by Jake Logan
Sometime during the night, Slocum was awakened by a soft rustling sound, coming from his left. Slowly, he reached for his Colt and readied it. Might be a puma, he thought, or more likely a bear nosing around for food.
But then he became aware that the “animal” was twolegged, not four, and immediately knew who it was.
“Come on in, Grimes,” he said in a low tone. “Suppose you want those handcuffs unlocked.”
He flicked his gaze toward Jack, who hadn’t roused. It figured.
After three more steps in the darkness, Grimes emerged into the small circle of light emitted by the dying fire. He was armed only with a wooden stick, on the end of which he had somehow managed to make a sort of point.
“You won’t need that,” Slocum said, digging into his pocket for the key and thinking that if he’d given it to Jack to take care of, he likely would have stuck it in Grimes’s back pocket for safekeeping.
Some bounty hunter!
He pulled out the key. “You want me to unlock ’em, or you wanna do it?”
“You,” said Grimes, and stepped closer, hands forward, including the one holding the stake. He pointed it at Slocum’s heart.
“You don’t put that stick thing down, I’m liable to get nervous and have to use this.” Suddenly, his gun was in Grimes’s face. Startled, Grimes sucked in air and dropped the stick.
“That’s better,” Slocum said, and proceeded to unlock the cuffs. He took them from Grimes and slid them into his saddlebags. You never knew when they might come in handy. Then he looked up and asked, “Where’s the horse you thieved?”
“Damn thing went lame on me,” Grimes responded in a muted tone. He, too, kept glancing at Jack, who was still sleeping soundly. “Turned him loose on the other side’a the hill, over there.” He pointed to the northwest.
“All right. Now, get outta here, and don’t let me see your face again, got that?”
Looking vastly relieved, Grimes nodded once, then slipped away into the darkness. Slocum listened as his footsteps diminished into nothing.
“Good luck,” he muttered to no one in particular, as he prepared to roll a quirlie. “It’s a big, nasty world out there, what with all those would-be bounty hunters runnin’ around.”
Jack rolled onto his side, but he didn’t wake.
17
Come morning, Jack woke to find that Slocum had already lit a fresh fire and was brewing coffee. Additionally, Slocum was brushing down the horses—who were munching on a pile of long, fresh grass—and whistling! How could he be so damned chipper when they had ridden all the way up here for nothing?
He struggled up into a sit, and grabbed an empty coffee cup. He was about to pour out a cupful when Slocum shouted, “Give it another five minutes or so, Jack. Just put ’er on,” then went back to currying Jack’s gelding.
Jack set the pot back, unpoured. Then he sat back, puzzled. What the hell was going on? He had fully expected to wake to Slocum’s jabbering at him about giving up bounty hunting, something he had no intention of doing. Slocum was crazy! Had he looked at Jack’s bank balance lately, or for that matter, his own?
Bounty hunting was making him rich, making them both rich! Why, a farmer could break his back for a good twenty years and not clear as much as he’d made in the past few weeks!
He’d let one lousy prisoner escape. So what? Everybody had bad days, and he guessed he’d been having one of his. But he’d apologized to Slocum, hadn’t he? Not that it was any skin off Slocum’s nose anyhow. It was supposed to be my capture, my bounty! he thought, equally angry with himself—for losing Grimes—and Slocum—for riding him so hard about it—and Rupert Grimes himself, for getting away in the first place.
And now he was supposed to settle down and do what? Keep a store? Herd cattle? Wait tables?
He didn’t think so. He’d done all three for other people, and he couldn’t say he’d liked it, liked any of them. Course, if he’d been the owner, like Sam Tompkins up in Flagstaff, then he could do the hiring and firing ... No, he still wouldn’t like running a café.
He liked bounty hunting. He liked the changing scenery and the fat bank account. He also liked traveling. Bounty hunting was made for him!
While Jack and the coffee slowly came to a boil, Slocum spent his time between brush strokes staring at the crest of the hilltop to the northwest of them. He was hoping that Lem’s sorrel would just sort of wander up and over the hill and save them the trouble of rounding him up. Of course, they’d lose time today. He didn’t want to push the lame horse. But they were close enough to Lem’s that he could almost spit there, and he’d be damned if they didn’t make it by dark.
There was no sign of the horse, though, so when he finished currying and brushing Rocky, he tacked him up and, telling Jack to wait there, rode up the hill. On the other side, past the crest, about a dozen cattle grazed peacefully in the knee-high grass between clumps of cactus. And among them, still wearing his saddle and bridle, grazed Lem’s sorrel gelding.
Slocum grinned and shook his head. “I’ll be jiggered,” he said, and laughed. Some of the cows took a step away at the sound, but the sorrel just kept grazing.
Slocum slowly rode down to him, parting the cattle with as little ruckus as possible. The sorrel simply stood there swishing his tail, even when Slocum bent to catch his reins. “Good boy,” he said softly. “That’s a good ol’ son. Let’s get you back to Lem, then.”
When he led the sorrel back over the hill, Jack stood up and stared at them. In fact, he stood there, as straight and stiff as if he were at attention, until Slocum had ridden all the way back down to camp and dismounted Rocky. In fact, it wasn’t until Slocum’s feet hit the ground that Jack’s tantrum began.
“Where’d you find him?” he shouted, and all the horses jumped. “How’d you know where he was? Goddamnit, this was all a trick! You had the whole thing laid out afore we left Lem’s, you sonofabitch, ’cause you wanted me to lose him, you wanted me to louse it up or think I had,’cause you wanted to get shed’a me! What’re you gonna do? Leave me up at Lem’s and then come down and collect Grimes? Have the reward for yourself?”
During Jack’s tirade, Slocum’s face had become darker and darker, and his hands had balled into fists. He snarled, “Shut the bloody hell up, you worthless little shit!”
And Jack, startled, complied, although he looked like he’d still try to take on a bag full of angry badgers. He’d lose, Slocum thought. And if they didn’t finish him off, I would! He was good and pissed at Jack, pissed enough that if Jack had pushed it, Slocum would have decked him without a second thought.
But Jack did have something going for him: he was basically smart. And some of the time—when he was actually thinking, that was—he used his brain the right way. Which he did at that moment.
He sat back down, folded his hands in his lap, and said, “Sorry.”
He didn’t look up, not even when Slocum got himself a cup of coffee and a hunk of beef jerky.
“Sorry I called you worthless,” Slocum said after he’d chewed some jerky. It was more recanting than he’d ever done, or was likely to do again.
“You were right,” Jack said after a moment. He was still looking down at the ground. “Don’t say you’re sorry ’bout it.”
Surprised and puzzled, Slocum stared at him. To begin with, he was shocked at the apology. But he was also wondering whether Jack meant it or not. Three or four hours—or days—from now, was he going to change his mind and set off, hunting outlaws who would surely kill him?
He shook his head. Jack was likely to do just that. But he couldn’t control what Jack did, nor did he have a right to. They weren’t kin. In fact, they’d barely known each other three weeks. All he could do, to aid in his own self-preservation and that of Jack, was to do his best to discourage the boy—no, he reminded himself, it’s Jack, not “the boy”—and then get out of town—and shed of him—fast. Slocum figured he might do pretty well up in Colorado. He wasn’t wanted there. Well, not very mu
ch anyway.
So far as he was concerned, the rest of the mess with Jack was up to the Lord.
Late that afternoon, just before the sun dipped down below the horizon, Slocum and Jack rode into Lem’s place, leading his limping gelding behind them. Slocum had checked him out and determined that he’d be all right if they kept it down to a walk, which they had, and they were all tired.
Lem came out of the house just as they rode up, and said, “By God, you fellers is quick! Thought you’d just be gettin’ down to Phoenix by now. And come to think of it, I never did fancy the name’a the place. They oughta have left it be Pumpkin Flats. That damn Lord Duppa-Dickhead! He comes around an’ tries to change the name’a my ranch, he’s gonna have a fight on his hands!”
Slocum broke it, “Lem? We ain’t been to Phoenix yet.” If he let Lem go on, he could rail for hours about Lord Darryl Duppa—the “dickhead” in question—and his so-called adventures since he hit the Arizona Territory after being paid to leave England by his family.
“What?! Why not? And where’s your pris’ner?” Lem peered under the sorrel, as if he might be hiding there.
Jack wasn’t saying anything, so Slocum answered. “Lost him at about the halfway point.”
“Lost him? Lost him?” Lem’s face was swiftly turning red. “How the hell couldya do that? You had ’im in chains, fer Christsake!”
Slocum shrugged, and shot a glance over at Jack, who was still staring at the ground. He hated like hell to do it, but he finally said, “All right, Jack. Man up.”
Amid a sudden flurry of tears, Jack admitted what had happened, then added, “And Slocum thinks I ought’a be in another business entire, and I don’t know what to do!”
By this time, Martha had come out of the ranch house and put her arm around Jack. Casting the words “You two are horrible!” over her shoulder, she walked Jack into the house, all comfort and cuddles. “Come along, Jack, come along and have some pie ...” Slocum heard her say.
Both he and Lem stood there for the longest time before Lem said, “Well, let’s get the horses took care of.”
Inside, Martha had sat Jack down at the table, and pushed a piece of freshly baked apple pie in front of him. It was deep dish, the kind his mama used to make, and his mouth immediately began to water.
But he said, “No thanks, ma’ am,” and pillowed his head in his hands. He had cried. Cried in front of Slocum, cried in front of strangers. He wanted to die. He wished that Slocum had killed him back down the mountains, when they found Lem’s sorrel.
The trouble and embarrassment it would have saved him!
He was so sorry, so sorry about everything: losing his prisoner, yelling at Slocum and calling him names, and now breaking down in front of Lem’s place. Slocum was right about him. He couldn’t track, couldn’t keep his hands on his prisoner, couldn’t break up a bar fight, couldn’t do anything.
Martha sat down beside him. “Jack, honey? It does a man good to let loose a few tears every now and then. I know you boys, how you’re all bravado, but inside, you’re just human beings like everybody else. So here.”
She handed him a towel. “Scrub your face and blow your nose and eat some’a my dried apple pie, or you’re gonna have me to contend with.”
She shoved back her chair and stood up, arms akimbo. “And you haven’t begun to have a bad day till you got me mad at you!”
Jack managed a “Yes’m,” and began to scrub at his face. He’d bet he was red as a beet. Or as red as his fanny after a good paddling from his pa, he thought, and then blushed even redder. He blew his nose, set the towel aside, and took the first bite of pie.
It was great! Even better than his ma’s, and he told Martha so.
“Don’t go talkin’ bad about your mama,” she said, her back toward him as she worked. “I’m sure she did the best with what she had. All mothers do.” She turned to look at him. “Well. You look a sight better than you did. Are you eating?”
“Yes’m,” he answered, then dug back into his pie.
18
Jake was calmed down by the time Slocum and Lem got back from the barn. Jack’s mare was still there, and still in full standing season. Slocum figured Jack’d be smart to take Lem up on his offer to trade, even up, for the gelding. But then, Slocum wasn’t Jack’s keeper, was he? Without opening his mouth, he followed Lem into the house.
Not that he’d had much chance to open it. Lem had been talking, nonstop since they’d arrived. Currently, he was going on about a pinto stallion that Sandy had, and which he’d really like to breed Jack’s mare to. If she wasn’t Jack’s mare anymore, that was.
Martha was setting the table when they got inside, and Jack was at the table polishing off what looked like it had been a bowl of pie. No sign of his tears now. Good. Jack had to learn to man up, goddamn it, and not go around embarrassing people by crying like a girl.
Martha looked up and smiled. “Well, just in time for dinner! And why am I surprised?”
Slocum chuckled and Lem grinned. Jack just kept eating pie.
“We’ve got roast beef in slices or stew for the hands, and fried chicken for us poor owners and their friends,” she went on. “Beans, biscuits and honey, and dried apple pie for everybody. Menu to your satisfaction?” She walked around the table and gave Lem a little peck on his hairy cheek.
“Sounds gut-rattlin’ good!” he said, smiling wide enough to expose his gold eye tooth.
“Yes, ma’am, sure does!” said Slocum.
Although he was busy chewing, Jack looked up from his pie and nodded. Nodded happily, Slocum noted. He wondered what kind of magic joy juice Martha put in that pie anyhow.
She turned her attention toward the table. “Hurry along, Jack. You’re about to be overrun by a passel of hungry ranch hands.”
Jack shoved the last of the pie into his mouth, picked up his bowl and fork, and got to his feet, all in one clumsy move, then carried his dirty dishes to the kitchen. Just in time, too—the hands began to file in, laughing and pushing and shoving. As before, they all took their hats off—and put their manners on—before they sat at Martha’s table.
Jack came and joined Lem and Slocum in the living area and rolled himself a quirlie. Lem already had his pipe going and Slocum was halfway through his smoke before Jack had his lit, but he seemed in no hurry. Didn’t seem the least little bit upset either, to Slocum’s mind. Deciding to leave well enough alone, he simply carried on his conversation with Lem.
“So I said,” Lem went on, “why the hell you got all them steers, then? I thought you said as how you wanted to raise breeding stock! And ol’ Win looks at me and says as how them steers didn’t quite measure up to what he wanted, and how he was gonna wait for the next crop to come along. Can you figger that? I mean, why would the next crop be any different? They got the same daddy, they got the same mamas. I jus’ figger ol’ Win is crazy, y’know?”
Slocum nodded and tried not to appear indifferent, which was what he was. Frankly, he didn’t give a flying rat’s ass about ol’ Win—whoever he was—and his cattle. He was more interested in why Jack was suddenly in such better spirits. No matter how good that apple pie had been, it couldn’t have been that good!
And it didn’t look to him as if Jack was paying any mind to what he or Lem was saying. His attention seemed to be on the dinner conversation at the table, although why he’d want to listen in was anybody’s guess.
“Slocum?” It was Lem.
“Sorry. Just sorta drifted off in my own head there for a minute, Lem.”
Lem waved a hand. “Hell, don’t be sorry. I do it all the time. Just ask Martha. She’s always harpin’ on me for woolgatherin’ or daydreamin’ or such. So, what’d you think?”
Slocum was at a loss. He said, “Sorry? About what?”
Lem began to laugh like crazy, managing between guffaws to say, “Guess you really was off in the south forty!”
Later, when the hands had gone and Lem, Martha, Slocum, and Jack were just about finishing up the
ir fried chicken, a frantic knock came at the door.
Saying, “I wonder who the hell can that be this late,” Lem stood up and went to answer it.
Their visitor was a man Slocum didn’t recognize, but who Lem seemed to know, for he asked him in. The fellow was talking gibberish at lightning speed, and Lem held up his hands and said, “Take it easy, Homer, slow down.”
Homer, a middle-sized, middle-aged fellow with grizzled red hair, put his hand on his chest and took several deep breaths to calm his ragged breathing.
“That’s it, Homer,” said Lem. “Remember your heart.”
Lem got him set down at the table while Martha ran to get him a drink of water, which he gulped down. “Th-Thank you, ma’am. Beholden to you.”
Martha was concerned, but smiled and went to fetch him another glass.
“All right, Homer,” said Lem. “What’s all the excitement for?”
“Horse thievin’,” Homer said.
“No!” Lem said in disbelief. “We ain’t had no hoss thieves up here in a coon’s age!”
“We do now. Mr. McMurtry’s good bay stallion, too! Took ’im right outta the corral, along with a rig’a tack and his good Henry rifle!” Homer was handed his second glass of water and gulped that down as well. “He sent us all out to ride to the nearest ranches, see if they had any trouble.”
Lem shook his head. “Nobody’s been thievin’ around here that I know of.” But he shot Slocum a glance that said he was thinking what Slocum was: Rupert Grimes had found himself a mount.
Slocum had explained the whole of the incident to Lem while they were out in the barn, and made Lem promise not to say anything in front of Jack, which he hadn’t. It didn’t appear that he was going to now either, thank God. He didn’t need Jack to all of a sudden go chasing after somebody who was likely halfway to the California border by now.
But Jack’s ears had perked up anyway, dammit. He had leaned forward and was staring at Homer. “Any idea what time they took him?” he asked.
