by Jake Logan
“Anything I like,” the swindler said with a laugh. “It’s going to be a real pleasure. In both your cases.”
“You won’t get away with this,” Abigail said. “The town will be up in arms if you harm one hair on our heads. They’ll come after you because we don’t have any crime in No Consequence. My neighbors would never cotton to killing, and I assure you they’ll never let you steal their money.”
“We’ll see about that. Now shut up. Both of you.”
Slocum fumed as they rode slowly behind the buildings lining the town’s main street. Adam Westfall stood on his soapbox in front of the small town hall and harangued a crowd into buying more bonds to insure that the railroad would actually reach No Consequence. From the infrequent glances Slocum was permitted between the buildings as they rode steadily, it seemed that Westfall had half the town’s populace out at his rally, whipping them into a buying frenzy.
“He’s damned good, isn’t he?” asked Ferguson. “I never heard a man lie with such conviction.”
“The only conviction you’re likely to see is when the judge sentences you to jail!” raged Abigail.
“Now, how is it that such a pretty woman can be so downright dumb? If you’d thrown in with Westfall and the rest of us, you could have been rich, too.”
Slocum saw they were heading toward the shed behind Abigail’s store. The door stood open, and he got a good look inside. Someone had rooted through her inventory already, as if they knew she wasn’t going to be in any position to complain. Slocum worried about that since it meant Ferguson and the others worked according to an established plan and that everything was going their way.
Steal goods from the stores for their getaway, steal the money from the bank—and they were free, rich men.
“Get in that shed. Beal, Quenton, see that they’re tied up real tight. Especially Slocum. It wouldn’t hurt me none if some blood flowed from his wrists.”
“You do your own dirty work, Ferguson,” complained Quenton. “Why even bother keeping them prisoner? Just put a couple bullets in them. I’ll do it, if you want. I’m not squeamish.”
“And you haven’t been paying attention,” Ferguson said caustically. “There’ll be time for that later, but not yet.”
Beal and Quenton stripped Slocum of his six-shooter and knife and began lashing his hands securely behind his back, until the thin rawhide strips cut deeply into his flesh. The blood Ferguson had wanted trickled from the cuts. Slocum resigned himself to some additional pain in an hour or two. The blood would soak into the strips, dry and then the rawhide would start to contract.
While the men roughly bound Abigail, teasing and tormenting her and enjoying her futile protests, Slocum cocked an ear to catch Westfall’s words booming throughout town. From the cheers at what he said, apparently the mayor had already collected more than the hundred thousand. The “extra” he wanted amounted to another twenty thousand dollars.
“What morning are the people of No Consequence going to wake up and find that you’ve held up their bank?” asked Slocum.
“Why hold it up?” asked Ferguson, laughing. “All we need to do is have Carleton open the safe. We can ride on out of town and nobody’ll be the wiser for a long spell.”
“You mean Carleton and Westfall will stick around and pretend they don’t know anything about it?” asked Abigail.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass what those two do,” said Ferguson. “Me and my boys will have the money. Let them try and take their share. Right, Beal? Quenton?”
Ferguson’s two henchmen nodded reluctantly, as if they realized Ferguson might try double-crossing them, too.
“What about your other two partners?” asked Slocum. “Do they get a share, too?”
“What others?” demanded Beal.
“He’s only trying to spook you,” Ferguson said too quickly.
“You haven’t told them about your partners from North Platte, have you? He’s got two men camped out on the prairie. I’d wondered what you were going to do with them. Now I know.”
“Shut up, Slocum.”
“You’re going to have them rob Beal and Quenton of their share. Where are you going to put their bodies, Ferguson? Beside Westfall and Carleton?”
“Shut up!” raged the swindler. He reared back, then swung with all his might. Slocum ducked at the last possible instant, but the barrel of Ferguson’s rifle struck him a glancing blow that sent him staggering into the shed. Slocum stubbed his toe on a sack on the floor and went down in a heap, too dazed to stand.
“We’ll take turns with your woman, Slocum. A dozen times each! Then we’ll kill her and you. How do you like that?”
To get Beal and Quenton’s goat, Slocum croaked out something about the men hiding out on the prairie, but the words were jumbled and too low to be heard. He grunted when a heavy, wriggling weight crashed onto top of him. Then they were plunged into darkness.
“John, are you all right? Let me get around.”
Slocum felt the weight vanish from his back. Ferguson had shoved Abigail on top of him. The blonde sat heavily beside him and sputtered in her anger. By the time she was more coherent, Slocum had scooted around and propped himself up against a crate. The shed was as dark as midnight but slivers of light slanted in through poorly fitted wall slats.
“John, I’m so sorry. I never thought anyone would steal the money. What are we going to do?”
“Die,” he said harshly, “unless we get out of here. I don’t know why Ferguson didn’t take Quenton’s advice and kill us out of hand.”
“Maybe he has something in mind for us?” Abigail sounded distraught and on the verge of tears.
“Is there any way he could frame us for robbing the money?” Slocum leaned back and gathered his strength as he thought hard. Whether Ferguson tried to implicate them in the scheme mattered less than getting out of the shed. Slocum doubted it would be long until whatever Ferguson waited for happened and the time had arrived to kill his prisoners.
“I don’t see how,” Abigail said. “Everyone knows I’m honest.”
“That and a nickel will get you a beer,” Slocum said. “When the farmers find their money’s all gone, they won’t much recollect anything honest about you, if Westfall points the finger in your direction.”
“Is that what they’re going to do? Have Carleton remove the money, then blame it on us?”
“They’re planning something else,” Slocum said. “I just rode in, so they couldn’t have factored me into their scheme.” He said nothing about Abigail. She would make a perfect scapegoat if Carleton and Westfall remained after Ferguson rode off with the money. Two pillars of the community accusing the chief fund-raiser of fraud was about perfect. Ferguson might stick around and claim he had caught Abigail and Slocum trying to escape.
The money, of course, would never be found. Westfall could tell the townspeople Abigail had hidden it somewhere, perhaps out on the prairie. No amount of jail time or even outright torture would ever recover the money.
That sounded likely to Slocum, but he thought there had to be more. He saw no reason for Carleton and Westfall to stay in No Consequence to point fingers and dish out blame, even if it cleared their names.
Ferguson obviously sought to double-cross Westfall and Carleton as well as Beal and Quenton. The men who rode with Ferguson back in North Platte were out on the prairie somewhere and figured into the scheme. Since neither Beal nor Quenton knew about them, they had to be Ferguson’s hole cards.
“My hands are getting cold, John. What are we going to do?”
Slocum forced himself around until he saw Abigail illuminated in a tiny sliver of light oozing around the shed door: Tears ran down her cheeks and glinted like morning dew drops.
“What’s in the shed that we might use?” He sneezed at the flour dust hanging suspended in the tight enclosure. A bag or two had leaked and sent the fine powder into the air like a mist. Motes danced like fireflies in the patches of light sneaking into the shed.
&nbs
p; “Nothing. Food, nothing else. I kept all the tools inside so they wouldn’t rust.” Abigail sniffed loudly. “As if the rain was bad this year. It’s been a drought year. Never seen it this way.”
“Abigail,” Slocum said sharply, “did you leave a knife or scissors out here? Flailing around in the dark’s not going to get us out of here, and the rawhide’s too tough for me to break outright.”
“I ... I might be able to untie the knots if you wiggled around,” she said.
Slocum tested the leather strips and knew that would be a waste of time. Even if her fingers didn’t get slick with his blood, the knots were too tight. The strips had to be cut off.
“Are there any nails poking through the wall? I might use the point to scratch through the rawhide.”
“The shed’s built pretty well. The only reason there’s any light coming in is because of the drought. The wood’s shrunk.”
Slocum rolled over in the tight quarters and got to one of the cracks so he could press his eye to it. The field of vision outside wasn’t too great, but it was enough to convince him Ferguson hadn’t left any guards.
“We might shout and draw attention,” Abigail said when he told her.
“That won’t work. Everyone’s at the rally, forking over their last penny to buy more of Westfall’s bonds.” Slocum heard the mayor’s voice urging everyone to take a risk on the future, to buy bonds that would insure the town’s survival—and their own. Slocum almost believed him as he listened to the beguiling, honeyed words.
“Do you think you can kick open the door?” asked Abigail.
“That was a mighty strong lock you had on it,” Slocum said, remembering the glint of the shiny steel padlock. “I might kick the door off its hinges.” He rolled back, braced himself against a crate and shoved his feet against the door.
Gritting his teeth and grunting with exertion, Slocum pushed as hard as he could. Nails squealed as they slowly came out of wood, and he felt the door giving slightly, but he wasn’t going to be able to kick open the locked door by himself.
Slocum gasped and sagged, defeated for the moment.
“Let me help, John. The two of us together might turn the trick.”
“Is there a wall where it might be easier to kick out a panel or two?” he asked.
“The door,” Abigail said firmly. “This is our best bet.”
“I felt it give a little. Not much, but some. The nails holding the hinges might be ready to pop out.”
“Both of us, together,” she said. He felt her warm body settle next to his and wished they were in the shed under different circumstances. Slocum caught the woman’s scent, felt the light touch of her blond hair on his face and experienced the heat from her sweating, straining body.
“There,” she said. “I can get my feet next to yours.”
“Not there,” Slocum said. “Position them under so we can put all our weight against the hinges.”
Abigail squirmed a bit more and then applied her full strength with Slocum’s. Almost immediately the hinges began pulling free of the wood and then a loud crack like a gunshot echoed through the shed as the door broke.
The door swung around on the hasp and lock and twisted at a crazy angle, letting in sunlight.
“We did it! We can get out!” cried Abigail, struggling to her feet. She recoiled as Slocum collided with her in his haste to escape, also.
Slocum fell face down and wiggled forward, only to stop when he saw a pair of dirty, scuffed boots blocking his path. He twisted around and looked up into the muzzle of a six-shooter.
“If Ferguson hadn’t told me not to plug you, you’d be dead right now, Slocum,” snarled Quenton. “Get back into the shed.”
“Go on, shoot me,” Slocum said, taking the only chance he could. A gunshot might bring the crowd, still cheering and crying out every time Adam Westfall told them of new riches to be brought to their town on the railroad.
“That’s too easy,” Quenton said. He reared back and kicked Slocum in the face.
Slocum tried to avoid the kick but was only partially successful. The toe of the boot crashed into the side of his head and knocked him out. By the time he struggled back to consciousness he thought he had gone completely blind.
Nowhere did he see the faint light of the sun filtering into the shed—and he was certain he had been put back there. The air was still filled with flour from torn sacks, and the crate against which he rested was as hard as before. Small, animal-like sobbing sounds alerted him to Abigail nearby.
“I think Quenton might have blinded me. I can’t see anything,” Slocum said, trying to get her mind off her own woes. “Can you help me?”
“Y-you’re not blind, John. It’s late. You’ve been unconscious for hours and hours.”
“The sun’s set already?” He shook his head and immediately regretted it. Things rattled around painfully inside.
“Yes,” she said, sniffing hard and fighting to control her emotions. “Quenton and Beal nailed the door shut this time. They worked for an hour, cursing the entire time. There’s no way we can hope to kick it open again.”
“If they’re standing guard outside, we wouldn’t get too far anyway,” he said, shifting into a sitting position.
“I heard them go hours ago. They were laughing and carrying on. I think Westfall’s gotten all the money he can. Those horrible men might already have taken it from the bank.”
“Any gunshots?” Slocum asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I didn’t get the impression Ferguson was going to leave either Carleton or Westfall alive.” Slocum frowned as he spoke. This didn’t seem right. Ferguson was a swindler, not the kind of bandido who put on a mask, drew a six-gun and then robbed a bank. Slocum felt there were undercurrents in this con game he didn’t understand.
“They’re coming back!” Abigail cried.
“Maybe it’s someone else,” Slocum said. He shouted a few times, only to be rewarded with a slug ripping through the wall a few feet above his head.
“You shut up in there, Slocum.” Rafe Ferguson sounded downright pleased with himself, in spite of his stem tone.
“What are you going to do now, Ferguson?”
“Me and my boys are riding out of No Consequence. Soon as you get out, you’re free to do whatever you want to come after us.”
Abigail let out a sigh of relief but Slocum tensed. Ferguson wasn’t stupid. After all he had done to Slocum, he had to know he had made an implacable enemy who would track him to the ends of the earth.
The sloshing sounds and the smell of kerosene told Slocum that he was right.
“He’s going to set fire to the shed!” Slocum warned Abigail.
Before the woman could answer, a loud snapping like a sheet ripping stopped her. The kerosene-drenched dry wood walls were encased in flames, and they were trapped inside.
14
Slocum coughed as the heavy smoke filled his lungs. His eyes watered, and he felt the heat from the fire beginning to blister his skin. Abigail was screaming, but her cries were muffled by the roar of the fire devouring the shed. Rolling over and getting to his feet, Slocum turned his head away from the worst of the flames, then let out a cry of his own as he charged like a bull.
He slammed hard into the wall and rebounded, stumbling and falling onto a crate. His foot caught on a bag of flour, and distant memories of other fires came to him.
“Get down,” Slocum shouted. “Face down. There’s going to be one hell of an explosion.”
He began kicking at the bag until the toe of his boot worried open a gash. Then he twisted and sent flour into the air. The explosion as the small particles ignited blew him back—and through the shed wall.
For a moment he lay stunned on the ground. Then he realized he was staring up at the clouds of smoke trying to hide the nighttime sky. Stars twinkled and a distant moon poked above the buildings at the far end of town. Slocum sucked in fresh air and rolled over, getting back to his feet.
“Abi
gail!” he shouted. “Get out of there!”
No response. Slocum took a deep breath and charged back into the shed, kicking away burning wood blocking his way. The blonde lay in a heap next to the crate he had fallen onto. Abigail moaned and stirred.
“Come on. The roof’s going to crash down any second.” He prodded her with his boot, then turned and used his numbed fingers to find her earlobe. He caught the tender flesh between thumb and forefinger, then pinched down as hard as he could. Abigail screeched in pain, but it was enough to clear the fog in her brain.
“Out!” he repeated.
Slocum shielded her the best he could from the intense fire as they blundered back through the side of the shed and for some distance before collapsing in the dirt. Both of them panted harshly as the smoke cleared their lungs. Slocum’s ears rang. Then he heard another clanging, and one not born inside his head.
“Fire alarm,” Abigail said. “I hope they get here in time to save my store.”
Slocum had a better view of the store and knew it was too late to save it. If the town’s volunteer fire department responded quickly enough, they might save the rest of No Consequence. Otherwise, everything was going up in flames.
“Can you do anything to get free?” asked Slocum. “I don’t see anything to use to cut my bonds.”
“My hands feel like ice, John,” she said. “I can’t even flex my fingers.”
“Over here!” Slocum shouted when the first of the fire-men came staggering up. The man was half-dressed and carried a paltry bucket of water. Then others formed a line and began passing filled buckets to the man in front to throw on the fire, while youngsters took the empties and ran to the rear of the line to get them filled again.
Slocum’s cries were heard by one of the boys, who came over and stared at them with wide eyes.
