Slaughter's Way (A J.T. Edson Western) Page 3

  “Just ate,” Slaughter replied. “Come down to talk with the boys. Say, you make sure the chuck wagon and bed wagon are ready to roll, you hear me now?”

  “Ah hears you good, boss,” Coonskin agreed. “You-all sure you don’t want no breakfast?”

  “Nope.”

  With a sniff, Coonskin turned and disappeared into the sacred ground of his kitchen. Sure Mrs. Slaughter was a real nice lady who always had a friendly word for a man, and never thought to come in his kitchen prying around. She even asked his advice and swapped recipes with him. But it sure didn’t seem right that Massa John should be deprived of proper victuals. Anyways, once they got on the trail, Coonskin would be able to put things right.

  “Tell you, Mr. Earp,” the Negro said to his unusual pet as it lay curled up under a table by the stove. “We’ll soon feed Massa John up again and set him up until the next time we goes on a drive.”

  Not knowing of his cook’s thoughts, Slaughter got down to business. Gathering the cattle would not be difficult with experienced hands such as the J.S. crew. The spring round-up had not long been over and his cattle would not have split up into small foraging groups for the grass was good and cows tended to hang together as long as they could. So Slaughter’s men would collect the small, scattered herds, bring them together on the flat open plain down by the lake a mile from the main house and cut out the required number of beef steers needed to fill the contract.

  To avoid possible misunderstandings, Slaughter decided to gather the stock grazing in the area through which Chisum would drive his herd. Naturally he would start his men gathering on the southern range for the Long Rail’s herd came up from the south. Even with good hands driving the herd, Chisum was unlikely to make more than ten miles a day, so it would be two days at least before he crossed the J.S.’s south line. By that time Slaughter’s hands would have moved all their cattle from the lower ranges and could keep ahead of the advancing trail herd.

  Quickly and concisely Slaughter gave his orders to the men. Not that they needed long-winded explanations for each of the fifteen regular hands was an experienced cowhand and knew his work.

  While the hands ate their breakfasts, Insomny Sam, the nighthawk, aided by the day wrangler, Young Sandy, brought in the remuda, driving it from the range and into the big corral before the bunkhouse. Sandy was a tall, skinny youngster learning to be a cowhand while working at the menial task of wrangling horses; and living for the day when he made a hand, was given his own mount—few Texans used the word “string” for their allotted work horses—and was allowed to handle cattle. Bounding from his old horse, Sandy ran towards the gate of the corral and prevented any of the remuda breaking out again. His heart was full of joy for his hero, Texas John, had said he could go along with the trail herd to Fort McClellan.

  Insomny Sam was a short, spry, leathery old-timer with a whiskery face and an aged hat that conservative opinion stated weighed a good two pounds heavier than when new and could be smelled across a wide room, but in the tradition of the true Stetson had weathered many a storm, lost any trace of its original color, yet still maintained its shape. He had ridden in Ole Devil Hardin’s Texas Light Cavalry during both the Texas War of Independence and the Mexican War, and profanely asserted that had he been in the outfit during the War Between the States it would have been Grant who handed his sword to Lee at the Appomattox Court House. At some time in his past Insomny had heard of insomnia and decided he suffered from it. So he retired from being a cowhand and became Slaughter’s nighthawk, handling the remuda or other chores during the dark hours and catching up on his sleep in the daytime.

  “Wish them yahoos’d hurry up,” Insomny complained. “Ain’t nothing worse for my insomny than gitting sunlight on the eyeballs.”

  “They’re coming now,” Sandy replied, watching the cowhands burst from the bunkhouse and head towards the corral. He gave a sigh and thought ahead to the day when he would be one of those happy-go-lucky hands instead of a danged, no account wrangler.

  Carrying their ropes, the cowhands approached the big corral and climbed on its rails. There were getting on for a hundred horses in the corral, for each man had a mount consisting of a couple of circle horses, used for covering the distances when gathering in cattle on a round-up and general work which did not call for special training, a cutting horse, one trained for roping, a night-horse and two or three younger animals in various stages of training as well as the man’s personal horse. Apart from his personal animal, the rest belonged to the ranch. On being hired, a hand was shown his mount, but the boss did not insult his intelligence by offering advice about the nature of the animals for to do so would hint at a lack of confidence in the hand’s ability. While he worked for the ranch, the hand kept his mount. If the boss changed a horse allocated, the hand knew he was being given a hint that his presence was unwelcome and that he should quit.

  On arrival at the corral, each man had to decide which of his mounts best suited the first stage of the day’s work, spot the selected horse among all the others, then catch and saddle it.

  To avoid spooking the remuda and tiring the horses before the start of the day’s work, the cowhands used either the hooley-ann or the overhand toss when throwing their ropes. Neither throw looked as spectacular as the whirls performed by trick-ropers in Bill-Shows, i but had the advantage of being accurate, did not scare the horses, and allowed several men at a time to be catching their horses without disturbing the remainder of the remuda.

  Man after man on the rail studied the gently moving remuda, picked out his horse, then tossed his rope, whirling it up over his head and sending the loop sailing out to drop gently over the head of the selected animal. Once the horse felt the touch of the rope, it allowed itself to be led from the corral and saddled.

  After saddling their horses, and riding out any bedsprings the animals might have in their bellies, the men headed across the range, riding south to make a start on the round-up. Pausing only long enough to tell Young Sandy where to deliver the remuda at noon, to allow the hands to change horses, Slaughter followed his men; for it was Slaughter’s way never to tell a man to do a job unless he knew he could do it himself.

  Slaughter, Washita Trace and the fifteen hands rode as a group at first, sticking together until they reached the stream which formed the ranch’s south line. At the stream Slaughter swung to the right, half of the men following him, while Trace took the rest to the left. After separating, the two parties followed the stream bank, man after man dropping out at intervals until the entire crew stretched in a long line along the banks and pointed their horses north.

  While riding north again every man kept his eyes open for signs of cattle. Once a cow, bull, calf or steer had been seen, it was gathered in, kept moving ahead of the line, being headed towards the rendezvous Slaughter selected that morning before leading his men to work.

  The hands picked up cattle in ones, twos, small herds, it made no never-mind to them. All were gathered and shoved ahead, chased out of their comfortable little niches, prevented from returning to their unhindered life of feeding and sleeping. Some of the cattle picked up would be allowed to return to the range, others were due, in the course of time, to fill the bellies of the Apaches in the hope of keeping those savage and cunning fighters at peace with the white-eye brothers and contented on their reservations.

  By the end of the first day John Slaughter was satisfied that few, if any, of his cattle remained in the lower section of his land. If Chisum’s trail hands ate beef on the J.S. range, it would come from the Long Rail herd.

  Along towards evening of the second day, Burt Alvord, working alone and driving as many head before him as he could manage, chased a reluctant steer back to his bunch. The steer took him to the top of a gently sloped valley before he turned it. On topping the valley, Alvord looked down at a fair-sized bunch of cattle grazing along the banks of a stream below him. After delivering a kick to the steer’s ribs and sending it racing back to the safety of his bunch,
Alvord stopped his horse and studied the situation. He figured there must be around a hundred head in the valley, which was more than he could manage, taken with the bunch he had already collected.

  While Alvord might lack formal schooling, he knew plenty about the ways of cattle. One glance at the valley told him those critters down below were not likely to leave in a hurry. They had food in plenty, water, shelter, all a Texas longhorn steer asked out of life in fact. Nope. He could not see them pulling up stakes and hunting a fresh home for quite a spell, certainly not before morning.

  ~*~

  Next day at dawn Alvord rode out with Tex Burton, a medium-sized, stocky young man who would act as Slaughter’s segundo and point man on the trail drive—Washita Trace was to stay behind and run the spread with a skeleton crew. The two men headed across the range and came to the rim over the valley.

  Only the hundred head were not down below.

  “Happen it was pay day I could think of an answer.” Burton grunted, but his grin robbed the words of any sting.

  “I can think of one right now,” Alvord replied, in a burst of loquacity of unprecedented length from him. “Let’s read some sign.”

  It did not take the two men long to find what they sought. They saw that the cattle had left the valley. The other signs told them enough to send them at a gallop back across the range to where Slaughter and his other men were starting to cut the gather and select animals for the trail herd.

  “Two men to help you hold the herd, Tex,” Slaughter snapped when he heard the news, “Wash, every other man, with a rifle, follow me.”

  Without asking questions, Trace led the men in a rush to the bunkhouse, for they had not troubled to bring out their rifles while working so close to home. No time was wasted, the hands left their horses before the animals stopped running and went bounding into the bunkhouse to gather their rifles.

  “What is it, John?” Bess Slaughter asked as her husband entered the house.

  “Cow thieves, honey,” he replied and walked from the hall into the sitting room.

  Putting down her brush, for she did all her own house cleaning, Bess followed her husband into the room. She stood at the door and watched him open the glass-fronted gun cabinet and take out his favorite Winchester. Opening a drawer under the cabinet, Slaughter extracted a box of bullets and stuffed it into his pants pocket.

  Bess had been married for long enough to know it was not Slaughter’s way to let folks rob him and then sit back yowling for the law to protect his interests. If somebody had driven off her husband’s cattle, he would be the one to go after the thieves and recover his property.

  “Take care of yourself, honey,” she said as he came towards her.

  Scooping his wife into his arms, Slaughter kissed her gently on the lips. For a moment his face lost its grim look and a grin creased his lips.

  “Don’t I always?” he asked.

  With his arm around Bess’s waist, Slaughter walked out of the house. He left his wife standing on the porch and went to where Washita Trace, sat a’fork the roan, held the black stallion’s reins. Taking the offered reins, Slaughter swung into his saddle and waved to his wife, then he swung the horse’s head away from the house and rode off with his men.

  Watching Slaughter go, Bess felt a little twinge of anxiety. Yet she had seen him ride off on these missions before and he always returned. When the men passed over a rim and out of sight Bess returned to the house and went on with her work as if nothing had happened.

  At the scene of the theft Slaughter halted his men and waved Burt Alvord into the lead. In later years Alvord was to become known as a murderous and unscrupulous lawman and then a train robber, but in the days when he rode for Slaughter in Texas he acted in a law-abiding manner. Alvord knew how to read sign, he could follow tracks where most men would see nothing but the ground. Not that it took a master track-reader to follow the sign left by a hundred head of cattle bunched up close to make them travel at a good speed, but there were things a good man might see; little details that could later be used in evidence. Not for a formal trial, but to satisfy Slaughter beyond a doubt who was the guilty party.

  “Three of ’em, boss,” Alvord remarked. “One rode light, one about medium and the other sat heavy.”

  That much could be learned from the depth of the hoof-prints in the ground; if a man had eyes keen enough to see it. Yet the ground was too hard to prevent even Alvord from seeing anything which might give positive identification of the horses by the shape of their hooves and shoes.

  For a time the men followed the tracks of the stolen herd. They rode in silence and with none of the usual horseplay cowhands indulged in when together. At last, after they had covered some three miles, Washita Trace brought his roan up alongside his boss’s back.

  “We’re headed for the south line,” he remarked, the direction of the tracks having enough significance for him to waste words making an obvious statement.

  Slaughter nodded in agreement, for the significance of the direction had not escaped him. Raising his right hand, he brought his men to a halt. On hearing the others stop, Alvord twisted in his saddle to discover the cause for the delay.

  “See where the tracks lead, Burt,” Slaughter called before the other could bring his horse around.

  Without a word Alvord returned to his tracking, knowing the other men no longer followed him. Slaughter might have mentioned the fact, or cautioned Alvord as to watching his step and avoiding being seen by hostile eyes, but he knew the dark young man was aware of the dangers of his work and needed no such warning.

  “Take the boys down that draw there, Wash,” Slaughter said as Alvord rode away. “Hold them there until I get back.”

  Leaving his men, and knowing they would obey him, Slaughter rode across the range in a southerly direction. He did not follow Alvord, but swung to the right of the line taken by the young scout. While riding Slaughter thought of the type of men he had seen at Chisum’s camp and put himself in the Cattle King’s place, thinking as the other would think under the circumstances. Combining his knowledge of trail driving with what he had seen of the Long Rail hands, Slaughter could make a pretty good guess at where Chisum, with his gun-handy crew, would cross the boundary stream on to the JJS range.

  Using his knowledge of the range, Slaughter reached the place he imagined Chisum would cross and came on it so as to be able to see others before they saw him. Keeping in cover, Slaughter looked down at the stream and could tell that no trail herd had crossed it that day. His caution proved its worth for soon after he arrived Slaughter saw Chisum and the Long Rail’s scout riding towards the stream.

  Just as Slaughter figured, the Cattle King headed straight to the crossing place where the stream’s banks changed from a six-foot high, steep drop and leveled down in a gentle slope to the water’s edge. Most likely the scout had been out and found the spot earlier, then went back to the herd and brought along his boss to confirm his selection. After allowing their horses to drink at the stream, Chisum and his scout turned and rode back in the direction from which they came.

  Rising to his feet, Slaughter scanned the range beyond the stream. He could see no sign of the approaching. Long Rail herd and made a rough estimation of how long it would be before Chisum’s party reached the crossing. There would be ample time for what he planned to do happen Burt Alvord came up with the right answers. Slaughter studied the ground around him, noting its physical make-up and picking out points of use to him in his plan. Already an idea had formed and Slaughter spent a few minutes tying up its loose ends. With the plan decided upon, he turned and went to where his horse stood hidden. Mounting the black, Slaughter made good time back to his waiting men.

  With his men around him, and using a pointed stick and a piece of bare earth, Slaughter drew a map of the crossing area. While waiting for Alvord’s return from the scout, he told his men of his plan and gave each his duty. By the time Slaughter had finished his explanation, a rapidly approaching drumming of hooves anno
unced the return of Alvord.

  “They crossed the river down there a ways, boss,” Alvord announced as he swung from his horse. While never a man to chatter, he knew the need for making a full report in a matter of this kind. “Kept on for maybe a mile, then stopped. The smallest of ’em rode off towards where Chisum had his night camp. Must have been there nigh on half an hour, then come back and they took the cattle down to the Long Rail’s bed ground.”

  “Then Chisum’s got our cattle, has he?” growled one of the hands.

  “It looks that way,” Slaughter agreed; “and he’s going to give them back.”

  Chapter Four – Chisum’s Bill Of Sale

  John Chisum tore down towards his halted chuck and bed wagons at a gallop. Behind him the Long Rail herd moved slowly along making for the water and he did not want any delay in moving the herd across.

  “Get them wagons rolling, blast you, Cookie!” he bellowed. “Don’t stop us.”

  Then he saw the reason for his cook’s immobility and brought his horse to a rump-scraping halt alongside the chuck wagon. Across the stream, seated in line, were John Slaughter, Washita Trace and Burt Alvord. More significant to eyes which knew the west, each man sat with a Winchester’s butt rested on his right knee, his right hand gripping the small of the butt, index finger inside the trigger-guard while the other three fingers passed through the loading lever. Men did not wait to welcome visitors to their land with rifles in their hands, and a man who knew anything about the dangers of firearms never placed his forefinger on the trigger unless he aimed to use the weapon, or meant to use it should such an action be called for.