Slocum and the Hellfire Harem (9781101613382) by Jake Logan Page B

afterward, all was still. The sun soaked into everything, driving even the buzzing heat-loving insects to silence. Slocum finished wrapping his kerchief tight around his leg to help slow the bleeding, and wished he had his saddlebags at hand, and especially that flask-size bottle of bourbon he kept secreted in there, mostly for mornings when the campfire was slow to catch and the temperatures were still too nippy.
    He wormed himself into a more comfortable position, then lay low, hat pulled down, leg throbbing like a locomotive churning at the station just before a journey. Waiting out your enemy was the only tactic he’d ever found effective against gun scum. He only hoped he had enough wherewithal to wait out old Red Shirt. This was one wily and patient man.
    At least I don’t have to worry if the woman has gotten herself shot, he thought. I’d surely have heard that racket.
    Time passed slowly. Slocum would occasionally hear a horseshoe strike stone, and knew the Appaloosa was well, if fidgety. He heard nothing of the woman and had grown increasingly worried. Maybe she had taken a shot after all. From all meager indications, Red Shirt was a decent shot. He figured the better part of a half hour had passed and he knew he couldn’t sit there and bleed to death. He had to do something. He bent low and craned his head, close to the ground, around the far right side of the bottom-most boulder he’d been hiding behind. No sign of that red garment.
    He pulled his head back, turtle-like, and another shot spanged off the rock close by, sending a spray of slicing chips at him. He covered his face with his forearms, but the rock fragments cut his arms and showered all around him. Enough was enough. Even if it was Tunk and even if he did know Slocum was tailing him, which he’d thought was all but impossible, Slocum had to end this thing.
    â€œHey!” he shouted in a voice lower than his normal tone. Just in case he was still clueless, it wouldn’t do to have Mueller recognize him. “You there, in the red shirt!”
    The paused was long enough that Slocum thought for sure the man wasn’t interested in a parley. Then the man’s voice barked, “Whatta you want?”
    Could well be Mueller. Sounded a bit like him, but it was raspy and frenzied, hard to tell. “I want to know why you’re shooting,” said Slocum. “I’m just passing through—no call to shoot at me.”
    â€œI didn’t shoot at you, I shot you. I seen it. And you ain’t alone.”
    Slocum shifted, hoping to catch sight of the man. He grimaced as fresh arrows of pain lanced up his leg. He had to get up soon or he’d be too stiff to do much of anything except lie here and get blood poisoning. “You sound distrustful,” he shouted back. “Like you’re a wanted man.”
    Another long minute passed and Slocum was about to raise the stakes and start firing, anything to distract the man and give himself a chance to stand up, when he saw a quick burst of smoke rise up where before there had only been light smoke wafting from the man’s campfire—but this was the fast rising, billowing sort of smoke you get from a doused fire. Something was about to happen. And it did—within seconds, Slocum heard hoofbeats receding. He risked another glance around the rock. Sure enough, through the trees he saw a red shirt moving away fast, on horseback. On one of the Monktons’ mounts, he bet, damn him. Slocum felt sure that it had been Tunk Mueller, though why the man had chosen to stop here was beyond him. He should have been well past this point by now. Unless he truly hadn’t expected to be tailed.
    Great, thought Slocum, now he’ll be tipped off and will move faster and with more caution than before. And I’m slowed up with a grazed, bleeding leg.
    Using his rifle and the rock, he managed to get his feet under him. A wash of hot pain rose up from the