by Janet Dawson
In the dome-observation car, Doug and Miss Larch stood in front of the door to bedroom C. Doug had his arms around her, leaning in for a kiss. Miss Larch returned his kiss, her hands around his neck. Then she stepped back when she saw Jill.
“Pardon me,” Jill said. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
Miss Larch smiled shyly. Then she took Doug’s arm and opened the door to her bedroom. “Let’s go inside, just to talk for a bit.”
Doug chuckled, with a sidelong glance at Jill. “I’d welcome the privacy.”
They went inside and shut the door. Well, well, Jill thought. It certainly looked as though this relationship was heating up fast. That didn’t alter the fact that Miss Larch was engaged to someone else, and that Doug was getting off the train in Portola tomorrow morning.
Lonnie Clark was in the buffet kitchen of the dome-observation car, washing glasses. In the buffet itself, Art Geddes sat with Victor Fontana, whose face was still angry as a thundercloud as he drank from the glass in front of him. Miss Larkin and Mrs. Baines sat nearby, chatting and sipping coffee as they played yet another game of gin rummy.
Jill smiled at the porter and then walked up the steps that led to the observation lounge at the end of the car. Avis Margate was in the first seat on the right side of the car, staring into space, as though she were miles away. Should she ask Miss Margate whether she’d been with Mr. Fontana last night? No, it didn’t seem to be the right time for such a personal conversation. There were others in the lounge. The fourth seat, angled so that it faced toward the front of the lounge, was occupied by Cora Grant. She had a book on her lap, turning the pages as she smoked a cigarette. Both of the small bench seats that faced the rear of the car were empty. On the left side of the car, opposite Miss Grant, was Rachel Ranleigh, who was also reading.
All quiet, Jill thought, surveying the lounge. She turned and walked toward the front of the lounge. Miss Grant looked up and to her left. Jill followed the direction of her gaze, seeing Mr. Geddes leave the buffet. He turned to his left and went up the steps, heading forward toward the sleeper cars.
Miss Grant leaned forward and stubbed out her cigarette in a nearby ashtray. Rachel covered her mouth as she yawned. Then she stuck a bookmark into her book and closed it. She stood. “Well, I’m all in. I’m going to bed. Good night, Miss McLeod.”
When she’d gone, in the direction of the sleeper cars, Jill retraced her steps to the buffet. The two women were still playing cards. Mr. Fontana sat alone now, his glass in front of him. He looked at his watch, frowning. Then he picked up the glass and downed the rest. When he stood, he seemed unsteady on his feet. Or was it just the motion of the train? He bumped into the table where Mrs. Baines and Miss Larkin were playing cards and muttered something. The two women gave him looks of disapproval. He straightened, as though getting his bearings. “Miss McLeod,” he said with a boozy smile. “My favorite Zephyrette.” He dropped a heavy hand on Jill’s shoulder, pulling her toward him.
Jill stepped to one side and dislodged his hand. “Good night, Mr. Fontana.”
“G’night.” He weaved past her toward the corridor.
“In his cups,” Mrs. Baines said when he’d gone.
“Absolutely awash,” Miss Larkin agreed. “The things you must put up with, Miss McLeod.” They returned to their game.
Jill turned to Mr. Clark. “Has Mr. Fontana been drinking a lot?”
“Oh, yes. He was already well on his way when he got here. That was about an hour ago.” The porter came around the counter and went into the buffet to retrieve the empty glass. Then he stopped and spoke to the card players. “May I get you ladies some more coffee? Or anything else?”
“No, thank you,” Miss Larkin said. “We’re almost finished with this game. We’re going to bed.”
Mr. Clark picked up their coffee cups. Then he returned to the kitchen and set the dishes in the sink. He added detergent and turned on the hot water.
“Gin!” Mrs. Baines cried from the buffet. She and Miss Larkin gathered up the cards and got up from the table. Then they left the buffet, agreeing to meet in the dining car at eight o’clock for breakfast.
“Mr. Clark,” Jill asked, “did you see something happen between Miss Larch and Mr. Fontana last night?”
He hesitated, washing the dishes and setting them on a dishtowel. Then he nodded and spoke in a lowered voice. “Yes, Miss McLeod, I did. Mr. Fontana was, well, not to put too fine a point on it, he was being a little too familiar with Miss Larch. Ever since she boarded the train in Chicago, he’s been looking at her, looking her up and down, like he was in the market and she was something tasty. You know what I mean.”
“I certainly do,” Jill said. In the two years she’d been working on the California Zephyr, she’d had her share of encounters with the wolves, amorous passengers who thought the Zephyrette was fair game. She’d learned early on how to dodge the men who backed her into corners or doorways, and slip away from the ones who tried to pinch her bottom or put their arms around her, as Mr. Fontana had.
“He bought her a couple of drinks,” the porter said. “And she got a little tipsy. I guess he figured that entitled him to make a pass. She got up and left, went to her bedroom. Did he try it again today?”
“I’m afraid so, in the lounge of the Silver Chalet. When she said no, he made a nasty remark. I didn’t hear it, but I certainly saw her reaction.”
“And that young man, Mr. Cleary? The one who’s been paying attention to her, he didn’t like it.”
“Not a bit,” Jill said. “He very nearly hit Mr. Fontana. I do hope we’ve heard the last of any trouble.”
Mr. Clark picked up another dishtowel and dried the dishes. “I hope so, too.”
“Good night, Mr. Clark.”
Jill walked forward through the transcontinental sleeper. As she entered the sixteen-section sleeper, she encountered Mr. Oliver, who was walking the opposite way. She nodded at him and continued forward, until she reached the Silver Chalet. She sat on the bench seat in her compartment, making notes for her trip report. Then she picked up Funerals are Fatal.
When the train entered the outskirts of Salt Lake City, Jill put away the book and left her compartment. Mr. Peterson, who’d closed up the coffee shop and lounge, was opening the door to the crew’s dormitory. He looked tired, past ready for his bunk inside. “Good night. Sleep well, Mr. Peterson.”
“You too, Miss McLeod.”
In the vestibule of the Silver Ranch, Jill stood with the car porter and a passenger, an old man holding a small suitcase. The CZ slowed, pulling into the Salt Lake City station. As soon as the train stopped, the car porter unlocked the door and flipped the lever that lowered the steps. Once he’d put his step box in place, he reached up to assist the passenger.
A man and a woman waited on the platform. When they saw the old man, they hurried toward him. The woman threw her arms around him, saying, “Grandpa, it’s so good to see you. You look wonderful.” Her husband took the suitcase and beckoned the old man toward the station entrance.
Next to depart the train was a young man, carrying a small valise in his hand. He waved to another man wearing a University of Utah letter jacket. “Hey, Johnny, over here.” The two men then headed for the station, talking a mile a minute.
Once the passengers had left the vestibule, Jill stepped down to the platform. She assisted a passenger who was boarding the Silver Mustang, then she walked toward the front of the train, where Mr. Perkins stood with the new conductor, briefing him on any train orders and the journey so far. Nearby was the new brakeman. The Denver & Rio Grande Western diesels that had pulled the CZ from Denver were being uncoupled. Then the engines pulled forward, onto a siding. Three Western Pacific Railroad engines backed into place, ready to pull the train across the Great Salt Desert and the rugged expanse of Nevada, into California and down the Feather River Canyon to California’s great Central Valley. Here, too, the crews were changing, with D&RGW personnel handing the Silver Lady over to WP emplo
yees.
Otis Perkins waved at Jill, then walked toward the station. The new conductor and brakeman were headed her way. The conductor was a middle-aged man with a wiry build, and she hadn’t seen him before. He must be new to the route. The brakeman she recognized, a tall lanky fellow named Carl Mooney.
“Good evening. I’m Jill McLeod.” She held out her hand and the conductor shook it.
“Bill Dutton. Pleased to meet you. I just started working on the Zephyr a month ago. I’ve heard your name. You’re related to Pat Haggerty, right?”
“Not really. I was engaged to his nephew.”
“Oh, yes, the young man who was killed in Korea a couple of years back,” the conductor said. “Sorry about your loss.”
Jill tamped down the inner twinge she always felt when Steve’s death came up. In some ways she would never get over losing him. But she was making every effort to move on.
She put on her brightest smile. “Glad to have you aboard, Mr. Dutton. And it’s good to see you again, Mr. Mooney.”
“Hope we have a nice, quiet run,” the conductor said.
“Amen to that,” the brakeman added.
As soon as the engines had been switched out, the conductor made his way down the platform with his familiar cry of “All aboard.” Jill climbed into the vestibule of the first chair car, the Silver Scout. The car porter grabbed the step box, then closed and locked the door. The whistle blew and the California Zephyr pulled out of the Salt Lake City station.
She glanced out the vestibule window. The train left the lights of the station and the wide city streets, heading for the western edge of the city. The buildings faded into darkness, punctuated at regular intervals by street lamps. The train’s route would take the CZ along the southern shore of the Great Salt Lake, the vast body of water that gave the city its name. In fact, at a place called Lakepoint, the tracks crossed a small part of the lake. Depending on lake level, which varied throughout the year, the tracks crossed water or mudflats. Had it been daylight, she might have been able to see the elaborate beach pavilion at Saltair, an old beach resort that had been built and rebuilt over the last decades. Generations of bathers had reached Saltair by a railroad from the city.
Jill turned and walked back through the train to the Silver Chalet. In her compartment, she put on her pajamas, brushed her teeth and washed her face. Then she converted the bench seat into her bed and climbed in, tucking the blankets around her. She propped her head with the pillow and reached for her book, reading a few more pages of Hercule Poirot’s case.
But sleep tugged at her eyelids. She realized that she’d read the same page twice. Time to call it a night, she told herself. She set the book aside and turned out the light.
Chapter Fifteen
Miss McLeod? Miss McLeod? Wake up, please.”
Someone was tapping on her door. Jill shook off sleep and reached for the light switch. She propped herself up on one elbow and looked at her watch. She hadn’t been asleep long. It was just after eleven.
She heard it again, a low, insistent voice. “Miss McLeod?”
“I’m coming.”
She threw back the blanket, stuck her feet into her slippers, and got out of bed. Reaching for her blue plaid robe, she put it on and tied the belt around her waist, taking a deep, steadying breath.
There was only one reason anyone would wake her in the middle of the night—a crisis of some sort. Perhaps someone was injured. She unlocked and opened the door.
Lonnie Clark, the porter from the Silver Crescent, stood in the corridor, a worried look on his face. “Come quick, Miss McLeod. Bring your first-aid kit.”
“Who’s hurt? How bad is it?”
“It’s Mr. Fontana, in the drawing room. Something’s wrong. I think he’s ill. Best you see for yourself.”
“I’ll be right there,” she told the porter.
Mr. Clark nodded and turned, heading back to the Silver Crescent. Jill shut and locked her door. CZ policy prohibited her from responding to these late night calls in her nightclothes. She quickly shed her pajamas and put on her uniform. Then she pulled the first-aid kit off the luggage rack above her bed and left her compartment.
Usually when she was called upon to give first aid to passengers, it involved something minor, like the scrape on Robby Demarest’s hand earlier today. Or motion sickness among the passengers, whether adult or child. But Mr. Clark’s demeanor suggested that this was more serious. Jill wouldn’t know what she was dealing with until she saw Mr. Fontana for herself.
Jill walked quickly through the train. At this time of night, nearly an hour out of Salt Lake City, most of the passengers were asleep. In the Silver Quail, all was quiet. There were no lights showing under the doors of the berths, and Joe Backus dozed in the porter’s seat on the Silver Quail. He didn’t wake as she passed him. Back in the Silver Falls, the door to the porter’s compartment was closed. She assumed that Frank Nathan was also asleep.
In the sixteen-section sleeper, she encountered Lois Demarest coming out of the women’s restroom. The girl wore a silky red nightgown and robe. Bundled in her arms she carried her clothing and her shoes. The teenager smiled and put a finger to her lips, then she tiptoed to one of the berths and slipped behind the curtain.
Jill continued down the aisle. Snores and mutterings came from several of the berths she passed. She went past the men’s restroom at the rear of the car and into the next car, the transcontinental sleeper. Finally she entered the Silver Crescent, walking past the porter’s compartment and the closed bedroom doors.
The porter waited for her in the passageway outside the drawing room door, a strained look on his dark face. He motioned with his hand and she stepped toward the doorway.
The light was on inside the drawing room. The seat perpendicular to the window had been folded down into a bed. The pillow had tumbled to the floor. Mr. Fontana lay on his right side, his arms in front of him and his shoulders hunched forward. His right leg was drawn up, completely on the bed, while his other leg, the foot encased in a maroon slipper, dangled over the edge. He wore gray silk pajamas under his plush maroon bathrobe. His breathing was slow and irregular, the air rasping as he drew it in and expelled it from his lungs.
“Mr. Fontana?” The man on the bed didn’t respond. Jill turned to the porter. “I don’t like the way he’s breathing. Do you have any idea what happened? Did he fall?”
Mr. Clark shook his head. “No, I don’t know. I didn’t see or hear anything. I was up in the Vista-Dome. When I came back down I checked the lounge and the buffet, like I always do before going to bed. Then I headed up the passageway to my own quarters. I saw Mr. Fontana’s door was open. It was moving back and forth like it hadn’t closed right. I reached for it, going to shut it. The light was on. I looked in, and I saw Mr. Fontana.”
The porter stopped and ran a hand over his face. “He was on the bed like that, on his side, in his pajamas and robe. It looked to me like he was taken sick and fell. Or passed out. You saw how he was when he left the buffet tonight. He was drinking a lot. When I found him like this, I called out his name. Then I stepped inside, called his name again. I didn’t go all the way over to the bed. I just took a look and saw his face all pale like that. And the way he’s breathing, well, I figured I’d better get you.”
Jill walked into the drawing room and set the first-aid kit on the floor near the bed where Mr. Fontana lay. His face, usually ruddy, was pale. In this light, it almost looked blue. And when Jill touched his forehead, the skin felt cold. His eyes were closed, but as Jill stood over him, his eyes opened and he stared up at her. His breath rasped and his mouth worked, as though he was trying to say something. Then he moaned.
Could this be alcohol poisoning? Her father had once described the symptoms to her, and Mr. Fontana’s symptoms were similar. Or was this something far more serious?
“Mr. Fontana?” Jill reached out and put her hand on his shoulder. He moaned again. Then his arms moved. He rolled back, revealing the front of his rob
e and the blanket where he’d lain.
Behind her, the porter gasped.
The blanket wasn’t supposed to be that color. Jill stared, horrified at what she saw. The maroon color of Mr. Fontana’s robe had hidden the dark red stain. Blood, and lots of it, had soaked into the robe’s thick plush fabric and stained the gray silk pajamas underneath. The letters VF were embroidered in gold on the left breast. A hole had obliterated the leg of the F.
Jill straightened. She looked down at the pillow on the floor and saw another hole on the white pillowcase, this one rimmed with black. She had no doubt that the other side of the pillow was stained with blood.
Mr. Fontana had been shot. And the pillow had been used to muffle the sound.
Jill took a deep breath to steady her nerves. She was surprised that her voice didn’t shake when she spoke. “Mr. Clark, please get Doctor Ranleigh. She’s traveling in compartment I on the Silver Quail. And find the conductor.”
The porter nodded and disappeared from view. Jill turned back to Mr. Fontana. A gunshot wound was far beyond the scope of her first-aid training. She touched his temple gently with her index finger. He groaned. His eyes opened, wide and dark, and he stared up at her.
Jill leaned forward. “Mr. Fontana, it’s Miss McLeod. I’ve sent for a doctor. Can you hear me? What happened?”
Something flickered in his eyes and he groaned again. Guttural sounds came from his mouth. But she couldn’t understand the words. His eyes closed, but he was still breathing, that awful raspy sound, in counterpoint with the clacking of wheels on rails.
A few minutes later, the door opened and Dr. Ranleigh bustled into the drawing room, wrapped in a plaid flannel robe. She carried her medical bag.