Slocum 246: Slocum and the Cattle King

Chisum stood on the porch and watched the quiet ranch hands ride into the yard. Three of the incoming horses carried bodies across them. Three corpses. Hooves splashed water in the mud holes and the somber men reined up in a line. Each was tight-lipped and grim-faced. Miguel removed his great Chihuahua sombrero and held it over his heart.

“The Apaches killed them.” He made a sweep with his brown hand to three blanket-wrapped corpses. “The Senor Tweedy, Juan Montoya’s daughter Tina, and Rudy, the boy from the stables.”

Chisum stepped from the porch. Cold chills ran up his face. At least they’d not returned his precious Juanita’s body. Was she dead too? Mechanically, he went toward the largest of the bodies to see for himself. What did Tweedy look like in death? He started to undo the knot that held the blanket wrap.

“Patron, no!” Miquel said, and moved his horse closer. “They were tortured by those red devils. It is not a pretty sight.”

“Put them in the saddle shed for now,” Chisum said, and stepped back. “We must hitch a wagon and prepare to take them to town.”

“You did very good, Miguel. I want every man that can ride in the saddle and out looking for my niece.”

“Sí, patron.” And he whirled his horse around and began in Spanish giving sharp orders to the men.

Nelda came on the porch, a kerchief pressed to her mouth. Chisum saw her, and rushed to the porch stoop to stop her from coming closer.

“It’s Judson, isn’t it?” she screeched, pounding on him with her fists.

She stared in horror at the bodies as the men led them off. Her mouth wide open, the scream caught deep inside her throat. At last she made a squeaky try, but by then Chisum had her headed inside.

“Nothing we can do for him now,” he said, anxious to settle the woman down. Actually he wanted to get her liquored up enough that she could stand the fact that her husband was dead. All of Chisum’s plans were crumbling. Juanita missing—his main banker murdered by Apaches. There must be no justice in the world.

“I’ll take care of her,” Barbara offered. “You have enough worries, John.” She herded the sobbing woman into the parlor and toward the cabinet.

Good, one less thing for him to handle. He shared a silent head shake with Moore.

Chisum ducked down and looked out the north window. He could see the company flag flying and hear the rattle of the cavalry approaching. Good, maybe they could round up those redskin killers and horse thieves. And he could go look for Juanita.

They could have whisked her away to Mexico by this time. He shook his head in defeat, crossing the living room. What had taken the damn military so damn long getting there? He’d sent the boy over twenty-four hours ago. He needed a drink of whiskey, but instead he rushed out to meet the officer in charge. He also needed to control his tongue. For the moment he needed their services.

“Captain McBride, sir.” The man introduced himself from behind a trimmed white mustache. He looked like a veteran of many campaigns. Hardly five-nine in his spit-polished boots, McBride still had enough bearing and presence for a taller man.

“John Chisum.” They shook hands. The officer turned to his first sergeant. “Dismount the men and water the horses. You have enough water, sir?” he asked Chisum.

“Very good,” the captain said, and handed off his horse’s reins to an enlisted man. Then, with his gauntlet gloves, he tried to brush off his blue uniform. “Yesterday it was dust, today it’s mud. It sure isn’t likely to do much else either.”

“My report said they stole several horses.” The captain pulled off his gauntlets and tucked them in his belt. “How many?”

“Close to two hundred,” John said. “But they murdered the Santa Fe banker Judson Tweedy and a domestic girl and a driver. My niece Juanita is also missing.”

“My heavens, I had no idea it was more than a mere bit of horse rustling. They killed Judson Tweedy here?” McBride looked taken aback by the news.

“No, he was en route to the construction project and they must have run into him on the raid. My men say he was tortured.”

“She’s twenty-four and left yesterday on a green-broken spirited horse. We found signs where the renegades stopped her.”

The man agreed with a grim nod. “My apologies. There have been some bronco Apaches stealing a few horses. I felt certain they had grown brave and struck you here. This is a major raid, and I need to wire the governor and my superiors to send more troops.”

Too damn late, John wanted to shout aloud at the man. Juanita could be dead by the time they fielded a force. Hell, there was nothing else he could do. Perhaps he could send for Bailey? No, Bailey had his hands full with cattle. He would handle this himself.

“Unnerved. They like myself never expected the Apaches to raid the main ranch. They have lost some people.” He started for the village, stopped, and turned back. “Austin, please show the captain and his officers the house and get something for them to drink. I will be right back.”

He arrived in the village during a fury of activities. Men were saddling shy horses. Those damn brood mares were hardly green-broken. Miquel was pointed out to him, and he hurried through the confusion as women helped the men contain their mounts to saddle them.

“Miquel, you go back and look very carefully for her. Where we saw those tracks.” Chisum wet his lips and wrung his hands to keep them from trembling. Oh, the pain he felt in his heart. A knife couldn’t hurt anymore.

“I will find her, patron,” Miguel shouted, and swung into his big-horned Mexican saddle. The gray mare ducked her head into stiff-legged bucks, and the others fanned her through the crowd with their sombreros and shouts of encouragement. Miquel soon raced to the east.

“We are headed for the main reservation. If the girl is alive, maybe we can ransom her,” McBride said.

“We know that. I can’t think of anything worse than a young woman falling in the hands of hostiles. We will do what we can.”

He watched them from the porch as they filed out in a trot. They were ill prepared to fight the desert warriors. Why, those Mescaleros could fade in and out of sight like dust devils. Then they could completely disappear off the face of the earth.

In a half hour, two rigs were pulled up to the porch. In the back of the second buckboard, Tweedy’s body rested inside a crude pine coffin. John considered the long drive—be past dark before they reached Arido. Barbara led the distraught Nelda out on the porch, and the men helped her in the backseat.

“Fine. We understand. You need to stay here and get things under control.”

“I appreciate your kindness. I feel I should go along and comfort Nelda, but Juanita—” He ran out of words, and Moore clapped him on the shoulder.

“Whatever you need,” Moore said, then climbed up and nodded to the driver to go on.

Through misted eyes, Chisum watched them head northeast and hit the fort road. This might be the final blow to his empire—his banker murdered, his niece gone from the face of the earth. Jesus, what else could go wrong?

He walked to the village, the youths had been left to tend to things for the others who had all ridden out in various directions to search for her.

“What I need,” he said, and looked around. The funeral for Tina and the boy would be in the morning. Some women were already digging the graves. All the men were gone. He felt regret about that, but there was nothing he could do at the moment.

Sancho’s wife brought out one of his good saddles and the pads from the tack room. The boy came leading a claybank mare on a long lead. Chisum recalled her—she’d come in a herd he bought out of Arizona. He always wondered if she had been stolen and thrown in. The trader who’d brought her never asked a dime more for her than the others though obviously she was well bred.

“How come someone did not pick her out to ride?” he asked, putting the blankets on her back.

“How could a ghost own a horse?” he asked disgustedly, and piled the saddle on. The mare acted very tame. Busy drawing up his cinches, he dismissed the native folklore that worried these simple people as ignorance.

He eased himself on her back and drew up the reins. “Who was the ghost who rode her?”

“Nonsense,” he said, and booted the horse southward. He needed to check on his project and the men. Perhaps Juanita had made her way there. He could always hope. When he let the mare out and she ran smooth as the wind that swept his face, he closed his eyes. Don’t let anything happen to Juanita.