Slocum and the Bixby Battle Read online

  “Bixby’s law, huh? You never brought in a killer for her husband. You’ve never stopped the raids on her cattle and neighbors. That, sir, is malfeasance of office and the Texas Rangers are on their way right now to check all that out.”

  “I’m the law here! You’ve drawn on the—”

  “Unbuckle your gunbelt and drop it. I’m tired of your mouth. Law is one thing. Hiding behind the badge to enforce criminal actions will get you twenty years under Texas law. And believe me, I know judges that will give you more than that. We’ll see how tough you are when the Rangers get here.”

  “There ain’t no Rangers coming here—”

  “Why? Because you bribed off the first one they sent?”

  McKlein blinked his eyes and frowned. “Hell—no.”

  Slocum knew the truth, despite the lawman’s denial. Somehow McKlein had stopped the Rangers from coming, and that was why Amanda had never seen them. It would be different the next time they sent them.

  “Now turn around and march for your horse,” Slocum ordered.

  “You won’t get by with this. I swear you’ll be in my jail or the funeral home in less than twenty-four hours.”

  “Funeral home—that’s where you want me, right?” He gave the man a shove toward the front door. “Bring the sheriff’s gun,” he said to Amanda as he marched him out to his horse.

  He holstered his own, removed the bullets from McKlein’s weapon and shoved the holster set at him.

  “Get on your horse and go tell Bixby that his bluff never worked. Tell the Colonel he has only seen the start of his troubles if he don’t come and ask for peace.”

  “He’ll never do that.”

  “Well, then his stubbornness will get him hurt. We don’t intend to stand by and let him harass any more of the Mexican or any other ranchers in this country. We can cure a dog of sucking eggs. We can cure him, too.”

  “I’ll have you in jail—”

  Slocum swung around and kicked McKlein’s horse in the gut. The gelding shied and about unseated the lawman. “Get the hell off this ranch and stay off. Start counting your free days now. You’ll do a stretch behind them bars yourself and it won’t be long starting.”

  His horse at last under control, McKlein glared at Slocum, his lips so tight they looked ready to bust. Then he swung the horse around and left.

  “Send for Pedro,” Slocum said to Amanda. “I’m writing a letter to Captain Rob in San Antonio. Pedro can take it to him personally. Rob’ll send help this time that will end this business with Bixby and his law dog that he sent to bite me.”

  “You think—” She hesitated. “I’ve sent three telegrams.”

  “They must have headed them off.” Slocum glared westward long after the lawman in the black suit was out of sight.

  She swung on his arm. “Come and eat some breakfast. You are acting too mad.”

  “I’ll be mad from here on.”

  Out of breath, Pedro came with his sombrero in his hand to report to him.

  “Have you ever been to San Antonio?” he asked the youth.

  “Sí, I have driven cattle there.”

  “Good. I am sending a letter with you to Captain Rob of the Texas Rangers. No one must see it but him. Not any of the other Rangers or anyone. If Bixby learns of your business, he will send men to stop you. McKlein would do the same. I have a friend in San Antonio you can trust. His name is Tony Petillio. He owns the Oasis Verde Restaurant on the south side of the Alamo Square.”

  Pedro nodded and accepted the envelope. “Captain Rob only?”

  “He’s the only one to give that to,” Slocum warned him. “Then find Tony. He will protect you.”

  “Here is money for the trip,” Amanda said, giving him a purse. “Be very careful, Pedro. Your mother needs you.”

  “Sí, señora, I will be careful. When should I leave?”

  “Dark,” Slocum said. “So you can go by town undercover and ride wide around it before you get back on the road.”

  “After I give this to Captain Rob?”

  “He will no doubt have a message for you to bring back, after you get some rest.” Slocum handed the youth the .30-caliber pistol in a small holster. “If you have to save your life, use this.”

  “Sí.” The youth swallowed hard and nodded as he accepted it.

  “Take one of my best horses to ride there,” Amanda said.

  Lights danced with excitement in Pedro’s eyes. “Sí, señora.”

  “Most of all you must deliver the message,” Slocum said.

  “I will. I swear upon my life I will.”

  Slocum rose and clapped him on the shoulder. “I know you will.”

  The youth left. Slocum hugged Amanda while they were alone in the room. “Now the war has begun, we must finish it.”

  “How?”

  “I think he will have guards at the windmills from now on. One or two and we will slip up, take them. Then undress them and shear their heads, so we can tell them. Give them twenty-four hours to leave the country or else.”

  “But—”

  He kissed her hard on the mouth. “Don’t worry. Montez and I are going out today and start our sheep shearing business.”

  “Oh, Slocum . . . I don’t know—”

  “It will work,” he promised her and kissed her sweet mouth again, leaving her breathless.

  “We have the shears, señor,” Montez reported. With him were two more vaqueros, Bigoata and Rafael, both men in their thirties, wearing the dress of their ancestors—ponchos, for the wind was cooler that day, and sombreros—and carrying six-guns and knives. Montez swore they were his best fighters.

  They squatted beside the corral, their backs to the sharp wind, and Slocum explained his plan. They would sneak up on the guards that Bixby had posted at the windmills, jump them, shear off their hair and let them ride back to Bixby’s ranch naked.

  “I don’t want them killed. But if they fight, they can die, too.”

  The two men looked at each other and laughed.

  “It will be very cold to ride home without your clothes,” Bigoata said and chuckled with his partner.

  “Ride out of this country,” Slocum said. “They don’t leave, they’re marked men. Bald heads. They’ll have gotten their only warning.”

  The men nodded that they understood. The four mounted up and headed for where Montez figured that Bixby would post the first of his guards.

  From a ridge, Slocum eyed the windmill with his telescope. At first he could see nothing, but then a wisp of smoke gave away the lookout.

  “They’ve built a fire to keep warm,” he said and handed the glass to Montez bellied down beside him.

  “I can’t believe that,” Montez said, handing back the glass.

  “These are not the toughest gunfighters, or the smartest,” Slocum said, and they headed for their horses. Montez felt they could ride in closer, before going on foot the last part.

  A half hour later, Slocum could smell the smoke and hear the men’s voices from where he rested in a dry wash. The other three were working in from the far side. He drew his gun and scaled the side of the wash. He went in a low crawl toward the cedars that separated him from the guards. Wind in the evergreen bows covered most of the sounds they would make approaching the two.

  “Hands in the air!” someone shouted.

  Slocum was on his feet and around the cedar. Both guards had their hands up. Bigoata held his pistol on them and Montez was disarming them. Rafael brought in their horses.

  “Start undressing,” Slocum said and he nodded in approval when Rafael removed their rifles, then checked their saddlebags for more weapons.

  “Undressing?” asked the black bearded one in disbelief.

  “Get your clothes off,” Slocum ordered.

  “What you going to do to us?”

  “Get undressed or we’ll undress you, and we ain’t easy.”

  “What you going to do with us?”

  “We’re going to strip you bare naked, shear your ha
ir off and then give you a horse to ride out of this country on. We ever see you anywhere near here again, we’ll shoot you like a damn dog.”

  “Hell,” the tall one swallowed hard, “I’d get the hell out of this country in my clothes and never come back.”

  “Naw, you’d go running to Bixby and be right back running off these folks’ cattle. Get undressed and then sit on the ground. You’ve got a haircut coming.”

  “Sonsabitches—”

  Slocum stepped over and jerked open the bearded one’s shirt, jammed it off his shoulder and drew him up close with a fist full of his underwear. “Listen real good. You want to fill a buzzard’s gut, you keep talking big. I have no reason not to kill you right here and now.”

  “All right.” The man hurriedly shed his clothing, and Rafael stepped in and began clipping the tall one’s hair. He winced a few times but sat on the ground huddled up, hugging his arms about him and shivering in the wind. The haircut complete, the bearded one knelt down and Rafael started for him.

  Slocum held him back for a second and pressed the muzzle of his Colt to the gunman’s skull. “You try anything, you’re dead. Hear me?”

  “Yeah.”

  He nodded for Rafael to start. The vaquero also clipped lots of the beard away. He stepped back when he’d finished, to admire his work.

  “Get on your horses. We better not see you in this country again. If you show your faces around here again, you better have a good suit to wear for your funeral.”

  “I won’t ever forget you for this,” the bearded one said, looking like a pale ghost in the saddle. Both men’s white skin shone like bleached sheets in the sunlight. Their heads showing the choppy haircuts, they booted their horses away.

  “Good job,” Slocum said as Bigoata came down from shutting off the mill. Bixby would have to send someone else back to turn it on. “Let’s ride. We need to find at least two more sets.”

  One gunman guarded the next mill. They tied him up to shear him and finally stuck the squawking, naked gun-fighter on his horse and sent him packing. They laughed for a few minutes at his indignation over their handling, before they rode on for number three.

  The next guards were cooking supper when they got the drop on them. Their boiled beans with fat pork and coffee tasted good to Slocum and his crew after they’d undressed and sheared them, and sent the naked cowhands off in the growing darkness on horseback.

  “That makes seven we’ve run off. How many hands he got?” Slocum asked.

  “He had close to thirty at one time,” Montez said. “Couple’s crippled up. Said they had broke arms and legs from falling off their horses chasing you and Pedro in the night. Doc told someone there were several bunged up over that.”

  “Two got their ears notched in San Antonio. They won’t be back.”

  “Ears notched?” Bigoata asked.

  “Two of them were following the señora around. Couple of guys convinced them to leave this part of the country. Guess they were poor learners—so they notched their ears.”

  “Whew, we are easy, only cutting their hair.”

  “All they need is a message. This time,” Slocum added as they rode in the dark for the ranch.

  “Maybe he will get desperate and raid the ranch?” Montez asked.

  “He may, but the word gets out about what’s happened to his men, he’ll have hell hiring any more.”

  “I heard he still didn’t have all his horses reshod,” Montez said with a laugh as a coyote began to wail on the ridge.

  Slocum felt good and laughed with them over the horseshoe deal. “As much work as that was, I hope it caused him all kinds of grief.” But his mind was on the warm bed and the lovely body that waited for him as he huddled in his jumper against the night wind. Be teeth-chattering cold to be out there with only a yellow slicker from behind your saddle to wear, like those gunnies they’d sheared.

  Them boys they fixed that day better have learned all they wanted to know about this range war business.

  12

  All Bixby needed was more bad news. By this time, McKlein must have back shot that damn Slocum and brought his body into town. It would be no problem to run off them Messikins without him. He’d promised that ranch house to McKlein, and trying to keep that plum from being destroyed had been the thing holding him back. His boys got too rambunctious and they’d burn her down. Damn, this wasn’t a war like the last one—and he needed McKlein to cover his ass.

  Damn near sundown, he put the pen away and rose from behind the desk. Who was out there naked in the yard? He watched them through the window. Damn, who was their barber? Hatless, they looked clipped, showing their heads to some of the other hands. What was going on? He could hear some of them laughing at the sheared ones’ plight.

  A big Texas cowboy wearing a towel crossed the yard. “I want my pay. I’m quitting.”

  “What the hell happened to you today? You’re supposed to be guarding a mill. What’re you doing back here?”

  “I got a gun stuck up my ass by a white guy and three greasers. They sheared us, stripped us naked and then disassembled the windmill. Give me my money.”

  “A couple of wetbacks jump you and you’re running away?”

  “Wetbacks, hell, they was toughs and I ain’t too sure they wasn’t the same ones notched old Taker and Nichols in San Anton. My money please.” He held out his calloused palm for it.

  “What did they tell you?”

  “If we didn’t leave the country, they was cutting our balls off and notching us next time they caught us. Said that’s why they sheared us, so they’d know who they’d warned.”

  “Bullshit! They can’t—”

  “Pay me, Bixby. I ain’t going to be here for it.”

  “I’ve got a howitzer ready that will send them on the run pissing in their pants.”

  “Listen, I ain’t pissing in mine again. Pay me.”

  He paid off five hands that evening. Didn’t need them anyhow. He hoped he had the parts to repair the mills. He’d send some real guards out in the morning.

  A windy morning the next day, he crossed the yard into the face of it. He looked up and saw two riders in the dust. No, three. They weren’t his crew—then he noticed the badges on two of them. McKlein’s men. Who did they have with them? Slocum? No, it was some boy.

  Bixby held his hat on and walked sideways into the blast to meet them.

  “Who’s he?” Bixby asked over the wind’s howl. Their prisoner had been shot, lots of blood on his shirt.

  “A Debaca hand named Pedro. Had a letter for some Ranger. McKlein figured you wanted him.”

  “He arrest Slocum yet?”

  “No. He had some problems about jurisdiction.”

  Bixby nodded. More damn poor excuses was all it was. “Take him to that shed over there. I’ll get some men to watch him. He may tell us all we need to know.”

  The deputy agreed and jerked the youth off the horse. They headed for the shed. Bixby went to the bunkhouse to see who he had in reserve.

  “Dun, you set up a guard detail. We’ve got a new prisoner in the shed. Do it army style and don’t let him get away.”

  “I can handle it.” Dun called to another to help him and then took off on the double.

  The kid bound to a chair wouldn’t tell them much when Bixby tried to interrogate him. He finally fainted, and two buckets of water did not revive him. Bixby left a man in charge of the shed about sundown and went to the house. More than anything he needed a drink.

  In the morning the kid would talk. They’d get tough on him if he didn’t spill the beans about Slocum’s plans. Bixby’s mind was on the girl Edora. He’d ordered her to take a bath and wear a blouse and skirt he’d found for her. She was to entertain him that evening. All this business about the horses, windmill raids and shearing his men’s heads—he had about forgot about more basic things like what was between his legs. This night he would serve her on a platter to his dick.

  The wine flowed and he made her drink it, then da
nce for him, while an old woman played a guitar. She whirled dreamlike on the tiles around the room.

  “Take off your blouse,” he said, anxious to see her firm breasts move with her steps.

  When she hesitated, he waved his hand at her to hurry. “Undelay!”

  Soon she stepped to the music, and her pointed breasts shook with her every move in the half light of his room. One day, the Debaca woman would do this for him. Damn, he could hardly wait. He had expected her to be his long ago. Ever since he paid McKlein the money for the back-shooter who killed her husband. He did that job right anyway.

  “Now the skirt, my pretty one.”

  She nodded that she heard him and began to untie the strings at her waist. The garment slipped away and he watched her beautiful legs leap and twist. Her tight ass reflected the candle’s light . . .

  Filled with a big need for her body, he rose and went to her. He swept her in his arms like he would the Debaca woman.

  “Keep playing,” he said to the old woman. It would be bombs away when he sent his cannon up there. That Slocum would wish he’d never accepted the job with her. He shed his pants and climbed on Edora as he would someday climb on that Debaca bitch’s ass.

  “Here,” he grunted and shoved his big sword into her.

  13

  They rode in after midnight, calling out to the guard before they entered the gate.

  “Come on in. Slocum, you better check on things. An hour ago, the señora’s gray horse returned with no rider,” the guard told them, standing on the wall in the starlight, with a rifle in the crook of his arm.

  “The one Pedro rode out on?” Slocum asked.

  “Sí, señor.”

  Slocum only had a few seconds to consider the latest problem. Had they shot Pedro? Damn their no-good hides—

  “Oh, thank God, you’re back,” Amanda exclaimed, rushing from the main house with a candle lamp to join him. “He tell you about poor Pedro? There’s blood on the saddle, too.”

  Slocum dropped his weary frame from the horse, pulled his pant legs down to free his crotch and shook his head. They were waiting for Pedro, lying in wait somewhere out there. McKlein could not take a chance on anyone getting word to the Rangers. Not from her place at least. Bixby’d bought himself more time, hoping that if he could destroy her and the ranch, the whole thing would blow over and could be covered up. All of Slocum’s moves earlier had only made a chained dog all the more vicious. And while he might stop Bixby by stripping his men and sending them packing, McKlein had even more to lose—enough to kill over.