by Jake Logan
Slocum dropped his chin and shook his head—too damn close.
16
The roan acted spooky, and riding him bareback with a rifle in his right hand made the job of staying on even harder. Slocum kept his eyes on the brush of the slopes, expecting another ambush. Chewy rode ahead of him a few yards, and the Apache did plenty of head twisting too. Hours later, they found some pot-holes to drink from and water their horses. Little doubt in Slocum’s mind, the gunrunners had made their sale by this time and his efforts to stop them had gone up in vapors. He smoked a roll-your-own, inhaled it deep and let the nicotine settle his anxiety and disappointment. Slade and Thorpe weren’t that tough or smart; they’d simply had some luck and a smoke screen—Diaz for one.
Maybe if Chako had lived? He took another pull on the cigarette and nodded to himself. Big loss for him losing that grinning Diné. Maybe it was time to move on, he’d been there too long. Chewy had covered his backside or he’d not have been there to listen to the night insects. Still—
“What will we do now?” The scout squatted before him.
“I’ve been asking myself that same thing. They’ve delivered those guns and we might as well head in.” He shook his head in disgust. “Hasn’t been the greatest deal.”
“Three dead broncos.”
“Yes, but two scouts lost too.”
In the twilight, Chewy nodded and sat on his haunches with his elbows on his legs.
“Guess you want to go back to Bowie? Two of us can’t do nothing about Caliche. The two of us . . .” He shook his head. “Thanks, anyway. You saved my bread today.”
Chewy shook his head to dismiss him. “You’d done that for me.”
“I’d hoped so. We’ll ride back to Bowie. Nantan Lupan should be there ready to close this chapter.”
“Crook comes back?” Chewy threw up his head and blinked at him.
Slocum nodded then ground out the rest of the cigarette. “He’s set on rounding up all the broncos if the Mexicans will let him in to go after them.”
“Good. Plenty grub and many laughs. I been with him.”
“He’s a good soldier. Tough as nails, but good. Let’s push toward Bowie tomorrow. Nothing we can do about them two.”
“What about Diaz?”
“You’ve got the same notion I have.” Slocum dropped his chin and exhaled hard. “I’d like to see him in hell too—but . . . there ain’t no way you and I can buck him.”
“Maybe get some scouts and get him.”
“You mean some Apaches, huh?”
Chewey nodded. “They would help get him.”
“Man, I don’t know, he’s got lots of soldiers. And he isn’t as big a fool as you’d imagine. Don’t need to underestimate him.”
“Ten good Apaches and some blasting sticks.”
“All we need are nine more Apaches and a mule load of sticks.” Slocum leaned back on his hands and laughed. “All we need . . .”
“Bet we can find them.”
Slocum sat up straight and looked him in the eye. “You can find the Apaches. I can find the damn explosives.”
Chewey tossed him one of his blankets. “You need this. I meet you in five days near his place. I have plenty Apaches—you have the sticks go bang-bang.”
“Deal. Where’re you going?” he asked, wondering what his man was up to.
“See you five days near the Conchos.” Chewy was on his horse and leaving.
Slocum stood up and removed his hat to scratch his head. That was the fastest he’d ever seen that scout move—he was going find a handful of bucks and be back. Now where in the hell could he get the blasting sticks?
He decided to sleep a few hours. Oscar, Oscar Sherlock would let him have all the sticks, fuses and cord he wanted. That and a good mule and he’d be ready—day, day and a half to get up to Oscar’s place at Naco and then he’d be headed back to the Conchos. In his blanket he looked at the silhouette of his hobbled roan. He’d for sure find a damn saddle there too. The insides of his legs were sore from clamping the thin roan to stay on. He only slept for a few, got up and rode off hours before the predawn. Maybe he’d find some food.
Half-starved, he rode into Naco and dropped off the roan on sea legs.
“Hey, who stole your saddle?” some whiskered smart ass asked, laughing and pointing Slocum out to his buddy on the boardwalk.
Slocum narrowed his eyes and he glared back. “You ever had a .44 stuck up your ass and got a hot lead enema?”
“Come on, Wake, that sumbitch is on the prowl.” His smaller buddy tugged on his sleeve.
“Screw him, Matt. Any dumb ass that can’t keep his own saddle don’t scare me none.”
“Then you ain’t very smart, partner.” Slocum adjusted his Colt on his hip. “Shame you ain’t got your Sunday suit on ’cause they’re going to bury you in them filthy clothes you’ve got on.”
“Wake, damnit—he’ll kill you!”
The big man shrugged off his concerned associate’s grab at his arm to hold him. “Guns or knives?”
Slocum charged up in his face, and before the big man could draw back his fist, Slocum slammed him over the head with his gun barrel, knocked off his felt hat and drove him to his knees, then gave him a kick in the chest that sprawled him on his back, the muzzle of Slocum’s six-gun pointed at his heart. “You ready to die?”
“No! No!”
“Then shut your damn mouth about my rig. I’m on a short fuse. That belonged to a bronco Apache who killed my horse and I killed him. My own saddle was under that dead horse and I had no way to get it out—plus I wasn’t waiting around for the rest of his bunch. So now you know.”
“I-I didn’t mean nothing.” The man held his filthy hands up to ward off Slocum.
“You damn sure did. You’re nothing but a half-drunk bully. Next time you spout off at me, I’ll shoot you first and tell God you died, you savvy?”
“Yes, yes.”
He holstered the gun and went on inside the cantina. Still raging mad, he ordered a double whiskey and pounded his fist on the bar to let some of the anger ease out.
“Oh, hombre. You are plenty tough one.” He glanced down at the short puta who was twisting her pointed finger in his side. More than half-Indian, she had a nice set of tits that she showed off in the low-cut blouse. Sweeping her full head of hair back from her face, she smiled up at him. “That fat slop is a bully and he likes to twist the arms of working girls and make them cry.”
Slocum glanced at the door. No sign of them. He turned back. “Can you get me some good food?”
“Ah, sí. What do you want?”
“Lots of tender fire-braised beef, sweet peppers, frijoles, fresh-made flour tortillas—”
“Where do you want it?”
“You got a room?” He looked around.
“Not here. At my casa,” she said and hugged him, driving her breasts into his side above his belt.
“Oh, you can eat and then we can dance—”
“What’s your name?”
“Rey.”
“Where’s this casa?”
“I will show you.”
“Bartender, give me—aw, two good bottles of whiskey. I have lots of trail dust to knock out.”
“Sí, señor.”
He paid the man and she led him outside. Once on the boardwalk, she ducked under the rail and undid the reins. “He can graze at my place.”
Tired sumbitch wouldn’t go nowhere if he turned him loose. “Good.”
“You want a shave and a bath too.”
“Unless you want to crawl in bed with a dusty grizzly bear.”
“Oh, no oso.” She laughed with the reins over her shoulder as she walked in the street and led the tired roan. “We will have much fun, mi amigo. I know.”
He bobbed his head. Most of all, he wanted some food—his backbone threatened to gnaw a hole in his navel.
17
His head hurt. Naked as Adam, the cool morning air on his skin, he reached down and touched his dick
. It was sore too. How long had they been on this fandango? She sat up straight beside him on the pallet and swept the hair back from her face. Her small, pointed breasts shook while she fashioned her hair back with a ribbon.
“How long have I been here?”
“Three days.”
She ran her hands down the insides of her shapely bare thighs and made a face.
“You sore too?” he asked.
She looked over at him and nodded with a sly grin. “We have did it more times than I count.”
“Three days . . .” He added the day and a half. Five days and he hadn’t done anything about the blasting sticks. “Sweet thing, I need to go find a horse, saddle and see a man.”
She made a face and then sprawled on him. Her small hands cupped his cheeks and she kissed him, moving over to sit on his lap. “I would send that boy for more whiskey and we could . . .” She slid back, reached down and gently pulled on his dick. “And we could do it till I see more stars.”
“If I don’t get busy, the damn army may fire me.”
“Oh,” she said, moving up against him so her nipples were in his chest and her cheek was on his shoulder. “We could make more love.”
He scratched his head. It felt nice to be clean. It felt nice to have this wild mink on his lap, her musk swirling up his nose—a mixture of lavender and female scents that fed his brain. A little coffee and food might clear his foggy brain—but. The rise of his growing erection under her made her leap up and kiss him.
“Ah, mi grande, he comes to life.” What the hell was another hour?
Oscar Sherlock’s warehouse sat on the U.S. side, which was only a dusty line in the imagination of what looked like a double-wide street and two custom shacks a block down the way in the middle of Naco. One had a tattered American flag over it, the other a sun-faded Mexican one. The businesses faced each other. Drunks staggered in the international tourist business from a cantina across to a saloon, to further pursue their leave of the world they lived in.
Sherlock, who imported and exported, was a short man behind glasses that his small red eyes peered from under a green visor. How in the hell a squeaky-voiced little man in his forties like Sherlock did all the business he did, Slocum didn’t know, as he wrapped the reins on the hitch rail.
“Slocum. Slocum,” Sherlock repeated, and blinked against the midday sun at his first sight of him standing at the base of his dock tying up his horse. “Why are you here?”
Slocum glanced around to be sure they were out of earshot. “A little business.”
“Well, well, come in. I’m always glad to see you, and happier I don’t need your services.”
“Good. I’ve got a project I need to handle. I need three boxes of blasting sticks, fuses and cord on the credit.”
Sherlock glanced back at the roan horse at the rack. “A saddle, a damn site better horse and what? One or two mules?”
“One.”
“Well, you’re lucky I have all that. I do. I do.”
“I am not flush with money.”
Sherlock threw his head back to see out from under his visor. “Did I mention money?”
“No, but money would be nice.”
“Sit down.” Sherlock indicated a chair before his cluttered desk. “I owe you more than I’ve ever paid you. Lots more.”
Seated, Slocum flexed his shoulders and arms. “This bandit Diaz killed my scout and another good one.”
“You need all that to repay him?” Sherlock chuckled and shook his head. “When do you need it?”
“Oh—tomorrow.”
“I know you. Know you well. Early. You get up before the chickens.”
“Something like that.”
“Martin! Martin!” Sherlock called out in his high-pitched voice.
In seconds, a fresh-faced youth of perhaps twenty stuck his head inside the office. “Yes, sir.”
“Meet my friend Slocum. Good friend. He ever needs anything, you give it to him if I’m not here.”
“Good to meet you.” Slocum rose and shook the young man’s hand.
“Yes, Mr. Sherlock says you’re the best man he ever hired for collections.”
“Martin, he needs that bay Morgan horse, a decent saddle and a mule with a good aparejo. Three crates of blasting powder stick, fuses and lots of cord—throw in some food.”
“When, sir?”
“Before daylight tomorrow—here.”
“They’ll be ready, Mr. Slocum.”
“Slocum.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Mind you, Martin, he will be here before a chicken even peeps.”
“I’ll have them ready. Anything else, sir?”
“I’m taking him to my house for lunch.”
“I’ll have Miguel bring the buggy around in a few minutes, sir.”
“You are—you’re going to have lunch with me and Marie?”
Sherlock blinked at him. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
The spanking buggy horse single-footed and made fast time. They soon drew up the lane to Sherlock’s fine white-plastered two-story house. A man came out and took charge of the horse and rig. Brushing off the road dust, they went in the front door and Slocum stood in the two-story living room.
A light-haired woman appeared on the balcony and Sherlock announced, “My amigo Slocum is here to eat with us.”
“At last I meet the famous man.” She swooned and hurried down the staircase. Mrs. Sherlock was an attractive woman hardly out of her twenties, with a sugary voice.
“Your husband exaggerates.”
She took both of his hands, and from arm’s length she looked him over and smiled. “Gods up close still are gods. Business bring you here?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Show him where to wash up,” she said to her husband. “I’ll go tell the kitchen help we have a famous person here to eat with us.”
“Make too big a fuss and he won’t leave,” Sherlock teased and showed him to the wash area. “You made a fuss the other day beating that bully with your pistol.”
“You hear about that?”
“Heard about . . . about the fuss you had when you got in town. I suspected that was you; then you disappeared.” Sherlock dried his face and hands on a towel and examined his cheeks in the mirror on the wall.
“People like that need lessons. I had business.”
Sherlock smiled. “I had wondered where you were since then.”
“Found a place to rest up, get a bath, shave and a haircut, plus lots of sleep the last couple of days. I needed it too.”
“Good enough.”
“Between Diaz and two worthless gunrunners named Slade and Thorpe, I’ve been running back and forth as well as keeping an eye on the bronco Apaches.” For the first time in days he thought about the schoolmarm, Mary. How was she making it?
Sherlock frowned at him. “Oh, Jed Slade?”
“Same shiftless border trash.”
“What was he doing—” Sherlock cut off his words at the appearance of his lovely young wife sweeping out of the kitchen.
“Plenty of food and may we have some of the good wine?”
“Of course,” Sherlock said and hugged her shoulders. “How have you been, my dear?”
“Good, I have been busy all morning with the cleaning girls. Arizona is as dusty as Texas. I will go get a few bottles.”
“I have to be back to work—”
Her index finger pressed to his lips, she shook her head, then twisted away in an alluring fashion for her skirt-swishing exit, with a pause at the doorway to say to him, “You can take a longer lunch today and visit with your old friend.”
Sherlock made a face at her disappearance. “Lovely lady—but she all the time makes me take long lunches.”
“Not bad company. Where is she from?”
“El Paso. Her husband left her there at a hotel and went into Mexico. He was killed by bandits across the border. They took all his money. She was destitute. I was there on business and it worked out v
ery well.”
Slocum agreed. The widower had needed a wife. Marie looked and sounded like the perfect mate for him—good.
They had a leisurely lunch. Sherlock’s food had taken on more of a border flavor than in the past and Slocum savored it.
“You’ve been working for Colonel Woolard?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“It must be dangerous. The Apaches and all.”
“At times. I really think it’s the meddlers that cause half the trouble, running guns and whiskey to them.”
“Where will you go next?”
“Oh, I have more work to do down there.”
“My,” she said as if impressed and appraising him. “Don’t you miss having a home? A wife?”
“I’m not certain.”
“Well, why not? You’re well educated and all.”
“I guess, war and all, I’ve never known what a house and wife would be like. So I can’t hardly know what I’ve been missing.”
They laughed and Sherlock patted his wife on the hand. “My dear, Slocum has the sugar foot.”
“What’s that?”
“It is an itchy-feeling disease anytime a female mentions settling down.”
“Oh, dear—”
“It’s not contagious, I assure you.”
“I hope not.”
Slocum left Sherlock after they rode back to the warehouse. He offered him the bay horse, but Slocum thanked him, jumped on the roan and rode him back to Rey’s casa. She rushed out to hug him when he dismounted.
“You have any use for this Injun horse?” he asked.
“Me?”
“Who else would I ask?”
“Of course I would have him. But what will you ride?”
“I bought another today.”
“Where is he?”
“I get him at daybreak. Then you can have the roan here.”
“Oh, you are too kind to me.” She hugged his hip as he undid the bridle and let the roan go graze.
“I have two new bottles of whiskey.”
“And you are leaving me?” She folded her arms and pouted.
He laughed. “Ah, but what a send-off party we will have.”
