Slocum and the Big Horn Trail Read online

  “I’m going to check on the horses,” he said, pulling on his boots with a twinge of pain in his side. Funny, he’d never noticed it making love to her. Oh, well—

  Winchester in his hands, and dressed in his jumper, he stepped outside to study the underbelly of a gray sky. Snow wasn’t far away. He first climbed up to the small lake and surveyed the upper end of the valley. Nothing looked out of place up there. A mule deer buck crossed the meadow at too great a distance for his gun. What did she say she wanted? A moose. A woman always wanted something hard, though a good fat moose would make great eating for a couple of months for the two of them. They might need to make a hunting trip before winter had them in its icy grasp and find themselves a good one.

  He found the horses and mules in the lower end of the valley. They looked up and considered him, then went back to grazing as the shadows lengthened and the sun set the ridge beyond on fire behind the cloud cover. Satisfied and listening to a scolding pair of ravens flying over his head, he started back for the cabin’s warmth. He’d been in much worse deals than this one.

  Snow began to sift out and the first wet flakes fell on his face. It covered the ground by the time he reached the cabin. He burst in and showed her the white flakes swirling around on wind gusts.

  “Winter is here?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “It’s only a warning.” He hugged her from behind and rocked her in his arms. “It will warm up one more time or two, then shut in. We can make a trip to Cross Creek to get some supplies. Then I’ll move the horses and mules lower down to a valley where they can find feed.”

  “Will someone steal them?”

  “No, I think they’ll be fine. They may stray, but we’ll get them up next spring.”

  “Then what?”

  “There are other men that look for me. They may come any time and I would have to leave you.”

  “This Red Dog?”

  “No, these’re lawmen and they too hound my back trail.”

  She nodded, looking at him. “Then we better have lots of fun until you have to go.” Her laughter rang as she went for the coffeepot. “We have plenty busy winter, huh?”

  “Plenty busy.”

  He smiled, looking at her. No one he could ask for would be a better person to spend the coming season with. As she stood before him pouring the hot coffee into his tin cup, they shared a private look of anticipation. The winter would fly by fast for him in her company.

  They were getting ready for bed. She was taking a sponge bath when someone began hollering outside. “Henry Davis, you ole squaw fucker, get up. Me and Cutter’s here. Gawdamnit, get up and put some food on. Why, we’re hungrier than a bear coming out of hibernation. Get your ass up.”

  Slocum waited for her to dress, then, gun in hand, went to the door and slid the bolt over, using his shoulder to hold the door in case they charged it.

  “Henry Davis ain’t here,” he said.

  “Well, gol-durn, where is he?”

  In the shaft of light from the partially open door, Slocum could see a man in a Texas hat and sheepherder’s jacket coated in wet snow standing out there and looking in disbelief at him.

  “Ain’t no Henry here. The man who previously owned it was killed by a grizzly a week or so ago.”

  “Cutter, be prepared for some real bad news,” the first one said to his pard, who was joining him.

  A taller drink of water, he wore a blanket for a coat and a wool scarf around his neck. Batting his eyes, he moved beside his companion. “What the hell happened to our old pard?”

  “A grizzly got him. ’Bout a week ago?” the first man asked Slocum.

  “Yes. Come in, but watch your language. The lady here was raised in a mission.”

  Both swept their hats off and nodded to him.

  “No cussing, Cutter, she’s churchy.”

  “Like my maw. No gawdamn cussing allowed in her house. No, sirree. She’d whack your ass and feed yeah lye soap.”

  “Damnit, act like you’re home then.”

  “I will. I will.”

  “He’s Cutter Tennet and I’m Roland Reilly. We knowed ole Davis for twenty years. We been by here to see him couple of times. Figured we could get in out of the snow.” Roland looked hard at Easter and blinked in the candlelight. “Why, she sure ain’t the same woman was here last summer.”

  “She’s new too. Her name is Easter, mine’s Slocum. There’s a fairly fresh grave up on the hill with some Sioux trinkets on it.”

  “Yes, sir, his last one was a Sioux all right. Blue Bell was what he called the last one,” Roland agreed after checking with his partner, who nodded in approval.

  “Antelope was a better one than that old crabby Sioux,” Cutter said, speaking to no one in particular and shaking his head in disapproval.

  Easter began rattling pans, firing up the sheet-iron stove like she’d expected them. The two removed their outerwear and piled it by the door.

  “Tell me about Henry Davis,” Slocum said when they took seats at the table.

  “Henry shot a man. Had to leave Texas. He come up here with a cattle herd and took up trapping and looking for gold. Said he had a good claim in Montana, but got into a scrape up there and had to leave it. I seen some of the free gold.”

  “He had little of anything on him.”

  “Must of spent it. How did he get into it with a bear?” Roland asked.

  “She said it was wounded with arrows and it must have been laying up there in the mud around the lake. Anyone came around, it got mad and charged ’em.”

  “Where’s that bugger at now?”

  “Skinned. I shot it the next day. She said Davis was going after water and wasn’t armed.”

  “Mighty handy, you coming along and finding his woman and this place open.” Roland frowned in suspicion at him.

  Suppressing his anger, Slocum scowled at him. “Now just what do you mean?”

  “Henry Davis was a veteran. Shot his share of bluebellies.”

  “Well, I did too. Who’s Robespierre?”

  “Him and Henry was partners. He went out one time to run his traplines and never come in.”

  “Could he read?”

  Roland shook his head. “I don’t reckon so. Henry never learned either. Why?”

  “Robespierrre had a wife back East he left behind to run a farm.”

  “Old Frenchy said she nagged at him all the time,” Cutter said as if to dismiss her. “Why, Frenchy had him a squaw of his own that fall we was up here and met him. I can’t recall her name, but she sure had a big ass as I re—” He slapped a hand over his mouth. “I never meant to say that.”

  “It’s fine. Wonder what killed him,” Slocum said.

  “Henry never knew,” Roland put in with a grim face. “Said that he didn’t find his remains till the next spring. These old mountains can sure be the devil in winter, I guess.”

  Slocum nodded. He watched Easter serve some leftover bear tracks on a wooden slab to the excited pair.

  “Whew-ee,” Cutter said with excitement dancing in his blue eyes. “You’ve done got you a real good’un. Been years since I had bear tracks. Girl, you are sure ’nough a real blessing.”

  The men slurped up the stew she heated and served them. Then Slocum told them they could sleep on the floor inside, and they all turned in. They thanked her for the food and hospitality. Their bedrolls strung out, they were soon under the covers.

  She undressed under the covers. “Will they be here long?” she whispered in his ear while snuggled close to him.

  He shook his head.

  “Good,” she said, and patted his muscle-corded belly as her hard breasts stuck in his back.

  He hoped he was right about his assessment of their departure. His half-hard dick told him if they had stayed away, he’d have been using his rising sword on her again. Damn.

  4

  Huddled under a blanket in the cave, Red Dog was cold and pissed off. His empty stomach growled at him. They didn’t dare start a fire
and risk drawing the posse to them. All their supplies and saddles had been lost in the frantic escape. Along with half of their horses—horses he’d intended to sell for cash money.

  Who had sicced the posse after them? Maybe the tall one who stole their money, who called himself Tom White. Red Dog never did trust that bastard, and when White took the whip away from him while he was beating his own dumb squaw who needed it—he’d gotten red-eyed mad. But instead of kicking him half to death and thinking they’d done him in, Red Dog should have sliced his throat. Never again would he leave someone for dead and not cut his throat. But how they would survive with the snow piling up outside, he had no idea. They’d lost their coats and all the blankets but the one she took with her and that now rested on his shoulders.

  Snake had taken one of the posse’s saddled horses with a bedroll. He shared those quilts with Tar Boy. Everyone had some of the dry cheese and stale crackers they’d found in the posseman’s saddlebags the day before. Snake and Tar Boy were out scouting their rabbit snares. Maybe they’d bring in something to eat. They might have to eat them raw, but at least the bear that used this den wasn’t around. The place stunk of bear shit and piss—it had been hard to get the horses inside it too.

  Mia pointed at the opening. “Someone comes.”

  Red Dog sat up and cocked his pistol. At the sight of a familiar hat, he undid the hammer and spun it back to the empty chamber. “What you get?”

  “Three sage hens and two rabbits.” Tar Boy held up the rabbits like prizes.

  “How did you get the hens?”

  “With sticks,” Tar Boy said.

  “Where’s Snake?” He brushed off the seat of his pants while standing up.

  “He be doing some scouting.”

  “Good,” Red Dog said to him, watching Mia take the stiff rabbits. “Make a very small fire. No smoke.”

  She nodded and carried them to a large rock closer to the opening, where she began to skin them.

  “Can we water the horses?” Red Dog asked.

  “I never seed no water the whole time I was out there.”

  “They can live a while without feed, but they don’t get water they may twist a gut. You see any willows?”

  “Some. Why?”

  “After we eat, she can go get some to feed them.”

  “How we’s going to water ’em?”

  “We ain’t got a kettle to melt any in—” Red Dog shook his head over the impossibility of such a task. How did they get in such messes? Must be some witch had cast a spell on him. That dumb Mia hadn’t—she wasn’t smart enough. White men like Tom White couldn’t put curses on someone unless they were witch doctors. White was no medicine man.

  Snake came in an hour later when the blackened rabbits were ready to eat. He slung down four sage hens. Tar Boy gave him half of his rabbit. Red Dog kept all of his and told Mia to fix the sage hens. She never showed any emotion, but set in pulling handfuls of gray feathers from the first one. In her world, the man ate first, then what bones were left the woman and children sucked on.

  “You see anything out there?” Red Dog asked.

  “Some Sioux in the mountains,” Snake said with his mouth full.

  “Sioux? What the fuck’re they doing here?”

  Snake shook his head. “I see some tracks. Maybe three. Maybe more.”

  “Where do they have a camp?”

  Snake finished sucking on a white bone and he discarded it. “I go see. Maybe they have rifles and saddles we can take from them.”

  Red Dog nodded. “Horses need water, but their tracks would lead them to the cave.”

  “I go find Sioux camp.”

  “Good, we’ll wait here.”

  Mia brought the dark bird livers to Snake, holding them out on her hand for him to take.

  He nodded in approval and tugged on Tar Boy’s sleeve. “Get sage hen power,” he said.

  Tar Boy took one and popped it in his mouth. Chewing on it, he grinned at them. Red Dog didn’t want any and told the others to eat it. He’d eat raw elk or buffalo liver, but bird liver was not for him.

  Snake left them before the hens were cooked and slipped away as was his practice. Tar Boy took a nap rolled up in one of the quilts. Red Dog sent Mia to get Snake’s quilt and told her to make a pallet for them. When she finished, she undressed and went under the covers. He left his place on the rock and crawled in with her. He pushed her raised knees wide apart and with his pants open, he jerked on his dick as he lowered himself on top of her.

  He stabbed the nose of his hard-on into her cunt, then braced himself above her and slammed it deep inside her. When she cried out, he smiled down at her. She was getting what she deserved. He began to pump his prick into her harder and harder. He knew when he plowed this deep into her, she’d soon grow excited and her breathing would speed up. Then the walls of her pussy would begin to contract around his swollen rod. His left nut ached, it had been almost two days since he’d had any.

  Furiously, he attacked her until at last he felt an unseen iron hand squeeze both his balls. He jammed his strained dick into her and blew the head off it in a long agonizing stream that made his asshole cramp in pain. Finally growing faint, he stiffened his arms braced over her.

  He needed a fresh one. This one wasn’t pretty and her breasts had no meat in them. First chance he got, he’d send her away. But not before he found a fresh one. He put his hand on top of her head and pushed her down so she slid underneath him until she could take his dick in her mouth. Then he began pumping it to her. While she sucked hard on it, she used one hand to jerk off the shaft and the other to cuddle his balls. In minutes he had another orgasm, and he felt the tender head of his tool against the roof of her small mouth spewing plenty into it.

  Good, she was swallowing it. He smiled. A new woman—he’d wearied of this one.

  Snake returned after sundown. He’d found a discarded lard bucket to melt snow in and water the horses.

  “What about the Sioux?” Dog asked

  “They are only boys on a quest.”

  “Can we sneak up and kill them?”

  Snake shook his head. “They have a few ponies. No rifles. They aren’t worth the trouble.”

  Dog hugged his arms against the cold. He’d wearied of the cave. “We need supplies and a warm place.”

  “We need to sneak out and find a settler to rob and use his place.”

  Red Dog nodded, but that would leave tracks for the posse. “How far away is the posse?”

  Snake shrugged. “Two, three days.”

  “In this damn snow any dumb bastard can track you.”

  “Several new settlers on rivers.”

  “Lower down.” Red Dog shook his head in disgust at the notion. They needed to do something. Their horses would soon be too weak to get through the snow. He agreed with a nod. “We better go find some or starve.”

  “What we’s doing?” Tar Boy asked, joining them.

  “We going downhill and find us some settlers to resupply us.”

  He nodded. “We’s sure do need to do that.”

  “Come sunup, we be going.” Red Dog shook his head at his own words. That damn black would have him talking like him pretty soon.

  The next morning, a Chinook wind had swept in during the night and the world of white soon became runny slop. They rode till mid-morning, and then let their ponies graze on some exposed grass in the open country. Red Dog felt better about the thaw. Snake stayed on the prowl looking for any sign of a posse. They’d crossed lots of country by late afternoon, and even shot a fat deer. The feast that evening was one of gluttony—they ate over half the carcass celebrating the day’s successes.

  Red Dog was too full when he fell in the blankets to even consider Mia’s ass. He awoke under a sky of bright stars and went off to squat and break wind. Half-nauseated at his overindulgence in eating, he felt the cool wind sweep his bare butt as he strained hard for some relief. They had much to find—saddles, arms, and supplies. Who led that posse? The badge
in Dog’s pocket might tell him more if he could read.

  More grunting from Red Dog, and the only answer was a loud fart and he swore some more. His belly really hurt. They’d have much raiding to do to ever get his bunch reequipped. “Ah,” escaped his lips, but it was only more wind he lost.

  They rode out at dawn like hungover dogs after a gut feast. They’d be out of the mountains in another day and down on the rolling prairie that footed the front range. A saddle couldn’t come too soon—his horse’s backbone was making his asshole sore from riding bareback.

  The weather warmed and, out scouting, Snake discovered a camp in the foothills. He rode back and told Dog all about two hunters and their outfit.

  “Three horses, two mules, a nice army tent—” The breed squatted by the small fire where Red Dog sat on the blanket and Mia cooked the sage hens Dog had shot earlier.

  “They army?”

  “No, Texas—I hear ’em talk.”

  “Might be drovers, huh?” Dog was already counting the money they might have on them from some cattle sale.

  Snake nodded. “They be easy to take.”

  With a shake of his head, Dog scowled. “They might be tough. They’re liable to be well armed and be handy with the weapons.”

  “Good horses, good tent, pack mules,” Snake said, acting as anxious as Dog had ever seen him.

  Food too. They better make plans on taking them. “How far away are they?”

  “Maybe hour ride.”

  “We can’t ride into that canyon. The horses’ sounds coming down would wake them.”

  Snake gave a toss of his head. “She can hold the horses.”

  “All right, we go down there and take them tonight. Make it look like them Sioux did it.” Dog laughed out loud and slapped Snake on the shoulder. “Good job.”

  After dark, they mounted up and pushed off the mountain. They wound their way under the stars off the steep sides until the sounds of a small stream joined their descent. The dim trail wound around and crossed the water several times. Snake held up his hand and vaulted off his horse.