “I don’t know who you two are or your business, mister, but I hope you nail his sorry hide to the outhouse wall when you find him. We would be beholding to you if you could get Molly and Bob back for us.”
“Praise the Lord,” a toothless older woman said, armed with a single-shot .22 as she climbed down from the tailgate.
“We’d even kill an old fat Dominicker hen,” a fat girl in her early twenties said and came around from the far side with a shotgun. “If’n you can find ’em.”
“Can’t guarantee anything. But we’ll ride ahead.”
“Ain’t they a fort west of here?” the middle one asked.
“Bent’s Trading Post. But it’s a hundred miles. We’ll go that far. We’re not back in a week, you three better start out or plan to winter here.”
“I got it in my mind you’ll get us our mules back.” The middle one nodded with a grim set to her thin lips. Then she went over all the details about the mules: how tall they were, scars, weren’t broke to ride, age, unshod.
“What were those women’s names?” Wink asked, looking back when they headed west again and were out of earshot.
“I ain’t sure they ever said, but old Henny met his match with them.” They both laughed.
“We know more about the mules than we do the women.”
“Two bay mules, sixteen hands, old wire-cut scar on the mare mule’s left leg.”
“Molly and Bob. That’s the mules’ names. How far can he get on a mule like that?” Wink asked.
“To hell and back, but he’ll earn every mile. They weren’t saddle broke, he just found the one could be ridden.”
“Can we catch him this side of the fort?”
“Maybe.”
Dark, they made camp and gathered some chips and a little wood for a cooking fire before twilight faded. Then she cooked them beans that took forever to soften. Somewhere in the night a coyote gave bray and Slocum turned an ear. In the distance, he heard a mule bray. He ran to their pack animal and muzzled him to prevent him answering.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, out of breath and joining him.
‘There’s mule not a half mile away.”
“Reckon it’s him?”
“Only way to know is go find out. I’ll need to do it on foot—mules gone to braying at my horse will warn him. You have to keep this one quiet too, so he don’t get suspicious and move on.”
“Be careful. Maybe the beans will be done by the time you get back.”
They both laughed and he kissed her on the cheek.
Starlight shone on the vast sagebrush-bunchgrass sea as he made his way in a jog down the road. He caught his breath on the next rise and listened—nothing but the night insects creaking. Another half mile, he stopped in his tracks. Off to his left, in the trees along the river, he heard a horse or mule cough. Almost went by them.
The outlines of three animals stood hipshot in the shadowy light. Two were large mules and the other a mustang. Slocum squatted down to get the lay of the camp. A small fire still smoked, the bitter fumes on the night’s soft breeze.
One bedroll to the side—someone looked rolled up in it. With care to be sure there wasn’t anyone else in camp, Slocum made his way around the site and came in with the river to his back. Then he stepped up, pistol in hand and shoved it in the man’s ear.
“Move a twitch and you’re dead.”
“Huh?”
“Where’s Henny?” he demanded and jerked the covers back. Then he got the man up by using his free hand, so he couldn’t reach for weapon, and checked him for one.
“Who?”
“The mule rustler?” Satisfied the short man behind the beard wasn’t his man, Slocum continued his interrogation.
“I-I never stole them mules. Bought them.”
“They were rustled.”
“I sure never—”
“What’s your name?”
“Watts, why?”
“Well, Watts, the three women who own them mules are stranded east of here. Where did he go?”
“West, I guess. I paid him twenty apiece and give him a good pony in trade.”
Slocum looked at the stars in that direction. Time he got the mules back to those sisters and got on Henny’s track again, there was no telling how far he’d get. Damn.
“Break camp. We have a long ways to go.”
“I never knowed he was a rustler,” Watts said, rolling up his bedroll. “I swear I never knowed that—”
“He also killed a lot of women.”
“How many?”
“About a dozen I can account for.”
“Why kill a woman?”
“Don’t like ’em I guess. Move. We’ve got lots to do.”
“Holy cow—I offered him to sleep here tonight.” The man still acted shook over the whole thing. “I never—what you going to do to me?”
“Maybe those women will offer you a reward—I can’t promise. They’ll be glad to see their mules.”
Watts rubbed his throat. “Sounds good to me.”
It was close to dawn when Slocum and his bunch reached the women’s camp. Mother met them with a shotgun and eyed them critically in the half-light.
“Those your mules?” Slocum asked, dismounting.
“Damn sure are.”
“Good, you owe Mr. Watts any reward you planned to offer for their return.”
Her eyes narrowed like slits, she shoved the shotgun at Slocum. “Them mules were stolen. How do we know he wasn’t in on the plan?”
“’Cause Henny got forty dollars and a good horse out of him in trade for them.”
“I reckon we’d pay ten dollars.”
“It’s a big loss to him.”
“Money don’t grow on trees.”
“I ain’t saying it does. The man was out lots of money; he could’ve taken those mules and sold them for profit and you’d’ve never seen them again.”
“All right, I’ll give him his forty dollars. Kitty, get him the money.”
“Coming,” the fat girl said, digging in a purse and standing behind the seat.
“Amen, amen,” Granny said and climbed out of the back tailgate.
Watts shook Slocum’s hand, then booted his horse in close to take the money. “Thanks. You’re a square shooter.”
“Just watch who you buy mules from in the future.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” he said to Kitty and took the gold coins from her. “I will. I sure will.”
“I never thought we’d ever see them again,” she said with wet lashes.
“Proud you have them,” he said, acting uneasy in her company.
Then she threw her arms around him and hugged the shorter man, about to smother him. Red-faced, he looked like a man drowning.
“You’ll have to stay for—” She blinked her wet eyes as if to see the time of day.
“I reckon since you asked—”
“Oh, yes,” she said and steered him around the wagon to the campfire like she owned him.
“Shotgun” made a face of disapproval and then came over to Slocum. “I guess you’re in a hurry. Hope you find that slinking dog and skin him alive.”
“We’re moving on.” Slocum stepped in the stirrup and, once seated, saluted her.
“You never said what I owed you.”
“Nothing.” He turned his horse and motioned for Wink to leave.
“I’ll get even with you!” she shouted and he nodded as they trotted west—a good day behind their man, mounted on a bay mustang with an SU brand on his right shoulder, according to Watts.
Bent’s Trading Post looked like a flagship in the ocean of gray brown against a curtain of green cottonwoods along the Arkansas. The thickly plastered adobe walls towered over them, and an assortment of freight wagons, ambulances, two-wheel carts, travois-laden Indian ponies all stood around outside the great wooden doors that had not been shut in years.
For years this had been the first sign of civilization for those headed west. The Bent Brothers, married to Cheyenne wome
n, had held a stiff business from the days of the mountain men to present times. For years their business with partner St. Vrain was fur trading with the Plains Indians. One of their satellites was the famous adobe walls site on the Canadian. At the main post, they traded foot-sore oxen for fresh ones for ten to twenty dollars per head depending on the market. The weak ones were turned out to recover and to be swapped later to another teamster needing one.
First place since Missouri for the traveler to buy things like coffee, flour, cornmeal, dry beans and sugar. Most of the goods were freighted up from Santa Fe, before the railroad. At one time, much earlier, the mountain men brought beaver pelts there, and they were baled and sent by mule to St. Louis.
So when he and Wink walked in under the archway, Slocum knew this was hallowed ground in the minds of several old men. Many a camp squaw had been bartered for or bought here. Most were captives and made a good item to trade for firewater. Slocum could recall sitting on his haunches as six Cheyenne bucks, not out of their teens, brought in five young women—Crows.
Their buffalo ponies no longer danced on their toes—gaunt from the hard miles they had pushed them, they blew exhausted in the dust. Some no doubt fed the ravens and coyotes where they had fallen headfirst to the ground, unable to be flailed by quirt into another step. Two girls to a pony, wrists tied in front and then looped together by the braided leather nooses, a short lead that forced them to dismount at the same time or strangle one another.
One pair of girls’ sea legs failed to hold them up once off the pony, and they spilled on their butts. One of the captors ran over and jerked both to their feet by a handful of hair, shoving them to the circle they had set for them to be held in. His rawhide boots slapping around his rock-hard calves and his shoulders wide like an eagle after prey, he drove them to the others. Under his breath, he called them whores and worthless in his own language.
It took no imagination to think how the six boys had shown their manhood by raping each of the girls repeatedly on the long journey south. Jerking the chosen one up by the hair from the circle and dragging her into the shadows of night; forcing her down on the sharp sticks, where he’d unceremoniously whip up her short skirt, spread her knees, without regard, and penetrate her cunt, jacking it to her until he came deep inside her and then laughed and mocked her.