Slocum's Silver Burden (7 page)

Slocum screamed, but the cry disappeared in the whine of the steam engine rushing past. He fell from horseback, and the mare galloped on. For a moment, Slocum lay stunned, then realized he hadn't been run over by the train. The clatter of its steel wheels already receded down the tracks as it raced on toward the Oakland depot. He flopped back and stared upward, watching billowy white clouds string out into feathery strands and then vanish, leaving behind only sky. Pure blue. Clear. Sky.

He was still alive.

Forcing himself to sit up, he held out his hands. They were steady enough. He'd had more than one close shave in his day, but this one had come closer than most. Bits of Jack's horse were strewn about where the train had struck it and severed its front legs. A frantic neighing drew his attention to the back of the clearing. Trees boxed in his mare. He heaved to his feet and spent the next half hour calming the horse from its narrow escape with death. By the time he mounted and headed back up the slope, he was once more determined to find Tamara and the silver and take them both back to San Francisco. When he reached the pass again, he dropped off his horse to check for vibrations in the rail. Only warm steel stretched under his fingers.

He led his horse through the pass and looked down the western stretch of track. He understood why the train robbers had chosen this section. Even riding down was something of a chore, but he kept the horse moving. The mare shied once or twice, forcing Slocum to look over the brink and down into the deep canyon on one side of the track. The other side presented some difficulty in riding because of the thick undergrowth and steep stone wall rising more than twenty feet above his head.

When he reached the spot where Jack had to have robbed the train, he found ample evidence of how the gang had waited in a clearing and where the tracks were newly repaired from being twisted around by a car that had run away out of control. He reenacted the robbery—where the gang had attacked, how the last two cars had been unhooked, the way those cars had rolled backward down the incline.

Slocum tried to figure out where the mail clerk had gone. The only possible direction he could have gone, unless he was one of the gang, was down into the canyon. No one survived a fall like that. He fumbled out the report and read through it again. No mention was made of recovering the body for burial. All he saw were detailed reports on repairing the track and how the next two trains from Virginia City had been delayed.

He doubted either of them carried as much silver as the shipment already spirited away. That much silver represented weeks of mining output.

Riding downhill, he finally came to a more level section of tracks. He grinned crookedly when he saw a small firepit with embers still smoldering alongside the tracks. While this might have been left by others Collingswood had sent out, he doubted it. All he saw were the tracks of a solitary horse. When he dismounted and examined the soft earth more closely, he knew he had found Tamara's trail. The small footprint belonged to a woman, not some big galoot out hunting for train robbers.

Spiraling out from the campfire convinced him that Tamara had stopped for a quick meal and to rest her horse, then had ridden westward along the tracks. He picked up the pace, sure that she hadn't veered away. The tracks were still through mountainous terrain, and opportunities for going north or south were nonexistent because of the deep canyon and the rocky walls on either side. But a few miles west, Slocum saw that he had to do some clever tracking. A road crossed the tracks and went down each of the branching canyons.

Tamara hadn't done anything to hide her tracks. Slocum took the road north. The sunbaked dirt hid any hoofprints but he had a good feeling this was the way she had gone—it was the way she read off Jack's map. An hour along the road, he heard the burbling of a creek and knew he had to water his horse. He gave the mare its head and walked alongside. As the horse drank noisily, he splashed water on his face to get off dirt and cinders. Removing the stench of burned steel from his clothing had to wait until later when he could give both shirt and pants a good scrubbing.

As he started to pull the horse away, he heard a muffled curse. His hand went to his six-shooter, then he relaxed. Staking the horse by a patch of grass, he made his way through the woods. Only a few yards off the road he found Tamara. The woman had the map pinned to the ground with four rocks and looked from it up to distant peaks and then back at the map.

He watched her for a spell, drinking in her sleek figure and the way she bent over now and again to study the map. She finally moved the map around and turned in a different direction. When she stood facing away from him, her hands on her hips and still cursing up a blue streak, he crept up behind her.

“Lose something, Miss Crittenden?”

He laughed when she jumped a foot. She half turned and caught sight of him. With a surprisingly quick move, she thrust her hand into a coat pocket. Slocum was faster. He caught her wrist and held it motionless.

“Better not come out with a gun,” he warned.

She relaxed, and he let her take her hand away. He stepped close and thrust his hand into her pocket. Pressed close, he felt her heart hammering as her breast crushed into his chest. Slocum might have fumbled around a bit more than necessary as he searched for her gun and then pulled it free. The movement of her hip through the fabric excited him, as did the nearness of his face to hers.

Tamara glared at him, put her hand on his chest, and pushed him away.

“Why did you frighten me like that?”

“I didn't want to end up with a bullet from this in my gut.” He held up the small pistol, a Colt New Line loaded with seven .22-caliber bullets. Up close it could be deadly.

“I'd never do that,” she said. “I'd aim between your eyes.”

He laughed again. Honesty appealed to him. He tucked away her gun in his coat pocket and looked down at the map.

“I saw you steal that from Jack.”

“Jackson? You're in it with him?” Tamara clamped her mouth shut and ground her teeth.

Slocum shook his head.

“You killed him? Jack's dead?”

“He resisted my attempt to take him back to Mr. Collingswood and the law for a proper trial.”

“I wondered why he hadn't caught up with me. He knows where the silver is stashed, after all. Rather, he knew.” Her despondency boiled out like heat from a fire.

“You and him?”

For a moment Tamara stared at him with her mouth open. She finally closed it to keep from catching flies. A sly look danced in her blue eyes.

“You don't miss much, do you? Did you see us in San Francisco?”

“You're quick on the uptake. That's how I got on your trail. I was on the same ferry across the Bay.”

“Getting a horse couldn't have been easy, not with only fifty dollars in your pocket.” She grinned. “I know what was in the envelope Mr. Collingswood left on my desk for you.”

Slocum didn't bother telling her he was robbed before he got on the ferry. He had done well enough since, though the close call getting run over by the locomotive put that in question.

“Where's the silver?”

“Jack told me they split it up, the four of them. Each took as much as he could load onto his horse.”

“No wagons?” Slocum frowned. “Did they bring pack mules?”

“I . . . I didn't know how big the shipment was. Jack and his gang weren't ready for so much. It turned into an embarrassment of riches. Nobody expected so much silver.”

“So you're saying they all hid the silver instead of freighting it off? That's what the map's for?”

“I can't make head nor tail of it. Jack never said it was a map to where he hid his silver or even if it showed where the others had gone with theirs. But why would he make the map if he didn't want to remember where he'd put his share?” Tamara furrowed her brows as she concentrated on this conundrum.

“Why make a map at all? Did he intend to give it to you so you could find it?” Slocum read the answer on her face. Jackson had complained about how she wanted more than he was willing to share. He had no intention of giving a single ounce more to Tamara than they had agreed on before the robbery.

“Jack could get lost if he turned around. He had a terrible sense of direction. He must have hidden the silver and made the map to remind himself where it was.”

Slocum had come across men who confused left and right. It still didn't set right with him that a man bold enough to make off with such a hoard of silver needed a map.

“You can't figure out what he did on the map?”

Tamara moved to keep him from picking up the map, but Slocum pushed her away. He looked at the map and saw how she had aligned it with the tallest mountain peaks surrounding them. The single line with bars through it had to be a crude depiction of the railroad tracks. Slocum stared off into the distance, checked the map, and looked back.

“If this is right, he hid the silver a couple miles in that direction.”

“What are you going to do, John?” Tamara stood with her arms tightly crossed over her chest.

“My job. I was hired to catch the robbers and return the silver.”

“Does that include me?”

“Mount up,” Slocum said, folding the map and tucking it into his coat pocket. “We're going to fetch some silver stolen from the Central California Railroad.”

He watched her closely, but she made no effort to run. When he was mounted, Slocum motioned for her to ride ahead. She hesitated, then obeyed.

“So,” she called over her shoulder, “how do you intend to take the silver back to San Francisco? You have the same problem Jack did. Even if this is only his share, it'll be too heavy for us.”

“I'll cross that bridge when I get to it,” Slocum said, but he'd already thought hard on the matter. He could try to flag down one of the trains and send a message back to David Collingswood about the hiding place. The vice president had the resources to get a dozen men out here inside a day or two and recover the stolen shipment. Or Jackson's part of it.

Slocum wasn't sure what the map actually meant. If Jackson had double-crossed his partners and taken their shares, this might be the entire pile of stolen silver. His mind drifted as he stared at Tamara's back and watched her gently bounce along ahead of him. It was a shame she had been such an important part of the robbery, but he wasn't inclined to let her go scot-free. He had been hired to do a job. Collingswood wasn't paying him to bring in only those in the gang he thought were guilty.

The same problem gnawed at him about Tamara as it had with Jackson. Proof for a jury was hard to come by. Tamara had confessed to him, but it came down to his word against hers. Slocum shrugged that off. The railroad vice president would have to decide, but Slocum wasn't inclined to let him question the woman the way he would have Jackson or any other in the gang. That wouldn't be right.

“How far?” She craned around to look at him. A ray of light caught her face and lit it like he had seen in a painting of an angel. But her beauty and seeming innocence couldn't deter him.

“Are there three trees around a clearing with a rock in the center?”

“I suppose,” she said skeptically. “That about describes every clearing in these parts.”

He rode closer and looked past her.

He hated to admit how right she was. From the map, this might be the spot. Three tall trees positioned just right, a boulder the size of a cow, and grass all around. Slocum swung down and walked to the rock. From the map, lining it up with one tree and a distant peak ought to give the proper spot. He began hunting for any ground that had been freshly turned.

Tamara rode closer and then began to circle the area.

“Are you sure you read the map right?” She shook her head. “I don't see any sign anyone's been here. No trampled grass, no dug-up ground. Nothing.”

Slocum had to agree. He looked for traces beyond the obvious. The spots of cropped grass showed no sign of a horse grazing there in the last couple weeks. He found deer tracks. If Jackson had spent any time here, his horse would have feasted on the ankle-high succulent grass just as the deer had, cropping close to the ground. A horse would have left much more of a stub than a deer, so only deer had come this way.

Giving up for the moment, Slocum sat on the rock and stared in the direction of the tree-mountain alignment.

“Maybe the silver is buried in the other direction. Jack got confused a lot.”

Slocum spun around on the rock and studied the terrain. He saw nothing to show this was the hiding place depicted on the map.

“What do we do?” Tamara asked after she had completed her own hunt. “There might be another clearing that looks like this.”

Slocum studied the mountains, the peaks Jackson had used as markers, and finally had to admit defeat.

“This is like all the other treasure maps. I can sell it for more than the worth of any treasure.”

“I've heard fake maps for valuable mines are sold back East all the time.”

“This isn't fake,” Slocum said. “Jackson did the map to mark something. I just don't know what it is.”

“So what do we do?” Tamara looked at him, a twinkle in her eye. “It's still early. Do you have any idea how we can spend the rest of the day?”

She didn't like it when he told her. They started back for San Francisco right away.

Slocum marched Tamara Crittenden down the narrow hall atop the Central California Railroad offices, feeling like a steer in a stockyard chute. He glanced at her desk. Papers had piled up on it during her absence, as if she would return at any moment and efficiently work as David Collingswood's assistant.

“What are you going to say, John?” She looked at him with her bright blue eyes so intense they burned through his soul.

“What I have to.” He knocked on the door. When he heard a muffled sound from inside the vice president's office, he took this as permission to enter.

Collingswood sat behind his desk and looked up. A scowl warped his features.

“It's about time you got back.”

“I got here as quick as I could,” Slocum said. He was startled when Collingswood blinked and stared at him as if he had turned into a pile of hot cow flop. “I brought her straight back. Here's her gun.” He slid the Colt New Line across the desk in Collingswood's direction.

The man stared at it as if it would turn into a snake and bite him. Then he pushed it back in Slocum's direction.

“What's going on? You can't just leave like that and not let me know. I have a business to run.”

“I was doing my job,” Slocum said. Again he got the hot stare. This time he pressed on. “Miss Crittenden told a man named Jackson and his gang about the silver shipment and was supposed to be paid off. Here's what silver I've been able to recover. I got it off Jackson.”

“Jackson?”

“Dead in a shoot-out,” Slocum said. “I caught Miss Crittenden just after that and tried to find the rest of the shipment.”

“What the hell is going on?”

“I'm trying to tell you,” Slocum said, getting angry. “She gave the robbers the information about the shipment. The gang's leader was named Jackson, and he tried to double-cross her. Or from what Jackson said, she wanted more when she heard how much had been stolen.”

“I'm not talking to you. Tamara, what's this all about?”

“I don't know, sir. Mr. Slocum is confused as to what went on.”

“I don't give a rat's ass what he thinks. Where did you go?”

Slocum started to talk, then clamped his mouth shut. He hadn't expected Collingswood to react this way. If anything, Slocum had been working up a fine speech during their ride back to San Francisco asking the railroad vice president to show some clemency for the woman.

“He's right about Jackson. He was one of the robbers. I found out about him but couldn't let anyone know. I had to keep him in sight, and he led me across the Bay and then along the tracks toward where he had robbed the train. I thought he would show me where he had hidden the silver, but I never got the chance to find out. Mr. Slocum made sure of that.”

“You shouldn't have risked your life like that,” Collingswood said.

“I'm sorry, sir. If Jackson had crossed over to Berkeley without me going after him immediately, he would have disappeared and with him any chance of getting the silver back. I had no chance to let you know. There aren't telegraph stations along that route.”

“Only at the depots,” Collingswood said. “You shouldn't have gone after this Jackson fellow. I could have had a dozen men on his trail within hours.”

“I could have telegraphed from our depot in Oakland,” she said contritely. She looked sideways at Slocum. A tiny smile crept to her lips and ran away quickly. “I know that now, sir. I was caught up in the moment and didn't think.”

“That's not like you at all. I am disappointed, Tamara.”

“She told the owlhoots which train to rob!”

“Slocum, I have no idea what is going on. You said you killed Jackson. Are you sure you didn't let him slip through your fingers and thought—wrongly, I say—to accuse Miss Crittenden for your incompetence?”

“She confessed to me that she gave them the information. How else could they have known which train to rob?”

“Do you have any proof? Other than your word that she, for whatever reason, confessed to you?”

“She's guilty,” Slocum said doggedly.

“Her word against yours. Which of you should I believe?” David Collingswood stood and leaned on his desk. Storm clouds swirled about him and turned him dark with anger. “You're fired, Slocum. Get the hell out of here. If you ever show your face in this office or on any other Central California Railroad property, I'll see that you are properly taken care of.”

Slocum heaved Jackson's saddlebags up and dropped them onto the desk with a loud thud. He doubted more than fifty dollars in silver rested there, all scraped off the bars in the shipment, but it proved some of his story. It had been Tamara's payoff. Collingswood grabbed the bags and sent them flying to crash against the wall.

“Get out, Slocum. I swear, if I hear of you ever again, I'll have every policeman in San Francisco down on your neck. And if those worthless louts cannot deal with you, the company specials will.”

“Mr. Underwood is a very dangerous man,” Tamara said in a low voice that only Slocum heard. Collingswood had taken to shouting and was lost in his own world of outrage.

“You owe me the rest of the month's salary,” Slocum said.

“Get out! Out!” Collingswood grabbed for Tamara's pistol, then froze when he saw how Slocum turned to square off. There was no question who would raise his pistol first and fire. “Get out!”

Slocum saw that the railroad man wasn't going to try to shoot him down. If Collingswood did attempt to gun him down, it would be when he turned his back. Slocum stepped away, keeping his eyes on Collingswood. He didn't bother looking in Tamara's direction. She had won without firing a shot or hardly saying a word. Slocum knew this was how it would have gone if she had been brought to trial. Evidence against her was thinner than hair on a bald man's head.

He left the office but didn't bother closing the door.

“I'm sorry this happened, Mr. Collingswood.”

“Your work has piled up. Get to it. And find Underwood. I need to send out more specials.”

“Yes, sir.”

Slocum heard muffled words but no longer found himself interested in what went on in the Central California Railroad office. He stormed past the guard in the lobby, who called out a good-bye. It would be a cold day in hell before Jason had a chance to speak to him again. Once out in the bright, clear San Francisco day, Slocum cooled off a little. But his anger smoldered like embers. He didn't mind that Collingswood saw fit not to bring charges against Tamara. What chapped him most was Collingswood not believing him. If anything, the man had come right out and called him a liar.

He turned and stared at the Central California Railroad building. His hand hovered above his pistol, then he relaxed. Shooting the place up solved nothing. His heated anger turned colder. Slocum walked away, knowing it wasn't worth his bother carrying this any further. More than once he'd been fired from a job, but never for being a liar. That festered in his gut as he went down to Meigg's Wharf and hunted for a rough-and-tumble saloon. He didn't have to look far. Not a one of them was a reputable place where a man could drink without being in fearsome danger, either for his life or for getting shanghaied.

Slocum dropped a dime on the bar.

“Beer,” he said.

The barkeep peered at him through his one good eye. The bad one was filmed over and wandered about at will.

“We don't serve piss here. Whiskey or nothing.”

“Whiskey, then.” Slocum grabbed the man's brawny wrist and forced him to lift the bottle and put it on the bar. “I don't drink alone. You first. I'll pay for it.”

The barkeep grunted and pulled free.

“If you're payin', then I want the good stuff.” He found a second half-filled bottle under the bar. “Show me the color of your money.”

Slocum dropped a silver dollar on the bar. The barkeep picked it up, peered closely at it, hefted it, and then tucked it away in his canvas apron pocket before getting a second shot glass. He poured two stiff drinks. Slocum waited for the man to down his before sampling. He almost gagged.

“This is the good stuff?”

“Better 'n that,” he said, pointing at the other bottle. The barkeep laughed harshly. “'Course, you drink that and you end up drinkin' ship's rum for a couple years.”

Slocum had guessed right about the first bottle being drugged. He looked into the mirror behind the bar and saw two sailors arguing. One pointed at Slocum, then the other knocked his hand down to the table for being so obvious.

“What's the going rate for a landlubber these days?”

“For you, ten dollars. For most of the derelicts who wash up onshore here, two or maybe three. Not more 'n that.”

“Then those two will be pissed something fierce at being robbed,” Slocum said. He took a second swig straight from the bottle, spun, and kicked the first sailor in the crotch as he rushed up.

Using the bottle as a club, Slocum smashed it against the second salt's head. The man had a skull made from pure oak. The glass showered down, mixed with the whiskey, and it never fazed him. He crashed into Slocum. Then it was Slocum's turn to get hit over the head. The barkeep swung a cosh with more enthusiasm than skill. His bad eye might have caused him to miss a square blow. It still staggered Slocum.

Slocum let out a roar and stumbled from the bar. The sailor pursued, thinking he had himself another shanghaiing victim. He doubled over when Slocum unloaded a punch that buried itself wrist-deep in his belly. By now a half-dozen others in the saloon joined the fight. They didn't care whose side they were on. They just wanted a good fight.

That was why Slocum had come here. He wanted to vent some steam, and pounding heads and bellies with his fists did just that. Solid punches landed, but Slocum never felt them. He was too intent on landing a jab or haymaker on anonymous brawlers. But when he reared back to unload a punch squarely into a sailor's ugly face, he found his right arm caught in a vise grip he couldn't shake free.

He strained and began to lose footing on the sawdust covering the floor. Still exerting himself, he swiveled around so his face was only inches away from one he knew all too well.

“Underwood!”

“Now, boy, don't get your dander up. The proprietor of this here place wants more than one customer left in drinkin' condition.”

Slocum relaxed, then ducked as Underwood swung his mutilated fist. The bony fingers wrapped up into a tight ball whizzed past Slocum's head and landed smack in the middle of another patron's face. The man stumbled back, was caught by another fighter, and resumed the fray there, not caring whom he swung at.

“Come along now.” Underwood caught Slocum by the elbow and lifted slightly.

To his surprise, Slocum couldn't break free of the two-fingered grip. He popped out of the smoky saloon and into the salt air blowing cold and fresh off the Pacific. Only when they were a dozen yards from the saloon did Underwood release him. Slocum stumbled a step and swung about.

“Don't go reachin' for that hogleg,” Underwood warned. He stood without any weapon in his hand, but Slocum had worked off most of his outrage and stood with his hands loose at his sides.

“What's Collingswood want from me?” Slocum demanded.

“Damned if I know. My guess is nothin' other than never seein' you again. You riled him up more 'n I've seen since he heard of the robbery.”

“I only did what he hired me to do.”

“So I hear, so I hear.” Underwood made no attempt to grab Slocum's elbow again. Instead he pointed along the two-thousand-foot pier. Without waiting, he set off.

Slocum caught up.

“It wasn't an accident you came after me.”

“Could be, since that's my waterin' hole. My port when I'm in port.”

“Could be that's an outright lie.”

Underwood took no offense. He grinned crookedly and said, “You got me pegged, Slocum. You got me all figured out, haven't you?”

“Why?”

“Well now, let's say that a man can have many masters. Mr. Collingswood, now, he's just one of those I work for. Another of my bosses sent me along to reason with you.”

Slocum stayed silent. Underwood would get around to what he had to say eventually. Until then, Slocum let cold calm settle on him. He had been inclined to punch Collingswood in the face, but the fight in the saloon had drained him of the need to do so. It was time to move on. Underwood was only holding him back. After all, he had a few dollars left and rode a horse. It belonged to the Central California Railroad, but Collingswood owed him for half the promised wages. Fifty dollars for the nag was outrageous, but he had tack along with it. He was willing to call the debt even with the railroad.

“You don't care to know who that is? Or do you know?”

Since he knew so few people in town, it took him less than a second to work it out.

“She wants my scalp for turning her over to Collingswood.” He made it a flat statement.

“You are quick on the uptake. I like that about you. Yes, sir, Tamara Crittenden sees the same in you. Maybe a bit more, her being the way she is.”

“What way's that?”

Underwood laughed.

“Horny as all get-out. I never saw a woman so driven. I'd say she was one of them there nymphomaniacs, only it ain't always sex she wants. She gets it into her purty li'l head she wants something and no price is too big. Son, I think she wants you.”

“Is that how she pays you?”

“I wish it was. She's too selective, and there's nothin' much I can get her, leastways like that. I lost more 'n my fingers in that fall.” Underwood stopped. Slocum went a few steps farther before he realized the man wasn't keeping pace. Underwood pointed using his good finger. “There. That building. You go right on up the stairs to the second floor. There's only one door at the landing. I don't reckon she expects you to knock, but she surely does expect you.”