As for the others involved in the conspiracy, Slocum knew that he had little hard evidence to convict any of them in a court of law. But in the far corners of the West, there was another law. The law of the six-gun and the rope. Men had to answer for their crimes, and if the law wouldn’t handle them, then good men must step up and see to it that justice was served.

  In Del Rio, he knew he was fighting against the law itself and could expect no mercy himself. He did have proof that the law was corrupt. When Delgado was hanged, despite his innocence, Slocum knew that he was the man who had to step up and mete out justice. Wyman had violated his oath of office, and so, too, the sheriff and his minions. If the hangings were to stop, if injustice was to be stamped out, Slocum knew that he would have to be the one to put a halt to the criminal activity so rampant in Del Rio.

  He thought of Lorelei and felt sad for her. She had to know, by now, that her father was a murderer, that he cared nothing for human life if it stood in the way of gaining personal wealth. And what about her half sister, Pandora? How close was Lorelei to her? And was Pandora as guilty as the others? Did she deserve punishment?

  Those were questions that Slocum wrestled with as he napped, waiting for someone to come to the adobe and bring his supper. He stood outside and smoked a cheroot, watching the sun go down over the sleepy village. He went inside and poured himself a drink of whiskey and was halfway through it when there was a knock on the door.

  “Come in,” Slocum said, knowing the door was not locked.

  Carmen entered, carrying a basket that smelled of corn and flour tortillas, spicy beef and beans. The food was covered with a cloth. He took the basket from her and set it on the table. He could see that she had been crying, but she wore a fresh flower in her hair. She embraced him and held on for a long time. But she did not cry now.

  “John,” she said, “I am glad you are here. I spoke to Abeja and he said he and the men of Hidalgo will help you.”

  He stroked her hair. It was like fine silk, as black and shiny as a crow’s wing. She nestled against him and she wrapped her arms around his waist, holding him even tighter.

  “You didn’t come here to talk about Abeja,” he said.

  “No. I did not know if you would . . . I mean, I am so bold. And shameless. Yet, I have fear.”

  “Fear of what?”

  “That you will not want me. I feel so alone and my house is filled with sadness.”

  “I know,” he said.

  “We should eat, John.”

  “We can always eat. It is not food that you need right now.”

  “No,” she said.

  “Should I light the lamp, Carmen? It’s getting dark in here.”

  “No, do not light it just yet.”

  “I don’t have much of a bed. No fine furniture.”

  “I will be your bed,” she whispered and pulled away so that she could stand on tiptoe and kiss him. She clasped his neck and pulled his head down. She put her lips against his and he felt the warmth shoot through him like liquid fire. She nibbled at his mouth hungrily and he moved over to his pallet and they sank to the floor.

  “What will you think of me?” she asked.

  “I think you have much to give a man.”

  “And you? Do you have much to give a woman? A woman who gives herself so willingly?”

  “Yes,” he husked. “I think I do.”

  “I think you do, too,” she said, and began unlacing the strands of cotton string that held her blouse together in the front. She slipped her blouse over her head and he saw her shadowy breasts, so pert and comely, and the nipples like little pink faces. He touched her there and the nipples hardened like kernels of dried corn, or little acorns.

  He leaned down and kissed each nipple and she shivered all over.

  “Oh, John,” she breathed. “Te quiero. Te quiero mucho. Te quiero tanto, tanto.”

  “I want you, too, Carmen,” he said, as her fingers flew to his gun belt. She began to open the buckle, her hunger flowing into him as she kissed his neck, her lips burning his flesh with the hot flame of her wanton desire.

  20

  The dusk melted away into darkness and the night enclosed Slocum and Carmen as they coupled on the blanketed sleeping mat inside the adobe. Carmen was warm and willing. The two kissed and explored each other with their hands until she opened to him like a flower. He stiff-armed himself on the pallet and slid into her, then let himself down, burying his cock deep into her steaming cunt. She cried out and her fingernails clawed Slocum’s back, raking his spine up and down, sending a sharp tingle through his flesh.

  “Oh, yes, John,” she cooed, “this is what I have been waiting for, ever since I first saw you.”

  “I, too,” he said, sliding his cock in and out of her steaming sheath. “You’re a beautiful woman.”

  She said something in Spanish that was so soft he didn’t catch it, but he knew they were words of love or desire, for her body undulated beneath him, impaling him as he stroked her, slow and steady.

  “I brought honey,” she said.

  “You sure did, Carmen.”

  She laughed and squirmed beneath him, her delight apparent.

  “No, I mean with the food.”

  “That’s the last thing on my mind right now, Carmen.”

  “Yes, yes.”

  And she rose against him, matching his rhythm with her own, her arms encircling him, her hips cupping him in a separate embrace.

  His balls were on fire and he surged against her with powerful thrusts until she clasped him tightly and began to moan. Her moans turned into soft screams and the night soaked them up as if they were spilled droplets of wine. She crooned soft Spanish words in his ear and he understood them. They were raw, sweet words and added to his enjoyment of her.

  “You’re all woman, Carmen,” he sighed, sinking his shaft to the very hilt. She wriggled her bottom and bucked up against him as he plumbed her deepest depths until she was all wet and warm and the folds of her sex were like warm honey against his skin.

  “More, more,” she said.

  Slocum gave her more.

  Faster and faster he stroked her until her screams blazed his eardrums like the lashing tongues of a soaring fire. She thrashed beneath him like a woman caught up in madness and he knew she was pouring out her grief and her love all at once, as if she were in the midst of a whirlwind.

  He took her to the heights and back down again, then with the sound of slapping bodies filling the room, he exploded his balls when she was at the peak of her own climax. She screamed softly and raked her fingernails down his back and then dug them in as her body thrashed and quivered for several minutes.

  “Ah,” she breathed. “So sweet. So good, John.”

  “Yes,” he said, and kissed her on the mouth. He rubbed the sweat on her forehead and buried his face in her hair.

  He rolled off of her and lay by her side on the bedroll. For several moments there was only the sound of their breathing in the silence of the room. Starlight beamed through the curtains and the cracks between the cloth and the window frames, filling the floor with tiny dancing lights. From somewhere down the street, they could hear the trilling notes of a guitar as fingers picked out the melody of a sad song of love and betrayal in a minor key.

  Off in the distance, a coyote yodeled and a dog yapped quick short barks until someone silenced it with a kick or a stick.

  “I was in need of you, John,” she said. “After the funeral, I felt so alone, so lost.”

  “I know how you feel,” he said.

  “Now, I feel alive. I feel as if I can go on living.”

  “Yes, that is the job of those who are left behind when a loved one dies. They would want that.”

  “Do you think so?”

  Slocum thought about his brother and his parents. “Yes,” he breathed. “That is why we are given the gift of life. To live it, no matter what.”

  “You are so wise,” she said and touched him, her hand kneading the limp flesh of his sex as though it were a piece of dough. He was becoming aroused again.

  Carmen sensed it and took her hand away quickly.

  “We must eat,” she said, “or the food will grow too cold. And the wine from a cellar may get too hot.”

  He laughed and got up from the pallet. Slocum was hungry. He watched her dress and then he put his clothes on, strapping on his gun belt. He never knew when he would need that pistol again, and he never felt dressed without it.

  Over supper, which included cold chicken, Slocum asked Carmen a few questions.

  “Did you know that Pandora Fernandez is Bill Hardesty’s daughter?”

  “Everyone knows that. And everyone knows that Pandora is the real owner of the Rocking H rancho.”

  “What?”

  “It is said, John, that Pandora witnessed something, a murder they say, at the ranch when she was a young woman. She made her father sign the ranch over to her for her silence.”

  This revelation stunned Slocum. It put a whole different light on the murders, the search for hidden gold, the hangings, everything.

  “Did she see her father kill her mother?” Slocum asked.

  Carmen shrugged as she nibbled on a small drumstick.

  “That is one of the stories. But one wonders why her father did not kill her, if she was a witness.”

  “Yes, it does look that way. How could a girl get the upper hand against a grown man?”

  Carmen drew a deep breath as if to clear her thoughts, as if to summon up a memory. Slocum waited, knowing she had something important to say.

  “There has been much talk about that over the years,” Carmen said. “Whispers. There was talk of a scandal.”

  “A scandal?”

  “A Mexican woman, who sometimes went to the Hardesty rancho to clean and cook for Mr. Hardesty and his wife, said that there was scandalous behavior. She said that the girl, Pandora, was very close to her father and, one morning, she saw them in bed together and Bill was mounting his daughter.”

  “Where was Hardesty’s wife at the time?”

  “She was sick in the bed. There were other times, too, when Clarita—she was the maid—saw the father and Pandora kissing and she said that they did unspeakable things together behind the mother’s back.”

  “And Pandora’s mother never found out?”

  “Oh, yes, she did find out. Clarita was there and she heard the yelling and the screaming and the daughter, she told her mother, that she was more of a wife to her father than her mother was. And shortly after that, the mother died.”

  “How did she die?”

  “She drowned in her tub,” Carmen said. “Mr. Hardesty said it was an accident and everyone believed him. Clarita said that Mr. Hardesty killed his wife, that he held her head under the water until she could not breathe no more.”

  “But she didn’t see this happen?”

  “She drew the bath for Mrs. Hardesty, a Mexican woman named Esmeralda Gomez. Then she saw Mr. Hardesty and he was all wet and he changed his clothes. He told the sheriff that he found his wife in the tub and knew she was dead.”

  “So Hardesty killed his wife,” Slocum said. “And did Pandora see this happen?”

  “Clarita said she helped her father drown her mother. She was wet, too, and after that, the father and the daughter, they sleep together like marrieds, and only Clarita knew of this. But she told my mother, and my mother told me.”

  “And what happened to Clarita?” Slocum asked.

  “Ah, you ask the good question. Not very long after that, Clarita was found dead between Hidalgo and the Hardesty rancho. They said that she fell from her horse and broke her neck.”

  “But you don’t believe that, do you, Carmen?”

  Carmen finished eating and put down her fork. She looked at Slocum, his face half shadowed, half golden from the lamplight.

  “No, I think Clarita was murdered. Like so many others.”

  Slocum pushed his plate away and took a swallow of wine from his glass. His mind was full of grisly pictures, from the war, from battles he had fought since then, and from the images Carmen had conjured for him.

  And, finally, he saw in his mind a young girl in her father’s lustful clutches, becoming a young woman, all twisted inside from carnal abuse at the hands of Bill Hardesty, a witness, perhaps a participant, in murder, growing up with all those secrets and all that power, taking delight in watching men die, watching men swing at the end of a rope, their necks broken like Clarita’s. He saw, finally, a monster and her name was Pandora.

  As Slocum thought of these things, a final plan began forming in his mind. Pandora, he believed, was a tormented woman, and so, too, probably, were those who had fed on her hate and lust and given her free rein. She had been allowed to hide behind her husband and her father, and those who knew the truth, turned their heads and looked the other way.

  Now was the time to splash light in the shadows, to light a torch that would burn away the darkness and the evil of all those years. Now, he knew, was the time to stop listening to all those rumors and finally proclaim the truth. Now was the time to shed light on the black caverns where all these people dwelled, to drive them out in the open where all could see them for what they were—murderers and cowards with greedy hearts and callous souls.

  “What is it, John?” Carmen asked, staring at Slocum. “You are thinking of something, no?”

  “Yes,” he said, getting up from the table. “I am thinking this has gone on long enough. All the killings, all the hangings, all the lies.”

  He walked to where his frock coat lay draped over the back of a chair and dug out a cheroot. He struck a match. His face was grim in the harsh glare of the flame as he lit his cheroot.

  Carmen shrank back, as if she had suddenly seen an apparition.

  “Tomorrow,” Slocum said, “I am going after all of them. One by one.”

  “What will you do?” she asked. “Kill them?”

  “The question is, Carmen, what will they do?”

  He walked outside, into the night, drawing smoke through the cheroot, the end of it glowing like an angry eye. He walked out under the stars to work out the final details of his plan.

  Carmen did not follow him, but stayed inside the adobe, struck dumb by what she had seen in Slocum’s eyes, awed by the power that radiated from him when his jaw hardened and his fists clenched and his shoulders widened with the weight of the determination he carried.

  She stayed inside.

  And she shuddered, fearful of the horror that she knew would happen.

  21

  Slocum knew he would never remember all of their names, but he made a point of shaking hands with each of the men Abeja brought to the gathering in Hidalgo. He was impressed with the number of young men who showed up to hear what Slocum had to say.

  “You must be a powerful persuader, Abeja,” he said.

  “They want to help, Slocum. They know what you are doing. Like you, they want justice.”

  “What I’m doing is not exactly legal,” Slocum said.

  “What has been done to the people of Hidalgo was not legal.”

  Slocum looked out over at the assemblage and cleared his throat. Someone had brought a large box for him to stand on so that he could tower above them. He knew it gave him the look of someone in authority, and it was just what he needed.

  “Men,” he said in Spanish, “thank you for coming here.”

  There was laugher, followed by resounding applause. Slocum knew they were glad that he was speaking to them in their language. He had learned Spanish over the years and knew that it helped him greatly, especially in a state like Texas.

  But he knew he was asking no easy thing. Especially since wherever he went, whether it be Colorado or Missouri or Kansas, the Mexicans he encountered were often loyal to the death for their employers.

  “I am going to ask you to do some things for me that will be against the law. But we are against the law that is now in Del Rio. The law there is very bad and I am going to see that justice comes to Del Rio. With your help.”

  There was more applause.

  “Do not applaud,” he said. “Just listen. Please.”

  All of the men nodded soberly. Slocum went on.

  “After I speak to you, I will put you in groups. Each group will have a job to do. Now, we will need horses, not only to ride, but two to haul a kind of wagon. Do you have horses?”

  Several of the men nodded. One man spoke up, addressing Slocum.

  “We do not have many horses, but we know where to steal some.”

  More laughter. Slocum grinned.

  “That’s the spirit,” he said. “You do not have to steal them, just borrow some until this is over.”

  The men laughed again and some whooped.

  “Viva Slocum,” one man shouted, and the others took up the chorus, shouting the same cheer.

  Slocum held up his hands to stop them from any further demonstration.

  “Each of you will need a horse and we need at least two extra to pull that wagon.”

  “What wagon?” a man asked.

  “The gallows wagon,” Slocum said and the cheers were deafening.

  “Vamonos,” the men cried. “Let’s go.”

  Again, Slocum held up his hands for silence so that he could continue.

  “Do you have weapons? Guns? Rifles? Pistols?”

  All of the men nodded and cried out that they did.

  Slocum broke the men up into small groups and told each group what he wanted them to do. He made sure that Abeja was with him as he spoke to each group of men. When he was satisfied that they all understood their roles, Slocum waited while those who had horses saddled up or rode bareback.

  Some men were sent to “borrow” more horses. These packed double on their horses and carried ropes. Some he sent to the Hardesty ranch to bring Bill and Cordelia into town, telling them to meet Slocum at the courthouse by noon. He warned them not to harm Lorelei, and if possible, to keep her at the ranch by telling her that he was riding out to see her and explain. He hoped that would keep her there, out of harm’s way. He wasn’t sure how Lorelei would take his kidnapping her father.