Free On the Wrong Track by Steve Hockensmith Page A

was a thud, and Gustav came flying out from under the train. His lantern spun from his grip, throwing wild flashes of light into the night before cracking Lockhart full on in the face. It was only by a miracle the lamp didn’t bust open and cover the Pinkerton in burning oil, lighting up his head like the tip of a six-foot match.
    “Ow!” howled Lockhart.
    “What was that?” yelled Morrison.
    “Somebody kicked me,” grumbled Old Red.
    “There’s a man under the train!” hollered I.
    Bang! said Morrison’s rifle.
    “Eyaaah!” screamed just about everybody else.
    The only person who didn’t have anything to say was whoever’d put the boot to my brother. With the lantern doused, all I could see of him was a hunched, shuffling shape, but it was clear where that shape was headed—over to the other side of the train. Once he got out from beneath the car, he’d have no trouble losing himself in the desert’s black expanse.
    “There he goes!” I shouted. “Stop him!”

    Nobody near me was in any position to give chase, however, as a fellow’s hardly at his speediest when he’s flat on his stomach with his hands over his head. So Lockhart opted to do his chasing with a bullet, raising his .44 and pointing it at the underside of the car—and more or less at me .
    Not only was I uncomfortably close to the line of fire, I wouldn’t have trusted the old Pinkerton’s aim at high noon, let alone in the dark of night. And even if he did manage to miss me, there was plenty of metal nearby—wheels, rails, rods—that could easily ricochet his shot through the wrong skull.
    “Uhhh, Mr. Lockhart—,” I began.
    But there was no time for talk. Gustav was closer to him, and he simply reached out and twisted the gun from the man’s grip.
    Lockhart gaped at him a moment before his shock gave way to fury.
    “You stupid son of a—”
    He was interrupted by an oof and a heavy thump from the other side of the train.
    “Hey!” I called into the blackness. “Is somebody over there? Did you catch him?”
    “I got him,” a deep voice replied. “What’s goin’ on over there ?”
    “The express messenger’s takin’ potshots at us!”
    “Oh, for Christ’s sake. Morrison! It’s Bedford! The fireman! Get your finger off the trigger ’fore you hurt somebody!”
    “But we’re being robbed!” Morrison yelled back. “Aren’t we?”
    “This ain’t no robbery! A circus is what it is! Now just get ahold of yourself, would you?”
    “Well … alright,” Morrison said weakly. “But I’m still not opening the door.”
    The rifle slowly slid back into its slot and disappeared.
    As the men scattered around outside began pushing themselves to their feet, an unexpected sound arose with them: laughter. The passengers were just gray outlines there in the gloom, but I’d seen them well enough on the train. They were tradesmen and merchants, comfortable men headed home to comfortable lives. No wonder they were chuckling
and chattering like it was intermission at a Wild West show. This was a show to them. They hadn’t seen enough death to know better.
    I suppose a gunfight would’ve been the perfect capper to the evening as far as they were concerned, and Burl Lockhart seemed ready to oblige. He snatched his gun back from my brother as the both of them stood up.
    “Don’t you ever get in my way again.”
    He stepped even closer to Gustav, literally going toe-to-toe with him. The blow he’d taken from the lantern had knocked his mustache so askew, one end was practically poking him in the eye, yet there was nothing even remotely funny about it—not if you could see the bitter scowl on his bony face.
    “Fine,” Old Red said. “Next time you wanna do a damn fool thing, I’ll just stand aside and let you.”
    “Why, you cocky little—”
    “Say, fellers,” I said, somehow managing to squeeze my not insubstantial bulk between them, “let’s go see who that was under the train, huh?”
    I turned to drag Gustav