It Happened on a Train

by Mac Barnett

  “Human-sized.”

  “Yeah, I don’t get that,” Steve said.

  “Hmm,” Dana said, and continued reading.

  Steve had trouble settling. He pulled the magazine from his seat pocket, but the crossword was already filled out. So was Dana’s. He slumped in his chair.

  What was this train doing with a nameless car? It wouldn’t be so strange if it hadn’t been for the scar-faced man hanging out back there with a handgun. A handgun Steve wasn’t supposed to see. You could call it a coincidence, and coincidences were the last refuge of the lazy detective. And Steve was not lazy. Of course, he was also not a detective.

  Steve’s thinking was interrupted by the arrival of the conductor.

  “Tickets.” This guy at least looked the part, white-haired and friendly, dressed in a neatly pressed uniform. It gave Steve hope that they were just in a dumpy car, and that the nice parts of the train were somewhere else.

  “Excuse me,” he said, handing his ticket over, “where’s the dining car?”

  The conductor made two sharp clicks with his silver hole punch, then pointed to the front of the train. “First car. Up past business class.” Good. Away from the “caboose.”

  “Can I go?” Steve asked Rick.

  “Sure.” Rick put down his knitting needles and reached in his pocket. “Here.” He handed Steve a five-dollar bill.

  “Thanks.” That was nice. Steve didn’t like it when Rick was nice. And he definitely didn’t like taking other people’s money, either. Steve had made five thousand dollars off a single case as a private detective, but his mom had made him put it away for college. And he doubted five bucks would go far in the dining car. Those places were swanky: white tablecloths and fancy china. It probably wouldn’t buy a chocolate sundae, let alone charcoal-broiled sirloin steak with maître d’hôtel butter.

  “Want to come?” Steve asked Dana.

  “Maybe when I get to the end of this chapter.”

  “Okay.”

  The second Steve rose, there was a loud roar. The whole car shook.

  CHAPTER XVII

  MEET CLAIRE MARRINER

  THERE WAS A SHOCKING FLASH of metal as an oncoming train passed theirs on the left. Steve stumbled, startled.

  Rick chuckled. “Still need to get your train legs, eh, Stevie?”

  Steve frowned. “What?”

  “Train legs. Like sea legs, for trains.”

  Dana looked up from his book. “I don’t think that’s a thing, Rick.”

  Steve smiled. Now that was the old Dana.

  He headed for the front of the train.

  Steve hoped business class would be better, but it wasn’t. As far as Steve could tell, the only difference between business class and coach class was that the stains on the business-class carpets were left by businessmen. (The very fact that Steve was allowed to walk through business class on his way to the dining car told him it wasn’t a very exclusive way to travel.)

  Man, train travel has really gone downhill, Steve thought as he walked past a snoring man in a gray suit. Still, he looked forward to sitting at a table, sipping celery juice or hot chocolate and watching the Pacific Ocean go by.

  But the dining car wasn’t even called the dining car. It was called the café car, and it was about as glamorous as the snack bar at a junior varsity volleyball game. The whole place smelled like burned coffee and bad soup.

  A man sat behind a counter, surrounded by snacks. He wore a light beard and a loose-fitting apron, and he looked at Steve without much interest. Behind him was a microwave, cups of breakfast cereals and dehydrated ramen, candy bars, bags of chips, and bottles ranging in size from tiny to just normal. The lighting was harshly fluorescent and completely unnecessary in the daytime, and it made Steve’s mood even worse. All the plasticky tables and chairs were empty except one.

  A girl about Steve’s age was drinking a cup of something hot and reading a book.

  The girl had long brown hair and light freckles and glasses. She rested her chin on both hands and held the book open with her elbows. When she reached for her cup, she didn’t even look up or take her elbow from the page open in front of her.

  She looked nice.

  That was ridiculous. Steve didn’t know anything about her. She was just a girl reading a book.

  Steve wondered what she was reading. He thought about asking her. In his mind she was reading a Bailey Brothers book (even though it was paperback and so couldn’t be a Bailey Brothers book). And then Steve could tell her that he’d read that one. And she’d be impressed, and they’d talk about their favorite Bailey Brothers mysteries and maybe even Steve’s own adventures as a detective.

  “Holler if you want anything,” the man behind the counter said to Steve.

  The girl looked up, and Steve quickly looked at the man. “I’m just looking,” he said quickly. The man smiled and nodded.

  Steve looked at the girl.

  The girl looked at Steve.

  Steve looked away.

  The girl read while the view sped by.

  Steve felt queasy. He studied a nearby poster advertising the UTZ FAMILY OF SNACKS while he organized his thoughts. Should he go up and talk to her? She was his age, and they were both on the train, so why not? But it wasn’t like he needed to make friends or anything. Dana was here. Staring at a photograph of some pretzels, Steve decided to leave the car.

  “See anything interesting?” a voice behind him asked. Steve turned. It was the girl. She was at least six inches taller than he was.

  “You’re the second person to ask me that today.”

  “What a coincidence,” she said.

  Steve usually didn’t believe in coincidences, but he was grateful for this one. It seemed like a good omen.

  “I’m Claire Marriner,” she said.

  “Oh. I’m Steve Brixton,” said Steve. “What are you doing on this train?” The question came out too harshly and left an unpleasant aftertaste in Steve’s mouth.

  “I’m taking a trip with my uncle.”

  Steve nodded. “Cool. Cool.”

  “How about you?”

  Steve had to think a bit before he remembered. “I’m going to this Model UN thing in San Diego.”

  “Oh.”

  Steve didn’t know why, but after an agonizing silence he said, “Yeah, I used to be a private detective. Now I’m retired.”

  Claire looked at him. “That doesn’t even make sense.”

  “Yes it does.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Twelve.”

  “Me too. You’re too young to be a detective, let alone a retired detective.”

  “That’s ridiculous. I was a detective. My picture was in the newspaper and everything.”

  Claire didn’t say anything. She just smiled dismissively. This infuriated Steve.

  “I was,” he said.

  “Okay,” she said brightly.

  “What do you know about sleuthing?”

  “My uncle’s a private detective.”

  Well. This was unexpected.

  “What’s his name?”

  “Cy Marriner.”

  Steve crossed his arms. “Well, I’ve never heard of him.”

  “You’re not supposed to have heard of him. That’s why they call them private detectives,” Claire said.

  “No it’s not.”

  “What?”

  “They call them private detectives because they don’t work for—”

  “I know, I know,” Claire said impatiently, “but still, it would be hard to work undercover if your picture was in the paper.”

  Steve shrugged. He’d never had any trouble working undercover.

  “Anyway, I better go back to my seat. My uncle’s probably wondering where I am.”

  “Where are you sitting?”

  “Oh, back a few cars. I don’t know the seat number or anything. These cars all look exactly the same.” She laughed.

  “Yeah!” Steve agreed, probably too enthusiastically.r />
  “Well, maybe I’ll see you later, old man,” Claire said.

  “What?” Steve said, but she was already gone.

  It took Steve a couple seconds to realize that “old man” had been a joke about his retirement. He didn’t like the joke. In fact pretty much all of his conversation with Claire Marriner had been irritating, and Steve wondered why he’d asked where she was sitting. He decided he’d rather not see Claire Marriner again.

  When Steve turned around, he noticed that Claire had left her book facedown on the table. He went over and picked it up. It was bound in green cloth and embossed with an A on the cover. The title on the spine was Pride and Prejudice. He saved her page, using a napkin as a bookmark. Obviously, Steve decided, she would need her book back. It was his duty to return it.

  He was looking forward to seeing Claire Marriner again.

  CHAPTER XVIII

  THE GIRL VANISHES

  BOOK IN HAND, Steve exited the café car. Grabbing unoccupied seat backs to keep his balance, Steve looked around for Claire in business class. He didn’t think she’d be in this car, and she wasn’t—it was just a bunch of men and women, most of them in drab suits, reading magazines and talking quietly. Claire wasn’t in Steve’s car either, although Steve already knew that. Dana was still deep in Wizards’ Worlds, and Rick was napping, slack-jawed, his head leaning against the window.

  Steve walked by quietly. When he passed the family, the man was holding the little girl up so she could look out the window. There were orange hand-prints all over the front of his T-shirt. The girl had her face pressed right up against the glass. She squealed. Her mother laughed. Steve looked back to make sure Rick was still asleep, and so he bumped right into someone coming toward him.

  “Sorry,” Steve said, turning.

  It was the scar-faced man.

  “You again?” The man looked disgusted.

  “I said sorry,” said Steve, and hurried to the next car.

  Claire was not here.

  Nor was she in the next car.

  Or the car after that.

  In fact, besides Dana there were no other kids on the train, let alone a girl with light freckles and long brown hair.

  Steve stood at the front of the train’s fifth car, the one called DEATH VALLEY, he remembered. There was

  only one car left: the phantom car. Steve swallowed hard. He continued down the aisle.

  The window on the door at the back of the car was almost completely covered by a bright orange sticker. It said DANGER—NO ENTRY—HIGH VOLTAGE, and it had a picture of a stick figure getting zapped by two bolts of lightning. The bolts were hitting the figure’s back and chest in a perfect, painful V, as if hurled by some angry and ambidextrous Greek god. Steve stopped and considered his next move.

  “Can’t go back there, son,” came a voice from Steve’s left. The white-haired conductor was sitting in the window seat, smiling. “Dangerous.”

  “What’s back there?” Steve asked. “What’s in that car?”

  “Electrical stuff. Wiring. And some cargo.”

  Steve nodded. He was relieved to have solved the mystery of the phantom car.

  But there was still the mystery of Claire Marriner. Steve looked again at the thick black lightning bolts and got woozy when he thought of Claire coming back here accidentally.

  “Hey,” Steve said, hiding his concern. “Have you seen a girl about my age come through this car? Maybe she came back through this door? In the last five minutes or so?”

  “Sure haven’t,” the man said. “And I’ve been here for a quarter hour. Nobody goes back there—the sign stops ’em. Although”—he leaned over conspiratorially—“it’s not all that dangerous. You can’t even get into the last car from inside the train.”

  Steve’s head was all swirling clouds. “Okay,” he said. “Thanks.”

  “Good luck finding that girl,” the conductor said, and winked.

  Steve turned and hurried toward the front of the train.

  CHAPTER XIX

  A DESPERATE SEARCH

  TRAIN LEGS OR NO, Steve almost ran down the train’s center aisle. His heart and lungs were working fast. But his brain felt like it wasn’t working at all. All his thoughts were flinging wildly about, then slapping against the inside of his skull. Claire Marriner had disappeared. How? It was impossible. And yet she was nowhere to be found.

  Steve must have missed her on his way back through the train. That was the only reasonable explanation.

  And so Steve began anxiously checking and double-checking the rows of seats. Whenever a passenger looked up at him, Steve quickly changed his expression from panicked to politely benign. But few people did notice Steve, which gave him plenty of time to examine them for false noses, concealed switchblades, or other indicators of criminal nature. There was something shady underway on this train—Steve had suspected as much since he saw the cops on the platform—and now Claire was caught up in it.

  After a blur of faces—some exhausted, irritated, or wrinkled, but none particularly nefarious—Steve found himself back in the café car. The scar-faced man sat at a table, glowering at him while emptying a tiny plastic wine bottle into a big plastic cup.

  Claire was not in the café car.

  Steve, sweating, turned around and walked back through the train.

  This time, at the back of each car Steve got on the floor in case Claire was hiding under a seat. Now people stared. Steve didn’t care.

  Why would a girl be hiding under a seat? Steve asked himself, his chin resting on the car’s cool floor. (He was only dimly aware of the grease stains.) It didn’t make sense.

  But how could a girl disappear from a train?

  A small, white dog barked at him from within its carrier.

  He got up. The dog’s owner looked at him disapprovingly. Obviously, this woman didn’t understand, and neither did the dog.

  Steve checked the train’s bathrooms. Only one was occupied. Steve loitered outside the door. He knocked. There was no answer. He softly pounded his right fist in his left palm. The red tab by the door’s handle clicked over to green. The handle turned. The door opened. A man with a shaved head and a striped scarf exited into the car.

  “All yours,” he said.

  “Oh, I don’t need it,” Steve said.

  The man raised his eyebrows and walked down the aisle. Steve followed close behind him. Why was this guy walking so slowly? The man gave Steve a strange look over his right shoulder.

  “Can I help you?” he said.

  “No,” Steve replied, and took the opportunity to squeeze past him.

  “Weird kid,” Steve heard the man mutter as he hurried down the train. Steve’s face flushed. At least Steve wasn’t wearing a scarf inside a train—that was really weird. Like sunglasses at night, only not at all cool. Although maybe you get cold when you don’t have any hair.

  Soon Steve was back in the sixth car.

  No Claire. He went only halfway back this time, smiled weakly at the conductor to eliminate any suspicion, and started walking forward again.

  This was the last trip he would make.

  He would find Claire this time.

  He looked at the passengers as he went by. They listened to music, typed on laptops, and told stories. Steve looked sharply at a man who laughed loudly at some joke. He felt angry with these people, casually going about their business while a crisis unfolded on their train.

  He stared at a woman reading a book. “Excuse me,” he said. He tried to take the edge out of his voice. “Have you seen a girl about my age, with brown hair and glasses?” The woman shook her head and wrinkled her nose like Steve’s question had smelled bad. She went back to her book.

  Steve checked all the luggage racks for brown-haired stowaways.

  Claire was not up there.

  Claire was not anywhere.

  Claire Marriner had disappeared.

  CHAPTER XX

  ENLISTING A CHUM

  STEVE PLOPPED DOWN IN HIS SEAT. Rick
was still slack-jawed and sleeping. Dana looked up from his book.

  “Where have you been?” he asked.

  Steve was breathing heavily. He brushed his hair back from his forehead. “I met this girl in the café car,” Steve said.

  “Ooooooohh,” said Dana.

  “No, listen. She disappeared,” Steve said. And then added: “And also it’s not even like that.”

  Dana’s face got serious. “Disappeared?”

  “Yeah. She just disappeared. I met her in the café car, and now she’s not on the train.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Steve told Dana about Claire, about his search through the cars, about the conductor and the phantom car and the scar-faced man and the woman reading a book.

  “Weird,” said Dana.

  “I know,” said Steve.

  “But that’s impossible,” said Dana.

  “I know,” said Steve. “Unless she’s a wizard.”

  Dana ignored that. He hesitated, and then asked, “Are you sure there was a girl?”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know,” Dana said quickly. “It’s just I’m trying to think of a rational explanation, and one rational explanation is that you like hallucinated this.”

  “That’s a stupid explanation,” Steve said. “I have her book.” He opened Pride and Prejudice to the flyleaf. There, written in cursive with a ballpoint pen, was the name “Claire Marriner.”

  “She has nice handwriting,” Dana said.

  “Yeah,” Steve said.

  “Oh!” said Dana. “Maybe she’s in one of the bathrooms!”

  Steve rolled his eyes. “I checked the bathrooms. Come on, Dana. I’m a …”

  Dana leaned forward. “You’re a what?”

  “I’m a retired detective, okay?”

  Dana rubbed his chin. “So what’s the plan? I mean, there’s nothing we can do, right? Should we wake Rick up and tell him?”

  Steve’s wide-open mouth conveyed his sense of betrayal. “Him? Come on. How many times have I outsolved that guy?”

  Dana shrugged.

  “Look,” said Steve, “there is an innocent person who is almost definitely in some kind of danger right now.”