Slocum 428 (3 page)

The driven palm-to-the-shoulder did the trick and sent the buffoon sprawling face-first to the packed surface already covered with bark chunks, boot grime, churned muck, and sopping, slushy snow. The combination greased the man's sprawl and sent him skidding a good six feet before he flopped and grunted to regain his feet.

In the meantime, Rat-face had surprised Slocum—and probably himself—by howling like a schoolgirl and launching himself straight at the brawny newcomer. He made the mistake of lowering his head and making a bull run straight at Slocum. He must have forgotten what a weak man he was, for his head did indeed connect with Slocum's midsection, but as it was a plank of ribbed muscle, Rat-face's neck bent and folded under himself. He curled up like a stunned kitten, a ball of wool and quivering limbs at Slocum's feet.

His heaving chest and a strangling whimper told Slocum the man was at least alive, if not neck-broke. He toed the man onto his back and let him gasp, face up.

The lead man stood some feet away, hands on knees, heaving, blood and grit smearing his homely features, muck pasted to his shirtfront. “What did you do to him?” The bloodied man nodded toward the wreck at Slocum's feet.

“I didn't do a thing to him.” Slocum gestured downward. “He did all this himself.” He looked at the lead man. “Talented fella, isn't he.”

Slocum forgot how much vim and vigor the average logger had, and this one proved no exception. The man rose up from his bent position, a wide, bloody leer of raw rage stretched across his foul face, and he, too, ran full bore at Slocum. He wasn't as ruggedly built as Frenchy, but the man had boldness and power, and he used them in a quick combination that drove Slocum backward, catching him before he could steel himself or, better yet, sidestep again.

But as dumb as he looked, it seemed as if the lead man at least had the ability to learn from his mistakes. He anticipated that Slocum might sidestep his charge, and at the last second he altered his course, driving his left shoulder hard into Slocum's side. The blow caught Slocum off guard and drove him backward, his left knee collapsing. He hit the wet churned ground hard, sending up a spray of slush.

It took him but a moment to recover and wrap a meaty arm around the attacker's stiff-muscled neck. He wrenched it tight, made to grab his wrist with his free hand, but the man had already begun to buck and twist out of his hold.

Slocum balled his free hand's fist and drove it down hard at the man's face—not because it was the easiest or best course of action at that point, but because in the flash of a second, he'd seen the man lunging with his mouth, trying to bite Slocum's encircling forearm.

He would not abide a man who bit another man. That was child's play, not proper fighting. His fist connected hard with the man's cheek and nose, made a crunching, snapping sound as it hit. Slocum felt the nose smear sideways under his knuckle, and it felt good, considering the nonsense these jackals had doled out, and all without knowing him.

The man continued to snap his stumpy teeth, squirm, and now gurgle on his own blood, but he didn't stop his thrashing attack. He was frenzied, so Slocum gave him another hard drive to the face. This one landed above the man's cheekbone. Slocum had had enough experience in the manly art of pugilism to know that his punch had delivered the ingredients of a black eye to the rascal. He'd wake up tomorrow with a throbbing blue, purple, and yellow shiner.

That blow slowed the man's writhing to a random but weakened struggle. Soon, and with a little more help from Slocum's tightening arm, the man's thrashing all but stopped.

“I . . . gaaah!”

“What?” said Slocum through clenched teeth.

“I . . . giiiive!”

“Damn right you do!” Slocum gave him a hard thrust and rolled the bloodied and bludgeoned mess of a man from atop him, then stood, smoothing the wet grime from him. He didn't have too much more in the way of clean dry clothes in his war bag, but at least he knew where there was a hot stove.

As if beckoned, Frenchy appeared, meaty hands on his hips, apron even more soiled than it had been less than an hour before when Slocum had left him to his meal prepping chores. “
Mon Dieu!
What has happened here?”

“Ask those two,” said Slocum, nodding toward the flopped, heaving men on the ground.

“But you bested the two of them?”

“Yeah, not proud to say one of them got the drop on me, though.”

“But this has not happened before!” Frenchy sidled up close to Slocum, spoke low. “They are, how you say, bad eggs. They are not from here, but they have the ears of some of the men of the Tamarack Camp. You see?”

“No, I don't really see, but I suspect I'll get the lay of the land pretty soon.” Slocum slid off his wool shirt and shook it.

“But you don't understand, Slocum,” said Frenchy, glancing at the two men, who were just beginning to groan loudly, almost in unison, and beginning to show signs they might stand within an hour or so.

“Frenchy, pardon me for saying so, but they're the ones who attacked me, right? So why are you so afraid? Can't be you're afraid of them, are you?”

“I . . .” He looked again at the men. The skinny one fixed Frenchy with a hard stare while he gingerly rubbed his neck.

“I must go, Slocum.” He turned to walk away, then swung back quickly and said, “Tread with care, you hear me? If not for your sake, then for the sake of Jigger,
non
?” Then he headed back toward the cook shack, cutting a wide circle around the two rogues. In a louder voice, over his shoulder, he said without looking back, “You had better shape up, Slocum, and get that firewood ready, or you will find yourself without a job,
oui
?”

Well, thought Slocum, as the English girl said in Wonderland, this thing just keeps getting curiouser and curiouser. He draped his wool shirt on the jutting butt end of a log, then slipped his gun belt and Colt Navy off another log end and strapped them on. He stepped around the chopping block, keeping it between him and the two moaning men. He wasn't quite sure what to do with them, since according to Frenchy, they weren't Tamarack men. So who were they? Once they came to, he decided he'd ask, knowing full well they'd not share a thing with him. As he set to splitting stove lengths again, he ruminated on what an odd situation it was that he'd willingly ridden into.

Wouldn't be the first time, he told himself. Nor the last, he guessed.

“There was a time when I would have kicked your ass, boy. You understand me? That time has long since come and gone, though.”

That night in the dining hall, the man speaking eyed Slocum from beneath two bushy eyebrows that looked like a pair of haired-up caterpillars about to duke it out. The aging logger set down his tin coffee cup and smiled. “But I reckon I'll let you live today.”

The crowded dining hall had just about quieted down right before the old man spoke. But when he did begin speaking, the remaining din dropped to almost nothing and all of the rangy, beard-faced men swung their heads in his direction. Once he spoke, from the barely concealed smirks on their faces, Slocum knew the older fellow was pulling his leg.

Why, he had to be—he didn't look like he could do much more than rassle an unconscious raccoon. But Slocum had been in enough ranch cook shacks, dining messes, and cow camps to know about a bit of joshing of the new man in camp. And this little tirade by the old man had all the earmarks of it.

Problem was, and Slocum knew he had to temper his outlook a mite, those fellows from earlier had at first seemed like they might be up to the job of taking him down, but they hadn't. Still, he'd been the one to pay for it.

They had up and skedaddled by the time he'd returned from bringing a load of firewood to Frenchy's kitchen, so he never got the chance to quiz them about who they were working for and why in the hell they had attacked him. Though he was pretty sure it was just a case of ribbing the new arrival, Slocum was nonetheless skittish.

“What you say to that, Slocum?” said Frenchy, hauling in yet another platter of hot elk steaks, sawed off the frozen carcass just that afternoon—Slocum knew because he'd helped with the task.

He set his fork and knife down across the chipped enamelware plate, raked his callused fingers through his thickening beard. He was glad he hadn't shaved weeks back, and even gladder when he had stayed his razor hand just an hour before he found out back in Timber Hills about the potential logging job.

Not only did having a beard help keep the cold air away from his face, but showing up in camp with a decent set of whiskers made him seem less of a greenhorn to these woods-hardened men. Each one of them had been seasoned in the frosty pitch and thundering crashes of old-growth pines. They took them down with whipsaws, then stood back as the long carcasses of the big brute trees thundered down to the frozen earth, raking the hell out of anything in their path on the way down, before slamming flat anything that was dumb enough to stay rooted beneath them as they fell.

“I tell you what . . .
old-timer
.” Slocum let that remark hang in the air for a few moments. It stung the old buck—that much was for certain. Slocum flicked his eyes toward the graying gent, whose smiling face bunched into a tight pucker, his dark eyes glinting for a few seconds. Until the glances of the other men settled on him, that is. Then he let a slow grin spread wide on his face.

That was a relief to Slocum. He was tired of games today, dog-tired from having to dole out significant fisticuffs to those two morons, and triple-tired from the quantity of stove lengths he'd split all day. Even Frenchy himself had marveled at the massive mound of raw split wood Slocum had managed to get through.

“Never has no one sized it up quite so fast as you, Slocum,” the portly cook had said, rubbing his paunch with an appreciative hand, his other scratching in his beard as if looking for remnants of snacks he'd stored there earlier.

Slocum had wanted to work hard, to exercise his body, his one most reliable weapon—besides his well-oiled Colt Navy, that is. He always tried to take care of himself that way, and was rarely let down by some failing of it. He'd seen countless gunmen and ranchers, cowboys, and drifters who'd all let their bodies go to seed, who'd trusted in the powers of youth, trusting blindly that the bodies of their youth would never wane, only to be let down at a crucial moment.

And now he was dog-bone-tired and not looking for another round of fighting, real or imagined.

“I would say, old-timer, that you have the right to believe whatever it is you want. But know this.” Slocum held up a cautionary finger. “If there's one thing that many a man has tried to do, it's best me in a round of hard pit-fighting. And while some of them have done so, it hasn't been pretty for either side. Not bragging much, mind you, just a simple fact.” All the while he said this, he smirked, knowing he was teasing the old man before his cohorts, and knowing that they all knew it, too.

Slocum always tried to keep in mind one thing his long-dead father had once told him: “You can say anything you want to about anyone you want to, John, as long as you say it with a smile on your face and a twinkle in your eye. Friend, enemy, or in between, it doesn't matter much. Just have at it—with a smile, that is.”

The entire dinner, once he proved that he could take what they dished out and even dish a heaping helping right back to them, was a pretty favorable affair, all things considered. They were a bunch of good men out there to do a rough job, much the same as the men in a hundred cow camps and cow towns. For a while Slocum let himself slip into the genuineness of the camaraderie, the good-natured revelry that comes up in a group of hardworking men at the end of a long day's labors. It was a fleeting thing, he knew, just as it always was on trail drives and ranch jobs.

But he decided he would ride it out as long as he needed to. And considering the paltry state of affairs that was his wallet, he felt certain he'd need a whole lot more good days up here in the sticks just to climb back out of the money hole he'd recently found himself in. So he put up with it and soon learned about the forest in which they were working. It would be a busy winter season, made especially so by orders from the “Far Orient,” as one young bookish logger put it.

Soon the talk flowed with the hot coffee, and though a number of men broke off in small groups to head to bed, others lingered by the stove, turning occasionally to redden the other sides of their faces, playing dominoes and cards with their fellows. Around the table a throng of men stayed, eager to talk about the woods they'd spent the entire day in.

Reminded Slocum of the cowboys who would linger in a stable or leave their bedroll early just to spend time with other cowboys, watching over the herd, talking horses, comparing notes about the terrain and weather.

He also noticed that the men appeared to be split unevenly into two rough groups. One was filled with what he came to think of as the scowlers, the half of the men who didn't even bother offering him the pretense of a smile. They just sneered at him as if he were a disease-riddled bum. The others treated him with kind caution that looked to be fast breaking down into camaraderie once the conversation flowed.

It was curious and worth noting, he thought, that the men in neither group conversed much with those in the other. Not unusual in large groups of men, but given all the strangeness of the day, Slocum couldn't help wondering if this wasn't another in the seemingly unending series of oddities about the Tamarack Logging Camp.

“One thing you got to get straight in your head once you get out there,” said a young climber named Ben, “is that them trees won't do much of what you ask 'em to. Oh, they all fall if you give 'em enough strokes to the trunk. But the key is to be on the safe side of the trunk when she starts to go!” The young man thought that was about the funniest thing he'd heard in quite some time, given the guffawing ruckus he made. The other men just rolled their eyes at the young man, obviously used to his odd sense of humor.

“Pay him no never mind, Slocum,” said a salt-and-pepper-bearded man, not particularly tall or wide, but solid-looking, as if he were all bone and muscle, all hard worker. He plucked his stubby pipe from between his lips. “He's a pup, but he's good at what he does.”

That made Ben blush and seemed to Slocum as good as telling him he was full of beans. A compliment paid among workingmen often had that effect.

The older, solid man drew on his pipe, let the smoke out in a leisurely stream, then continued. “Occurs to me we haven't asked Slocum what his experience in the forest has been.”

Slocum couldn't help smiling. This was the one question he'd be awaiting, and a little surprised that they hadn't yet asked him. All eyes swung to him, even the men closer to the stove, huddled over coffee, shuffling chipped dominoes and plinking checkers, darning their holey wool socks, or slapping down pasteboard cards. All activity paused. This was their chance to hear if the newcomer was a braggart, and to hear of his experiences. Unless, of course, he
was
a braggart.

Slocum knew all eyes were on him, so he chose his words carefully, chewed them like a good steak before speaking. Finally he said, “I don't have as much experience as most of you. But I have spent time swinging an axe on a couple of forest crews, have bucked plenty of board feet of lumber working at a sawmill, and have cut my share and then some of logs for cabins, though mostly for burning to keep ranch hands warm. No getting around that when you're working cattle country up high in the Northern Rockies. Those winters get cold.”

“Never understood why cowfolks and such think they need to spread their cattle all over hill and yon.” It was the old man again. “Keep 'em down in the low country, I say. Down where they can't bother a man making an honest living in the woods.”

Slocum bristled slightly. “You saying working cattle is dishonest?”

The old man squinted through his pipe smoke. “Now I ain't saying no and I ain't saying yes. What I am calling into question is whether it's work at all.” He drew once again on a pipe, a little too emphatically for Slocum.

Another test. But Slocum decided he'd been through enough that day and would let the old man have his fun another time. He certainly wasn't about to let the old buck goad him into a kerfuffle.

Before he could say as much, make his excuses, and head to the bunk Frenchy had assigned to him earlier, a gust of sudden wind rocked into the thick, log wall cabin, driving smoke back down the chimney. One man who had, moments before, announced he was bushed and was calling it a night had reached for the door handle when the gust hit.

The wind itself wasn't much of an event to cause concern, other than for someone to twist the damper handle on the stove pipe in an attempt to slow the backwash of smoke. But what followed it as if carried on the wind itself did raise everyone's eyebrows.

The long, plaintive wail, at once wolflike and human, did not pinch out but continued, building in depth and becoming a low guttural growl, snapping and harsh. Men from both unofficial groups whitened and widened their eyes. Slocum couldn't help feeling the same spine-freezing chill he'd felt the previous night, as if bony fingers of the long-dead were raking his backbone, tapping his scalp, ready to tighten around his neck.

The sounds dropped off instantly, replaced with another slamming gust of wind. Moments later the sounds of animal rage began again, closer to the cabin. The men were all riveted, watching the side of the cabin as if the very frosted log walls might explode inward at any second. Slocum fancied he heard footsteps crunching hard in the snow outside. He moved cautiously to the door, shucked his Colt Navy on the way, and laid a bare hand on the latch. The sounds abated and Slocum, listening to a flurry of whispered protestations, stayed his hand for a moment.

“Don't go out there, Slocum. Bad news.”

“What do you mean by that?” he said in a low voice.

“I mean, it's the skoocoom, man!”

That was what Jigger had told him earlier, and the boss man had reacted in much the same way. But the skoocoom was a fairy story, nothing more. At least that was what he had believed up until last night. Then he heard that thing, saw those green-yellow eyes staring him down from the darkness outside his meager fire's circle of light. Now he was just plain confused about skoocooms. Doubly so since it seemed these Tamarack loggers actually believed in the creature.

But now that he was faced with it once again, he was determined to figure out what in the hell it was, despite being admittedly disturbed once again by the freakish sounds.

He swallowed deep, snatched up the bail of a lantern hanging on a hook from a ceiling beam, and wrenched the door inward. He held the lantern aloft before him and stood in the doorway a moment before venturing out onto the path worn in the snow.

He heard shuffling and the sounds of chairs squawking on floorboards as men jockeyed in a throng behind him. “Hold up there,” said the thin, salt-and-pepper-bearded man behind him. “I'll go with ye. You men,” he said to the rest, “don't go locking this door now. We'll make a circle around the building then be back afore you know it.”

Slocum was relieved to have the company. The howls had stopped, but he recalled they had come from something that had drawn quite close to the side of the cabin. And since he'd never seen nor heard of anything that substantial not leaving sign or tracks behind, Slocum was determined to find evidence of it, be it beast or man.