Slocum and the Forgetful Felon

by Jake Logan

  12

  When they rode into Monkey Springs that evening, even the dying light couldn’t disguise that they’d ridden into practically a ghost town. The general store was still standing as well as what passed for a saloon, but the old livery had collapsed in on itself and nobody had even bothered to clear up the boards.

  Teddy’s head twisted all around, like a barn owl’s. “You sure this’s a town?” he asked, breaking the long silence.

  “Thought you’d been here before,” Slocum said, dismounting.

  “No,” Teddy corrected him, “I just said I reckoned I knowed where it was. And it’s right here, too! Or at least, the leftovers.”

  “Leftovers is about right.” Slocum tied his horse to the rail out front of the saloon. “Get down. We can get a drink anyway.”

  They had watered the horses about a half hour before they came riding into Monkey Springs, so they were content to be tethered to the rail. Slocum led Teddy into the saloon.

  That, at least, hadn’t changed. It was still narrow, with stools at the bar and no tables to den up around. And it was empty, except for one lonely bartender, who said, “Welcome, fellers! Come on in!” when they first parted the batwing doors.

  “Can I getcha some wet for your whistles?” he asked, not a second later.

  When they both said, “Beer,” he set off toward the taps.

  “Why’re we even stoppin’ here?” asked Teddy.

  Slocum snorted. “Don’t go quizzin’ me. You’re the one what got a wild hare up his butt about the town.”

  Teddy just made a face, probably out of embarrassment.

  The bartender came back and slid two beers in front of them. Slocum reciprocated by pulling a couple of coins from his pockets. “You get much trade around here?” he asked the man.

  The barkeep held his hand out level, then moved it from side to side. “Now an’ then, now an’ then.”

  “S’pose you’d recall a stranger, then?”

  “Don’t know.” The bartender raised his brows. “Maybe I would.”

  Slocum sighed. This one was going to take some greasing. He brought out another coin—a double eagle that sparkled in the lamplight—and held it in his palm. The barkeep’s eyes instantly locked onto it.

  “Did you have a young Mexican feller come through, oh, ’bout three months back?”

  “Sure. Lots’a Mexicans come through.”

  “This one was called Jorge. Jorge . . .”

  “Ruiz,” Teddy said, his voice overly eager. “Jorge Ruiz.”

  “Yeah, that’s it.” Slocum nodded, but slid his leg over to knee Teddy in the thigh. “Tall, good-lookin’ kid. Clean-shaved. Would’a been ridin’ a plain bay gelding.”

  The bartender scratched at his chin for a few moments while Teddy danced nervously, foot to foot, then asked, “Geldin’, you say? A plain one, no white?”

  Slocum nodded. “Plain bay. Name’a Rufus, I think.”

  “Hmmm. Well, I don’t remember the horse’s name exactly, but I ’member that boy and his bay gelding. Awful nice-lookin’ horse, it was. He was so nice, matter of fact, that our town sheriff tried to buy him. No deal, though. Why, you would’a thought the horse was right straight outta the wrapper, the way that kid doted on him!”

  Slocum, who’d been in here before and questioned this same man about somebody or other—Bronc Dugan, maybe?—had learned not to try and drag out the information. He was fairly sure the bartender’s name was Gary something-or-other, though, and that he’d tell them plenty if just given enough time and patience, and so he kept kneeing and kicking Teddy every time the kid began to look too excited.

  In fact, Teddy finally had enough and moved off, down the bar, to put away his third (by that time) beer.

  When Gary had finished talking and pouring beers, Slocum had boiled the thing down to this: Jorge had, indeed, been through the “town” about three months back. He had stayed the night over at the then-standing livery, and taken off the next morning for the south. He also learned that a posse from Tucson had been there a few days later—which Gary held back telling him until the end—looking for Jorge.

  Obviously, they hadn’t found him or there wouldn’t still be paper out.

  After Slocum thanked him very kindly for the information, he asked, “Don’t suppose there’s anyplace to stay around here, is there? Last time I was through, I slept in the barn with my horse.”

  Gary shook his head. “Nope.”

  After a pause, Slocum said, “Well, nobody’d object if we was to make camp out on the street, would they?”

  “Reckon they wouldn’t make a fuss,” Gary responded. “We cook breakfast, too,” he added hopefully.

  “Good!” Slocum said, and at last let go of the double eagle he’d been palming throughout the conversation. Gary grabbed it as quick as a goose on a bug. “Reckon we’ll be around for mornin’ vittles, too.”

  Slocum lit himself a ready-made and once again congratulated himself on buying two packs back in Phoenix. Quirlies were all right, but you couldn’t beat a ready-made for taste. He thought he’d try to remember this brand, too. They were nice and smooth.

  He drained his beer and turned his head. “Hey, Teddy?”

  The boy was practically asleep on the rail. But he looked up and said, “What?”

  “You awake? Let’s go out and make us a camp, all right?”

  “Camp? Where?”

  “On the street. Where else?”

  Teddy shrugged and followed him through the batwing doors, giving the bartender a sleepy wave on the way out.

  They made camp—right in the middle of the street—heated up the chicken, and ate. Teddy, who was nodding off at the start, came full awake when he smelled that chicken heating up. He swallowed his down, almost without taking a breath. It tasted pretty good to Slocum, too, but his mind was on Jorge. It had been three months since his escape. Chances were that he was long gone, into Mexico. Slocum figured they could ride forever without finding him, unless somebody remembered that horse.

  Slocum did, but then, he was a horseman. Most other folks didn’t think about horses at all, except for when they wanted to get somewhere. But this one, this one was a horse!

  Slocum had seen him once, about a year back, when he was in Tucson picking up Lonny Chambers. He couldn’t remember Lonny’s face, but he could remember every curve and line of that horse. Rufus, the mayor called him, and he was a genuine Thoroughbred, leggy and lean and fine-headed. Tall, too. Slocum had guessed him at a bit over sixteen hands. Sixteen-one, maybe. He’d never seen a finer head on a horse. He remembered that it had a slight dish to it, with wide-set eyes and small ears, tipped in toward the center of his head, and a fine, small muzzle. He didn’t look like he could herd cattle for shit, but you could tell he was bred to do something!

  Slocum said, “Jump hedges,” under his breath.

  Teddy, who was on the apple pie by that time, said, “Huh?”

  “What?” Slocum said before he realized he’d spoken out loud. “Oh, nothin’. Just thinkin’ about the mayor’s horse.”

  “Huh?” Teddy tipped his head quizzically.

  “The one Jorge stole.”

  “Oh.” The kid bought it, and didn’t say another word. Good.

  Slocum had counted on Jorge taking refuge right there in town, but now he realized how stupid that had been. Of course he’d go to Mexico! It was his homeland and U.S. marshals weren’t allowed to cross the border. So they’d just put out paper when his tracks led them to it, and let it go. Bye-bye, Jorge. Bye-bye, Rufus. Bye-bye, reward. He didn’t figure he wanted to take another trip down into Mexico. Teddy might have a different opinion, but Teddy had to go where Slocum went.

  And that was the end of it.

  He didn’t say as much to Teddy, though. Not this night. If they were going to argue, Slocum thought it had better wait until morning. A contented Teddy wouldn’t take off for the southern hills in the dark, hard center of the night, and the last thing Slocum needed, besides Tedd
y gone missing again, was Teddy gone to Mexico.

  The next morning, they took breakfast (which turned out to be passable) at the saloon, then rode out. Going north again, despite Teddy’s protests.

  “What in the devil you doin’?” he shouted at Slocum once they got clear of town. “This’s the exact opposite way we should go!”

  “Shut up,” Slocum said, grabbing Teddy’s reins. “Jorge’s gone to Mexico, and we ain’t ridin’ all the hell over another country just for a couple grand. Or mayhap nothin’.”

  “Nothin’?”

  “We don’t know how good Jorge is at findin’ himself places to hole up. And I ain’t gonna waste my time goin’ through every bear cave, cougar haunt, and jungle ruin in Mexico. No, here’s our new quarry.” Slocum let go of Teddy’s reins long enough to dig a folded poster out of his pocket. He handed it to Teddy.

  Teddy squinted at it.

  Slocum knew exactly what he was reading. He’d pretty much memorized it last night. “Jonas Hendricks,” the poster read, “Wanted for Murder and Thievery.” Below that was a highly stylized drawing of Jonas, who looked like a mother killer and a baby splitter, all right. He was purported to be a midsized feller, with dirty blond hair and brown eyes and a ragged mustache. He was about five-foot-ten, around 170 pounds, and he’d half-killed a rancher up by Strawberry, and all-the-way killed a deputy sheriff that was in the posse that chased him up into the Bradshaws before they lost him.

  The poster didn’t say he was wanted for rustling, but given that he’d shot a rancher, Slocum was willing to put money on it. He was wanted dead or alive, too. That ought to please Teddy.

  It did, by the looks of him. He was grinning by the time he finished reading. “Dead or alive,” he said, handing the poster back to Slocum. “Now, that’s a whole different kettle’a fish! And he was headed for the Bradshaws only two weeks back! Hell, we could be practically standin’ on him right this second!”

  Slocum tucked the poster away. “Thought that might be your reaction.”

  “And two grand’s nothin’ to sneeze at neither,” a grinning Teddy replied. “Hot diggedy damn!”

  Slocum chuckled. “Slow down, kid, slow down. We ain’t got him yet.” He, himself, was happy, but more relieved than anything else.

  “He’s about my size, too. I can beat anybody my size at wrastlin’!”

  “He’s also forty-three years old.”

  Teddy laughed. “Then I won’t have to wrastle him. I’ll jus’ tip over his wheelchair!”

  Slocum didn’t answer. Shaking his head, he rode up front.

  And not for the first time, he marveled that the kid had lived long enough to see twenty-four years.

  13

  They didn’t find Jonas on that day, or on the next, but on the following day, Slocum picked up his trail. They had spent the last couple of days fanning out wide and back and forth, looking for signs of anyone’s passing, finding nothing. But this morning, at about ten, Slocum spotted a break in the brush. Likely, it was just where some critter or other had spent the night—that had been the case several times before—so he rode toward it without alerting Teddy.

  When he got there, the place wasn’t clearly animal, though. In fact, he’d be damned if he ever heard of a bear or a coyote building a little fire, let alone trying to cover its remains with kicked-over grass and twigs.

  He looked to the north, and shouted, “Teddy!” waving his hands.

  When the kid finally heard him, Slocum signaled him to come over and come fast, which Teddy did. Together, they combed through the site.

  Teddy found a pocket comb down in the weeds, and Slocum found where Jonas had tied out his mare. There was fresh manure, full of processed corn and oats as well as the grasses that grew around here. Slocum figured it was made this morning. Still looked—and smelled—fresh anyhow.

  The man might have killed a person, but at least he fed his horse right.

  Teddy was ready to spring into action right that minute. He jumped on his mare, saying, “Hurry up! Hurry up, before he gets away!”

  But Slocum took his time having a last look around the little campsite, then mounting up on Ace. “Take it easy, Ted. You even got an eye on the trail?”

  “Huh?”

  “You even know which way he went?”

  Teddy took a deep breath before he said, “Well . . . up that way, I reckon.” He pointed to the northwest, where the hills turned into mountains.

  Slocum shook his head. “If you knew you’d killed somebody, plus stole a bunch’a cattle, but you also knew that you’d shaken off the posse, would you go up in the Bradshaws of your own free will?”

  “Well, I . . .”

  “No, you wouldn’t. You’d go down toward the flat lands, which is exactly what Jonas did.” Slocum stopped talking long enough to light a ready-made—and long enough for Teddy to think over what he’d said.

  Teddy said, “Oh. I getcha,” at about the same time Slocum shook out his sulfur tip.

  He didn’t figure that Teddy “got” it at all. In fact, he doubted Teddy had seen Jonas’s trail, heading to the south-west. But he said, “C’mon,” anyway, and started following it at a jog.

  Gradually, Teddy figured it out. He began to see the little bends in the grasses, the place where a hoof had scuffed a patch of the loose topsoil. Well, what passed for topsoil out here anyway. He began to make out the trail, which, to Slocum, stood out like a red line painted over the scrub.

  When they stopped, a couple of hours later, to rest the horses and grab some lunch, Teddy shook his head and said, “You’re good. I mean it.”

  Slocum was making a couple of cheese sandwiches. “Not that good,” he said. “Just practiced.”

  “Should I get a fire goin’?”

  “No, Teddy. We’ll have to make do with water. Not gonna be here that long.” Slocum handed him a cheese sandwich, then finished making one for himself.

  “Druther have coffee . . .” Slocum heard him mutter, but acted like he didn’t hear. He’d rather have had coffee, too, but he didn’t want the smoke of a fire alerting Jonas Hendricks. He figured Jonas couldn’t be more than five miles ahead of them at this point.

  Slocum ate his cheese sandwich fast, and washed it down with canteen water, as did Teddy. He noticed that the kid was already scouting the trail before them. Good. He was learning. Teddy hadn’t mentioned any more remembering, and Slocum was hoping like hell that he never would. Or that if he did, he’d have the common sense to keep it to himself. He’d been granted a chance unheard of in the Territory, or anyplace else, so far as Slocum was concerned.

  He’d best keep his mouth—and brain—closed.

  Besides, Slocum liked him.

  Teddy was a fast learner even if he was a tad impatient, and he had a fair sense for things. That’d improve as time went on and he learned more. And you sure couldn’t beat his enthusiasm.

  The moment Teddy finished eating, he stood up, walked back behind a cluster of palo verde, and took a long piss. And then he was on his horse again, ready to go.

  “You wanna wait for me?” Slocum asked. He was behind the cactus now, emptying his own bladder.

  “Well . . . sure! But can you hurry it up some?”

  Slocum laughed while he buttoned up his pants. “Jesus, Teddy! Don’t believe I’ve ever seen you so blasted eager! You gotta pay more attention to what you’re doin’ and what’s goin’ on around you. For instance,” Slocum went on as he stepped out into the clear and swung up onto Ace, “just how many places could Jonas be hidin’ right now, with your curly head in his sites?”

  Teddy quickly swiveled his head, searching the distance with a surprised look on his face.

  Slocum just shook his head, watching him. “Take it easy, Teddy,” he said at last. “He ain’t around. I checked this place good before I called a halt. But we’re both gonna have to start watchin’, lest we give him a chance to gun us both right outta the saddle. All right?”

  Teddy said, “Slocum, I ain’t nev
er gonna learn all this stuff! Each time I think I got it licked, there’s ten new things that come poppin’ up!”

  “Relax. You’re pickin’ it up good and fast. Just don’t go gettin’ cocky. ‘Cocky’ has got more men killed than guns and sabers put together, I’ll bet.”

  Teddy brightened. “For real? You figure I’m pickin’ it up fast?”

  Slocum nodded. “Right good and fast. But you still got a lot to learn. One’a which is that your life could come to a screechin’ halt at any given moment. And I mean any moment. While you’re trackin’ a man or haulin’ him in, while you’re pleasurin’ yourself with a whore, while you’re stopped on the trail to take a piss or have a coffee, anytime. You gotta learn people,” he went on. “You may be thinkin’ that the man you’re hunting is just an outlaw, but you gotta keep the human in him, always. He’s got hopes and fears, same as you. He’s also got plans and schemes, like you, to make his life better. He’s gotta eat and drink and shit and sleep, just like you do.”

  Teddy nodded, taking it all in like a little sponge. “Yessir,” he said.

  Slocum was surprised. It had been a few years since anybody had “sirred” him, and for just a second, he was pleased with himself. Just for one second, though. “Let’s get goin’,” he said, and clucked to Ace. “Same deal as before.”

  Which meant that Slocum rode to the right of the trail and Teddy kept to the left, each constantly scouting his side, and the center as well.

  “Move into a slow lope,” Slocum said. “Don’t wanna spend a whole nother day trackin’ this bastard.”

  Grinning again, Teddy complied, although he had to slow up some to keep pace with Slocum. To him, “a slow lope” meant just that.

  Still, there was no sign of Jonas Hendricks except for his passage—a faint line in the weedy, brushy hills they’d traveled through today.

  At about four, Slocum slowed them down. They’d been jogging, and Teddy, for one, was relieved. His mare had a jarring jog, and his butt was saddle-sore. “Why we slowin’ down?” he called over the ten feet between him and Slocum.