Slocum's Breakout - Jake Logan [20]
Still, Slocum had ridden with worse in his day. Bloody Bill Anderson and his commander, William Quantrill, had been conscienceless killers. Anyone wearing a blue uniform was fair game, no matter their age. That had gotten Slocum gut-shot and left for dead when he refused to kill Yankee sympathizers in Lawrence, Kansas, who were as young as eight years old. But compared with the killers serving with Quantrill’s Raiders, José Valenzuela was a babe in arms.
“Something’s wrong,” Slocum said. The uneasy feeling grew. “Where’re the horses kept?”
“On the other side of the house, but do not worry about that, John. Come, let us—”
Slocum shook his head as he drew his six-shooter. Something felt wrong. He had survived during the war by listening to this inner voice. Sometimes it whispered; other times it screamed. Slocum was almost deafened by it now.
With Conchita trailing behind, struggling to get her blouse pulled up over her shapely shoulders, Slocum rounded the house and saw the crude corral.
Empty.
“José’s gone,” he said.
“There is nothing to worry about. He will be back soon. I know it.”
Slocum ignored her and went to the house. He pushed open the front door with the toe of his boot, then edged into the dim interior. Calling out wasn’t too smart; Slocum went to the bedroom door where the elder Valenzuela had been on his deathbed.
Had been.
The room was empty. The bed was neatly made and might not have been slept in recently.
“Both José and your pa’re gone,” he said. Slocum turned to face Conchita, who stood with a curious expression on her face. It was a mixture of anger and confusion. “Where’d they go?”
“I . . . I cannot say. Perhaps José took him to a doctor. Our father. To a doctor.”
“Why’d he do something like that if the old man was dying? The time’s past for giving him a tonic or some other medicine.”
“José knows so much more than I do, than our papa does. He might have seen and known the right place to go.”
“You’re lying. Where are they?”
“You cannot call me a liar! I will not stand for it. You get out. Now. ¡Con veloz!”
“So I get your brother out of San Quentin and you run me off?” Slocum reckoned he had gotten paid out in the shed, and there had been so many times prior to him agreeing to carry out her crackbrained scheme, but it hardly made up for a week in solitary confinement in the bowels of the prison. He had been tricked before and likely would be again, but he felt angrier at himself for letting this pretty muchacha dupe him so easily.
Rather than leaving as he was told, Slocum went into the bedroom and began rummaging about. He had no idea what he was hunting for. There wouldn’t be any money to recompense him for all he’d been through, but he wanted more to find something that would tell him where José and his father had gone. They had left almost immediately after Conchita had lured him out to the shed, so they had been planning something. He wanted to know what it was.
“Get out!” Conchita cried. “You cannot rob us!”
“Wasn’t planning on that. I want to know what you and your family are up to.” He found a small metal box. Using the butt of his pistol, he knocked off the small lock and dumped the contents onto the bed. A few coins and a sheaf of papers comprised the entire contents. He left the coins and pawed through the papers. There were maps and scribbles in Spanish that he didn’t understand.
“Tell me what this means,” he said, holding out one map for Conchita, but she had disappeared. He stuffed the paper into his pocket and strode into the main room. The sound of a horse got him moving outside in a rush. He saw Conchita riding bareback on the horse that had so reluctantly pulled the buggy. He took a couple steps in her direction, but the dust cloud obscured her direction when she got to the nearby road.
He took off his hat and slapped it a couple times against his leg to dislodge some of the dust. Then he began walking, fuming as he went. He hadn’t even come out of this ridiculous failure with a horse, even a swaybacked nag hardly up to carriage