On the Wrong Track Read online

  “And then there you was in Dodge—my baby brother, lookin’ at me like I was Vater and Mutter and Buffalo Bill Cody rolled up in one. You was just a scared kid tryin’ to feel safe … needin’ something to believe in, I guess. A hero. I couldn’t admit I was just as scared as you. So when we took to the trails, I let you assume what you would.”

  He gave his head a woeful shake of the kind he usually directs at me with a roll of the eyes. But it was himself he was disappointed in now.

  “Later, I was afraid how you’d take the truth. And not just cuz I’d misled you. There was all them extra days in the saddle, too. I wasn’t sure you’d put up with it anymore if it was just cuz I was yellow about something. I wasn’t sure you’d still put up with me. You see, I’d got used to havin’ you around, Otto. And … well, dammit, I reckon that’s all there is to say.”

  My brother wilted back in his seat looking winded—and for good reason. He’d just been digging hard, dredging down as deep as he’d ever gone with me before. For him it was toil, hard labor, talking like this.

  But he’d done the job right.

  “You were wrong back in Dodge,” I said.

  Old Red’s face shifted, tightened, as if he was expecting the worst. “I know, I know. I shouldn’t have—”

  I shook my head. “I ain’t talkin’ about what you done. I’m talkin’ about why you done it. I didn’t need a hero, Gustav. I just needed my brother—and there you were. As for ridin’ trails ’stead of trains all these years … well, if I was willin’ to go to all that extra trouble for principle, don’t you think I’d do the same and more if I knew it was for you?”

  For a moment, Gustav didn’t seem to know how to react. Then he tried to react—tried to smile, actually—but the best he could manage was a sort of trembly-lipped grimace.

  “I suppose you would.”

  “You bet I would … and I will.” I pointed a finger at him and gave it a shake. “Now, that don’t mean I’m any happier about workin’ for the S.P. But I can see how much it really means to you. Your gettin’ on the Express shows that. If you could get over your feelin’s about trains, I suppose I can get over a thing or two myself. So I’ll see this through with you—to Oakland and wherever else, to the end of the line.”

  Gustav gave up trying to smile and settled for a simple nod. “Thank you, Otto.”

  “Don’t mention it,” I said, and that’s not just an expression for me and my brother. Most likely, we’d never speak of this conversation again.

  Perhaps a minute passed in silence while we let it all sink in—the look I’d been given into Old Red’s heart and whatever change this might bring about between us.

  It was my stomach that spoke first, unleashing a roar that commanded Feed me! in no uncertain terms. Man cannot survive on bread alone, the old saying goes, and I’d add that bread and java still isn’t enough to get by on. So I waved the steward over and put in an order for kippered herring, griddle cakes, eggs, sausage, bacon, biscuits, potatoes, and, if available, a horse, since I was hungry enough to eat one.

  “Alright, then,” I said as the steward staggered away under the weight of my prodigious order, “how goes our investigation? Anybody see Wiltrout sneakin’ around with a snake? Or a stranger in a curly blond too-pay lightin’ up a stogie with the manifest?”

  My brother sat up straighter, looking profoundly grateful for the change of topic. “Nobody saw nothin’. But I ain’t through askin’ around just yet. And there’s other ways to get at the data we need.”

  He spun the dime novel around and slid it across the table.

  “The Sons of Jesse James” stared up at me from the cover. They were Westerners as only an Easterner or a schoolboy could imagine them: neatly groomed, dandified, with a silver six-gun in each hand and eyes alight with the will to fight for what’s right. They were the ideal—Old Red and I, the grimy reality.

  “Where’d you get this thing, anyway?” I asked, rapping a knuckle on the magazine. It looked as ragged as my brother’s Holmes tales, with dog-eared pages and creases in the cover.

  “Kip. He didn’t have anything new he could sell me on the Give-’em-Hell Boys—folks bought out everything he had, ’cept for that. It’s his personal copy.”

  “And he just gave it to you?”

  Gustav took to dusting imaginary crumbs from the table. “Sold it to me … for a buck.”

  “That little pirate,” I chuckled.

  I flipped the magazine open and started skimming through the story. The bellowing blast of the first sentences was all it took to turn my snickers into a groan.

  Reading Doc Watson’s tales has often left me uncertain as to my own skills with pen and paper. The man weaves quite a tapestry, whereas it sometimes seems like my own fumbling fingers produce nothing but knots. That was part of the reason the book I’d written was tucked away in my war bag rather than sitting on some New York editor’s desk.

  The dime novel before me had the opposite effect, however: Reading it, I couldn’t help but feel like Mark Twain by comparison.

  “What do you think you can learn from this?” I asked Old Red.

  “That ‘robbery’ yesterday’s still sittin’ about as well with me as that is.” He scowled at the uneaten eggs on his plate as if he’d been served a generous helping of hot scrambled pig shit. “I figure the more I know about the Give-’em-Hell Boys, the more what they done might start to make some kind of sense.”

  “They rob trains, and Barson and Welsh are the brains. That’s all you need to know … and it’s more than you’ll get out of this.” I gave each of the Sons of Jesse James a little flick of the finger.

  “You don’t know that for a fact. There could be some important data buried in there somewheres.”

  “Oh, yeah? Alright, then. Let me know when we get to the ‘important data.’”

  I assumed the chin-up, chest-out bearing of a Shakespeare-reciting ham.

  “‘Ka-pow! Ka-pow!’” I intoned with lugubrious solemnity. “‘The shots ring out! The Give-’em-Hell Boys have robbed another Southern Pacific train! The railroad men curse! The ladies swoon! And some—yes!—some cheer! Who are these daring desperadoes? What turned them from peaceful farmers into the most feared bandits in the West? Read on! Read on! Read on!’”

  I looked up at my brother. “Shall I read on?”

  But Old Red didn’t answer. He’d been struck dumb by something behind my back, near the door to the Pullmans. When I twisted around to see what it was, I, too, found myself tongue-tied—and scared stiff.

  Burl Lockhart was striding toward us. In his hand was the gleaming steel of a gun.

  That’s when everything went dark.

  Twenty-seven

  A BIG OL’ HEAP OF QUESTIONS

  Or, I Tie Up Loose Ends While Lockhart Continues to Unravel

  “What the hell?” I blurted out.

  Light returned almost immediately, but it was different now—the weak glow of electric lights, not blinding-bright sunshine. Outside the window, it remained black as night.

  “Snowshed,” Gustav explained tersely, clearly unnerved. “Third today.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  I’d read about the sheds—wooden tunnels, miles long, built to keep mountain tracks free of snow. I would’ve paused to marvel at the sight of one (or lack of same, since there wasn’t anything to see but dark), but there were more pressing matters to attend to.

  The man moving up behind me with a drawn gun, for instance.

  “Mornin’, Mr. Lockhart,” Old Red said, sliding a hand down toward his Colt. “What can we do for you?”

  The Pinkerton brought his gun up fast—and slammed it onto the table before me.

  “There,” he said. “I owe you that.”

  Then he marched off without another word.

  For a moment, he was the only thing in the dining car in motion. Everyone else had frozen—waiters clearing plates and passengers holding cups of coffee halfway to their lips and Old Red and me with our
jaws hanging as loose on their hinges as a couple of porch swings.

  No one moved until Lockhart sat at an empty table and hid himself behind an upraised menu. Once he was out of sight, it was as if he’d never been there at all, and within seconds the chatter of conversation and the clink-clatter of silver on porcelain was louder than ever.

  I finally looked down at the hogleg on the table.

  “Hey, that ain’t mine.”

  The gun Lockhart had taken from me the night before had been a beat-up rubber-gripped .45—a no-frills affair made for slinging lead and nothing more. But the frilled-up iron before me now was something else entirely.

  It was a pearl-handled, silver-plated Smith & Wesson .44 engraved with ornate scrollwork and the letters B.L. in fancy, flowing script. And it was notched: Seven stubby little nicks were lined up along the outside curve of the grip.

  “Holy shit … it’s one of Lockhart’s own six-shooters,” I said reverently, as if whispering a prayer. I’d seen too much of Lockhart the man to hold him in any awe, but the gun—that was a link to Lockhart the legend. “Looks like a match for the gun the Give-’em-Hell Boys took off him last night. ‘Aunt Virgie.’”

  “You oughta go talk to him about it,” Gustav said, nodding at Lockhart’s table. “We need to ask him some questions, anyway—and you’re the one to do the askin’.”

  “Me?”

  “Sure. I couldn’t ask the man the time of day without him takin’ offense.”

  “Or you givin’ it.”

  Old Red shrugged. “He and me don’t see eye to eye. But you … you could see eye to eye with an ant or an elephant, either one. Or at least talk like you do. If there’s one of us who could get some answers outta Lockhart without gettin’ his teeth knocked out for his trouble, it’d be you.”

  I drummed my fingers on the table, weighing the chance to lose a few teeth against reading more of The Sons of Jesse James.

  “What kinda answers you lookin’ for?”

  Gustav didn’t smile, but a gleam came to his eyes I hadn’t seen for quite some time. “Where he got that gun, first off—he didn’t have it in the Pullman last night. And was he up to anything in Carlin other than gettin’ fall-down drunk? And how did he know to send us to Colonel Crowe back in Ogden? And why’s Chan so keen on gettin’ into the baggage car?”

  “Anything else?” I asked. “His boot size, maybe? Mother’s maiden name? Favorite color?”

  “No,” my brother sighed. “That’s it.”

  “Alright, then.” I scooped up Lockhart’s fancy .44 as I got to my feet. “Wish me luck.”

  “Good luck. And … thanks, Brother.”

  “Just doin’ my duty,” I said, giving my badge a tap—though it wasn’t my duty to the Southern Pacific I was thinking of.

  As I turned and started toward Lockhart’s table, the craggy old Pinkerton was putting in an order with the steward, pointing at something on the menu even as his sunken eyes locked on me. If he’d looked like death warmed over the day before, now he was death served cold—gray, dried out, stiff. He watched me drawing closer with a stillness icy enough to freeze the balls off Jack Frost himself.

  I approached him holding the hogleg cradled sideways in both hands, the way you’d hold an offering, not a gun you aimed to use. When I reached his table, I placed the .44 gingerly before him. The steward scurried off toward the kitchen—and cover.

  “Thank you, Mr. Lockhart, but I can’t take this,” I said. “That beat-up Peacemaker I loaned you last night wasn’t worth a tenth what this is.”

  Lockhart lifted his bony shoulders in a listless shrug. “I owe you a gun.” He nodded toward the Smith & Wesson without looking at it. “That’s a gun.”

  “It sure is. One hell of a gun. If I might ask … how’d you come to have it with you? Sure don’t look like a toy you bought off Kip.”

  Lockhart’s gaze bored into me. Not in an angry way, though—more like he was afraid to let his eyes slip somewhere else. Down, say, to the six-shooter that lay gleaming between us as shiny as King Arthur’s armor.

  “That’s Aunt Pauline, one of the two best guns I ever had—and I’ve had plenty. She was packed away in my trunk last night or I guess she wouldn’t be here now. I had to twist that son-of-a-bitch conductor’s arm till it nearly snapped to get into the baggage car and dig her out. So you just go on and take her … and be grateful you got her.”

  I made no move toward the .44.

  “Seems to me she’s mighty special to you, Mr. Lockhart.”

  The Pinkerton chuffed out a bitter snort. “I’ll tell you how special she is to me. Do you know what I did with your Colt?”

  He knew I didn’t, of course, so I just gave him the head shake he was looking for.

  “I was in such a fired-up hurry to set after the Give-’em-Hell Boys last night, I didn’t even stop to get Aunt Pauline there. No time. I was gonna track down Barson and Welsh and gut ’em like catfish. After what they done, what they said, I had to. They were practically darin’ me to come after ’em. But you know what I also had to do? Get me one little drink first. To steady my nerves, I told myself. Well, one drink didn’t do it. Two didn’t do it. Three didn’t do it. And before you know it, I was tradin’ your gun for booze. I can even remember thinkin’, ‘A half-empty bottle of rotgut—that’s all they’ll give me for this piece-of-shit Colt? If I had Aunt Pauline here, they’d give me every damn bottle in the place.’ Yeah, I would’ve traded her. Like that.”

  Lockhart snapped his fingers, his thin lips bowing into the most colossal frown I’ve ever seen—a curving pucker the shape of a horseshoe.

  “Well, you saw what happened,” he went on, still scowling. “And the next morning I roll out of bed not knowin’ how I got there, and that mouthy news butch tells me a Chinaman, a woman, and a dumb lummox with a third-rate badge dragged my sorry carcass back to the train.”

  He jabbed a finger at the gun, still unable to bring himself to look at it. “So I mean it—you take Aunt Pauline. I already let them Give-’em-Hell bastards have Aunt Virgie. I reckon I ain’t worthy of either of ’em anymore.”

  Despite all that Lockhart had just said, I knew better than to pick up that .44. It wasn’t just his gun lying there—it was an old man’s notion of everything that had once been noble about himself. Take that away, whether he told you to or not, and he’d hate you for it.

  “If Burl Lockhart ain’t worthy of that gun, I don’t see how a ‘dumb lummox with a third-rate badge’ is,” I said. “You wanna give away Aunt Pauline, that’s your business. But I’d just ask you to wait till a better man than me or you comes along. My guess is, you’ll end up holdin’ ol’ Pauline a long, long time—cuz you’re still Burl Lockhart, after all.”

  Lockhart’s jaw worked up and down beneath his frown, as if he was trying to chew some little bit of gristle he couldn’t quite catch between his teeth. Then the chair across from him slid out from the table—pushed by his foot—and the corners of his lips made the long journey upward, curling into a smile.

  “Have a seat,” he said.

  Lockhart paused to take a sip of water as I thanked him and sat down. When the glass left his mouth, his smile was gone.

  “What’s your handle again?”

  “Otto Amlingmeyer, Mr. Lockhart. But my friends call me Big Red.”

  The Pinkerton snorted at the obviousness of it. When you’re a strapping six-foot-one redhead like me, folks don’t call you “Little Blue.”

  “Well, I reckon ’stead of gripin’ about you gettin’ me back aboard the Express, I really oughta be thankin’ you. So … thanks, Big Red. And I apologize for that ‘dumb lummox’ remark.”

  “I’ve been called worse—by my own kin, even.” I shrugged. “And no need for thanks for last night. It just seemed like the thing to do. Anyway, it was Dr. Chan who went after you first.”

  “Course it was.” Lockhart waved the thought away irritably, like cigar smoke puffed in his face. “Don’t think he did that out of the kindness o
f his heart. Them crafty little buggers always have a scheme cookin’, and I know his. He was just scared, is all.”

  “Scared? Of what? That he’d have to ride on to Oakland with no nanny holdin’ his hand?”

  I bugged out my eyes, as if I hadn’t intended my question to have quite so sharp a point to it. But I had—and the needling worked, too.

  “Get this straight,” the Pinkerton snapped, his long face flushing. “Burl Lockhart don’t play nanny to goddamn Chinks!”

  As dining cars are packed so tight you could accidentally slice up your neighbor’s steak without realizing it wasn’t on your own plate, the folks at the nearest tables heard every word. Most of them miraculously finished their breakfasts at that exact moment, hopping to their feet and leaving coins they didn’t bother to count.

  “I apologize, Mr. Lockhart,” I said as the tables around us cleared. “I didn’t mean nothing by it.”

  “Oh, don’t apologize,” Lockhart sighed. Though anyone who could’ve eavesdropped was dashing for the nearest exit, he dropped his voice anyway. “I know how it looks. The Pinks have been tryin’ to put me out to pasture, but still … they wouldn’t do me like that. I ain’t here to protect Chan.”

  “I knew they wouldn’t have you here just to nursemaid some nobody. You’re Burl Lockhart! It had to be something big.”

  I was lathering up the soft soap so thick it’s a wonder Lockhart could see me through the suds, yet he showed no sign of catching on.

  “You nailed it, Big Red,” he said. “Chan ain’t diddly. It’s what he’s takin’ back to San Francisco that’s big.”

  “You’re aboard the train to bodyguard … a body?”

  The Pinkerton smiled again, though he only managed it with his mouth this time, not his eyes. “You noticed Chan’s name on that casket, did you? Well, you just remember what I said about Chinks bein’ sneaky. That ain’t no coffin—it’s a treasure chest.”

  Lockhart hunched over the table and gestured for me to do the same. When I’d bent in close enough to suit him, he went on in a just-between-you-and-me whisper.