Slocum and the Lady from Abilene by Jake Logan

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

12

Pedro rode beside Slocum across a prairie brightening with sunrise. The road to Sabinas Hidalgo ran arrow-straight through mile after mile of thorny undergrowth and scattered stands of mesquite trees. As dawn came, they passed occasional burro carts laden with woven baskets, clay pottery, and sometimes bushel bags of corn. Now and then a few vaqueros rode in small bunches toward another day’s labor gathering wild longhorn cattle from land so impossibly dry and rugged that Slocum found it hard to believe animals could exist on it. From time to time they glimpsed a few longhorns moving through tangles of mesquite nibbling on beans growing from low branches. Mesquite beans were the only edible things in this wasteland, Slocum decided, besides a few clumps of dry bunchgrass hidden below a thorny limb or yucca spines.

Pedro talked freely now, apparently convinced Slocum wasn’t going to kill him for his role in the attempted robbery. The boy told him several things about Luis Zambrano that might come in handy. Zambrano recruited men from mountain villages across Tamaulipas and Coahuila to raid cattle ranches in Mexico and Texas. Zambrano plundered rich ranches, sharing some of the spoils with poor people, making him something of a legend among simple peones who worked for wealthy landowners. Pedro’s cousin, Raul, believed in Zambrano’s raids because some of what was stolen was given to the poor. Of late, however, Raul had begun telling Pedro that he’d become disillusioned with Zambrano’s promises. Zambrano continued to raid and loot ranches and larger farms for the booty, keeping most for himself. Men who rode with Zambrano were beginning to grumble that their leader did not believe in helping the poor after all, that he merely used it as an excuse for banditry. Slocum wondered how widespread this low morale was. Could it be a weak link that might allow him to get close to the girl?

Pedro pointed to an offshoot trail east of the road. “This is the way to Rancho El Rio, Señor. It is only a few miles to the rancho. I will tell Señor Villareal that I must visit my cousin for a short time. We can water these caballos there and be on our way muy pronto.”

Slocum nodded, following the boy eastward when they came to a pair of dim ruts. Pedro didn’t seem like a bad kid, but he occasionally listened to bad advice from his friends. During the night the boy had told him what it was like working on a cattle ranch in this unforgiving land. Water was as precious as gold to cowmen here and during a drought, cattle died by the score when wells dried up, or from starvation when there was no grass and a poor crop of mesquite beans. Life for a cowboy was equally tough when it did not rain. Men suffered along with animals when the corn crop came in short. Pedro recalled several years when there was hardly any food for his family. Being poor, going

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