by Jake Logan
“In a town this size, I’d imagine you know just about everybody.”
“That might be true if they wanted to know me.”
Once again, Slocum felt bad for sticking his foot in his mouth.
“One of the stable hands was killed. Cut up pretty bad,” she continued. “Sheriff thinks it may have been in a fight.”
“Is it anyone I might have seen while I was here?”
“Maybe. His name is Derrick. Came to town less than six months ago all the way from Boston I think. He was always nice to me. Of course, he always wanted something more than just a how-do-you-do, but that’s not uncommon.”
“A woman looking like you must get used to that sort of thing.” Slocum was glad to see the tired smile his compliment brought to Vivienne’s face. The smile disappeared just as quickly as it had come when the sheriff and the liveryman stomped in through the front doors.
“Where were you last night?” Marshal asked. “Couldn’t find hide nor hair of you.”
“Didn’t know I was on such a short leash,” Slocum replied.
“Long as you’re in my town, you’ll be on any leash I please. For now, just stay put. Will I be able to find you in the same spot as before?”
It took every bit of restraint Slocum could muster to keep from knocking the lawman onto his ass. It took even more to keep from glaring at the sheriff in a way that would betray what was truly running through his mind. After a few tense moments, Slocum nodded and said, “Yeah. Same place.”
“Good. I’ll want to have a word with you soon.” With that, the sheriff turned sharply around and headed outside.
The liveryman looked Slocum up and down, sputtered a few halfhearted syllables, and then rushed to catch up to the sheriff.
Their footsteps were still fading when Slocum turned back to his horse and continued strapping the saddle to its back.
“Well,” Vivienne said, “at least we can spend a little more time together tonight since you’ll still be here and all.”
“Sorry, but I must be moving along.”
“But . . . he just said you were to stay put.”
“I heard what he said,” Slocum replied. “Don’t mean I have to abide by it.”
At first, Vivienne seemed shocked to hear such a thing. Then, a little grin flickered across her face. “He’s the sheriff. You’re just gonna tell him one thing and then do another?”
“I suppose . . . if that’s what you want to call it.” After cinching in the last strap, Slocum nodded and said, “On the other hand, I don’t suppose there’s any other thing to call it. I tried to help by bringing that dead robber to him and damn near got tossed into jail for it. That sheriff of yours is a strutting little jackass who’s too wet behind the ears to know how to get his job done. If he had any sense at all, he would have organized a posse to go after that Ellis Jaynes fella a long time ago. Instead, he sits back and waits for someone else to bring a killer down. For all we know, there’s already more men hiring on new gunhands to terrorize the same stretch of road.”
“If he’d formed a posse now to check on that,” Vivienne asked, “would you have joined?”
“Probably. Too many times, I’ve been the only one that seems concerned about bringing a killer to justice or protecting those who were hurt by men like Jaynes. It ain’t my lot in life to just ride around and do jobs for men who are too damn lazy, stupid, or cowardly to get their own hands dirty. I’ll lend a hand where I can and help when it’s needed, but I ain’t about to do your sheriff’s bidding and I sure as hell ain’t gonna set aside my business just because some little asshole with a badge pinned to his shirt tells me to.”
Vivienne approached him and took hold of his shirt so she could pull him down and plant a kiss onto his lips. When she was through, she said, “You don’t care for lawmen very much, do you?”
“As a general rule, not as such. After you run across so many crooked ones, it spoils you on the rest. There have been a few that were good enough, but they seem to be in the minority.”
“I know what you mean. I guess our sheriff isn’t much for impressing. Do you think he’s crooked?”
Now that the saddle was in place, Slocum checked his gear. Next came the saddlebags, which he draped across the animal’s back, where they belonged. “I haven’t seen anything to make me think he was crooked. I’d say he was just in over his head. No,” he corrected himself. “More like too ignorant to know he was in over his head. Either that or proud. Whichever it is, I don’t make it a habit to suffer men like that. If I had nothing else to do, I might stay just to see how this pans out. Since I’ve got my business to tend to, I suppose this means we’ll be parting ways.”
“Whatever you think about the sheriff,” Vivienne said in a soft tone, “I would have liked you to stay for a while.”
Slocum led his horse from the stall and took a peek out the front door. Since there were no lawmen in sight, he figured Marshal was blowing his smoke in the privacy of his own office. “You could come with me,” he offered.
“I could . . . what?”
“Come with me. I’m headed to Mescaline, but you could catch a stagecoach or a train to wherever you like. Doesn’t seem like you have much keeping you here apart from a lot of folks who don’t think very highly of you. Trust me, I’ve been plenty of places filled with them that don’t want me there. It’s not worth your time to be in a place like that as opposed to . . . well . . . anywhere else.”
“It’s not that simple,” she said.
“Actually, it is. Most things in life boil down to some pretty easy notions. Go or stay. Do or don’t. It only gets complicated in the execution, but every now and then some things really are just a matter of making a decision. The hardest part is in going against everything that’s come before. Why are you staying here?”
After not a lot of consideration, she replied, “Because it’s where I wound up.”
“You may be surprised how many folks have the same answer to that question. If you don’t like where you’re at, find somewhere else to be. That line of thinking has been serving me well for a number of years.”
“I guess it simply doesn’t serve me well enough to leave just yet. Thanks for the offer, though.”
Slocum let go of his reins so he could step up to her, wrap his arms around her, and draw her close for a long, lingering kiss. As much as he wanted to stay with her at that particular moment, he let her go so he could collect his reins and push open the stable’s door. “If the day comes, you don’t need me to pick up and go.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. You’d best go before the sheriff comes back around to collect you.”
Now that he was outside, Slocum climbed into his saddle and said, “He can watch me go and wave good-bye, as far as I’m concerned.”
“If he asks about you, I’ll say I don’t know why you left or where you went.”
“Tell him everything I told you. If he needs to find me so badly, all he needs to do to ride to Mescaline. Somehow I doubt he’ll find the time to go so far out of his way.” Then Slocum flicked his reins and got his horse moving toward the street. There wasn’t any movement through Davis Junction at that moment, so he stood out like a single bump on a log as he made his way toward the edge of town. Since there weren’t any trains approaching or leaving the station, every step the horse took echoed down the street and rattled between the dusty buildings.
As was often the way, Slocum felt himself leaning in more than one direction. One part wanted to just get out of town and continue with his life at his own pace. He’d stepped in and cleaned up a small mess for the sheriff, and that was just fine.
Another part wanted to take his time in leaving Davis Junction so he could be certain the sheriff saw him going. Granted, that was a petty part of himself that he wasn’t very proud of, but it was there all the same. Marshal just struck him as one of those people wh
o figured he deserved to have most everything handed to him on a platter and that folks would just step in line and do what he told them because they didn’t have a choice. Respect had to be earned, however. Slocum knew that much after years of experience and fighting to earn his fair share. Good men chose the rough path and did their best to ride it while lending a hand to others along the way. They didn’t puff out their chests and act like the lord of the manor. By riding slowly enough to make certain the sheriff or his deputy caught sight of him, Slocum would be making a statement. If possible, he might even be able to add to that statement by riding off with the lawman hollering like a crazy man at his back.
Thinking about watching that brought a wicked grin to Slocum’s face. Of course, if he did everything that he’d thought about while grinning that way, he would have found a permanent home behind a set of bars a long time ago.
The final part of him was tempted to steer his horse back to the stable, put it up for another night, and see what he could do to help the sheriff clean up whatever mess Ellis Jaynes may have left behind. There was something to be said for the Good Lord having a reason for putting a man in a certain place at a certain time. Plenty of men had stepped up to help him in times of need, and it was only proper that he should return the favor whenever he could.
“Slocum!” the sheriff shouted from somewhere behind him. “Get back here!”
Slocum sighed and weighed his options one last time. He was just beginning to favor helping the sheriff when Marshal hollered, “You’d best be moving that horse to more suitable accommodations so you can plant your ass back into that room you rented! Otherwise there’ll be hell to pay, damn it!”
“Some men never learn,” Slocum grumbled as he snapped his reins and tossed a wave over his shoulder. “It always pays to be neighborly instead of a strutting, squawking asshole.”
Slocum left Davis Junction and didn’t look back.
7
Throughout the better portion of that day, Slocum had been waiting to hear a horse or two gallop to catch up to him so the town’s sheriff could give him what for. If anything, he figured Marshal would be bent far enough out of shape that he would simply have to remind him about jurisdiction and authority and any of the other long words spouted by men like him. But the only thing Slocum heard was the rumble of iron horses riding the tracks spanning one end of the country to the other.
After a while, he wondered if he might catch sight of a thief masquerading as an Indian brave sitting on a high ridge somewhere. But he didn’t see that either. All that filled Slocum’s line of sight that day was flat terrain, sun-baked rocks, trails of smoke from steam engines, and the occasional clump of parched scrub bushes. Before long, even the trains were too far away to see or hear. Critters scattered as his horse rumbled by, seeking shelter in little caves or dens scratched out of the uncompromising ground.
As far as deserts went, Smoke Creek wasn’t a large one. He could have circled around it while only adding a few days to his ride, but that involved passing through some terrain that was just a little more difficult to traverse. As long as he knew there was an end in sight, riding through a desert was actually not so bad. In fact, forging through a cauldron of heat and arid harshness did something to cleanse a man’s soul. If Slocum had to ride more than one long day, he would have grudgingly picked one of those harder routes instead of the one that led straight to Mescaline. As it was, he’d committed himself to his course and was too stubborn to veer from it now.
The first time he’d come this way, he didn’t have so many choices. He’d been riding scout for a small wagon train full of prospectors with their eyes set firmly on the mines scattered throughout Nevada. They’d lost a few horses, which made for a bad situation, and when one of the men decided to steal the savings of everyone else in the wagons so he could strike out for a new life, the situation turned bad. When Slocum had arrived in Mescaline back then, crawling in from the desert nursing a few wounds, things got even worse.
He’d been introduced to Jeremiah Hartley when the outlaw had tried to kill him just to prove that he made every decision in Mescaline, including who got to come in and who got to leave. Mescaline had been a little town far from the reaches of the law. Even if there were a few well-meaning sheriffs scattered throughout the other neighboring towns, their reach didn’t extend far enough to help the people there. Hartley got to do what he pleased, and when a man as cruel as him was given that kind of leverage, it didn’t bode well for anyone who got in his way.
Locking horns with Hartley hadn’t been easy. In the end, however, Slocum was the one who walked away from it with his life and Hartley was dumped into a shallow hole. A fitting end for a man who’d created so much misery in an already miserable world.
The people in Mescaline had been grateful. They’d heaped their praises upon Slocum’s shoulders and waved tearfully when he left. While Slocum wouldn’t have minded reaping a bigger reward, he hadn’t taken on Hartley for that. He’d done it because he simply had no tolerance for small men imposing their will upon good people. Also, he wasn’t about to become a smaller man himself by staying around like a dog that had worn out its welcome just so he could lap up a bit more attention. On the other hand, being known as something other than a vagrant or stranger in a place could serve a man well.
Slocum did have business to conduct, and selling gold with someone who was playing straight was a much brighter prospect than trading with a man looking to put one over on someone. Also, there was Anna Redlinger. Slocum had spent plenty of nights with her while he’d been in Mescaline. They were nights a man dreamt about when he was forced to sleep alone on a bedroll beside a dying fire surrounded by all manner of vermin and inclement weather. Even after the night he’d spent with Vivienne, Slocum still had a smile to spare when he thought back to his time with Anna.
Any of those reasons would have been enough to bring him back to Mescaline. On top of that, he was also curious to see how the folks he’d befriended there were doing after they’d been given their lives back. Slocum was feeling downright cheery when he spotted the first angular shapes in the distance marking a spot where the desert gave way to civilization. Dusk was swiftly approaching and there was a mighty hunger gnawing at his belly.
Tapping his heels against his horse’s sides, Slocum allowed the gelding to run as fast as it liked for the last stretch. With an animal as spirited as his, it was all Slocum could do to keep his grip on the reins as the horse charged toward Mescaline. When he pulled back on the leather straps, Slocum felt as if he was arriving in a cloud of dust like something that had rolled all the way down from a mountaintop. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anyone there to appreciate his dramatic flair.
In fact, he couldn’t see anyone there at all.
Slocum rode slowly down the street leading straight through the middle of town. Although the buildings on either side were vaguely familiar, none of them matched his memories of the place. Rather than take time to ponder the many ways he could have embellished things while thinking back on them, he steered toward the closest place that looked as if it could offer him a good meal. The place called Slim’s had been there on his first visit, and if he remembered correctly, it served a fine cut of steak.
The smile on Slocum’s face appeared for two reasons: hunger and the fact that Anna Redlinger had been working at Slim’s when he’d first met her. The water trough in front of the place had recently been filled, so he tied the gelding there and walked inside.
Slim’s was just as he’d remembered it. A dining room the size of a closet that was filled with the aromas of cooking meat. There was one other customer inside, so Slocum tipped his hat to him and found a seat at a table away from the front window.
The woman who stepped out from the kitchen was not Anna Redlinger. In fact, she was large enough to be two Anna Redlingers. She waddled in, wearing an expression that was neither a smile nor grimace, huffing as if every step was a tri
al in balance and stamina. The rounded sides of her plump figure brushed the tables and chairs she passed enough so that the other customer there had to grab his glass of water before it was knocked over.
“What can I get for you?” she asked as she trundled to a stop at Slocum’s table.
“How about a steak?” he asked.
“Just served the last one. It’s late for supper.”
“Try telling that to my stomach,” Slocum said good-naturedly although his comment was not received as such. Since the expression on the large woman’s face hadn’t changed, it was difficult to say if it was received at all.
Without moving any more than was absolutely necessary, she replied, “Too late for supper. No more steak.”
“What do you have?”
“Coffee.”
“Anything to eat?” Slocum asked in a monotone that was almost a perfect match to the large woman’s.
“Pie.”
“Anything with meat?”
Twisting her face into a disgusted expression, she asked, “You mean like meat pie?”
If Slocum had had a white flag to wave, he would have surrendered the conversation right then and there. “Yeah,” he sighed. “Meat pie. That’s exactly what I mean.”
“I’ll go check.”
“You do that.”
She waddled back to the kitchen, leaving Slocum to wonder why the hell he’d bothered coming back to Mescaline. His curiosity was so far gone he could barely recall what it felt like. As for putting some distance between himself and Davis Junction, there was a perfectly good desert out there with caves that were more hospitable. Any other reasons he might have had slipped his mind altogether.
The big woman’s steps as she returned to his table sounded like someone dragging a dead body over the floorboards. “We got a few pieces left,” she grunted.
Slocum looked up at her and asked, “Of what? Meat pie?”
“Yes.”
He blinked, wondering if she was joking. It didn’t take much to see that she probably didn’t know how to do such a thing with anybody. He might even go so far as to say that the severe lines on her face, like so many cuts in an oversized lump of clay, weren’t made to express anything but the frumpy expression she showed him now. “I’ll try it,” he said. “Thanks very much.”