Slocum 329

The sheriff signaled for Berto to stop about twenty yards out from the body and walked up alone, casting his gaze right and left for tracks.

Two men had been camped here—Foley and probably Marcus, if Berto was right. They’d had company somewhere during the night, too. Tracks entered the camp from the east, and the rider had stopped for a spell.

Robertson quickly took the visitor off his list—temporarily, anyhow—because he’d ridden out. And Foley’s own boot prints crossed on top of the stranger’s.

The sheriff followed the prints and found a yellowish stain on the rocks, where Foley had probably taken his morning piss.

Robertson nodded. “Good. Do that, then. And make sure you’re trackin’ the right horse!”

Berto said, “It’s easy. Foley’s horse was shod with a cross bar on the left front. And I should know. I shooed him just last week.” He spun his horse and took off toward the south.

Berto was a handy man to have around, Robertson thought. Slowly, he approached the corpse.

Scavengers had already been at the body, but it was recognizable. Granger Foley, shot in the head. Likely hadn’t known what hit him. And the shot had come from up close, no more that four or five feet away.

More snooping—as his wife liked to call investigating—turned up a pair of hobbles and all of Foley’s tack. His horse had been deliberately set loose, long before Foley had even thought of putting any tack on him.

But the perpetrator hadn’t been afraid of being discovered. He’d left Foley in his blankets, made coffee—the pot was still on the dead embers of the fire—then saddled up and ridden out, to the northwest. At a slow jog.

In no time at all, Berto was back, leading Foley’s chestnut gelding.

Berto shrugged. “He was just out of sight, grazing on some of the good grama grass behind the hill over there. It was the first Mr. Judah brought up from Dragoon Springs.”

“I remember,” said the sheriff with a nod. “Judah was awful set on improving this place.”

Together, the two men folded Foley’s corpse over his horse once it was saddled and tied it down.

“I’m gonna track this other hombre,” Robertson said. “Probably the one that did the shooting. You can split off and take Foley back to the Bar C, if you want.”

Berto shook his head. “I have a feeling who did this. And a few other things, too. And he is dead. I told you. Slocum killed him.”

“Well, that remains to be seen,” Robertson said. “I’ll do the detecting, and you do the horse-leading.”

They mounted up and, with Berto leading Foley’s horse, began to follow Marcus’s trail.

“Four times!” Miranda said, languidly lying on her back and half off the bed, with her fingers brushing the nap of the rug. “That’s a record, Slocum, even for you!”

He grinned around the cigar he’d just lit. “The day’s still young,” he quipped.

She sat up and faced him. “But I’m not! You’re makin’ me older by the second, you brigand, you!”

“And I’ll still love you when you’re a hundred and fifty, Miranda, my girl.”

She chuckled. “You’d better!” Then she threw herself on his chest and began nibbling at his chin.

“Whoa up there, gal,” Slocum said, laughing. “Four times is my limit. For one morning, anyhow. I’m thinkin’ we ought to go see if Carmelita’s rustled us up some grub, aren’t you?”

She stuck her lower lip out in a pretty pout. “Who needs food when you’re here, Slocum? And when I’m rich, to boot!”

He moved her aside and swung his legs over the side of the mattress. “That may be true—I mean, that you can eat all the cash you want now—but this boy needs his lunch!”

He grabbed for his britches and pulled them on, then started a hunt for his shirt.

“Well, in that case,” she said, giggling, “I suppose we should eat something.”

“Besides,” he added, tossing her petticoat toward the bed, “the sheriff’s due pretty soon.”

Berto saw the traces immediately. They were high atop a ridge. The grass and brush behind the boulders that dotted its edge had been beaten down by quick bootsteps in some places. In, others, by the full length of a man’s body. Marcus had left his horse below, then traveled up the ridge on foot to ambush Slocum.

He saw, too, a large gush of blood, still damp enough to be drawing flies, just at the side of one of the boulders. He’d seen Marcus’s body, and immediately knew this was where Marcus had received the killing shot.

As if reading Berto’s mind, Sheriff Robertson said, “Yeah, he fell here,” and pointed down the steep side of the ridge. He stared. “Went bucket over barrel, too.”

He turned back to where Berto sat on his horse and held Foley’s. “Reckon Slocum told you the truth, all right. I can see his tracks down there, at the bottom and out a ways. He got himself ambushed, pure and simple.”

Berto allowed himself a small sigh of relief. He liked to think he knew an honest man when he met one, and Slocum—despite all those dime books, of which Berto had read a few—seemed honest.

He was glad the sheriff had seen what he’d seen, and said what he’d said.

“Back to the ranch, now?” Berto asked. He glanced up at the sun. “If we hurry, we might be in time for one of Carmelita’s good meals.”

The sheriff swung up on his buckskin. “Sounds like a heckuva good plan to me, Berto. Lead on.”

Slocum and Miranda were just sitting down to a grand noontime spread—roast pork in plum sauce, candied yams, fried potatoes, peas, and applesauce—when Carmelita answered a knock at the door.

Behind him, Slocum heard, “Ah, Sheriff Robertson! Come in, come in! You too, Berto! I am just serving lunch if you would care to—?”

“Join us?” Miranda broke in, rising. Robertson’s face lit up like Christmas. It was obvious he’d had a taste of Carmelita’s cooking before. Miranda ran to help with the extra plates.

Slocum stood up, too, and shook hands with both men. “Good timing, Robertson,” he said with a grin, and motioned to two empty chairs. “You, too, Berto. Have a seat!”

When both men were seated and served and had gotten past the first heady bites of Carmelita’s cooking, Robertson said, “Well, we’ve got a little surprise for you, Slocum.”

“We found Foley’s body out there. Well, actually, Berto here, found it on his way into town, and bird-dogged me back to it on the way out here.”

“And we found the place where you killed Marcus,” Robertson went on, and helped himself to another slice of pork. “Everything was just like you said.” He scooped extra plum sauce on it and continued, “So I wouldn’t worry none about an inquest or a trial. I’m satisfied, and if I am, the circuit judge is gonna be, too.”

Slocum nodded his gratitude. He had to. His mouth was full of yams.

“I imagine we can put off Abel till after dinner?” said the sheriff.

“Please do,” Miranda said distastefully, and put her fork down and her hands in her lap.

“Miss Miranda?” said Carmelita from the kitchen doorway, “You no like what I fix?”

“Yes, I do. Sorry, Carmelita. Just thinking about Uncle Abel again . . .”

Carmelita addressed all the men in the room when she shook her finger and said, “Shame on you! Shame on you for upsetting my Miss Miranda!”

She went to Miranda’s chair, helped her up, then walked her down the hall, murmuring to her the whole time.

“You didn’t have nothin’ to do with it,” Robertson said, cutting his meat. “It was my big mouth. Hope she don’t get the vapors . . .”

Slocum figured there was little chance of that, but said nothing. In fact, he was waiting for Robertson to ask him his side of the story. Any story. There were so many to choose from!

But he held his tongue. Or rather, he kept it tied up in Carmelita’s good lunch. The sheriff and Berto beat him to the finish, though. Robertson pushed back from the table and loosened his belt a couple of notches, and Berto belched loudly before excusing himself.

“Just a warnin’, Sheriff,” Slocum said. “If you don’t want to get your ass kicked from here to kingdom come by a couple of women, you’ll take off your spurs.”

Robertson suddenly looked guilty. “Thanks,” he said, reaching down to unbuckle the first one. “Forgot. Carmelita’s hell on wheels about that.”

“Reckon so, by this time. Hell, I ain’t been out here in years! Eight or nine of ’em, maybe. Abel didn’t like company.”

Well, he was in for it now. Slocum worked his jaw muscles once or twice, then he said, “For one thing, it’s my opinion that he killed his own brother.”

Surprisingly, he got no argument from Robertson. Instead, the sheriff simply sat there and nodded. “Wondered about that, myself. Wasn’t anything anybody could prove, though.”

“Tell me somethin’. Did Judah Cassidy die before or after lawyer Clark’s office burned down?”

Robertson looked totally lost. “Gomer Clark? How’d you know anything about Gomer Clark?”

“Miranda. Plus which, I read the original will. The copy got burned up in the fire, I guess.”

“Yeah, it did. Most of the town’s legal papers went up that day.”

“Well, I got a feelin’ that Abel Cassidy had a hand in it. Can’t prove a damned thing. But Judah left this ranch to Miranda, not Abel. Abel never did own one part of it. Just worked here as a hired hand.”

The sheriff’s jaw dropped. Slocum took advantage of the lull in the conversation to go fetch himself a cigar. He brought back one for Robertson, too.

After Robertson accepted the cigar, he said, “Can I see this will?”

“Don’t see why not. Think there are a few other papers you might want to have a gander at while you’re at it, too.”

“Fair enough,” Robertson said, and bit the end off his cigar. “This is turnin’ out to be a very interestin’ day.”