First thing the next morning, Slocum walked over to the big house. As he was climbing the steps to the front porch, the door opened and Julie Townsend stepped out. Slocum stopped, surprised, and took the hat off his head.
“Good morning, Mr. Slocum,” Julie said.
“Morning, ma’am,” said Slocum. He realized that he was staring at her, and he forced himself to look down at the steps. “I, uh, just came over to have a word with Mr. Townsend.”
“He’ll be out in a moment. Won’t you sit down?” She indicated one of several chairs that were scattered around the porch. Slocum climbed the last two steps and went over to the chair to sit. He waited until Julie was seated.
“Thank you, ma’am,” he said.
“How do you like your job here so far, Mr. Slocum?” Julie asked.
“The boys are all friendly enough,” Slocum said, “and Mr. Townsend seems to be a fair man.”
“You didn’t really answer my question.”
“A job’s a job. If a man had enough money in his jeans, he wouldn’t need one.”
“So you don’t have enough money?”
“I ain’t never seen enough money, ma’am.”
“Well, Mr. Slocum, you’re certainly not going to get rich working here.”
“No, ma’am.”
The door opened again, and Old Man Townsend stepped out. When he saw Slocum sitting with Julie, he looked up a bit surprised. “Oh,” he said. “Good morning, Slocum. Don’t you have an assignment?”
“Yes, sir, I do,” said Slocum, standing up. “But I wanted to have a word with you.”
Julie stood up then and said, “I’ll just be going back into the house. Excuse me, gentlemen.”
Townsend shot her a glance, and Slocum said, “Morning, ma’am.”
“Well,” said Townsend after the door had shut behind his niece, “what is it?”
“Mr. Townsend, last night in town, me and ole Cash killed a couple of White Hat boys. Does it matter?”
“It might.”
“Well, they picked a fight with us. We was minding our own business, sitting at a table with young Monkey and that gal Honey Pot. They was standing at the bar, and they come all the way over to us to pick a fight. We told Monkey to keep out of it, and he did. Well, we whipped them pretty good, but as I was leaving the place, they went for their guns. Both of them. Me and Cash was just faster than them is all.”
“How come you’re telling me this, Slocum?”
“I thought you might want to tell us to ride on.” Slocum waited for a response from Townsend, but there was none. He continued. “Honey Pot said the White Hat is a pretty tight outfit. We might bring trouble on you.”
“You thinking you ought to run for your life, are you?”
“It ain’t that, Mr. Townsend. I don’t want to bring my trouble on you is all.”
“Slocum, go find your partner, and you might just as well bring Monkey along. Get back over here with them right away. We’ll have us a talk.”
Slocum stared at Townsend for a moment, wondering what the old man was up to. Then he put his hat on. “All right,” he said. “We’ll be back in a hurry.”
As Slocum went down the steps, Townsend stood watching him go. In another moment, Julie stepped back out on the porch and walked over to stand beside her uncle. She gave him a curious look.
“It’s started, Julie,” he said. “Do you want to catch the stage back East?”
“No, Uncle,” she said. “I’ll stick it out.”
Slocum returned, followed by Cash and Monkey. He had told them of his conversation with the old man, and they were ready for anything. When they reached the house, they found Townsend sitting on the porch alone, waiting for them. “Come on up, boys,” he said. “Have a chair and a cup of coffee.” He gestured at a table with a tray of cups and a coffeepot on it.
“We’ll hear what’s on your mind first,” said Cash.
“Well, sit down then.”
They all sat. No one said anything more. They were waiting to see what Townsend had to say. He poured himself a cup of coffee and took a sip.
“Boys,” he said, “I hired you—well, not you, Monkey. You were already here. I hired you two under false pretenses. I led you to believe that I was needing cowhands. Truth is, I thought you looked like gunslingers. That’s how come I hired you.”
“What?” said Cash, leaning forward in his chair.
“You heard me right. I’ve been expecting trouble with the White Hat outfit for some time. When I first saw you two, I was afraid that you might have come to town to work for them. When I heard you talking about looking for jobs, I made you an offer before you got a chance to go the other way.”
“You’re paying us cowhand wages,” Cash said.
“If you’ll stay on with me,” said Townsend, “that’ll change.”
Cash leaned back and rubbed his chin. “Well, now,” he said. “What about the kid?”
“He’s a cowboy,” said Townsend. “He’s no gunfighter.”
“He will be,” Cash said. “I want him with us.”
Townsend looked at Monkey. “What do you say, son?”
“I go with Cash, Mr. Townsend.”
“All right. Slocum?”
“You say you been expecting trouble with that bunch?”
“For quite a spell. Aw, we’ve had a few fights in town, but they haven’t amounted to much. Not till last night. Now, I’m afraid that it will all break loose. Well, what do you say?”
“I don’t like being suckered into a situation,” Slocum said.
“I been paying you to be a cowhand,” Townsend said. “I didn’t start that fight last night. You can ride out if you’ve a mind to.”
“I’ll stay on,” said Slocum. “At cowhand’s wages.”
“You crazy?” said Cash.
“I hired on to be a cowhand,” said Slocum. “If trouble comes, I’ll fight.”
Guy Hembree rode his horse hard, harder than he should. He whipped it up as he turned into the main gate of the White Hat Ranch, riding underneath the arched sign overhead that bore the emblem of a big Stetson, also the brand of the outfit. Guy rode hard till he arrived at the ranch house, a low, rambling building with an overhanging roof in front but with no porch underneath it. As he pounded up to the house, the door opened and three men stepped out, curious to see who was driving a horse so hard. One of the three men stepped out in front as Guy dismounted.
“What are you doing, Guy?” the man asked. “Trying to kill my horse?”
“No sir, Mr. Amos. I ain’t. I just got urgent news from town is all.”
“Well, what is it?”
“Rawls and Toughnuts’re dead,” Hembree said.
“What?”
“Killed. In the saloon.”
“Who did it?”
“I don’t know their names, but they work for Townsend. There was three of them in the saloon together. One of them just sat there while the other two done the job. To tell the truth, Toughnuts started the fight. Them two beat the shit out of them. Then one of them, he headed for the door. Rawls and Toughnuts went for their guns, but the other two was faster. Much faster. Jesus. I never seen anything so fast.”
“So you’re telling me that it was a clear case of self-defense. Is that right?” Amos asked.
“Yes, sir. I’m afraid so.”
“They were that fast?”
“Yes, sir.”
“So Townsend’s got himself a couple of gunfighters, has he? Well, we’ll see about that. Stackpole.”
One of the two men with Amos stepped up to his side. “Yeah, boss?”
“I want you to go to town. Poke around. See if you can find out the names of those two.”
“Yeah, boss.” Stackpole headed for the corral to get a horse.
“In the meantime,” said Amos, “we’ll hit them where they ain’t expecting it. Hank, you and Guy here, I want you to do a little job tonight.”
“What is it, boss?” asked Hank.
“Take a couple more boys with you. Tonight, just after dark, ride onto old Townsend’s north pasture. I know he’s got a small bunch of cows up there. There might be a cowhand or two over there watching them. Might not be. Kill all the cows and all the men you see.”
“Just like that?” asked Guy.
“Just like that,” said Amos. “Townsend started it up. Let’s get it on.”
Slim and Hoss were riding in the north pasture. They were not riding together. Slim could see Hoss across the way until the sun dropped below the horizon. Then he lost sight of him in the dark. He rode slowly around the small herd, watching for any signs of trouble. Everything was quiet. Besides that, he did not expect any trouble. There had been no rustling in the area for several years, and the trouble with the White Hat hands was all confined to fights in town. He was alert, but he wasn’t worried. He rode easy.
Hank and Guy, with four other hands from the White Hat, topped the horizon, and from their vantage point, even in the darkness, they could see both of Townsend’s riders. They stopped for a moment to survey the scene below them. Then Hank said, “Guy, you take those two with you. Go over to the left. Take out that cowhand there, and then start shooting the herd. We’ll go to the right and do the same.”
“Got you,” said Guy.
The group split up and rode off in opposite directions. Soon, Guy’s bunch was riding down hard on a surprised Hoss. Too late, Hoss jerked the six-gun out of its holster. Shots zipped past him on both sides. Three bullets hit him almost at once in the chest and belly. Hoss fell from the saddle dead. His horse fell an instant later. Then the raiders started shooting cattle.
Across the way, Slim heard the commotion. He pulled out his six-gun and yelled out, “Hoss!” He started to ride in Hoss’s direction, but then he saw the other group headed for him. He snapped off a couple of wild shots, then turned to run. He could see he was outnumbered. He had no idea what had become of Hoss. He wanted to stay and fight, but he also wanted to live. He rode hard back toward the ranch house, telling himself that he was riding for help, but knowing that any help he might get would be too late to do any good.
He heard the shots behind him as he raced away, and then he felt one bite into his shoulder. He flinched, but he kept riding. He could feel the warm blood running down his chest and his back. He felt no pain, but he felt lightheaded. He had to make it to the ranch house. He kicked his horse and lashed at it viciously.
Behind him, the pursuit stopped, Hank yelling out, “Let him go. Let’s get back to the herd.” The raiders turned their horses and rode back to where Guy and the others were still shooting the bawling animals. In a panic, the herd started to run, and both groups of raiders rode after them shooting and killing. At last they stopped. A few head of cattle had escaped the slaughter. “Come on,” said Hank. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”
Slim weakened, and he stopped kicking and lashing, and the horse slowed down to a walk. Slim sagged in the saddle. He felt like he was going to sleep. He kept telling himself that he had to keep going. He had to get back to the ranch house and tell the boss what had happened out there. He could not afford to let himself drift into sleep. He talked to his horse, trying to keep awake. At last, he was overcome. He slipped into total darkness and fell out of the saddle. The horse kept going.
Slocum went to the corral early the next morning to saddle his big Appaloosa, and he found a brown horse, saddled and standing outside the corral gate. He looked around, but he saw no rider. He walked over to the horse, and he could see right away that it had suffered a hard ride. He decided to unsaddle it and worry about the details later, but when he walked around to begin the work, he saw the blood on the saddle. “Damn,” he said.
He took the animal by the reins and started walking toward the big house. About halfway over, he could see that old Townsend had already stepped out onto the porch. As he moved closer, Townsend saw him and called out to him. “Slocum.” Slocum walked on over to the porch.
“I just now found him standing by the gate outside the corral,” Slocum said.
“Outside?”
“Yes, sir, and that ain’t all.”
He wiped his hand on the saddle and held it up for Townsend to see.
“Blood?”
“It’s blood,” said Slocum. “Whose horse is this?”
“It’s mine,” said Townsend. “I don’t know who was riding it.”
“Well, we better find out,” said Slocum.
“Shotgun will know. I’ll go get him.”
“I’ll take care of this poor horse,” said Slocum.
Slocum led the horse back to the corral and pulled the saddle off its back. He tossed the saddle up on the top rail of the corral fence. Then he started back toward the house, but he saw Townsend coming with Shotgun. He walked to meet them.
“Slocum,” said Townsend. “It was Slim riding that horse. He was out on the north pasture last night along with Hoss.”
“Any sign of Hoss?” Slocum asked.
“No,” said Shotgun.
“Well, there ain’t no other stray horse,” said Slocum.
“Let’s get saddled up,” said Townsend.
“Judging from that saddle,” said Slocum, “we’d best have someone follow along with a wagon.”