Slocum and the Woman Sold to the Comanche by Jake Logan

Author:Jake Logan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group

They rode southeast for Mason, and stopped at a rancher’s place to camp for the evening.

A thin sharp-featured woman came to the front door of the low-walled ranch house when they rode up. She looked them over with sharp eyes.

“What kin I do fur you all?”

“We need a place to camp for the night and water our horses. We can pay you,” Slocum said.

“You can camp here for twenty-five cents. What’s the matter with her?” The woman’s eyes narrowed as she studied Mrs. Toby.

“She’s been a hostage of the Indians,” Slocum said, dismounting.

“Poor thing. Bless her heart, she’s lost her ever-loving mind, ain’t she?”

“For now,” he said as Carlos gathered the leads and reins to water the horses.

“Oh, she won’t ever be right. They’ve ruined her.”

In no mood to argue with the woman, Slocum lifted Mrs. Toby off her horse and sent her with the boy and the horses.

“You her kin?” the woman asked.

He found the two bits in his vest pocket and paid her. “No. We just managed to find her.”

“How long’s she been up there with them savages?”

“Too long, I reckon.” He removed his hat. “My name’s Slocum. The boy’s name is Carlos.”

“I seed her somewheres before.” The woman squeezed her chin. “You taking her home?”

Rather than explain, he nodded.

“Well.” She waved her arm to the north. “You can camp past the big water tank. Be by yourselves down there.”

Slocum thanked her and joined the others. They unloaded the horses. She sat on a canvas roll and watched them pile off their gear and saddles. Then Carlos built a fire and started supper.

A short man came walking down and shook Slocum’s hand. “Charlie Wiggans’s my name. Essie said you had a Comanche captive you were taking home.”

“I’m Slocum, that’s Carlos. The lady seated over there is the one she’s talking about.”

“You know her name?”

“We think so. She’s not talking, but she answers to a poster we saw up at Fort Concho.”

“Doesn’t talk at all?” Wiggans looked pained in the day’s fading sunlight.

“Has not said a word in a week getting here.”

The rancher took off his hat and beat his leg with it. “Damn shame. She’s a beautiful woman. Where’s she hail from?”

“Mason, we think.”

“What’s her last name?”

“Toby.”

“Don’t ring a bell. I belong to the Texas Frontier Society and know several folks in that organization from down there. I don’t know that one—wait, wait, I think the state court listed a Mrs. Toby as officially dead here recently.”

“I’m not surprised,” Slocum said. “And I suspect they intended for her to be just that. That’s why I am delivering her to the sheriff in that county and not her family.”

“You mean she was deliberately turned over to those savages?”

“She was doped, bound tight, and gagged when two men traded her to the Comanche for four sorry horses.”

“Who told you that?”

“A subchief of the tribe, and they were told if she escaped them and got back, that the army would castrate every Indian they caught including the dead ones.”

“My God, man, you learned all that out there?”

“There’s lots to learn if you can listen.

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