Slocum and the Meddler Read online

  Slocum caught up to the fleeing man just before sundown. Barnett had been wounded more severely than Slocum thought, and his trail became meandering as he weakened. A stretch of prairie separated the two. Slocum drew out his Winchester and sighted along the barrel, but his finger never moved against the trigger. Instead, he thrust the rifle back into its scabbard and put his heels to his tired horse’s flanks. To its credit, the gelding responded, and within fifteen minutes Slocum came up behind Barnett.

  “I’m not going to kill you, though heaven knows I ought to,” Slocum called. Barnett turned and tried to draw his six-shooter. He never got the weapon free. He fell from the saddle and hit the ground hard.

  Remembering the trick he had used, Slocum circled and came up on the fallen man from an angle where he could see both his hands. From the spastic kicks, Barnett wasn’t faking it, laying a trap for his foe. Slocum dropped to the ground and approached, still cautious.

  He plucked the pistol from the man’s holster and stepped back to stare down at him.

  “Why’d you try to kill me?”

  Barnett looked up, his lips moving but no sound coming out. Then he collapsed to the ground. Slocum edged forward and pressed his finger up under the man’s nose and felt the slow gust of breath.

  “Come on,” Slocum said, grabbing a double handful of coat and pulling Barnett to his feet. The man tried to fight but was too close to exhaustion. He managed to take a few steps, and this was enough for Slocum to hoist him over his shoulder, turn, and then flop Barnett belly down over his horse.

  It took a few minutes, but Slocum soon had Barnett lashed onto his horse as if he were a supply pack. The occasional groans as they rode back to Abilene told Slocum his prisoner was still alive, although barely so by the time he rode up in front of the jailhouse.

  Marshal Wilson came out, saw who had come to visit, and then spat.

  “Dang it, Slocum, you’re a real bad penny. You jist keep on comin’ back to bedevil me.”

  “Barnett, Ralston’s foreman. He ambushed me on my way out to the Holman spread. We shot it out, and he came up the loser.”

  “He dead?”

  Slocum let the marshal see for himself that Barnett was still alive, if barely. The two of them got the rope lashing off the man, and Slocum carried him into the hoosegow, depositing him in the first empty cell.

  “You really want to prefer charges? He ain’t likely to make it to sundown.”

  Slocum looked out the open door and saw that the sun was breaking on a new, sizzling hot Texas day.

  “You got a doctor in town? Fetch him.”

  “Who’s gonna pay for it? You?”

  “He tried to kill me.”

  “Your word ’gainst his,” Marshal Wilson said. “No way of knowin’ what went on out there. The words you had with his boss sounded like you might be the one layin’ the ambush.”

  “Ask him. He’s awake again.”

  “Damnation,” muttered Wilson, going to the cell. “You hear what Slocum there said ’bout what happened?”

  “Git Mr. Ralston. Git him. I ain’t sayin’ nuthin’ ’til I talk with him.”

  Wilson grumbled some more, then turned to Slocum and said, “You don’t leave town ’til we git this squared away. I’ll send one of those layabouts over at Clyde’s store with word to Mr. Ralston.”

  “I’ll be at the nearest saloon,” Slocum said.

  Wilson made a shooing motion. Slocum went directly to the saloon to get himself a shot of whiskey to ease the ache in his arm. For a crease it still hurt like hell.

  Two shots of whiskey later he was feeling mellow enough to go out onto the boardwalk, find a chair, and sit to watch the traffic in the street. He saw Ralston coming in his direction.

  “Didn’t take long to find you,” Slocum said.

  “I was in town, no thanks to you. I had to talk to the banker about giving me a loan to buy the Holman ranch.”

  Slocum nodded. This was more promising, but he doubted Ralston willingly offered Angelina a dime more than he had to since he had low-balled his first offer to her, thinking she wanted nothing but to leave the ranch she and her husband had carved out of the harsh Texas land.

  “Drop the charges, Slocum. I don’t know that you didn’t shoot first, but Barnett is a good man.”

  “Don’t know about that. I do know he’s a lousy shot or he would have left my carcass out there for the buzzards.”

  “Barnett looks after my interests,” Ralston said.

  “By killing Holman for you?”

  “Holman was a goddamn rustler!”

  “What’s your proof?”

  “Barnett told—” Ralston bit off the rest of the sentence. He glared at Slocum.

  “Your foreman told you a neighboring rancher was stealing your cattle, and you swallowed the lie hook, line, and sinker.”

  “Barnett had no call to lie. Didn’t put an extra dime in his pocket one way or the other.”

  Slocum thought for a moment, then said, “Might be that Barnett was rustling your cattle, making a few extra dollars off working for you.”

  “He wouldn’t!”

  “Might be true. Might also be true he was wrong about Holman.”

  “Just because you and that whore wife of Holman’s—” Ralston clamped his mouth shut as Slocum pulled his six-shooter and cocked it.

  “Keep a civil tongue in your head.”

  “You can’t know what Michael Holman was like. You just blew into Abilene.”

  “There’s something to what you say, but any man who had as devoted a wife as Angelina Holman, well, it’s not likely he was the owlhoot you make him out to be.”

  “Burn in hell.” Ralston stormed off.

  Slocum returned his six-gun to its holster and considered going into the saloon for another drink. It was still early, but his arm ached something fierce. He stopped when he saw a huge man carrying a small black bag coming from the jailhouse.

  “Doc!” he called. The man looked up, verifying Slocum’s supposition. “You got a minute to patch me up?”

  “It’s one of those days, and it ain’t even eight o’clock,” the doctor grumbled.

  He was a huge man, taller than Slocum’s six feet by an inch or two. He carried his more than two hundred pounds lightly and moved with easy grace for such a big man.

  “Let’s see what’s ailing you.” The doctor saw the bloody sleeve and worked to open the catch on his bag. He rummaged about and came out with a roll of bandages and a bottle of carbolic acid.

  Slocum bared his arm. The doctor ran his bear-paw hand over the arm with surprising gentleness and showed even more dexterity cleaning and bandaging the wound.

  “You don’t look it, but you’ve got the hands of a surgeon.”

  “Was, during the war. Ain’t no grace required in most of that surgery.” He closed his bag and said, “I could lop off an arm or leg inside a minute. Difference ’tween me and most of the others, my patients lived.” He shook his head. “Not that they saw that as a boon, mind you. Can’t say I don’t agree in most cases. But you? Easy wound. That’ll be fifty cents.”

  Slocum paid him.

  “You patch up Barnett? Over at the jail?”

  “Did. He’ll make it. Didn’t even have to whack off any important pieces.” The doctor looked hard at Slocum. “You’re the one that brought him in, aren’t you? Willie’s all upset over it since he had to cross Monty Ralston.”

  “I’ve met Mr. Ralston,” Slocum said.

  “I just bet you have.” The doctor shook his head. “Things haven’t been the same around here lately, not since that young fellow Holman was stabbed.”

  “Stabbed? I thought he was gunned down.”

  “Stabbed a couple times in the belly. Right about here,” he said, drawing a line across his side just under his left rib. “One cut went up and into his heart. That ’bout killed him outright.” He fumbled around in his bag and brought out an envelope. A couple quick taps caused something to come loose inside. He held
it open for Slocum to see.

  “What is it?”

  “Looks to me like the point of the knife that killed Holman. It was broke off and lodged in the muscle around his heart. Might have cracked when it bounced off a rib, then fractured as it killed him.”

  “Why’d you keep it?”

  The doctor shrugged, then said, “If Willie ever finds a knife with the point busted off, I might piece it back together. That’d mean whoever had the knife was likely the killer.”

  “You tell anyone about this?” Slocum tapped the envelope.

  “Willie knows. Don’t know that he’d tell anyone else.”

  “Let’s go back to the jail. The marshal’s got Barnett’s gear.”

  “You think he done in that Holman boy?”

  Slocum and the doctor walked back to find the marshal unsaddling Barnett’s horse.

  “I ain’t ready fer you, Slocum. You ruined a perfectly fine day already.”

  “You’re not the only one with that sentiment,” Slocum said. “Is there a knife in Barnett’s gear?”

  Wilson looked hard at him, then at the doctor, who held up the envelope. Slocum thought the marshal turned a shade paler under his suntan and grime. He dropped the saddle and picked up saddlebags he’d already tossed inside the jail. Wilson brought the saddlebags out and upended them, spilling the contents to the ground at their feet. A short knife gleamed in the sun. He picked it up.

  The point was broken off.

  “Don’t mean nuthin’,” Wilson said. “Happens all the time to cheap knives like this.”

  The doctor fished out the broken tip. It fit perfectly onto the blade.

  “Damnation,” the marshal said again. “I’d never have thought it of Barnett. Never in a hundred years.”

  Slocum caught rapid movement from the corner of his eye, but when he turned, nothing was there. Again, nothing was there.

  8

  “I got the evidence,” Marshal Wilson said testily. “Come clean and might be I won’t see you get your damned neck stretched.”

  Barnett propped himself up in the jail cell, back against a cold stone wall, and stared at the lawman.

  “You can’t have proof. I didn’t kill Holman!”

  “Ralston wanted him dead, and you do what your boss asks,” Slocum said. He got a hot, angry glare from the marshal. He ignored it. “With Holman dead, Ralston could buy his ranch for a song and a dance.”

  “Why’d he want to? He’s got more cattle than any ten men need. And his danged ranch? It keeps going so far beyond the horizon your horse’d drop dead ’fore you got to the boundary.”

  “Water,” Slocum said.

  “I got the knife,” Wilson cut in. “The tip of the knife blade was stuck inside Holman. Doc took it out and saved it. Fits yer knife perfect-like.”

  “I lost my knife. Haven’t got a new one yet.”

  “This yours?” Wilson held up the knife.

  “Not mine. Mine’s got a horn handle. Horn from a buck I kilt up in Colorado when I was ramrod on a drive up to Wyoming.”

  “You sure?” Wilson held the knife through the bars, as if begging Barnett to grab it from him.

  Slocum saw the hesitation, the evaluation of his chances, but Barnett never stirred. Whether he couldn’t because of his wounds or because he knew there wasn’t any chance he could get free, even with the weapon, was a question to be argued over for some time.

  “I didn’t kill Holman. I would have, but I didn’t.”

  “You’ll burn in hell for your crime, Barnett,” the marshal said. He pulled the knife back through the bars and stalked off.

  Slocum stared at the prisoner for a moment, then trailed Wilson outside into the hot sun.

  “I knowed you was bad luck the instant I set eyes on you,” Wilson said, almost spitting in anger. “Why didn’t you keep ridin’ like I told you to?”

  “He didn’t kill Holman,” Slocum said.

  “What?” Wilson squinted and finally said, “Yer not makin’ sense, Slocum. You brung him in. We found the murder weapon. I wouldn’t put it past you to frame him, but the doc? He’s as honest a man as I ever did see. He wouldn’t make up evidence.”

  “The knife was used to kill Holman. That’s as sure a thing as can be,” Slocum said. “But Barnett didn’t use the knife.”

  “So who did, Mr. High-and-Mighty Know-It-All?”

  Slocum didn’t have an answer. As much as he wished Barnett were guilty, he had played enough poker with enough cowboys in his day to know when they had good hands and when they were bluffing. Barnett wasn’t good enough an actor to conceal his guilt. When he denied the murder, he had been outraged at the accusation. If he had killed Holman, he was more likely to be arrogant about it and brag on the details.

  That proved nothing, Slocum knew, but all the little things that would point to Barnett being the killer weren’t there.

  Slocum pushed back his coat to better get to his six-shooter when he saw Ralston storming along the street toward the jail. He wondered if the man ever walked anywhere or if he was always stomping and kicking up dust clouds.

  “You’ve got my foreman locked up in there,” Ralston said. “Let him go.”

  “Now, Mr. Ralston, it ain’t as easy as that,” Wilson started.

  Ralston shoved the marshal back so hard, he hit the wall and his teeth rattled. But before the rancher could take another step, he found himself stopped with the cold steel muzzle of a Colt Navy shoved into his belly.

  “Don’t know how most places work, but they don’t let anybody push around the town marshal,” Slocum said.

  “You’re not a deputy. What’s your part in this?” Ralston’s belligerence didn’t fade although Slocum could easily put a slug into his stomach. Point blank, the muzzle flash was as likely to set fire to his clothing and burn him to death as anything. Nothing deterred Monty Ralston.

  “I can’t say.” Slocum’s reply was an honest one. He had never wanted to stay in Abilene, yet circumstances kept piling up, forcing him to do that very thing.

  “I got a herd to tend. I need Barnett. You hear, Willie? You let my man out of your lockup!”

  Wilson dusted himself off. Slocum saw the conflict on the lawman’s face. He was used to taking orders, but Ralston had overstepped his bounds when he shoved him. That had given Wilson some cojones.

  “I got good evidence your boy kilt Holman. Looks like we’ll be goin’ to trial when the judge comes through.”

  “Judge? Trial? Barnett’s not standing trial!”

  “Don’t make me run you in for disorderly conduct and assaultin’ a peace officer,” Wilson said. “Nobody’d like it if you forced me to do that.”

  “Look, Willie, this is all a big misunderstanding. You know how riled I can get. I didn’t mean to push you like that, but I did, and for that I apologize.”

  “Apology accepted.”

  “So let Barnett out and—”

  “He stays put. ’Til the trial.”

  Slocum thought he would have to pull the trigger to stop Ralston as he lurched forward, hands groping for Wilson’s throat. The rancher turned livid, so red in the face that the bulging vein on his temple looked ready to explode. At the last instant, Ralston checked his attack and backed off.

  “You haven’t heard the last of this.”

  Then he spun and stormed away, as mad as when he had come over to the jailhouse. Slocum wasn’t sure who the rancher directed the threat toward. He slowly slid his pistol back into the cross-draw holster and watched the marshal’s reaction to it all.

  He had gone pale, but now his color was not only returning but giving a flush to his face. Anger built to the bursting point.

  “Git the hell outta my sight, Slocum. You’re the cause of all this. I don’t know how or why, but you are.”

  “How do you figure, Marshal?”

  “None of this was a problem ’fore you showed up in town.”

  Slocum didn’t bother pointing out that Michael Holman had been killed prior to his ar
rival. Whatever had driven Macauley was before Slocum came to Abilene, too. With the marshal in such a poorly contained rage, facts meant nothing.

  He followed Ralston, but he was too late to catch the man at the livery stable. He had ridden out, leaving the stableman in a snit because the rancher hadn’t paid. Slocum considered his chances of learning anything if he rode down Ralston, then slowly walked back to the saloon near the jailhouse. There weren’t any more customers inside than before.

  But the one sitting at the same chair he had occupied before drew Slocum.

  “You have your ear to the ground, Herk,” he said. “Who else besides Ralston wants the Holman ranch?”

  “Wants it? For what? It’s the butt end of an ugly mule, that spread.” Herk made a snorting noise, then pushed back and stood, using the table and chair back for support. When he got his balance, he went to the bar, one leg dragging behind. Slocum watched as Herk dragged the inside of his right heel along the floor, almost stumbling as he went. He ordered a beer, then came back. In spite of his uneven gait and his filled mug swaying to and fro, he managed to return without spilling a drop. He fell into the chair and used both hands to pull his gimpy leg around.

  “Why else would someone kill Holman?” Slocum asked.

  “Mighta got into a fight over his wife. You seen how purty she is. Purty enough for a man to kill for, a man what ain’t seen another woman for a month whilst he was out on the range.”

  “You got a name to go with that guess?”

  Herk looked all thoughtful, then said, “Could be the fellow they got locked up. The one you got locked up.”

  “Barnett?” This notion startled Slocum since he hadn’t considered it.

  “Him and Miz Holman mighta been foolin’ ’round. Not sayin’ they was, mind you, but could be all in Barnett’s head. That man looked plumb loco to me.”

  Another thought struck Slocum, one that turned him cold as ice inside. He pushed back from the table and left without a word, Herk calling after him to wait. The barkeep was demanding Herk pay up for his beer, now that the likeliest source of money had dried up. Slocum ignored it all. What if the one sweet on Angelina wasn’t Barnett but Monty Ralston?