On the Wrong Track Read online

  Or, Maybe the killer’s not asleep at all. Maybe he’s waiting for me to start snoring.

  I distracted myself from these gloomy musings by aiming my ears at a particular berth—the one directly beneath us—making out a little muffled rasp that seemed then like the sweetest music I’d ever heard. Even so coarse a thing as a snore has its allure when it slips from betwixt the ruby lips of a pretty young lady.

  Saddle tramps like me and Gustav don’t stay any one place long enough to have sweethearts—not the kind you don’t rent out by the quarter hour, anyway. But if I were to change that, settle in somewhere, Diana Caveo was exactly the sort of woman I’d set my sights on. She was good-looking, good-humored, sharp, and just sharp-tongued enough to cut through the bullshit I tend to lay on too thick.

  Of course, she was also four or five years beyond me in age—not to mention four or five rungs above me on the social ladder. Yet such practical considerations are no match for a man’s imagination, and my mind was soon busy concocting scenarios as unlikely as they would be embarrassing to relate.

  Which is perhaps why I didn’t notice the shush of parting curtains or the creaking of cautious footsteps in the aisle. What I did eventually notice—because it was practically puffing on the side of my face like a bellows—was the shallow, huffing pant of a man’s breath.

  Someone was lurking in the passageway, I realized with a jolt that jerked me from my moonings. He was lurking close, too—right beyond our berth curtain, mere inches from my head.

  Now said head has been described as both hard and thick many times over the years, but not even Old Red would claim it was so dense as to repel lead. All it would take was one well-placed bullet to plug glugging holes in both my skull and my brother’s. We had only one chance: put a hole in that other fellow’s head first.

  I yanked our curtain open and whipped up Gustav’s .45.

  I expected to find myself eyeball-to-eyeball with the killer, but all I was eyeball-to was skin. Before me was a scalp as white and smooth as a brand-new baseball. The man it belonged to was hunched over, staring at something beneath my berth. He straightened up quick, though, and the terrified eyes that met mine belonged to none other than Chester Q. Horner.

  Even in the dim half-light that (barely) illuminated the car, I could see the color drain from his face. He recovered rapidly, however, plastering over his shock with a bright salesman’s smile as he put up his hands in mock surrender.

  “Sorry to disappoint you … I’m not Barson or Welsh.”

  He lowered his hands as I lowered the Colt.

  “You scared the piss out of me, Otto,” he went on, whisper-quiet. “Which is funny, cuz I was just draining the dragon down in the gents’. I’ve really gotta remember: no nightcaps on a train. All this swaying and rocking gets the liquor sloshing, and before you know it, your bladder’s crowing like a rooster. You’d think a traveling man like me wouldn’t forget.”

  He was moving as he talked, backing away toward his berth, directly across the aisle from mine.

  “Anyway, see ya tomorrow.”

  And he threw himself up into his bunk and closed the curtains tight behind him.

  It was over so fast it left me gaping, slack-jawed, thinking maybe I’d nodded off into a dream. But then I leaned out and looked down, wondering what Horner had been up to, and I saw proof that it had been plenty real.

  The curtains of the berth below ours had been pulled open. Not all the way—just parted a foot or so. But that was enough to give anyone in the corridor a peep at the passenger inside.

  Horner had been ogling Miss Caveo.

  I stared down, disgusted by the liberty the drummer had taken … even as I took it myself without quite meaning to. I didn’t have the right angle to see much, but what I saw made it hard to tear my gaze away.

  Dark locks spilling across a pillow. A soft, slack hand, the delicate fingers curled ever so slightly. An upturned wrist as pure white as porcelain. A naked forearm disappearing into a lacy sleeve.

  My heart got to thumping so tom-tom loud I was sure it would wake everyone on the train, and I leaned out farther to close the curtains, intending to avert my eyes while I was at it. My eyes refused to avert, however, and I got an even better look at Sleeping Beauty.

  She wasn’t the model of feminine perfection one finds in paintings and magazine illustrations. Her nose was a touch too bulbous, her face too freckled, her middle perhaps not wasp-waisted enough. But what some would label “imperfections” merely strengthened her hold on me, for they emphasized that this was a real woman. Not a goddess, not an image, not an ideal. She lived in the same world I did. She was something I could reach out and touch.

  As was the book lying by her side. Having a nightie-clad female before me and all, it took me a moment to notice it.

  It was Rules and Regulations of the Operating Department, published by the Southern Pacific Railroad.

  My eyes widened.

  Miss Caveo’s fluttered.

  “Feather,” she moaned.

  Or maybe it was “weather” or “heather” or “favor” or “father.” I certainly didn’t hang there upside down waiting for her to repeat herself. I closed her curtains quick and retreated back into my bunk.

  For the next minute, I lay there, utterly still, listening for any hint that Miss Caveo had seen me. There was no gasp or squeak or scream, though, and finally I relaxed, convinced she’d slept through the whole thing. Without a doubt my brother had, for he honked out another mighty snore.

  Most times, Gustav’s the lighter sleeper of the two of us: He was working the cattle trails back when there was still a chance you could wake up with a Sioux brave’s knife under your scalp, and it usually doesn’t take anything more than a flea’s fart to get him up grabbing for his gun. He had to be exhausted indeed to sleep through my encounter with Horner.

  As pissed at him as I was, I didn’t begrudge him a little extra shut-eye. So I stayed on watch as long as I could, passing the time as before with thoughts of Diana Caveo. They were different thoughts now, though.

  I could tell Old Red didn’t trust her, and he’d warned me more than once that I shouldn’t trust myself when it comes to women. And she’d certainly proved herself to be an accomplished liar—or persuader, to use a term she’d probably prefer.

  Yet I still couldn’t bring myself to believe there was anything truly treacherous about her. She had peculiar taste in bedtime reading, sure, but I expected there was an innocent enough explanation. I’d wheedle it out of her the next day, along with whatever smiles and laughs I could get. Maybe I’d even feel her arm linked with mine again.

  Maybe I’d even get a kiss.

  This last thought was where the line between daydreaming and dreaming-dreaming had started to blur. Miss Caveo became Mrs. Kier, who became my sister Greta, who became the snake, who became (most horrifying of all) Wiltrout.

  I gave Gustav a jab in the ribs. Without a word, we wriggled around till he was by the aisle cuddling the gun and I was by the window cuddling my pillow. At last, I could let my eyelids drop like the curtains on a theater stage.

  The next morning, they’d open again on the final act.

  Twenty-six

  ALL THAT

  Or, Gustav and I Try to Iron Things Out, and Up Pops a New Wrinkle

  What seemed like mere moments after falling asleep, I was lured from my slumber by an enticement even my weary body couldn’t resist: the aroma of fresh-brewed Arbuckle. I opened my eyes to find Samuel smiling at me, a cup of black coffee in his hands.

  Gustav was gone.

  “Good mornin’, Mr. Amlingmeyer,” Samuel said. He’d opened the berth curtains just enough to peek in and wave the joe beneath my nose. “I know you had a rough day yesterday, so I let you sleep long as I could. But I’m gonna have to ask you to come outta there soon. There’s only two upper berths on the whole train that haven’t been folded up yet, and you’re in one of ’em.”

  Having long ago accustomed myself to the
early-morning risings on cattle drives (which usually start before dawn with the cook banging a pan and kicking goldbrickers upside the head), I felt like quite the pampered prince awaking to coffee in bed.

  “Thank you, Samuel,” I said, propping myself on an elbow and reaching for the cup. I took a sip and smacked my lips. “Tough luck for my brother he ain’t here to be coddled like this.”

  “Oh, he’s been up for hours. Sendin’ you the coffee was his idea.”

  “Oh.”

  The taste of the java took on a bitter bite.

  “He’s waitin’ for you in the dinin’ car,” Samuel said.

  The coffee was strong but it wasn’t all that hot, and I swallowed the rest of it in two gulps. “I’ll be cleared outta here in a minute. But you can tell my brother I won’t be down to see him till I’m good and ready. I need a shave.”

  Samuel lingered, watching me, as I dug out a clean shirt. When I noticed he wasn’t leaving, I grinned and stuck a hand in my pocket.

  “For your trouble,” I said, pulling out a nickel and handing it over.

  “You’re learnin’, you’re learnin’,” the porter chortled, and he pulled the curtains closed.

  After squirming out of my dirty old duds and into a fresh set, I hopped down into the aisle and made my way to the washroom. What I saw in the mirror was an improvement over the night before—though improving on hideous still won’t get you handsome. The purple-balloon swelling of my nose had shrunk to a pink-tinged bulge. Rather than resembling a man with a plum stuck to his face, I now merely looked like a puffy-faced drunk.

  Our Pullman was nearly deserted when I stepped out of the privy, and it wasn’t hard to account for all the empty seats—the car had never been noisier. Mrs. Foreman’s curly-topped hellions were re-creating one of Billy the Kid’s train robberies (never mind that the Kid never robbed a train) with wild whoops and howling death throes. I was even obligated to die once myself, having been drafted into the role of an unlucky lawman. I guess the boys just assumed the part suited me.

  As I made my escape toward the back of the train, I passed the last upper berth still down with curtains closed: Lockhart’s. It was hunkered atop Chan’s berth, so the Chinaman’s bed hadn’t been put up for the day, either. Given the mood Lockhart would be in (and the hangover he’d have to contend with) once he awoke, I could understand why Samuel hadn’t hustled him from his cubbyhole. The longer the old Pinkerton slept, the better off we’d all be.

  As I continued on through the next sleeper, I encountered our conductor coming the other way, and we had to do an uncomfortably cozy Tennessee reel to slide around each other.

  “Your presumptuous, troublemaking, son-of-a-bitch brother’s waiting for you in the dining car,” Wiltrout growled. (He didn’t actually say the “presumptuous, troublemaking, son-of-a-bitch” part, mind you—it was simply implied by the tone of his voice.)

  A minute later, I had to do another passageway do-si-do, this time with Kip and his tray of nickel-and-dime diversions.

  “Hey, Otto,” the kid said as we maneuvered around each other, “your brother’s waitin’ for you—”

  “I know, I know. In the dinin’ car.” I rolled my eyes. “Jesus.”

  A plump Presbyterian burgher seated nearby shot me a disapproving glare.

  “Is Lord,” I added.

  The man wasn’t fooled, but at least he directed his frown down at the Saturday Evening Post spread across his ample lap.

  “Samuel and Wiltrout already told me the same thing,” I said to Kip.

  “I’m sure the captain just loved playin’ messenger boy for Old Red. Your brother’s got him mighty p-”—Kip caught himself before he offended any of his potential customers with the -issed that almost followed—“-erturbed again.”

  “What’s he doin’ now?”

  “Just askin’ folks a lot of crazy-soundin’ questions. ‘Have you seen a man with curly blond hair slinkin’ around?’ ‘Did you see a bald feller creepin’ out of the baggage car?’ ‘Have you lost a teacup recently?’”

  The news butch shook his head, shaking off his usual air of cocky self-amusement in the process.

  “You know, Otto—I appreciate your brother’s stick-to-itiveness. Joe Pezullo was a friend of mine, after all. But Old Red’s not exactly the smoothest talker in the world, is he? I mean, Wiltrout ain’t the only person he’s perturbed this morning. Maybe you better tell him to ease up if you don’t want to get tossed off the train keister over teacup.”

  “Who says I don’t?” I snorted.

  Kip’s expression turned quizzical, but I didn’t feel like explaining myself. I wasn’t sure I could even if I tried. I was mightily peeved at my brother, and the badge I was wearing still chafed against my chest. But just how mad was I—and what did I intend to do about it? That I hadn’t thought through.

  “Thanks for the tip, kid. I’ll keep it in mind.”

  Kip nodded and got on his way, barking that he was offering “fresh newspapers, fresh spring water, fresh strawberries—with fresh talk added free of charge!”

  A moment later, I was stepping into the crowded dining car. I spotted Old Red right off. He was hunched over at a table for two near the car’s matchbox of a kitchen.

  Whether he was being plagued by his conscience or the half-eaten serving of scrambled eggs on the plate before him, I couldn’t say. Either way, he looked miserable.

  When he saw me, he actually raised his hand and gave a timid wave, as if unsure I’d recognize him. I replied with a neutral nod and headed toward his table.

  Drawing closer, I spotted something sitting next to his plate. Even halfway across the compartment, I could tell what it was—the printing on the cover hollered as loud as Kip at his most earsplitting.

  The dime novel’s title was The Sons of Jesse James: The All-True Story of the Give-’em-Hell Boys. Below that was a drawing of two gaudy-dressed gunslingers who resembled Mike Barson and Augie Welsh about as much as a unicorn resembles a pack mule.

  So that’s why he’s been looking for me, I thought sourly. He just wants me to read something for him.

  “Mornin’,” I mumbled, my voice flapjack flat.

  I slumped into the chair across from my brother.

  “Mornin’,” he replied quietly. “Nose looks better.”

  I shrugged. “That wouldn’t be hard.”

  I could’ve added that he actually looked worse. His face was as pale as the bleached-white tablecloth, and hanging beneath his bloodshot eyes were bags so large Kip could have filled them with peanuts and peddled them to the passengers.

  Yet I said nothing. Not to spare Old Red’s feelings—I just wasn’t in the mood to banter with him.

  Gustav seemed to be waiting for me to say something, anything. I’m the talkative one, after all. For once I didn’t know what to say, though, and I turned away and looked out the window.

  In the night, the Pacific Express had escaped the Great Basin and its yellow-gray sea of alkali sand. Now we were in the Sierras, and everything was different. Whereas before all had been dingy sameness, our new view included a blanket of emerald pines, jutting towers of black rock capped with ivory-pure snow, shimmering blue water at the bottom of gaping gorges—such a variety of sights as to be almost dizzying.

  And for Old Red, there was no “almost” about it. He followed my gaze, and one glance into the nearest ravine was enough to set his eyes spinning like paddle wheels.

  He swiveled around to put his back to the window, muttering something I couldn’t quite catch.

  “Huh?” I grunted.

  Gustav squirmed and toyed with his fork and looked at the floor.

  “I said, ‘I’m sorry, you know,’” he finally managed to croak out.

  I gaped at him like he’d taken to spouting Latin. I’m sorry just wasn’t a phrase I thought was in his vocabulary.

  “Matter of fact, I didn’t know,” I said.

  “Well, now you do.”

  “Alright … apology accepted. Now y
ou wanna tell me exactly what you’re sorry for?”

  My brother fidgeted again, writhing in his seat like a worm on the hook. “Not particularly. But I reckon there’s no gettin’ around it, is there?”

  “You reckon right.”

  Old Red pressed his fingertips to his head like it had come loose and needed straightening. “It’s hard to talk out—cuz I don’t entirely understand it.” He shrugged. “Trains just make me sick. Queasylike. Always have, from the first time I rode one.”

  He shrugged again and went silent. I let him have a moment, then shook my head and gave him the palms-up, double curl of the fingers that usually means “pay up.” This time, it meant “more.” Gustav answered with a reluctant nod.

  “Maybe it’s cuz it’s something I can’t control,” he said. “A horse, a buggy, a wagon—you got reins. But these damned things?” He gave the car around us a limp little wave. “All you can do is sit here and hope there’s someone workin’ the gears who knows what the hell he’s doin’. And even if there is, what if a trestle washes out? Or bandits mess with the rails? Or another train ends up on the wrong track—your track, comin’ straight at you? Why, you wouldn’t even know it till …”

  My brother’s voice had grown louder with each word, and he cut himself off when he noticed the stares he was drawing from the tables around us.

  “Look, I can understand all that,” I told him. “What I can’t understand is why you didn’t just tell me you felt that way.”

  Old Red sighed. “I guess maybe it was pride. Partly. But there was more to it than that. Do you remember … after … you know? The flood and all that. I had you come down to meet me in Dodge City?”

  I nodded. The flood and all that was what had set me and my brother adrift together—the destruction of our family farm and our family with it.

  “I couldn’t even bring myself to ride a train up to get you, see that our people was buried proper.” Gustav’s voice was growing hoarse, his eyes red and moist. “That left me feelin’ … pretty low.”

  His gaze drifted down toward the floor again. But then he cleared his throat and forced himself to look me in the eye.