17
Juliana walked down the store aisle trying on her new boots.
“How do they fit?” Margie asked from on her knees where she’d been assisting Juliana’s fitting.
“They’re a little tight, but I’ve been in moccasins for a year. It’ll take me some time to get used to them.”
“At least we had some different sizes in those. Most of our shoes are one-size-fits-all. You have to use newspapers to fill out the difference.”
Squatted on his heels to the side, Slocum smiled at her words. Margie might be fun to be around. Her tongue sounded honest and sharp.
Juliana told her, “I’ll take them. Thanks, Margie.”
“Good.” She rose with a slight twist and then straightened, flexing her shoulders when she stood up. “I could use a good back rub this morning.”
“Where does the line for that form?” Slocum asked, rising to his feet.
“You find it. You call me over,” Margie said, and went off to get her charge pad.
“He owes them over a thousand dollars here. I had Margie check. Heavens,” Juliana said privately to him. “I will be years paying these bills off.”
“Maybe you should see the banker, too?”
“I don’t know if I have the nerve. Lord only knows what he borrowed from the bank. What was he doing with all that money?”
“Having a high old time on your estate.”
“We better check on the bank then, too.”
Margie had returned with her receipt pad and swung back her hair. “I am so glad that you’re back. I’m so sorry that I fainted, but I couldn’t believe that he did that to you. I have know him for years. He once worked for my father on his ranch.”
“I’m learning all sorts of things he did to me and others.”
“Others?”
“I understand he kept the Woolsey girl at the house.”
“Yes, they were to be married when the courts declared you legally dead.”
“Anyway, I am certain there were others, now that I know so much more.”
Margie shook her head. “Sorry, I can’t help you. I’m either here working or at the ranch working there.”
“You need a good man.”
Hands on her hips, she surveyed Slocum and Carlos. “Which one do I get?”
Slocum held up his hands. “Excuse me. I need to get her settled.”
“I’m-I’m with him, too,” Carlos said, scrambling to get up.
“See? I can’t find a man anywhere.”
They laughed.
The three crossed the street to Texas National Bank. Carlos waited outside for them. A Mr. Cruthers invited her and Slocum inside his office. He was a slight man behind square glasses with weak-looking brown eyes and a serious set to his face. He showed them to chairs to sit on in front of his desk.
“How much does he owe here?” the man said, repeating her question. “Two thousand dollars and the interest.”
She looked shaken by the news. “What did he need that much money for?”
“Said to buy some prize brood mares.”
“I’m shocked,” she said. “My family kept their bills paid. I wonder what he was thinking about.”
“We expect, Mrs. Toby, the Hendley brothers to deliver a thousand head of your three-year-old steers to Kansas for a five percent commission,” Mr. Cruthers said. “Cattle at the Abilene, Kansas, railhead have been selling in a range from seven to twelve cents per pound. At that rate, you should have an income from the sale this summer of between fifty thousand and a hundred-twenty thousand dollars to repay these notes.”
Her tanned complexion faded and she put her hands to her mouth. “That much money?”
Cruthers nodded sharply. “Any more questions?”
“No,” she said in a small voice.
“Will you need more money to operate on before then?” Cruthers asked.
“I’m not certain, sir.”
“If you do, come see us. As you can see, we feel your operation is very creditworthy, Mrs. Toby.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Outside in the sun, she still looked shocked.
“You going to be all right?” Slocum asked.
“I’ll be fine. I never realized what this Kansas cattle business meant, nor how much money could be made. A year or so ago when all this started, and before I was kidnapped, cattle were bringing two-fifty a head if you could sell them.”
“Things have changed fast.”
“I would say so. Let’s get out to the ranch and see what a mess he has left me.”
“You want a saddle?” he asked. “I mean, I never thought about it.”
“No, I should have one at the ranch. Besides, I’ve not ridden on one in over a year. Like these boots, they’ll take some getting used to as well.”
Slocum laughed as they joined Carlos.
“What did you learn?” the youth asked.
“They aren’t about to foreclose on her place yet.”
“Good.”
“He’s teasing you,” she said. “I have a thousand head of cattle headed for Kansas. We need to pray they make it.”
“I can do that.”
“Now we’re going to the ranch and see what she has left.”
Slocum boosted her up with his hands clasped together as a stirrup.
“You ever wonder back there why Margie Pitch fainted over hearing he’d sold me to the Comanche?” She reined her horse around.
“Just thought she was shocked that anyone would do that. Why? Do you think anything is out of place?”
“I’m thinking there is more there than we know about.” She booted her pony to go. “Guess we won’t ever know, will we?”
Slocum looked back at the store. “Maybe there is a way to find out.”
The ranch headquarters looked like it was dripping in blood with the sun setting in the west. They dismounted in front of the house. Maria ran out to greet them, screaming, “The señora is alive! She is really alive. Oh, my, what a wonderful thing.”
Juliana dismounted and hugged her. “I guess he’s gone?”
“Early today. He rode in and rode out.”
“Is his woman gone, too?” Julianne asked looking around for her.
“Piper Jordan came for her a few hours ago..”
“He needs her. Is Valdez gone also?”
“Yes, and he and Señor Toby took many things with them.”
Juliana swung around to look at Slocum. “Guess we start over here.”
He had his hat off, scratching his head. “It looks all right. Didn’t burn down the house anyway.”
“But it is a mess, Señor,” said Maria. “Those men were just tramping through it.”
“I bet they were. Carlos, put up the horses and make sure that area is all right. I’ll go inside with her and see what they did in there.”
“I can handle it.” He gathered up the reins, then headed for the barns and pens.
“Should I close my eyes?” Juliana asked Maria.
“Oh, I am so sorry how things have gone here,” Maria said.
“You couldn’t stop them.”
Broken glass crunched under his soles when Slocum stepped inside the vestibule. He stopped the women. “Wait until I sweep a path inside.”
“That is not your job—”
He came back with a broom and swept the glass shards aside. The place did look ransacked. The places where pictures once hung were now lighter squares on the walls.
“Why did he take the portrait of me?” Juliana frowned at a vacant wall.
“They were like wolves in a lamb pen. Who knows why they took much of it?” Maria said, shaking her head.
“There is nothing we can do about that,” Slocum said. “Are there still people working here?”
“Some,” Maria said.
“Then ring a bell and get them up here. We are cleaning this house first. Then we will straighten out the livestock.”
“Who rode up just now?” Juliana asked.
“I’ll go see,” Slocum said.
He walked to the open front door and saw a big man whose gut hung over the Mexican saddle horn. “Can I help you?”
“Yeah, where’s Toby? He owes me six brood mares.”
“How do you figure that?”
“Who in the hell are you? I want to talk to Toby.”
“He’s not here.”
“Where did he go?”
“The sheriff would like to know that, too.”
“Mister, he owes me—”
“You got a contract or receipt?”
“You know who I am?”
“No, who the hell are you?”
“Chester Knowles.”
“I imagine with that name and ten cents, I could buy a cup of coffee in town. My name’s Slocum. Now tell me why he owes you six brood mares.”
Knowles made a scowling face. “I delivered six kegs of whiskey to a fella named Kelso Jennings for him a while back. Toby said to drop by and he’d pay me in brood mares.”
“Why in the hell did he owe the one-eyed bastard whiskey anyway?”
“How in the hell am I supposed to know? He owes me six brood mares. You going to give them to me or we going to guns?”
“Keep your hand away from that gun’s grips. Toby’s on the run and he ain’t here to pay you. Mrs. Toby is here and she ain’t buying the whiskey story. I can tell you right now.”
“Shit-fire, he said he’d pay me in them brood mares for that whiskey.”
“You’re a few days late. He came back from wherever and must have heard the sheriff wanted him and lit a shuck.”
“You mean I’m out all that money?”
“Looks like it to me unless you can find him.”
“What good would that do?”
“Damned if I would know,” Slocum said, satisfied the man had indeed taken whiskey to Kelso and not gotten paid. The way Toby did business was to charge it. But Toby wasn’t giving any whiskey to Kelso for his Indian whiskey business. Something else was going on. That worthless no-account whiskey trader—where did he fit in on this deal?