Slocum 419

by Jake Logan

  “I have to go,” he said as he slid from the bed.

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  Slocum didn’t say anything as he began to dress. He didn’t want to encourage or discourage her. But in the back of his mind, he knew that she had a stake in seeing Wolf gone from her life and from Durango.

  Maybe, he thought, it was foreordained.

  But one way or another, Wolf had to disappear. From both of their lives.

  That was Fate, he knew, as surely as if all of it were written in the stars.

  24

  Bert Loomis stretched his one serviceable leg as he sat by the window in Wolf’s cabin. It had stiffened up on him, and he felt as if his circulation had shut down and the good leg—his right leg—was dying alongside the injured one. His left leg acted up regularly, with a sharp knifelike pain in the wound. He wished he could just drown himself in whiskey and sleep.

  But Hobart and Wolf were banging around, stuffing supplies in their saddlebags, along with bullets and rifle cartridges. So far, Wolf had not told him what he was going to do. All he had heard were scraps of conversation between Hobart and Wolf that he could not decipher, as if they were talking in another tongue or in some kind of gibberish code.

  He was growing angrier by the minute.

  Finally, the two men came into the front room, with saddlebags slung over their shoulders.

  “We’re leavin’,” Wolf said to Loomis.

  “Where you goin’, boss?”

  “For a ride.”

  “This time of night?”

  “You stay put, Bert. No tellin’ who might show up.”

  “What do I do if that Slocum feller comes around?”

  “Shoot him,” Wolf said.

  Hobart laughed.

  “What are you laughin’ at, Cornelius?” Loomis said with a whining underline to Hobart’s given name.

  “I told you not to call me that, Bert,” Hobart said. He hated his first name and almost never used it. And he hated to be called “Hobie.” Some who had called him that had broken jaws that he’d delivered free of charge.

  “We might be back, Bert,” Wolf said. “All depends.”

  “On what?” Loomis asked.

  “If we run into Slocum, we’ll drop him and then it’s business as usual.”

  “I hope you run into him,” Loomis said.

  Hobart and Wolf left the cabin and walked the few blocks to the stables, past all the little Mexican stores, cantinas, and cafés. They passed the yard where the Mexicans stored their carts and wagons, a few doors from the livery stables, which was the largest in town, and the most accessible.

  Palacio de Caballos stood in a large tract nestled against a towering mountain at the back, so its large corral only had to be fenced on three sides.

  It was dark on the street, but there were lanterns burning inside the stable, which was one of the largest buildings in town, complete with a hay loft, a tack room, and a blacksmith’s shop off to the side in another structure.

  Benito Aguilar was on duty. He was not the owner, but he groomed and fed the horses, and acted as night watchman. The stables were owned by Eladio Salazar, a tough, trail-wise Mexican from Sonora who had been one of the earliest settlers in Durango. A white-haired, bearded man, he knew horses and cattle like he knew the back of his hand.

  “Mr. Wolf,” Benito said when Hobart and Wolf walked down the stalls toward one that Aguilar was cleaning with a pitchfork and shovel. He had a wheelbarrow parked outside the stall and a lantern hanging on a twenty-penny nail to give him light. “You come to visit your horse?”

  “I’m going to saddle up, Benny,” Wolf said. “Hobart wants his horse, too.”

  “Yes, I will show you where they are and open the tack room for you to get your saddles.”

  Benito left the stall and led them to the tack room. He took out a ring of keys and unlocked the padlock. He lit a lantern and hung it on a wire loop that was attached to the ceiling.

  Wolf and Hobart set down their saddlebags a few feet apart outside the tack room.

  “Your horses are in the small corral,” Aguilar said. “I will get them for you.” He took two rope halters from the wall and left the two men to find their saddles and bridles.

  “Smells like horseshit in here,” Hobart said.

  “Just be glad it ain’t sheep dip,” Wolf cracked back.

  Hobart chuckled as he found his saddle with the rifle scabbard attached. He lugged it outside and lay it on its side. Then he found his bridle on a dowel set into the wall along with several others. Wolf lugged his saddle out, along with his bridle, and lay them next to Hobart’s.

  Benito returned in a few moments. He led two horses into the livery, both prancing and eager to see their masters. Both horses whickered when they saw their owners. Some of the horses inside the stalls neighed. There was the pungent aroma of hay and horse manure inside the livery, and flies buzzed here and there as they flew up from piles of fresh offal.

  “I will saddle your horses,” Benito said to Wolf. “You have the blankets?”

  “Couldn’t find ’em,” Wolf said.

  “I know where they are,” Benito said. He went into the tack room and came out with two saddle blankets, both with different patterns woven into the wool. He laid them on the right saddles as he picked up the two bridles.

  Wolf and Hobart watched as Aguilar slipped off the halters from their horses and replaced them with their bridles. Wolf’s horse was a dappled gray and Hobart’s was a paint, both stocky and only fourteen or fifteen hands high, what the cowboys called cow ponies, with dubious bloodlines.

  “Benny, give us a couple of hatfuls of grain in a feed sack, will you?”

  “Coming right up,” Benito said.

  He went into another room, which housed barrels of corn and oats and bins of alfalfa and other grasses. He emerged with a flour sack of corn and oats, which he handed to Hobart. Hobart stuffed the sack into one of his saddlebags.

  Wolf and Hobart both checked their cinches, then laid on their saddlebags and cinched them to their saddles.

  “You will come back, Mr. Wolf?” Benito asked.

  “Maybe,” Wolf said. “Could be a very short ride, or a very long one.”

  Benito laughed, not because he understood, but because he didn’t. He just did not want to look stupid in front of these two men.

  Wolf and Hobart slid their rifles into their separate scabbards, gave one last tug on the single cinches of their saddles, and led their horses from the stables.

  “Good night, Mr. Wolf,” Benito called after them.

  “Night,” Wolf said and seated his hat tighter on his head.

  Outside, the two men mounted their horses.

  “Where to, boss?” Hobart asked.

  “Let’s hitch up at the saloon. Have one for the road.”

  “I’m all for that,” Hobart said.

  They rode the few blocks to the saloon and dismounted, tied their reins to one of the hitch rails out front, and walked into the saloon.

  They went straight to the bar as Wolf glanced at the patrons. The usual crowd was there—Mexicans who worked the mines or hauled equipment to the various claims; a few drifters, some down on their luck with sad faces; miners and prospectors; and an old lady or two with their fans and cheap rings, enlarged bosoms, and drab dresses looking for any man who would buy them a drink and maybe take them to bed after the saloon closed.

  Joe came up to where the two men sat at the end of the bar.

  “Back again. What’ll it be, gents?” he asked.

  “Whiskey,” Wolf said. “The good stuff, not that rotgut you serve those swine lining the bar.”

  Joe laughed uncomfortably.

  “You know, Wolf, that I only serve you our best brand of ninety-proof.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Wolf said.
“Watered down sometimes.”

  “Not by me,” Joe said.

  “I’ll have rye,” Hobart said. “Two fingers.”

  “Rye it is,” Joe said, and drifted away to fetch glasses and bottles.

  Wolf looked at the saloon girls who sat at the tables with their skimpy dresses and a lot of leg showing, encased in black mesh. But he was looking for someone else and he spotted her, finally, when she arose from one of the far tables at the very back of the large room.

  Amy Sullivan had been talking to some friends, the man and the woman who owned the dry goods store in town. They were an older couple who liked hard cider before they toddled off to their home and bed.

  She had seen Wolf and Hobart come in, with their heavy jackets on, and walk to the bar. Which was unusual. Wolf almost never sat at the bar. He always took a table where he could watch who came in and who went out. That was curious enough, but the men were dressed as if they were leaving town.

  She wondered if Slocum’s message had sunk into Wolf’s brain enough to make him worry about living to see another sunrise in Durango.

  She walked slowly across the room and came up to where the two men were sitting, their hands on the bar, their fingers intertwined.

  “Amy,” Wolf said. “Hello again.”

  “Wolf. Surprised you’re here at the bar. Are you not going to stay long?”

  She tried to hide her disgust of the man. She ignored Hobart completely.

  “No, we won’t be here long. Just in for a nightcap, you might say.”

  “Well, enjoy yourself,” she said and started to walk away.

  Wolf swiveled around on his stool and grabbed her arm.

  “Oh, don’t rush off,” he said to her. “I got something to show you.”

  “Let loose of my arm,” she said, a cold hard tone to her voice.

  Wolf let her go. He smiled at her and she couldn’t help thinking how much his name fitted him. His smile was like that of a savage wolf, fangs and all.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Just didn’t want you to leave just yet.”

  Joe brought their glasses and two bottles. He poured the rye and the whiskey, and Wolf dug into his pocket and laid some bills on the bar top.

  “Thanks, Wolf,” Joe said. “You’ve got change coming.”

  “Keep it, Joe,” Wolf said, “and take the bottles back where you got ’em.”

  “Just one drink for both of you?” Joe said.

  “Just one,” Wolf said.

  Joe picked up the bottles and walked down the bar to put them back on the shelf against the wall.

  Amy stood there, a scowl on her face. “What’s on your mind, Wolf?” she asked.

  “I brought you something, Miss Amy,” he said. “I got it outside because I didn’t want a lot of people in here gawking at it.”

  “I don’t want any gifts from you,” she said, trying to put some politeness into her voice.

  “The gift is not from me,” Wolf said.

  “Not from you? Who’s it from?” Amy was genuinely puzzled.

  “It’s supposed to be a surprise, so I can’t rightly tell you. You have to see it for yourself.”

  “I can’t imagine. What’s the gift?”

  “Can’t tell you that either, Miss Any,” Wolf said. “But I got it and I promised this person to deliver it to you before I leave town.”

  “Oh, you’re leaving Durango?” Amy studied his face to see if he really meant what he had said. She saw no deception there.

  “Yep. Soon as I down this here drink,” Wolf said.

  He turned from her and upended the glass of whiskey into his mouth. Hobart drank his rye down in a single gulp. He was as puzzled as Amy was because Wolf had not said anything to him and he didn’t know what kind of surprise he had for Amy.

  Wolf swiped his sleeve across his mouth and slid from the stool.

  “Hobart, you go on out and wait for me and Miss Amy. We’ll be along right after you.”

  Amy backed a step away from Wolf as Hobart slid off his stool and marched to the door like an obedient soldier.

  “I—I don’t know, Wolf,” she said as the batwings swung until they stopped in the wake of Hobart’s exit. “I’m not expecting anything from anyone and certainly not a surprise, like you say it is.”

  “Well, you’ll be surprised, Miss Amy.”

  “Is it from someone I know?”

  “Oh, yes, you know her.”

  “It’s a she, then.”

  “That much I can tell you,” he said, and that warm, disarming smile returned to his face.

  “Well, I just don’t know what to say,” she said.

  “No need to say anything. Come on with me. It won’t take but a minute and then I can be on my way.”

  “Where you going?” she asked.

  “Pagosa Springs,” he said quickly, without hesitation.

  “Oh.”

  He got off his stool and held out his arm for her to take it. She ignored the offering. So Wolf walked toward the door, a slow step at a time.

  Curious, Amy walked with him.

  She saw the horses at the hitch rail. Hobart sat on his paint and he held the reins of the dappled gray in his hand for Wolf.

  “Where’s the surprise?” she asked.

  “Over here, at the corner of the saloon,” he said. He pointed to a dark place beyond one of the front windows.

  “I don’t see anything,” she said.

  “Just walk on over there and you’ll see it,” he said.

  Reluctantly, Amy walked past the window to the corner of the building. She stared at the ground and started to peer around the corner when she heard footsteps behind her.

  She turned, suddenly afraid, and saw Wolf advancing toward her, almost on tiptoe. Quietly.

  He jerked his pistol from its holster.

  “Here’s your surprise, you bitch,” he said. “This is for Jimmy John and a preview of what’s going to happen to that bastard, Slocum.”

  Amy opened her mouth to scream, but she heard the click of the hammer as Wolf cocked it, and she froze.

  Wolf squeezed the trigger as he pointed the barrel straight at the middle of her forehead a half foot away from her.

  The explosion split the silence of the night.

  A round hole appeared in Amy’s forehead and she crumpled like a sad thrown-away doll to the ground.

  Wolf holstered his pistol and dashed to his horse.

  He climbed into the saddle and grabbed his reins from Hobart.

  “Let’s light shuck, Hobart,” Wolf said and turned his horse away from the hitch rail.

  “Holy Christ,” Hobart said. “I didn’t expect you to shoot down no woman, boss,” Hobart said as they trotted away from the saloon.

  “She’s the one who told Slocum that Jimmy John was out back. Got him killed. I hate a slut like that.”

  “I guess you purely do,” Hobart said.

  They put their horses into a gallop and disappeared up the street as patrons in the saloon rushed out through the batwing doors to see what had happened outside.

  A woman screamed.

  Amy lay dead in a pool of blood, her eyes fixed on eternity, unseeing, glassy as smoked crystal marbles.

  Somewhere, up on the mountain, a wolf howled long and mournful and men gasped at the sight of the beautiful woman lying there dead, a hole in her forehead.

  And most of those who stood there knew just who had killed Amy.

  Wolf.

  25

  There was no one in the lobby of the hotel when Slocum and Clara stopped to leave his key at the clerk’s counter. A sign on the counter said the clerk was out for thirty minutes, with no explanation.

  Slocum’s saddlebags were slung over his left shoulder, along with a wooden canteen. Before he left the room, he had hidden
his belly gun at his waist behind his belt buckle, and he carried his Winchester in his left hand. He felt weighted down on one side, and the only counterbalance was his hotel key.

  There was a slot where room keys could be dropped so that they would not lie on the counter for anyone to take. Slocum dropped his key through the slot. He heard it strike other keys.

  “This is one of the hotels where you should sleep with a gun close by your bed,” Slocum said.

  “It’s not the Ritz,” Clara said.

  They walked outside and looked up at the stars, the satin black sky with the Milky Way a sprawl of sparkling jewels, the moon not yet risen.

  Slocum sniffed. He reeked of Clara’s musk and it was a satisfying aroma. She was some woman, he thought. Wasted for all those years. Deprived of affection and loving. It was a dirty shame.

  “You keep your horse at the livery, Clara?” Slocum asked.

  She nodded. “I try to see her almost every day. A bay mare I call Rose, only because the name seems to fit her. She’s a dark bay with three white stockings.”

  “Let’s saddle up and ride over to Wolf’s. See if he wants some company.”

  “If he’s there, he’ll have a man or two watching for you,” she said.

  “Are you a good shot with that two-dollar pistol?” Slocum asked.

  “It cost more than two dollars, John. And yes, I’m a good shot. With either pistol or rifle.”

  “Ever kill a man? Or a woman?” he asked.

  Clara shook her head. “Not yet.”

  “Big game?”

  “I’ve shot deer and elk. I’ve got good eyes.”

  “Who taught you to shoot?” he asked.

  “Wolf,” she said with a wry smile on her lips. “But he doesn’t know I have this pistol. And he never gave me a gun of my own.”

  “Do you know why?”

  “I’m sure he doesn’t want me to use a gun on him,” she said. “I bought the pistol from a passing drummer we ran into when we were outrunning a posse in Kansas. Wolf was off shooting at rattlesnakes and prairie chickens, and I had saved money from my allowance. I paid the drummer five dollars and fifty cents for that pistol, and I practiced shooting it every time Wolf wasn’t around. When I bought groceries for the gang, I bought cartridges for my Smith & Wesson.”