by Jim Woolard
Dawkins accepted the double eagle. He didn’t bite on it as Nathan anticipated. He did give Nathan some unsolicited advice. “There are a dozen ruffians within a mile that would kill you for a half dollar. Put a couple of coins in your pocket. Never show your purse in public.”
With that warning, Dawkins reached beneath the driver’s seat, straightened, and whipped his arm in the direction of the caboose. Whatever Dawkins threw struck wood with a hollow thump. In a few seconds, a bearded face could be seen peering through the window of the rear door. The face disappeared, the narrow door swung inward, and a wiry body stepped out onto the rear platform of the caboose. “Is that you, Dawkins?”
“It’s me. I’ve got your passenger. If I was you,”—Dawkins spat to lend emphasis to his words—“I wouldn’t let the wind so much as tickle the hair on his head. Westfall won’t forgive any mistakes. Money the old copper’s paying, the lad’s special.”
“I’m fully aware of that, Dawkins,” the trainman snapped. “Come along, Mr. Tanner.”
Nathan learned a quick lesson climbing to the rear platform of the caboose. Train steps were steep and one could not ascend them without making use of handrails. The wiry trainman led him through a compartment where bare wooden benches lined the walls. Lanterns hung above the windows. At the middle of the caboose, storage compartments occupied both sides of the narrow aisle. Iron rungs mounted beside the storage cabinets led upward to the windowed cupola that provided brakemen a view the length of the train.
The forward compartment had a touch of luxury about it, containing a drop-down desk, two separate leather-padded benches wide enough to hold a sleeping man, a cast iron stove complete with ash pan, and a brass, shaded ceiling lamp. Another coal oil lamp attached to a swinging wall bracket illuminated the desk.
Nathan had his first good look at the trainman’s face in the light of the lamps. His cheekbones bore pockmarks and the salt and pepper beard below them was neatly trimmed. The trainman took Nathan in from head to foot. “Lord, but you Tanners are prone to shoulders, muscle, and gray eyes, aren’t you?”
With a smile, the trainman extended his hand. “I’m forgetting my manners. I’m Conductor Sam Darling. Welcome aboard the 903.”
“Thank you, Mr. Darling,” Nathan said, shaking the proffered hand. “I appreciate your help.”
“You can thank your father and Ira Westfall. Your father and I were old friends and Ira spared me a public embarrassment that would’ve cost me my job. Like I told Ira, you won’t need to pay me. I’m afraid it won’t be the same story farther down the track.”
“I’m prepared for that eventuality, Mr. Darling.”
“You talk like your father, too. He always set great store by fancy words.” The conductor sighed. “I’m sorry your father’s gone. He was a rare soul. He was a cutthroat businessman, but he helped many a man he didn’t need to, and seldom asked anything in return.”
The conductor pointed at the bench opposite the drop-down desk. ”Slide your bag under there and sit awhile, lad.”
Once Nathan was seated, Sam Darling pulled a Raymond railroad watch from his vest pocket. “We’ll be underway soon as I signal the engineer. The brakemen will come aboard as we leave the yard. I’ll do the talking where they’re concerned. The MP has strict rules against non-employees riding their freights, but Stan, Farrell, and Toby will do as I tell them.”
The conductor lifted a red-globed lantern from the floor, whipped a “strike anywhere” match across his pants leg, touched flame to the wick of the lantern, and left the caboose via the front door. Shortly thereafter, his red lantern arced in a half circle, giving the engineer the highball. Almost instantly, the engine whistle blasted twice, couplings rattled, and the caboose bumped ahead. A series of small jerks ensued as the train slowly gained momentum. Sam Darling grabbed the handrail at the corner of the caboose as it went by, swung onto the steps of the rear platform, entered, and made straight for his desk in the forward compartment.
Two of the train’s three brakemen followed in his wake. The foremost brakeman spotted Nathan, but said nothing and climbed the wall rungs to the cupola with the nimbleness of a monkey. The second brakeman was less reticent. Large of jaw, lips, and brow, he hesitated in the narrow aisle connecting the front and rear compartments and asked, “Who’s the outsider, Mr. Darling?”
“He’s our passenger, Farrell. He’s riding through to Kansas City. He’s a guest of the MP.”
“Says who?” the brakeman inquired.
“Me and his father, Lucius Tanner, a major stockholder in this railroad,” Sam Darling responded. “He won’t be a bother and you needn’t worry, I’ll take full responsibility for him.”
The conductor had made no reference to the fact that Lucius Tanner was now a deceased stockholder of the Missouri Pacific. Farrell thought a little while, and then nodded his large-jawed head. “That’s fine with me, Mr. Darling. If something goes wrong, it’ll be you dancing on the super’s carpet, not me.”
With that, the brakeman humped his shoulders and returned to the rear platform. Sam Darling swiveled in his desk chair and grinned at Nathan. “Farrell’s more bark than bite. He hates being the End Man. You’ll meet Toby later. He’s our Head Man. He rides in the engine and does the switching in front of the train. Are you hungry, lad?”
With the mere suggestion of food, Nathan discovered he was ravenously hungry. “Yes, Sir, I’ll eat anything I can swallow.”
Sam Darling retrieved a tin lunch pail from beneath the drop-down desk. He freed the hasps of the pail, opened the curved lid, and pulled forth a wedge-shaped package. When Nathan peeled back its newspaper wrapping, he uncovered a mammoth sandwich of freshly baked white bread and roasted beef slathered with butter.
One whiff of the sandwich and Nathan began eating fast as he could. After three hasty swallows, he realized his oversight and ceased his furious chewing, but with his mouth full, his attempt to express his thanks produced what was at best a muffled squawk.
“Relax and eat,” Sam Darling said. The conductor fished a Mason jar of water from the lunch pail and passed it to Nathan. “This’ll go nicely with the bread and beef.”
The conductor consulted his Raymond watch. “Seven minutes to the main line. Lad, you look exactly like your father when I first met him.”
Sam Darling scratched his bearded chin. “Let’s see, it was twenty-five years ago next month, which would make it October 1868. He’d been running cattle south of Alamosa, Colorado, with his older brother, your Uncle Seth. After nearly freezing to death in a blizzard, he’d had enough of tending cows from the saddle of a horse. He came to St. Louis and applied for a job with the Missouri Pacific. The MP took him on as a brakeman. He was assigned to my freight crew, and we rode together for two years. Then your father was promoted to passenger conductor.”
Sam Darling chuckled. “That same spring your mother boarded his train and with one gander at Lila Blackridge’s black hair, black eyes, and pale skin, he was hooked. Lila was well set-up and a moneyed passenger while your father was a mere railroad conductor. That didn’t make a whit’s difference to him. He wheedled her name from her female traveling companion and made inquiries from one end of St. Louis to the other about her...and her family.”
Nathan straightened on the bench. His parents had never related the details of their initial meeting or their courtship beyond his mother’s comment that Lucius Tanner thought long engagements were for those uncertain of their intentions.
Sam Darling consulted his watch. “Five minutes to the main line. I’m probably telling you a story you’ve heard many times.”
Somehow, the conductor’s reminiscences eased Nathan’s hurt and grief, at least for the moment. He cleared a lumpy throat. “No, sir, Mother and Father were pretty tight-mouthed about their early years. Please go on.”
“Well, your father vowed he wouldn’t sleep until he’d been introduced to Lila. Try as he might, he couldn’t even finagle a smell of the roses outside her door, so he did something so unexpected
St. Louis talked of it for a decade. He barged into the office of her father, Lionel Blackridge, the wealthiest merchant in the city, without an appointment. Surprisingly, that tough old bird didn’t have him thrown out and him and your father palavered for most of a morning.
“Your father never told anyone what transpired behind that closed door, but he had dinner at the Blackridge residence that evening. The next morning he resigned from the railroad. In three months, the newspapers announced he’d been appointed general manager of the Blackridge Drayage Company. He married your mother a week later. We railroaders always figured your father showed more backbone and sense than all the bachelors chasing Lila put together. They wanted your mother bad as he did, but none of them was clever enough to let off the scent and win the support of old Lionel.”
The conductor dipped his head and winked at Nathan. “You know, you remind me of your Uncle Seth, too. He and your father looked a lot alike, didn’t they?”
Just the awareness that the conductor was personally acquainted with his uncle heightened Nathan’s curiosity. “Mr. Darling, I only saw my uncle once. He wasn’t married when he came to St. Louis to visit Father. Now, uncle’s dead and I’m to spend a month or more with an aunt I’ve never seen. Do you know anything about her?”
Sam Darling’s lips pursed. “Not much, other than what your father said here and there. He always claimed Seth preferred the company of cattle to women, and news of Seth’s sudden marriage surprised him. Your uncle was past sixty at the time. Your father feared some scheming female had hitched up with Seth to get title to his ranch and hustled off to Colorado to meet the new bride.”
“He never shared anything with me about his trip, neither did Mother,” Nathan said. “Did he ever talk about it with you?”
The conductor nodded. “Just once. We were having dinner at Breen’s Pub not long after he returned. He mentioned he was investing in your uncle’s cattle ranch and that Seth’s new wife had insisted she be an equal partner. I thought your father was joking, but he just laughed and said Alana Birdsong wasn’t a city belle like your mother. Seems she totes a rifle everywhere, and owns a huge black dog with fangs long as your thumb. The dog never leaves her side. He even sleeps at the foot of her bed.”
Brakes squealed. The 903 slowed and then came to a full stop. “That’s all I can recall about her, lad. We’re at the mainline and I’ve chores to do.”
The conductor rose from his chair and patted Nathan’s knee. “Eat the rest of your sandwich and get some sleep if you can. You’ve a long trip ahead of you.”
Sam Darling reclaimed his lantern and joined Farrell on the rear platform of the caboose. Nathan finished his impromptu meal and pulled his carpetbag from beneath the bench. The canvas jacket he sought for a pillow was folded beneath the revolver and shell belt Ira Westfall had borrowed from his father’s den. Nathan lifted the weapon from the carpetbag. A cross-draw holster held a Colt six-gun. The initials “N.T.” had been burned into the wooden grips of the revolver. Nathan realized that it was the same pistol his father had given him on his birthday.
The unfairness of the whole miserable night descended upon Nathan and he bit his lip to avoid bursting into tears. He had to own up to the truth as it was, not as he wished it to be. His parents were gone forever and nothing could change that, but even in death, his father had provided him the means to survive. He had a revolver and ammunition, money in his purse, and temporary quarters that were hopefully beyond the reach of the murderers hunting him.
Maybe his aunt wasn’t like his mother. Maybe she would never dress in a satin gown and play the spinet for the cream of St. Louis society. But boarding at a ranch whose owner packed a rifle and kept a huge dog for added protection had its advantages when you were being sought by paid assassins. Maybe the most he would have to worry about once he reached Colorado was staying in the good graces of Alana Birdsong’s giant guard dog until Ira Westfall jailed the killers.
Nathan traded the Colt six-gun for the jacket in the carpetbag, rolled the jacket into a pillow, and lay back on the leather-padded bench. A whistle blew and the 903 jerked forward. Despite the rough motion of the train as it chugged onto the main line, he was asleep almost instantly.
Four
The monstrous animal charged without growling or barking. At first Nathan thought a huge bear was attacking him. As the onrushing mass of fur drew nearer, he realized it was the biggest dog he’d ever seen. He knew he must flee for his life, but for some crazy reason he couldn’t fathom, his feet refused to move.
The giant dog crouched and lunged at his throat. Its mouth sprung open, exposing white, glistening fangs as long as a man’s thumb. Nathan managed to throw himself to one side and raise an arm in front of his face.
Snapping fangs clamped onto his forearm. Nathan screamed and shook with all his might to free his arm, but failed to dislodge those horrible fangs and the giant dog landed atop him, driving his shoulder into the ground.
“Wake up, lad, wake up before you do yourself serious harm!”
Nathan’s eyes popped open. There were no fangs tearing at his forearm. No beast of a dog was to be seen anywhere. Freight Conductor Rueben Bean of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, not Sam Darling of the Missouri Pacific stood at Nathan’s feet, genuine concern showing on his ruddy face. “Gosh, that must’ve been one hellacious nightmare.”
Nathan grinned sheepishly. He lay on the floor, his arm caught between the end of the bench he’d been sleeping upon and the forward wall of the caboose. What had landed atop him was his own carpetbag.
“Lacey, if he’s the nephew of Seth Tanner, I’ll suck a rotten egg.” The speaker, a D&RG brakeman named Jake, hung upside down from the cupola. “Ain’t no nightmare gonna scare a true blood relative of Seth Tanner.”
Lacey, lounging at the foot of the storage cabinets beneath the cupola giggled and pounded his knee. “Just wait till he and Heft Thomas meet up at Placer Tank. Old Heft hates wet-nursing young calves. He ain’t gonna take kindly to tending one who falls out of bed easy as he slips off the teat.”
Conductor Bean found that prediction particularly hilarious. He broke into a braying hee-haw, which in turn sparked a fit of prolonged laughter on the part of the two brakemen.
Nathan freed his arm and regained his seat on the bench. His cheeks and the nape of his neck were burning hot, and he was certain the trainmen could see his skin getting redder and redder. He could never remember being so embarrassed in front of adults, not even during his childhood.
Lacey stopped laughing, wiped his streaming eyes, and said, “Wonder if old Heft will brand him or shake his hand?”
This clever query produced another round of braying and giggling, which was enough laughter at his expense to last Nathan a month of Sundays. Though the train crew would later tell it differently about the roundhouse, the sight of the six-gun emerging from Nathan’s carpetbag silenced the caboose. Eyes widened and bodies flinched as Nathan leveled the barrel of the six-gun and cocked it.
“Since everyone knows more about my travel arrangements than I do,” Nathan said, struggling to keep his voice from cracking, “I’d appreciate it if you gentlemen would answer a few questions. That is, if you don’t mind?”
“No, sir, we don’t mind,” Conductor Bean stated. “We’ll gladly answer your questions, won’t we, men? Ask away, Mr. Tanner, ask away.”
Nathan sat the six-gun on his knee to steady it. “Who’s Heft Thomas?”
A surprised look passed among the trainmen. Jake, down from the cupola and standing next to Lacey, asked in return, “What do you mean, who’s Heft Thomas? He’s the foreman of the Tanner Ranch, has been for years.”
Nathan studied Lacey. “You said this Heft Thomas is to meet me at Placer Tank. How do you know that?”
The conductor’s ruddy face darkened. “I told him,” Rueben Bean admitted. “I told Jake and Lacey who you are as well as who you’re meeting so they wouldn’t report me to the division super. The Denver and Rio Grande shows no me
rcy to employees that allow passengers aboard their freight trains.”
Nathan wriggled the barrel of the six-gun and asked the conductor, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Heft told me you wasn’t to know. He wired me at Pueblo,” Rueben Bean said. ”He knew which Southern Pacific train from Denver you’d be riding. He asked me to meet you and sneak you aboard the 420. You were to believe that someone named Ira Westfall had ordered us to take you through to Alamosa. We’re really to hand you over to Heft at Placer Tank.”
Nathan relaxed a little, but made no move to lower the six-gun. “Where’s Placer Tank?”
Rueben Bean checked his pocket watch. “It’s dead ahead and we should be there in less than three minutes. I was coming to wake you when you slipped off the bench.”
The timeliness of the conductor’s calculation was apparent immediately. The caboose shuddered as the two giant Mogul engines pulling the freight began braking for the watering stop at Placer Tank. Rueben Bean smiled at Nathan. “We mean you no harm, Mr. Tanner, and if you don’t mind, we must see after our duties.”
At Nathan’s “fine by me” the trainmen were on the move. Conductor Bean and Lacey snatched up lanterns and left by the rear door while Jake scampered up into the cupola.
Nathan settled back on the bench. He laid the six-gun in his lap and wiped his sweaty palm on a pants leg. He’d never pointed a gun at anyone before. He suspected that he’d wrung information from the rough-and-tumble trainmen not because they feared him, but because they were afraid he might accidentally shoot one of them if they spooked him or misspoke in any way. If any of the trainmen had taken offense, he hoped he didn’t meet up with them again unless he had the upper hand. A pointed gun might get results, but it sure wasn’t going to make a bosom friend of anybody.
The 420 slowed to a crawl. By the clock above Rueben Bean’s desk, it was almost midnight. Nathan slid the six-gun into his carpetbag and donned his jacket and cap. He tried not to think about the dog nightmare, but that was impossible. He knew he would never forget falling from the bench in front of the train crew. The next best thing to forgetting such an embarrassment was to get away from the scene, and that, thank the Lord, was about to happen.