Slater's Way Read online

  Nudging his father’s sorrel gelding, he descended to the noisy street below, riding along unnoticed by the drunks coming and going from the saloons. He pulled the horses up when he got to the harness shop next to the Miners Saloon, thinking he was prepared to see the grisly sight of his father’s lifeless body dangling from the solitary pole again. He was wrong, however, for the sight of his late father jolted him as before. The crowd that had been there had dispersed, returning to the saloons of their choice to talk about the shooting and the hanging that had followed. At present, there were only two spectators standing at the foot of the pole, gazing up at the late John Slater Engels. Jace remained in the saddle and waited until the novel sight of the dead man yielded to the craving for another drink of whiskey and the two men walked back toward the Miners Saloon.

  Jace nudged the sorrel, anxious to do what he had come to do before someone else showed up to gawk at the hanged man. He felt the blood in his veins go cold as ice when he pulled up beside the corpse. Seated as he was in the saddle, his eyes were even with his father’s belt. With his heart pounding inside his chest, he forced himself to remain calm and do what he had to do.

  “Easy, boy,” he said softly to the horse. “Steady, now,” he repeated as he pulled his feet from the stirrups and carefully placed one foot on the saddle. Then, using his father’s body to steady himself, he stood up on the saddle. As he pulled himself up, he almost lost his footing when he brushed against his father’s face and looked into the sightless eyes staring grotesquely at him as if already suffering the fiery coals of hell. Forcing himself to look away from the cruel face, he pulled the skinning knife from the cartridge belt and sawed furiously at the rope above his father’s head. It seemed the rope was never going to part, but finally the last strands were severed and the corpse dropped to the ground. Rigor mortis having already set in, the body landed feetfirst and, rigid as a pole, fell face forward in the trampled mud.

  Jace dismounted and stood staring at the body for a long moment. It would be no easy task to get the corpse across the saddle. He was still contemplating the job when he was startled by a voice behind him. “Hey, boy! What the hell do you think you’re doin’?”

  He turned to find Arlen Tucker walking up behind him. Tucker, a blacksmith and a prominent member of the vigilance committee, was no doubt instrumental in the hanging of Jace’s father. “I’m takin’ my pa for buryin’,” Jace answered.

  “The hell you are,” Tucker said. “Nobody told you you could cut that murderer down. Now you can help me haul him back up that pole. I oughta give you a good whippin’ for pullin’ a stunt like that.”

  Jace gave no thought to his response to Tucker’s threat. Tucker was just beside his father’s horse, his face was no more than a foot from the butt of the Henry rifle riding in the saddle sling. Following his natural instincts, Jace pulled the weapon from the scabbard, cocking it as he brought it to bear on the surprised blacksmith.

  “I wouldn’t advise you to try it,” Jace said. “You look like a pretty stout feller, so I reckon you oughta be able to lift my pa up across that saddle.”

  “The hell I will,” Tucker responded. “Boy, you’d better put that rifle down! If I have to take it away from you, I’m gonna break it across your backside.” He threatened, but he made no move toward the determined boy.

  “I reckon you could try,” Jace said calmly, “if you think it’s worth gettin’ shot over.”

  Tucker hesitated, measuring the cold ominous look in Jace’s eyes. He decided it not worth the risk to test the boy’s resolve. “You’re makin’ a helluva mistake,” he said. “You’re gonna wind up with the same reputation your pa had.”

  “Pick him up and lay him across that saddle,” Jace said, motioning with his rifle. “I ain’t waitin’ around here all night.”

  “All right, all right,” Tucker replied, “just don’t get careless with that damn rifle.”

  He took hold of John Engels’ shoulders and stood him up. Then he bent down, put his arms around his knees, and lifted him up as though hoisting a log. Henry Weed’s roan was not sure it wanted the body across its back, and it sidestepped nervously when the corpse landed on the saddle. The sudden motion caused Jace to quickly grab his father’s shoulder to keep the body from sliding off the saddle. Tucker saw it as his chance to act. He pulled the .44 he wore, to his instant regret. Because of the stiffness of the body, John Engels’ feet kicked up to spoil Tucker’s aim when Jace pulled on his father’s shoulder, causing his shot to miss. Jace took no time to think. Holding the nine-pound Henry in one hand, he pulled the trigger and cut Tucker down with a slug in his belly.

  Staring in disbelief, the blacksmith sat down heavily in the mud, clutching his stomach. Equally surprised, Jace paused only a moment to consider what had just happened. Someone was bound to have heard the shots, so, in a panic, he grabbed the horses’ reins and turned to discover a witness staring at him, seemingly in a drunken stupor. Until that moment, he had not noticed the man slumped against the side door of the saloon, obviously having gotten no farther after leaving the saloon. Although he continued to gape openly at the boy, the drunk didn’t move, and he said not a word. Jace paused for only a moment before leading the horses around behind the saloon to secure his father’s body across the saddle. Working as quickly as he could, he bound the body with a rope, hearing voices from the side of the saloon. Thinking the man sitting against the side door was no doubt telling them what had happened, he climbed up into the saddle as fast as he could and rode down the alley behind the stores, leading the roan behind him. When he came to the first trail that led up from the gulch, he followed it out of Virginia City and into the hills beyond. His only quest now was to find a place to dig a grave. It didn’t matter where, as long as it was not easily seen. The burial itself was not as important to him as the removal of his father’s body from public display. So when he came to a grassy ravine with one solitary spruce tree standing as a grave marker, he decided to bury his father there instead of taking him back to Daylight Gulch.

  When the grave was done, and his father’s body was in the ground, Jace stood looking at it for a long moment. It was customary to say something about a person when he was buried, talk about all the good things he had done before he died. He continued to stand there while he thought back over his short life and the relationship he had had with his father.

  Finally he said, “I can’t think of a damn thing he ever did for me and my ma except make life hard for both of us. Amen.”

  * * *

  It was in the wee hours of the morning when Jace rode back into the camp at Daylight Gulch, but there was a glow from a lamp in the window of the cabin. Hearing him ride in, Henry Weed burst out the door to confront him. Jace’s mother stood in the doorway behind Weed.

  “Where the hell have you been with those horses?” Weed demanded.

  “Buryin’ Pa,” was Jace’s stoic reply. He dismounted and led the horses to the makeshift stable with Weed following right behind him.

  “You dumb little shit!” Weed blurted. “I reckon you led a posse of vigilantes right back here, too.”

  “I might have,” Jace calmly allowed. “So I expect I’d best get my things together and be gone when they get here.” He had already decided that he was not going to live with Henry Weed. He pulled the saddle off Weed’s roan but left the sorrel saddled. “I don’t reckon you and Ma have to worry. It’ll be me they’re lookin’ for.”

  “Maybe they won’t be lookin’ for you,” his mother said, just then joining them. “Did anyone see you?”

  “Just one man, but I don’t know if he’ll tell or not,” Jace replied.

  “Why wouldn’t he, if he saw you?” Weed demanded.

  “He was fallin’-down drunk. I’m hopin’ he don’t know what he saw,” Jace said.

  “Nobody tried to stop you from takin’ John down?” Weed asked.

  “One man and I don�
�t know if he’ll tell, either.”

  Exasperated with the boy’s lack of distress, Weed demanded, “Well, why in the hell wouldn’t he?”

  “Because I shot him,” Jace replied. “And I don’t know if I killed him or not.”

  “My Lord!” his mother gasped, and clutched the corner post for support. It was almost more than she could comprehend, coming as it did on top of her husband’s death.

  “I’m sorry, Ma,” Jace said. “I wouldn’ta done it if he hadn’t tried to shoot me. He didn’t give me no choice.”

  She was too distressed to think clearly, but Weed was quick to advise, “He’s right, Leona. He needs to get packed up and get the hell away from here. They’ll be comin’ lookin’ for him, sure as shootin’.”

  “But he’s just a boy,” Leona protested. “He said the man was going to shoot him. Maybe if he tells them that—”

  “That won’t make no difference to that posse,” Weed insisted. “They’ll string him up, just like they did John. It’s best he gets away from here. If he’s old enough to shoot a man, he’s old enough to look out for himself.”

  “I can take care of myself,” Jace assured her. “I’ll be all right.” He was well aware of Weed’s preference that he should leave, even before this happened. “I can tell you where I buried Pa if you want to visit his grave.”

  “She don’t wanna visit his grave,” Weed quickly declared. “That’s over and done with.”

  Jace ignored the remark and addressed his mother. “Like I said, I can draw you a little map to show you where Pa’s buried.”

  She glanced nervously at Weed before answering, “I guess it’s not necessary. I don’t need to see the grave.” Concerned for herself, she realized that it was in her best interest to concede to Weed’s wishes. He clearly wanted Jace out of the picture, and her son had conveniently accommodated him by shooting a man. “Henry’s right,” she said to her son. “It’s best for you to leave before they come here looking for you.”

  Jace nodded solemnly, glancing at the scowling Weed, then back at his worried mother.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “I’m leavin’ just as soon as I get some things together.” He went back to the cabin then to gather what clothes he had, his blanket roll, and some of his late father’s things. Most of what he might need was already in the saddlebags on his father’s horse. “I don’t reckon you mind if I take this,” he said to his mother as he pulled a rain slicker out from under her bed.

  She shook her head, but Weed saw fit to comment, “I reckon it’s fittin’ for you to take some of your daddy’s stuff, but I don’t know about his horse and rifle. They might better be left with your mama and me.”

  “I expect I could just walk off in the hills with nothin’ except what I was born with,” Jace replied sarcastically. “But I ain’t gonna. I reckon Pa would druther they was left with me, instead of you.”

  Weed bristled a bit at the remark. “I might have more to say about that than you. I ain’t sure I’m gonna let you leave with that sorrel and that Henry rifle. I don’t see as how you’ve earned a damn thing that belonged to your pa.”

  Jace dropped his hand to rest on the handle of his father’s single-action Colt .44 he still had strapped to his side. “You and me ain’t ever really got along too good,” he said solemnly. “And right now ain’t a good time to mess with me unless you wanna make my ma a widow for the second time.”

  “Jace!” Leona cried out, shocked by the threat from her son. She looked at Weed then and pleaded, “Let him take what he wants, Henry. Just let him go!”

  Weed was caught in an uncertain position. This was not the boastful bluster of an immature boy. There was a lethal quality in his tone that promised this was no idle threat. Although smarting mentally at the thought of being faced down by a fifteen-year-old boy, he found himself at a distinct disadvantage, since he was not wearing a gun. And the stony-eyed boy had already shot one man that night.

  “All right,” he said. “I’ll do it for you, Leona.” Back at Jace then, he blurted, “Just get the hell on outta here.”

  “With pleasure,” Jace replied calmly.

  Chapter 2

  With no destination in mind, Jace pointed the sorrel’s head toward the north and made his way down through the hills in the dark, being careful to avoid the deep cuts and gravel slides that might cause the horse to stumble. Once out of the higher hills, he continued north across an open plain that stretched seven or eight miles before encountering the foothills of a dark mountain range.

  He rode on, and as first light approached, he could see that the range he was entering boasted snow-covered peaks extending up from pine-clad slopes. It looked like the perfect country he needed to escape to from those who might be searching for him. He felt sure he could find a place to hide from a lynch mob in those mountains, thinking the drunken bunch of volunteers would soon weary and go back to the saloons. Montana had been made a territory for less than a year, and Bannack was named the capital. So maybe there was a U.S. Marshal there already; Jace had no idea. But had there been, he might have considered telling his version of the shooting to a deputy marshal.

  A line of trees running about halfway across the plain told him there was a fair-sized creek between him and the mountains. As he rode, he considered the occurrence of this unexpected turn in his life, and the sobering thought that at his young age, he had shot a man and probably killed him. He thought about his father, lying dead in a shallow grave, and realized that he did not feel the grief that should come with the loss of one’s parent. He could not recall any happy times spent with his father, only occasions of drunken abuse at worst and almost total indifference at best.

  Jace had never been an emotional child. His father had often remarked that the boy had the disposition of a hanging judge, never smiling, never laughing. Maybe he was right. There wasn’t a brother or sister to compare himself to, and no friends his age, so he didn’t bother to care about his stoic nature.

  He was not without compassion, however, for those who deserved it—like his mother. He hoped for her sake that she would have a decent life with Henry Weed. But he felt no regret that he would not be there to share that life, for he could not forget how quickly she had agreed to become Weed’s wife, and how she had urged him to leave. The two deserved each other, he decided, and resolved to think of it no further. It was time to consider the rest of his life, and at present, that meant finding a place to camp and rest his horse.

  When he reached the creek, he stopped to let his horse drink. It would have been a good place to camp had he not been concerned about a posse riding to catch up with him. So he decided he’d better not stop until he gained the safety of the mountains. With that in mind, he pushed on, following the creek until he came upon a small stream. The stream appeared to come from high up the slope, flowing down a narrow ravine to reach the creek. This, he decided, was more like what he was looking for, so he began to follow the stream back up the mountain.

  The higher up he climbed, the harder it became to follow the stream, until he finally determined it was safer to dismount and lead the horse. The trees, mostly pine with patches of firs, grew thick on the mountainside and so close to the stream that it became necessary to walk in the water in many places. About a third of the way up the slope, he came to a grassy meadow, where the stream split in two. This was the spot he picked for his camp.

  He pulled the saddle off the sorrel and unrolled his blanket, succumbing to a deep feeling of weariness from not having slept all night. He took the precaution to hobble the horse, however, before crawling into his blanket roll.

  It was past noon when he woke to find the sorrel gelding nibbling the meadow grass near his feet. An empty feeling in his stomach told him that he was hungry as well, but it also reminded him that he had no food. It did not cause him undue concern. He had been a skillful hunter for as long as he could remember, and he felt sure gam
e was readily available in these mountains. There remained the question, however, that someone might be close enough behind him to hear the distinctive report of the Henry rifle. He rolled out of his blanket and got to his feet.

  Addressing the sorrel, he said, “Well, I’m gonna have to find something pretty soon, or learn to eat grass like you.”

  There were other things to think about for a man on his own, and regardless of his age, he was a man on his own. And he was smart enough to know that he couldn’t live forever on nothing more than what he could kill. But that was going to be his diet for the foreseeable future, so he counted the cartridges in his cartridge belt. There were twenty-two left. In addition to those, there were six in the rifle’s magazine, plus five shots in his handgun, the hammer resting on an empty chamber for safety’s sake. He would have to be very conservative with his cartridges, for he had no money to buy new ones. That thought caused him to remember that he had no money to buy basic supplies to live on, either.

  “I’ll have to think of something,” he said to the sorrel. “I reckon I’ll have to take up my pa’s trade, if I can’t find some way of makin’ honest money.” He was not inclined to follow in his father’s lawless footsteps, but he didn’t rule out the possibility if it was his only recourse.

  Ignoring the gnawing in his stomach, he saddled his horse and pushed on farther into the rugged mountains, his eyes constantly searching for signs of game. The stream led him to a small lake high up the mountain that bore evidence of numerous visits by deer as well as elk and grizzlies. This was the place, he decided, where he would acquire his meat supply. So he dismounted, pulled the saddle off his horse, and left it to graze near the edge of the lake while he picked a good place to hide and wait for a potential target to come for water. As he had suspected, judging by the many tracks, he didn’t have to wait long before supper showed up in the form of half a dozen deer that suddenly appeared in the pines above the lake. Showing no concern for the horse grazing near the lower side of the lake, they filed down to the water’s edge to drink.