The Loner: Trail Of Blood
Read The Loner: Trail Of Blood Online
Authors: J.A. Johnstone
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Copyright © 2011 J. A. Johnstone
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eISBN-13: 978-0-7860-2778-1
eISBN-10: 0-7860-2778-9
First printing: February 2011
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The men boarded the train at different stops as it rolled through West Texas: three at Sweet Apple, four at Sierra Blanca, the final pair at Pecos. Each group gave no sign they knew the others.
Yet those who were familiar with the signs could tell the men were cut from the same cloth, whether they were acquainted or not. They had the same hard, watchful eyes, the same air of tension about them that was mindful of a coiled spring. Their hands never strayed far from the guns on their hips.
Nearing the dawn of a new, modern century, fewer men packed iron than had twenty years earlier, and fewer still did so openly. Since the men were spread out on the train, no one really paid much attention to them despite the guns.
That is, until one of the men in the second of two passenger cars stood up, balanced himself against the slight swaying and rocking of the
coach, and reached up with his left hand to yank on the emergency cord. Passengers were flung forward in their seats, some tumbled to the floor and most cried out in sudden fear as the engineer up in the cab of the smoke-spewing locomotive threw on the brakes. Outside, sparks flew in the air as drivers locked and skidded on the steel rails.
The man who pulled the cord braced himself for the jolt by grabbing the back of the bench seat beside him. He was still on his feet when he lifted the bandanna around his neck up over the lower half of his face. He drew the Colt from its holster on his hip and yelled over the hubbub, “Nobody move! Do what you’re told and nobody gets killed!”
The menacing revolver drew more screams and shouts. A male passenger, red-faced with anger, leaped up and yelled, “By God, you can’t—”
The man with the gun shot him.
The Colt’s roar was deafeningly loud in the close confines of the railroad car. The slug smashed into the red-faced man’s shoulder, slewing him halfway around. Crying thinly in agony, he slumped against one of the seats as blood welled from the wound.
“I said, nobody move!” the gunman repeated.
“Is-is this a holdup?” a woman asked in a quavering voice.
Under the bandanna, the outlaw grinned. “Yes, ma’am, it sure is, so you might as well go ahead and fork over that fancy bracelet you’re wearin’, along with any other jewelry you got.”
A similar scene was playing out in the first
passenger car, although none of the passengers had been foolish enough to leave their seats and threaten the gunman who had taken over that car. The outlaws began collecting watches, wallets, jewelry, and anything else of value they could find.
Up at the engine, two members of the gang had scrambled over the coal tender and invaded the cab as soon as the train jolted to a halt. They covered the engineer and the fireman to make sure the train didn’t move again until they were gone. One man was in the caboose, keeping his gun on the conductor and the two brakemen. That left two men to loot the express car and two more to take over the private car that had been added to the train between the express car and the caboose.
“Who do you think this fancy rig belongs to?” one of the outlaws asked the other as they paused in the private car’s vestibule with their guns drawn. “The president of the line, maybe?”
“Who else would be rich enough to have his own railroad car?” the second man asked. “This is a real stroke of luck. I knew there was money in the express car, but I didn’t figure on bein’ able to grab somebody we can hold for ransom!”
They made sure the bandanna masks were secure over their faces. It wasn’t their first train robbery, but so far the law didn’t have good descriptions of any of them. They boarded the trains at different places, they didn’t bunch up so as to create suspicion, and when the time came to strike, they moved with practiced ease and efficiency.
As they liked to congratulate themselves when they were holed up in their hideout, celebrating
their most recent holdup, ol’ Jesse James didn’t have anything on them.
One of the outlaws threw open the door leading into the fancy car. Holding their guns tightly, thrust out in front of them, they charged into the car and found themselves in a sitting room with a thick rug on the floor, an overstuffed divan, several armchairs, a writing desk, and a hardwood bar. Everything was richly appointed, and the car itself was trimmed with gleaming brass. A door on the other end of the sitting room led into a short corridor with a sleeping compartment on either side.
The man standing at the bar smiled and said calmly, “When the train made an unscheduled stop, I thought someone might be coming to call. Would you gentlemen care for a drink before we get on with the business at hand?”
The outlaws stared at him. His reaction wasn’t at all what they had been expecting. Usually folks either screamed or begged for mercy. Often they did both. They didn’t stand around offering drinks.
The man was tall and broad-shouldered. He wore an expensive but not ostentatious black suit with a dark gray vest and white shirt. Black boots and a string tie gave him a Western look, although his voice wasn’t a Western drawl. His sandy hair was longish, his tanned features rugged enough to be handsome but not pretty. He had to be rich, sure enough.
He held a wide-belled glass in one hand, a bottle of cognac in the other. He cocked an eyebrow quizzically as he lifted both items and held them out toward the robbers as if offering them.
“Damn it, we don’t want a drink!” one of the gunmen burst out. “You’re comin’ with us. I bet your family will pay plenty to get you back in one piece!”
The man’s easy smile went away as his face hardened. “You’re going to kidnap me and hold me for ransom?”
“That’s right, you fancy-pants son of a bitch!” the second gunman said.
“I don’t like that. I’ve been kidnapped by outlaws before, and it wasn’t a pleasant experience at all.”
“Stop flappin’ your jaw!” the first outlaw said. “Put that booze down and give us anything you got on you right now!”
“If you insist.” The man dropped the glass and the bottle.
The eyes of the two outlaws instinctively followed them as they fell. Before the delicate crystal shattered as it struck the floor, the man crossed his arms, sweeping aside the tails of his coat to grip the butts of the two short-barreled revolvers the garment had concealed. Faster than the eye could follow, he drew both weapons and fired. Flame spat from the muzzles, the shots shockingly loud. Despite the relatively small size of the guns, each packed a .38 caliber punch.
The two outlaws were taken completely by surprise. The first pair of slugs drove into their chests and knocked them back a step. Their guns sagged as pain coursed through them. As they tried to lift the weapons again, the man fired a second time. One of the outlaws dropped with a bullet in his brain, the other reeled to the side as he clutched
at his blood-spouting throat. He collapsed after a couple steps, pitching forward onto his face. Blood began to pool around his head, soaking into the thick rug.
“That rug’s going to have to be replaced. On the other hand, this new cross-draw rig worked very well.” The man holstered his left-hand gun, sliding it butt-forward into the leather on his right hip, but kept the other gun in his right hand as he checked on the two outlaws, making sure they were dead. Then he turned and called through the open door, “You can come out now, Arturo. It’s safe.”
A slender, pale man in his thirties emerged from one of the sleeping compartments and stepped into the sitting room. He wore an expression of disapproval as he looked at the two corpses sprawled on the floor. “Really, sir, was that completely necessary?”
“Yes,” said Conrad Browning, “I think it was.”
He took a couple of cartridges from the loops on his gunbelt and replaced the rounds he had fired from the Colt Lightning still in his hand. As he reloaded the other gun, he went on, “I’m certain these two didn’t stop the train all by themselves. I think I’ll go have a look for their friends.”
“Sir, are you sure you should—”
Conrad snapped the gun’s cylinder closed. “Yes. I am.”
The gang would have taken over the caboose, too, Conrad figured, so he might as well start there. He stepped around Arturo, leaving the nervous-looking valet in the car with the two dead outlaws. Knowing the man—or men—in the caboose probably heard the shots from the private car, and would be alert for trouble, Conrad swung down from the private car’s rear platform instead of stepping across to the caboose. He dropped lithely to the ground with one of the .38 Lightning double-action revolvers in his right hand. Crouching low, well below the level of the windows, he ran to the rear of the train.