“You featherbedders have it easy, Frenchy. Me, I’ve got wildcatters tying up the high rail, scabs hanging from wigwags, and a college-educated yard dog cooling his heels in the Gallup jail.”
“So, you’re bringing up a new yard dog, are you? Guess jail is as good a place as any to start him out.”
“Experience on line isn’t important anymore, Frenchy. These kids think they can talk their way out of trouble.”
Frenchy lit his cigar, puffing it to life. “Well, all of America is sinking to hell if you ask me. We’re feeding half of Europe and running up the cost of living in our own country. Truman’s locked in price controls and threatening to draft the strikers into the goddang army. It takes five years to get a Pullman on line, and wages been frozen since forty-two.”
“But you got the union, Frenchy. All I have is Eddie Preston.”
“Any fool knows the union is in management’s pocket, and there’s a hole in it the size of a half-dollar. We employees work our asses off, pay our dues, and for what? Eight hours and ice water, that’s what.”
The fireman shoved his hat back. “You bastards don’t quit, I’m going to jump,” he said.
“Save us from having to push,” Frenchy said, winking at Hook.
* * *
Hook waited in the office of the Gallup jail for Junior Monroe to come out. When he stepped through the door, Hook hardly recognized him. He looked like he’d been hung out to dry on a windy day. The brim of his hat had been torn loose, and a grease smear ran the length of his cheek. Dark rings encircled his eyes, and his ears glowed red as a signal lamp.
The deputy behind him pushed his hat back and said, “Is this here your boy, Runyon?”
“Appears so, though I can’t be certain,” he said.
“He don’t resemble no real yard dog to me,” the deputy said.
“No, he doesn’t, I admit,” Hook said.
“Maybe you better take him home to his mother before he gets himself in real trouble.”
“Good idea,” Hook said. “You called that B&B foreman yet?”
“Couldn’t reach him. He’s staying in a crew car out on the line somewhere.”
“Well, no need to bother him. I’ll see that bus gets back soon as I get the boy here on his way.”
Junior followed behind as Hook walked down the street. At the Around the Bend Café on the edge of town, Hook turned.
“You hungry?”
Junior ran his finger under his nose and sniffed. “Famished. I lost my wallet, and I haven’t eaten anything but jail food since.”
“They have pancakes in here big as boiler plates. Don’t be ordering meat, though. What with the expenses of chasing you down, I’m nearly broke myself.”
The waitress came to the table with menus. She looked at Junior, whose bow tie sat at three o’clock under his chin, and whose hair hung over one eye like Clark Gable.
She turned to Hook. “Fathers ought not let their sons out drinking half the night in my way of thinking. It ain’t right.”
Hook started to protest but changed his mind. “You know how boys are,” he said.
“Oh, do I,” she said. “Okay, what will you have to drink?”
“Coffee for me,” Hook said. “Hot tea for the boy here.”
“Hot tea?”
“With cream.”
She slipped her pencil behind her ear. “Maybe he’d like a crumpet with that, too?”
“Just tea,” Hook said.
After she’d gone, Hook said, “I’d be interested in how you wound up in jail, Junior.”
Junior coughed and rubbed at his eyes. “I jumped on that train like you said. It nearly tore my arm off. No offense, sir. Those cars were so slick, I couldn’t go up or down, so I just clung to the ladder in hopes that I could make it to the next stop.”
“Getting on a blacksnake is only half the job, Junior. You have to figure how to stay on once aboard and then get off without killing yourself.”
“The train just kept gaining momentum,” he said. “The faster it went, the worse the wind became until it took the breath right out of me. The dirt nearly blasted the skin from my face. When I thought I couldn’t hang on another second, the train slowed and came to a stop.”
“Did you jump?”
“I considered it but then I didn’t.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because we were sitting on top of a trestle so high I couldn’t see the bottom. And then a swarm of mosquitoes arrived, humming and whirling around my head in a black cloud. I thought they would surely drive me mad. For a moment, I reconsidered jumping, trestle or no trestle.”
The waitress arrived with their drinks. “Two coffees,” she said. “Boss says we don’t do tea and crumpets for no one, ’cept the queen, and this ain’t her week to be here.”
“We’ll manage,” Hook said.
They both watched her top off cups as she worked her way back to the kitchen.
“Go on,” Hook said.
Junior pushed his coffee to the side. “Somehow I made it to Gallup. But by then my fingers had turned blue from hanging on, and my eyes had clogged with dirt. Frankly, my resolve had begun to weaken. I decided then to jump the moment the train slowed for Gallup.”
“Good thinking, Junior.”
“But it never did,” he said, staring into his plate. “It only accelerated.”
“Lay asides can be unpredictable,” Hook said. “One time I rode a coal car clean to Winnipeg, Canada, before she stopped.”
Junior nodded. “And then we went by these stock cars filled with cattle.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “The thing is, they urinated just as we passed.”
“Urinated, you say?”
He nodded. “Collectively, as if premeditated.”
“Well, you can never be certain what cows are thinking,” Hook said.
The pancakes arrived, and both fell silent as they slathered on butter.
Hook held up his knife. “You mind if we get to the jail part now, Junior?”
Junior shoved large portions of pancake into his mouth as he gathered up his story.
“So I’m thinking perhaps I made a serious mistake not jumping when I had the opportunity. But then again, perhaps the train would slow enough when we came to the bus. I calculated that the road couldn’t be that far off.”
Hook poured syrup over his cakes. “The jail, Junior? I got pressing matters.”
Junior laid down his fork and stared off into space. “We shot past that bus so fast I could barely see it. We must have been going seventy miles an hour.
“In the end, I didn’t get off until the train stopped in Fort Defiance. I walked all the way back to the bus and discovered the keys under the seat. Though the bus was in a state of disrepair, I thought it only logical that I attempt to drive it back.”
“The jail, Junior.”
“Apparently the bus belongs to the bridge and building foreman, who had parked it there while attending a job in Amarillo. He’d requested the police to keep an eye on it.
“When I arrived in town, I was promptly arrested for stealing railroad equipment. I explained to the deputy that I was in fact a real railroad detective, that I had been directed to remove the bus by railroad officials.”
“He didn’t believe you?” Hook asked.
“He said he was a real cop, too, and would be directing me straight to jail.”
Hook leveled his prosthesis at Junior. “It’s the job of yard dogs to put other people in jail. They’re not supposed to be put in jail themselves.”
“Yes, sir.”
“A yard dog has to set an example, be an ideal citizen, so to speak. He can’t go around getting picked up by the authorities. His life has to be whistle-clean and his integrity beyond question.”
“I’m sorry, sir. Had I known…”
“Being put in jail cast the company in a bad light. You don’t want that.”
“I can do better. I promise.”
Hook pushed his plate aside.
Junior cupped his elbows in his hands. “Are you going to release me, Hook? I’m afraid my father will not understand.”
Hook twisted his mouth to the side. “I’m prepared to give this a second chance, Junior, though I do so with considerable doubt.”
“I won’t disappoint you a second time. I promise.”
“Thing is, I found a boy hanging off the potash wigwag. He might have been a murder victim.”
Junior’s eyes widened. “Murder?”
“Possible. Turns out he’d been scabbing, and hard feelings had developed among the signal crew. The coroner found a Bronze Star around his neck with the name Samuel Ash engraved on it. So far, it’s the only lead I have.”
“A war hero?”
“I want you to go back to Clovis and see if you can find out anything about this Samuel Ash.”
“Where should I begin the investigation?”
“Where the answers are, Junior. In the meantime, I’ll see if I can clear the air around here.”
“Yes, sir, but…”
“But what?”
“Do I have to jump on another train? Perhaps you could arrange a permanent pass?”
“There’s a mail car comes through this afternoon. I’ll see if they’ll take you on.” Hook stood. “And check on my dog when you get back. He pines something terrible when I’m away.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And, Junior, let’s keep this between us for the time being. Eddie Preston doesn’t always understand the ins and outs of criminal investigation.”
12
AFTER GETTING JUNIOR on his way, Hook located the old bus parked behind the police station. The front grill had been replaced with chicken wire, and a board had been bolted over the back window. He found the keys under the seat and cranked her over while pumping the foot feed a half-dozen times to bring up the fuel. Bridge bracings and bolts of every ilk had been stacked on the passenger seats, and the smell of grease permeated the air.
The bus fired up, and a cloud of blue smoke sailed over the police station. Hook worked the gearshift into reverse. The bus jerked back as the clutch caught and slipped like an old washing machine.
He brought her up to forty and checked his watch. There should be plenty of time to get her parked back in the right-of-way before Frenchy came through.
Eddie deserved an ass chewing for ordering a tow on a company vehicle in the first place. But at the moment, given his own standing, Hook figured to let it pass.
Dusk fell as he rattled along the country road toward the crossing where the bus had been parked. Dust boiled in from around the windows, and a trickle of sweat raced down Hook’s neck.
He considered having a one on one with that B&B foreman about leaving his equipment on the right-of-way. Such carelessness encouraged others to do the same thing, and security, being overworked and shorthanded, had all it could manage now.
As he approached the crossing, he slowed to check for trains before turning down the right-of-way. A couple hundred yards in, he backed the bus around and shut off the engine. The first stars of the evening clicked on, and a mourning dove cooed somewhere in the distance. Hook checked for Frenchy’s light in the rearview mirror.
The death of that boy on the wigwag lay on his mind as heavy as a sad iron, not so much because of the business of dying, death in itself being unremarkable, but because he couldn’t shake the manner in which it had been dealt—the injustice of a man hauled up by the neck and left to strangle at the end of a rope. It struck him as reprehensible to discard a war hero in a pauper’s grave and without a soul in the world to give a damn.
When he looked up again, Frenchy’s glimmer lit the horizon, and the wail of his whistle lifted into the night. Hook turned the ignition key and flipped on the stoplights. The clicker ticked and tocked, and the red glow of the lights pulsated in the mirror. The chug of the steamer deepened as she slowed, and Frenchy lay in with short blasts of his whistle to announce his stop.
Hook tossed the keys under the seat and made his way to the track to wait. Frenchy brought her in as easy as a rocking chair and slid up beside him. The steamer huffed and sighed, and the smell of heat filled the night. Frenchy stuck an elbow out the cab window and leaned over it.
“You boarding or taking hostages?” he asked.
“I haven’t thought it out,” Hook said, working his way up the ladder.
The fireman ducked his chin at Hook before turning back to his gauges. Hook located a perch. Frenchy bumped her ahead, and they were soon making time.
“Running light, aren’t you, Frenchy?” Hook asked.
“Just this here bullgine and a couple of hopper cars I’m deadheading back to Belen. Picking up an old louse box there and hauling her into Clovis.”
“Sometimes they don’t even bother to run a caboose anymore,” Hook said. “Don’t know what the world’s coming to.”
Frenchy dug out a new cigar and rolled it between thumb and index finger next to his ear. He bit off the end and struck a match on his overalls’ button.
“Did you get that greenhorn out of jail?” he asked between puffs of smoke.
Hook said, “Didn’t know the B&B work bus from his ass and took her for a spin.”
“Too dang much education,” Frenchy said. “Causes a man not to think his own thoughts.”
Hook nodded. “Junior Monroe wears a bow tie, drinks hot tea, and fans his face every time someone stokes up a butt.”
Frenchy turned and pushed the bill of his hat up. “The hell? He should have got twenty years hard labor, if you ask me.”
Hook smiled and leaned back for a nap. “Bat the stack off her, Frenchy, and wake me when we get to Belen.”
* * *
Frenchy kicked the bottom of Hook’s shoe and pointed at the door.
“Belen,” he said. “I’m taking her into the yards for a drink, and I’ll be picking up that old louse box after that. Be about an hour.”
Hook rubbed the sleep from his face. “I’m headed for the Harvey House to eat. You want anything?”
“I brought a nosebag,” he said. “The Harvey’s too ritzy for the likes of me.”
* * *
Hook searched out a table near the back of the restaurant and had just pulled up his chair when the waitress arrived. He ordered the blue plate special and a glass of milk.
The dining area, nearly empty, smelled of baked pies and fresh-brewed coffee.
A woman sat at a table near the front and dabbed her linen napkin against her mouth. For a moment, Hook thought he recognized her but decided that it must be the familiar remnants of old age that he recognized.
He considered the possibility of hot apple pie topped with a slab of cheddar and had nearly caught the attention of the waitress, when the old lady stood, took up her purse, and made for the restroom.
When she passed by Hook’s table, she glanced at him. Only then did he notice the white socks and realized that the purse looked exactly like the knitting bag the old lady had that day in the Amarillo depot.
He started to get up but hesitated, not anxious for yet another public confrontation with an old lady. By then she had disappeared into the ladies’ room at the back.
Minutes passed, and she didn’t come out. They brought his dinner, and he ate it. He ordered apple pie, and she still hadn’t come out. After finishing his pie, he drank another cup of coffee. Perhaps she’d recognized him, found a different exit, or perhaps she had simply decided to wait him out.
He checked his watch. Frenchy would be coming soon. He paid his tab and then made his way to the restroom hallway. Pausing at the ladies’ door, he listened. After a second look down the hallway, he pushed the door open and went in.
The lights were off, save for a single bulb over the sink, and he could see no one inside. He moved into the nearby stall and bent over for a look-see under them. From there, he spotted the old lady standing in the back stall, her white socks clearly visible.
Hook flushed the toilet, waited a few sec
onds, and then opened the bathroom door as if to leave. Slipping back into the stall he waited, quieting his breath.
First came the squeak of her stall door and then the shuffle of her feet as she made her way to the exit. When she opened it, Hook stepped out and grabbed her by the arm.
She yelped and struggled to get loose. Hook clamped his hand over her mouth.
“Railroad security,” he said. “Keep your voice down or we’re off to jail.”
He slowly removed his hand.
“Rapist,” she said. “Murderer. I’ll scream.”
He laid his hook against her cheek. “I twisted a man’s tongue right out of his head with this thing one time. I suggest you not scream.”
“What do you want from me?” she asked.
He pulled her in close, and his fingers disappeared into the soft flesh of her arm. She smelled of stale perfume and menthol.
“You been working diversion for those pickpockets,” he said. “I never forget a thief’s face.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. “I’m just an old lady traveling alone.”
“This could mean prison,” he said. “Maybe years, and, believe me, that’s not the way you want to spend your old age.”
“You’re going to arrest me?”
“An accomplice is just as guilty as a perpetrator. We’ll go out the back way and have a talk with the cops.”
“I’m just an old lady. They said all I had to do was pretend to fall. I needed the money. I’m alone and have to make my way. The world doesn’t care about old ladies.”
“The world doesn’t care about anyone, and neither do I.”
He started for the door with her in tow. “No, wait,” she said, pulling back. “Isn’t there something I can do?”
Hook hesitated. “Maybe you know where those pickpockets are working?” he said. “Maybe you could provide a little information?”
“They paid me to kick up a disturbance. I did and then I left. That’s all I know, I swear.”
“Too little too late,” he said. “Let’s go downtown.”
The Hanging of Samuel Ash Page 8