Slocum 428 Page 9

  It had been more than a day since anyone at the camp had heard from or seen signs of the creatures, but now it seemed they were making a comeback—and from the sounds of it, they were lining both sides of the trail.

  Only after a few hundred yards did the sledge begin to outdistance the eerie sounds. By the time the men reached the camp, the howls had become nothing but a ringing memory. And one more thing that made Slocum wonder just what he’d gotten himself into.

  16

  “It’s shaping up to be a real a corker, make no mistake, Slocum. One thing we got going for us is . . . you.”

  “Me?” Slocum stared at Ned, his confidence waning by the second. “I thought you were going out there, too.”

  “Oh, I am, but though I know these woods and this here river valley, I don’t have a clue as to how to track a man.”

  “To tell you the truth, Ned, tracking a man in the snow isn’t all that difficult.” Slocum helped Frenchy stuff the last of the provisions they’d need into the pack basket, then cinched the canvas cover down tight and gave it a few extra knots for safekeeping. It wouldn’t do to have their food spill out should he take a tumble on the snowshoes. He’d been on the things a few times in his years roving the West, but never in such terrain, and mixed with a manhunt.

  “We’ll take the black team downtrail back toward town,” said Ned. “That’s a good stretch. I’m hoping he’ll be somewhere along there, maybe the boys missed him the first time through. But you know what my old father used to say about hope, don’t you?”

  “I have no idea,” said Slocum, “but I’m beginning to see why you and Jigger get along so well.”

  “Who says we get along? I can’t stand the man.” Ned laughed. “But then again, he probably can’t stand me either. Heh heh.”

  “So what did your father used to say?”

  “Oh, about hope? He’d say, ‘Hope in one hand, fill t’other with rocks, and see which fills up faster.’”

  “I think I would have liked your father.”

  “Nah, he was worse than Jigger.”

  “Oh, I see.” Slocum couldn’t help smiling. “So are we ready then?”

  “Yep, the boys’ll have the team watered and fed and rigged. Anson will man the team—that way he can bring them back here if need be. Or on to town, and we can hoof it back.”

  On their journey down the mountainside, they took the same primary log-driving trail that Slocum had used to get to the Tamarack.

  As they slid downtrail, the horses, while not the match of Jigger’s Belgians, were powerful pulling beasts, up to the task of hauling loads of logs a whole lot heavier than three men and a bit of gear. The wind came directly at them, funneled through the trough the road had formed in the vale of pines. Slocum felt its cold sting on his cheeks, just above his beard. He kept his mouth clenched tight, but soon he had to rewrap the wool scarf he’d been wearing nearly around the clock, so cold and biting had the temperatures become.

  “We’re coming close to where the boys say they backtracked and claim they saw sign in the snow as if Jigger had stopped—or someone had stopped the team. I dunno, all we can do is try.”

  Slocum nodded. “It’s as good a place as any to start. We need to get cracking, because nightfall is coming—and sooner in the mountains. And this storm, as you say, is fixing to be a doozy. Once the snow starts for real, following any tracks will be that much more difficult.”

  But it was still another mile or so until they spotted the “corner boulder,” as the men referred to it, because the big gray stone marked a turn in the mountain trail. As Anson slowed the team to a halt before the rock, Slocum hopped down onto the packed road surface. Following each snow, Jigger sent a team of horses and men to drag a snow roller along the surface of the trail to help keep it passable by packing the fresh white stuff atop the old.

  It worked pretty well, and the newest skin of snow provided Slocum with a fresh set of confusing tracks. As he bent low to study them, he noted a number of what appeared to be huge wolflike tracks, as well as men’s boots and horse prints. Then farther off to the side of the trail, the uphill, mountain valley side, he found snowshoe tracks, made by at least two men, perhaps three—it was difficult to tell, as they were hampered by new falling snow.

  “We best get going,” said Slocum, pointing into the woods. “Tracks lead that way and there’s no time to lose.”

  Ned nodded and cupped his hands, yelled back to Anson, waiting at the sledge twenty feet away. “Give us ten minutes. If we don’t return, you best head back.” He turned to Slocum with raised eyebrows, as if to have Slocum verify what he’d just told the young logger with the team.

  “That sounds fair,” said Slocum, and Ned turned back toward the waiting teamster for confirmation. The man waved back and gave a vigorous nod.

  Slocum bent close to Ned’s ear and said, “These tracks weren’t made by one man. There were at least two, and on snowshoes. I may be wrong, but all sign points to Jigger having been taken.”

  “Hellfire!” said Ned. “And I bet I know just who’s behind it.”

  “It wouldn’t be that Whitaker character, would it?”

  “The one and only. I’ll fill you in on more about the situation later. I expect you’ve been kept in the dark long enough.”

  Slocum wanted to say, “Mighty big of you,” but he held his tongue. Maybe they all had good reason for being secretive. Maybe it wasn’t anything more than loyalty to Jigger and a respect for keeping the man’s affairs private. It didn’t really matter to him just now so much as wanting to do all he could to make sure Jigger and his captors, if that was what the situation was, were tracked and found. And fast.

  As if to punctuate that thought, a stray, bold gust of icy wind snaked in from the road and buffeted the two men. It pressed their heavy wool mackinaws tight to their backs, made them pull their collars tighter around their faces. Slocum finished strapping on his snowshoes, checked that Ned had done the same, then led the way, bent forward to the task at hand.

  Slocum hustled, making as much time as he could following the tracks before he lost light and the tracks to snow. He had no worries about Ned keeping up with him, as the man spent a good deal of time in the contraptions. Slocum was pleased to note that he himself kept upright and didn’t falter too much. The trail was easy to follow, but dark was descending.

  Soon the hidden land sloped upward and their pace slowed. He gazed farther upslope and saw that their trail cut switchbacks up a steep rise out in the open, some of it uncovered with snow, the white layer having slumped to reveal a talus slope beneath. That gave the pursued away. Slocum had seen such indications plenty of times. Without weight such as from a sheep or a man to undermine the snow, it was unlikely that the layer would have slid of its own accord.

  He nodded toward the slope and Ned returned the nod, no doubt seeing the same thing. But then Slocum could see that the trail cut up and over the ridge.

  “What’s beyond that ridge?”

  Ned rubbed a mitten over his beard, softening the ice crystals formed there. “Got a boulder field there, then she picks back on up there where we can’t see, with trees and such.” He reached for his pipe, but he’d tucked it away in an inner coat pocket when they’d begun their trek. He grinned. “Habit.”

  Slocum nodded, then having caught his breath, he plunged on ahead. Had to make time before the light dwindled. He wasn’t worried about himself and Ned—they had plenty of provisions and Ned was a savvy woodsman—but what happened to Jigger? And why?

  They managed to make it to the top of the scree slope, and once they broke out of the tree cover, they gained visibility. The snowshoe tracks, three sets for certain, continued down the other side and on up to the next.

  Slocum sped up his pace and just behind him he heard Ned shout, “Easy does it, boy. You snap a leg out here and—”

  That was all Slocum heard, fo
r a gunshot ripped the darkening, lead gray sky. It had come so close that Slocum heard the buzz as it sliced the air by his head, felt the very movement of air. Instinct caused him to turn, hunching low, a reflexive move honed from years of trailing and tracking and being trailed and tracked himself. He noted with eye-blink speed that his sleeve now bore a smoking gash. He felt no sting, so he knew it was only his woolen coat that had been grazed.

  But not so with Ned. He had stopped speaking so abruptly because he had taken that bullet smack-dab in the middle of his forehead. Slocum had no time to do anything more than drop to his knee, crouching low over the older man, hoping against hope that the shot hadn’t been fatal—perhaps he’d been somehow miraculously grazed? But his gut knew better.

  He had no time for more such thinking because a second, then a third shot whipped in low, spanged off jagged rubble around him. He grabbed Ned by the lapels, shouted, “Ned! Come on, man!”

  No response, but Slocum hadn’t waited for one. He grabbed the front of the man’s coat tighter and hurled them both downslope. They tumbled, side over side, Slocum doing his best to hug tight to the man he’d come to regard highly, even in the short time he had known him.

  His goal was a large crag of rock twice the height of a man and three times as wide at the base. This, he hoped, if he had judged the direction from which the bullets had come, would provide protection from the shooters, if not protection from the wind. Anything was possible, but that would be too much to hope for.

  First, though, they needed to make it down there in one piece. They tumbled like rag-doll men, legs and arms akimbo, slamming into the slope, collecting snow, and jamming into rocks, before finally colliding with the leading edge of the ragged boulder.

  Slocum lay still for a moment, his breath coming in short, gagging gouts. If the bullet hadn’t killed Ned, then the tumble surely did. It sure as hell hadn’t done Slocum any good, of that he was certain. As rough as it had been, as he began to move, he didn’t sense any broken bones. He knew he’d be covered in welts and stiff as a board the next day. But it beat being dead.

  “Ned?” He held the man’s coat by the front once again and, kneeling, raised the man up in front of him. Aside from a fresh cut on the man’s cheek, there was no change, and now Slocum could see with certainty that the shot had killed the man instantly, coring right into his forehead as it had. A small blessing, he thought as he lowered Ned to the ground.

  Judging by the fact that the shooter hadn’t cranked off another round, Slocum guessed they felt they’d accomplished their task and either scared him off their tail or shot them both. Either way, he figured he was in a world of hurt. Whatever had happened to Jigger—and he presumed the scrappy little man was still alive, because of the three sets of snowshoe tracks—he couldn’t worry about him now.

  He hoped that he was out of the shooter’s sight, because with this weather coming in, he had to make a fire, or strap on a pair of angel wings himself. And as cold as his face and hands and feet were, and as chattery as his choppers were, he had no intention of giving in so easily. He’d make a fire close to the rock face, hunker in, and kill anything that came close. But first, he thought, as the mountain night closed quickly, he’d have to figure out how much of their goods from the pack baskets had spilled out onto the snow on the way downslope.

  He knew he had lost a snowshoe, and he’d heard a lot of loud clattering—he hoped it hadn’t been his rifle snapping in half. But beyond that, he had no idea what sort of shape his gear was in.

  17

  “Well, if it ain’t John Slocum, the dandiest limbin’ logger this trapper woman ever has clapped eyes on.”

  From his dark spot behind his guttering fire, Slocum breathed a low sigh and eased back on the hammer. “Hella. What brings you out on a night like this?”

  As he waited for her to approach, he thought, How much do I really know about her anyway? For all he knew, she could be the one who’d made off with Jigger, could be the one who’d drilled Ned and tried to kill him, too.

  She must have sensed his hesitation, because in a low, less playful voice, she said, “I saw the men you’re tracking. I saw what they did, saw your tumble, too. I’m surprised you’re still able to function. I was too far off to be of use. Until now.”

  “Who says I can function?” he said, not quite ready to reveal all his cards to this stranger—even if she was a handsome one.

  “Your friend, Ned, the old logger. They kill him?”

  “Yeah. At least he didn’t suffer any. It was a quick, clean shot.”

  “I remember him well. Kind man, from what I could tell.”

  Slocum could hear a tinge of sadness tighten her voice.

  “Yeah, nice fella,” he said.

  “He was McGee’s right-hand man, wasn’t he?”

  “Yep.”

  “Okay, John Slocum. Just to prove I am what I say, I’m coming in, both hands up, rifle uncocked, gripped high on the barrel where I won’t be able to make any fast moves. Got me?”

  Slocum thought for a half beat, then said, “No, don’t give up your piece—those backshooting bastards might be watching.”

  He heard her sigh. “John Slocum, as I said, I saw them. And they’re long gone. If they were still watching, you wouldn’t be listening to me talking right now because I wouldn’t be talking right now. At least not to you. I’m not dumb enough to walk into a firefight uninvited.”

  Slocum smirked—she had a point. “Who would you be talking with, then?”

  “Oh, I expect I’d be sitting alone in my cabin, thinking up some way to amuse myself.”

  “Must get lonely,” he said as she came up to the fire and knelt on the other side, her hands extended out over the flames.

  “Yep,” she said.

  In the low, flickering light, she looked even prettier than he remembered. Either that or the weather was already playing tricks on him. He leaned forward. “You said you saw the men I’m tracking. How many were there?”

  “I expect you know the answer to that, but I’ll indulge you. There were three. Two goons who work for Whitaker, near as I can figure, and they had Jigger between them. From a distance it looked as if he took a nasty knock to the bean, which would explain why he was so quiet. From what I know about Jigger, if he was being hoo-raahed or corralled by anyone, he’d be livelier than a scalded cat and twice as loud.”

  Slocum nodded, appreciating the information, but wanting more. “You know which direction they headed, so point it out to me. I might be able to gain on them tonight before the snow piles up much more.”

  She snorted. “You have to be kidding, Mr. John Slocum. This storm? You’d be lucky to make it over that next rise without dying of frostbite. Or getting addled and turned around five times.”

  “I have to do something. They killed Ned, they have Jigger, for what reason I’m still unsure of, and they tried to kill me.”

  “I know all that. But take it easy. I happen to know where they’re going. I also happen to know that once they get there, they won’t be going anywhere for a couple of days.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “Because they’re headed to a line shack trappers use—sometimes I use it when I’m feeling too lazy to head back to my place.”

  “How do you know they’re going there?”

  “Because I was there a couple of days ago, checking on things. I knew a storm was coming in soon and I always make a point of checking on it before the big snows barrel in. I noticed it had been stocked up with all sorts of things I wouldn’t have put there, and I’m pretty much the only trapper left up here nowadays anyway. So when I saw those men with Jigger today making a beeline in that direction, I figured I knew where they’d end up. I never expected to see them, let alone to see them shooting at someone fogging their backtrail. And that turned out to be you and poor Ned.”

  Slocum was about to res
pond when she spoke again. “I was too far away to help. Or I would have, I hope you know.” She looked up at him, her eyes shining with tears that he was sure she wouldn’t let flow. “I would have dropped them in their tracks.”

  “I know it, Hella. And thanks.”

  She straightened. “Now that you know it would be a fool’s errand to head out after them in this storm, and in the dark, let’s get out of here.”

  Despite the situation, Slocum laughed and stood, wincing as he felt the first pull of what he knew would be many knots and aches. “Just where do you propose we ‘get’ to?”

  “My cabin. It’s a whole lot closer than the one they’re headed for, and a whole lot warmer than this damn rock you’re huddled under.”

  “I’ll need to bring Ned.”

  “We certainly can,” she said. “But we’d only have to bring him back this way once the storm passes, which might be tomorrow, might be in two days.”

  “I don’t want any critters after him.”

  “Not much worry of that. Only critters foolish enough to be out here in this storm are humans. We’ll bundle him up, leave him laid out here in the lee of this rock. I’d only have to do the same at my place.”

  “Fair enough,” said Slocum, not having to think too much about it. They readied Ned’s body, knowing that when they returned to bring him to town, he’d be stiff as a log himself. Then Slocum made one good pair of snowshoes out of the three shoes left, shrugged into his pack basket, hefted the other, and they headed out. Hella led the way, a rope tied to her waist trailing back a few yards to Slocum’s belt, where he’d tied his end.

  “I know the way in the dark,” she shouted into his ear.

  “Good thing!” he replied.

  Once they stepped away from the boulder, the storm drove at them like a fist, blinding and incessant in its attack.