Slocum and the Town Killers Read online

  “Wha—?”

  Slocum spun and clamped his hand over the marshal’s mouth to silence him. For a moment, he thought he had been successful. Then he heard the metallic click of a rifle cocking.

  “Who’s out there? That you, Kimbrell?”

  Marshal Vannover tensed at the name. Slocum recognized it as the name belonging to the wanted poster Sarah Beth Magee had identified.

  “Naw, Kimbrell’s still sacked out,” Slocum said in a low whisper. “I was just takin’ a leak.”

  “Who is that? Come on out, and you better have your hand on your dick or I’ll shoot it off!”

  Slocum moved fast. He shoved the marshal in one direction as a diversion and went in the other, getting around to the guard’s flank. The sentry saw movement as the lawman thrashed about to regain his balance. Then came the blur of Slocum coming at him like an avenging angel. The man let out a tiny gasp and then sank to the ground with Slocum’s knife in his side.

  Grabbing the rifle to keep it from hitting the ground and possibly discharging, Slocum stood over the man and turned his back on the camp as another guard called out, “Lemuel, what’s the fuss?”

  “Nuthin’,” Slocum replied, keeping his voice low and gruff like the dead guard’s.

  “You sure?”

  “Go to hell.”

  “You first, you silly son of a bitch. You still pissed how I cleaned you out in the poker game?”

  “Yeah.” Slocum knew the longer they traded words, the guard asking questions and him fielding with only single-word answers, the more dangerous it got.

  “Kimbrell will divvy up the take from that last town soon enough. Then I kin clean you out again!” Laughing at this, the other guard strolled off. Slocum stayed stock-still until he no longer heard the man’s steps. He dropped to his knees and pulled out the blade from the guard’s ribs, wiped the metal off on the dead man’s shirt, and then returned the knife to the top of his own right boot. He hastily searched the man’s pockets and found a single dollar bill all wadded up. This had to be the sole survivor of that poker game. He tucked it into his own pocket and then stood, keeping his back to the camp.

  No West Point ring. He had to keep looking.

  “You out there, Vannover?” He spoke in a low voice that carried but would not alert anyone in camp. Over the years, he had found that whispering drew more attention than simply speaking in subdued tones. Something about a whisper carried, and everyone immediately wondered what was being kept secret.

  “Damned near busted my arm. You shoved me into—”

  “Never mind,” Slocum said. “Get over here. Now!”

  The marshal jumped like he had been stuck with a pin.

  “Stand here with the rifle. Don’t talk unless you have to and don’t face camp so they can catch a glimpse of your face. There’s a lot of them to remember, but it’s a tight-knit outfit. They’re going to know anyone who doesn’t belong.”

  Slocum did not add that Vannover lacked the killer look that most of the gang had. There was a coldness in their stares that the marshal could not fake.

  Without another word, Slocum set off to explore the perimeter of the camp. He disliked leaving the lawman behind like that, but if anyone made a casual inspection, they would see a man where a guard was supposed to be stationed. Putting Vannover out in plain sight was less risky than leaving a hole in the outlaw perimeter.

  Every step silent, Slocum moved about, counting the outlaws and seeing the kind of equipment they carried. He went cold in the gut when he recognized it as what he had carried when he had ridden with Quantrill’s Raiders. Back then, they had bristled with six-shooters and rifles. Going up against a company of men three times their size had been easy enough, especially if the Federal soldiers had been armed with single-shot muskets. A decent soldier could get off three shots a minute. Any one of Quantrill’s men could empty his six-gun accurately in half that time and be reaching for a second loaded pistol before his target had hit the ground. They depended on speed and sheer quantity of lead aimed at their target.

  More than once that target had been an entire town. Slocum still had nightmares of what they had done to Lawrence, Kansas. Clayton Magee and his band of cutthroats had brought similar carnage down on at least two towns. Slocum figured the coordination and ease of the attack, especially on Cherokee Springs, meant those had not been their first towns. Magee led an experienced, brutal gang.

  There had to be something Slocum was missing, though. Magee might be hunting for his wife and daughter, but the rest were intent on robbing and killing. And raping. The saloon girls sprawled naked on the pool table reminded him that these men took their pleasure in all things brutal and bloody.

  He found the ammo dump covered with a tarp. He would have considered blowing it up if it hadn’t been guarded by no fewer than four men. Magee took no chances. The two women had said he had been a major in the Union army. His expertise showed in the way the camp was laid out and the supplies guarded.

  Knowing there was little else he could do, Slocum made his way back around the slowly stirring men. Dawn was still an hour away, but they rose early. He guessed they cleaned their six-guns and other gear like any good military unit before reporting for their day’s duty.

  Where that would take them, he had no clue. He had not found where Magee pitched his tent, though even if Slocum had, there would have been nothing he could do. Cutting the head off a rattlesnake worked real good to stop its venomous attacks. Killing the leader of a gang this size only meant someone else would take his place.

  Slocum hurried now to get out of the camp before everyone was awake. He made his way back toward the spot where he had left Marshal Vannover on guard duty, but got clumsy. The toe of his boot caught on a rock around a fire pit and sent it rattling into a coffeepot. Several men looked up.

  “Sorry,” Slocum said, moving his hand over his face to hide his identity. The men grumbled and went back to their chores, most of them cleaning their six-shooters. But one man watched him with cold intensity.

  Slocum walked on, trying not to hurry. He felt the man’s eyes boring into his back. Not turning to confront the outlaw took all of Slocum’s willpower. It was then that Slocum made his second mistake. He went directly to where the marshal kept guard.

  As he approached, Vannover turned toward Slocum, showing his face to anyone behind Slocum.

  “Who the hell are you?” came the shouted question.

  Slocum thought about bulling his way through. He had learned to bluff well playing poker, but Vannover did not allow him to even attempt it. The marshal gasped and lifted the rifle taken off the dead guard.

  “Kimbrell!” the lawman shouted as he raised the rifle and fired. The slug tore past Slocum’s head, causing him to flinch. From the commotion, Slocum knew the marshal was no better as a shooter than he was at keeping a low profile. He had missed Kimbrell by a country mile.

  “Git ’em, boys,” cried the outlaw. “We got spies in our camp.”

  Slocum swung around, slapped leather, and drew. He fanned off three quick shots. He didn’t care how accurate they were. He wanted to sow confusion all around. If he did, it was not apparent. Three outlaws were hastily loading their six-guns and Kimbrell had his out and firing.

  Two bullets ripped past Slocum. One might have found Vannover from the way the lawman grunted. Looking to see how badly injured the man was would have meant Slocum’s death. He fired with more accuracy now, straight at Kimbrell.

  They faced each other at a distance of twenty feet. In the dim light of almost dawn, Slocum had a difficult target to hit. The only saving grace was that Kimbrell had the same handicap. As the outlaw moved, Slocum saw how Vannover had identified him. Fires blazed high to either side and sometimes lit up the outlaw’s face as if he was on a theater stage with a spotlight trained on him.

  Slocum aimed carefully with his final shot and squeezed the trigger—just as Kimbrell jerked to one side. The outlaw had stepped into one of the cooking fires and dance
d out of it at the same instant Slocum sent a slug in his direction. Kimbrell yelped, but Slocum knew the shot had barely scratched the man’s skin, if it had hit him at all. The outlaw might have reacted to his pants leg being on fire, or the notion that anyone had sneaked into his camp undetected.

  “Come on,” Slocum said, spinning and reaching down to grab the marshal’s shirt. He pulled the man to his feet. “You hit?”

  “I stumbled,” Vannover said. “I twisted my knee, but I can walk.”

  “Don’t walk, run,” Slocum said. He kept the marshal ahead of him and moving. They had barely reached the thicket before the outlaws finished loading their six-guns and opened fire. The tree trunks and limbs exploded in a sticky mass of sap and splinter. Leaves fluttered down all around. Then came a second volley, as deadly as the first.

  “I can’t—”

  “You’d better,” Slocum said, shoving the marshal again to get him deeper into the woods. He yanked the rifle from the lawman’s hands and turned, took a deep breath, and waited. He saw Kimbrell leading the charge coming after them. Slocum squeezed off a round, and knew he’d hit the outlaw this time. Kimbrell dropped his six-shooter and grabbed his right forearm with his left hand. Slocum was not as lucky with his next shot. He missed Kimbrell but hit another outlaw. Slocum cursed his bad luck in missing what should have been an easy shot. He wanted Kimbrell brought down. From everything he had read on the man’s wanted poster, Kimbrell had to be second in command.

  This wasn’t as good as cutting off the snake’s head—killing Magee—but it was better than randomly taking potshots at the men riding behind the major. That was too much like dipping water from a well using a sieve.

  “My ankle’s startin’ to swell up,” Vannover said. He gasped for breath and limped more with every step. “You go on. I’ll hold them off.”

  “You’d be dead in ten seconds. Five, if they see your badge.”

  “What are we goin’ to do?”

  Slocum had no idea. He heard the outlaws gathering just at the edge of the clearing. By now all thirty or forty outlaws would be awake. Magee might take over. Slocum was not discounting the man’s tactical skills, even if he might be crazy as a bedbug.

  “That way,” Slocum said, herding the marshal in a direction parallel to the clearing. They stayed in the woods, but no longer tried to plunge deeper. He remembered his brief scouting of the camp, and knew they had to create a diversion or they were goners. Too many killers on their trail with limitless ammo spelled only shallow graves—or simply being left out for the coyotes and buzzards.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Keep them confused,” Slocum said. “It’s our only chance.” As he walked, he reloaded. The rifle he had taken from the marshal was useless now. The .36-caliber ammo for his Colt Navy wouldn’t fit the .44 Winchester. Slocum cut back toward the camp and chanced a quick look.

  Luck was turning in his direction again. Most of the outlaws were clustered behind Kimbrell at the edge of the woods where the guard lay dead. Nobody even glanced in their direction because they thought anyone running away from them would run fast and hard in a straight line.

  “They’re not huntin’ for us,” the marshal said. “What do you make of that?”

  “Kimbrell will get a few of them organized and those will be the only ones after us. Following our trail’s not going to be hard once the sun comes up.” Slocum estimated they had less than a half hour before it got light enough for a decent tracker to find their spoor and realize they had not run directly away. Before then he had to have come up with another plan.

  “There’re the horses. In a rope corral,” the marshal said. “We can steal their horses.”

  “That’s good, as far as it goes,” Slocum said. “How good a shot are you?”

  “Fair to middlin’,” the marshal said with enough confidence that Slocum believed him.

  “Here.” Slocum shoved his six-shooter into the lawman’s hand. “See that pile over yonder? The one covered with the tarp?”

  “Supplies?” The marshal thought for a second, then said, “That’s their ammo dump. My God, they have enough for an army!”

  “They are an army,” Slocum said. “Walk over there, get close enough to be sure you are putting every last round into that pile, and don’t stop until both six-shooters are empty.”

  “They’ll kill me!”

  “They just might, even if my plan does work. If it doesn’t, you’ll have the satisfaction of blowing some of them to hell and gone and making it damned inconvenient to keep killing towns.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  Slocum slid his knife from its sheath and thrust the tip in the direction of the ammunition. He didn’t wait to see if Vannover followed his orders. A pair of guards wandered along the rope holding a dozen horses. If they spotted Slocum before he got to them . . .

  Slocum walked quickly, but did not run. The men were arguing, and only noticed Slocum when he was a few yards away. Then it was too late. Slocum closed the distance with three quick strides. His knife slashed furiously and caught the closer guard across the eyes. As the man screamed in pain, Slocum spun about and kicked the other guard in the kneecap, taking him to the ground fast. He used the knife to kill that guard before returning to the first one. In seconds they were both dead.

  Panting harshly, Slocum took their rifles and six-shooters and went to the string of horses. He slashed the rope holding the horses, then began firing. When he did, he heard answering fire. He smiled. The distinctive sound of his Colt Navy told him that Vannover was going after the ammunition dump.

  Slocum exchanged rifle fire with another guard, then finally winged him severely enough to make him go scuttling off for shelter. Using his knife, Slocum freed three more strings of horses, only holding onto a pair. He’d gotten a bridle onto the first one when Vannover finally struck pay dirt.

  The explosion from the ammo drove him to his knees. Hot lead sang all around him as box after box of ammunition discharged. There wasn’t time to get a bridle on the second horse. Slocum swung onto its back and clung to its neck for dear life. He lost the second rifle he had, but managed to draw one of the captured six-guns and empty it at a few outlaws coming to stop their horses from stampeding.

  He threw that pistol away and tugged on the bridle of his first stolen horse to get it trotting in the direction of the ammo dump.

  “Get on,” Slocum said. “No time to saddle up.” Marshal Vannover didn’t have to be told twice. He jumped awkwardly, almost slid off the far side of the first horse, then found his seat. Bending low, reins in hand, he galloped off. Slocum followed, not caring what direction they went. The outlaws had to run down their escaped horses—and with the sizzle and explosion of cartridges still filling the air with noise and death, it might take longer than any of the outlaws expected.

  That gave Slocum and Marshal Vannover that much more time to get the hell out of the outlaw camp.

  They rode without speaking into the sunrise, each lost in his own thoughts. Slocum had no idea what went through Vannover’s head, but he could not keep from wondering if it would be Kimbrell or Magee himself who finally came after them.

  8

  “Settle down, child. It’s only an Oklahoma dust storm,” Mrs. Post said. “Now get on with the cleaning. However, save the dusting for last.”

  “I . . . I need to fetch my belongings and tell my ma. I’ll get right to work when I come back.”

  “Oh, very well.” Mrs. Post sniffed and shook her head. Sarah Beth heard her say under her breath, “Young people. Lazy bunch. Lazy!”

  Sarah Beth almost blurted out what she feared would happen to Foreman when the dust cloud arrived. It was a storm, all right, but not blown by the wind and driven by nature. She was sure her pa had found her again and no one in Foreman would be alive by the time the sun set. Running hard, she got back to the bakery. The delicious odor of baking bread no longer thrilled her. Instead of making her mouth water, the scent turned her sto
mach. Her mouth was as dry as cotton and not quite as tasty.

  “Ma, he’s coming. Please, ma, we got to—” She looked up and saw Maggie Almquist looking at her as if she had grown three heads.

  “What are you going on about, dear?” Louisa Magee came from the rear of the bakery, struggling with a large sack of flour. Her face was a spolotchy white, and her hands and arms were completely covered in the flour. She was actually smiling for the first time in ages.

  “Mama, th-there’s a cloud of dust. Coming toward town,” Sarah Beth stammered.

  “We’ll shut the door. Dust storms aren’t uncommon in the Territory,” Maggie said. “You ought to know that if you’ve traveled much here. Get over into red clay country and you’ll end up redder ’n an Indian after a storm. Try to wash it off and your skin gets dyed bright red.”

  “Sarah Beth, please. I have to work.”

  “Come look, Mama. Please.” Sarah Beth grabbed her mother’s arm and pulled her to the door and pointed at the dust cloud. It was visibly closer to town now.

  “How about that,” said Maggie, peering around the other two women. “Looks like we got visitors. Riders and a passel of ’em by the look.”

  “It’s not a dust storm?”

  “Naw. Why’d you ever think that?” Maggie looked hard, and Sarah Beth felt the woman’s piercing gaze go to her soul. Maggie knew she had never thought it was a dust storm.

  “We . . . we have to go, Mama.”

  Louisa pulled free and shook her head.

  “We’re staying, daughter. We’re staying. No matter what.”