Читать книгу Maiden Lane - Michael Januska - Страница 10

RUNAWAY TRAIN

Dusk

The young fireman had no sooner closed the door to the fuel car than there came a pounding from the inside. Impossible, he thought, I must be imagining things. He turned his back on the door, leaned on his shovel, and continued watching the two engineers work the controls. He still had a lot to learn.

Bam bam bam.

This time it was loud enough for the engineer and his assistant to hear over the engine. They had their hands full so they instructed the fireman to go investigate. The boy unlatched one of the swinging doors, and out came a big man wrapped in an overcoat and brandishing a sawed-off shotgun. He looked like he’d just climbed through a coal mine.

“There’s a cow on the tracks,” he said.

This was his opener. He said it loud enough that he wouldn’t have to repeat it, probably thinking it was too good a line to waste. The engineer and his assistant pulled their eyes off the grimy wall of dials and gauges and faced him.

“Who the hell are you?” demanded the engineer.

“I gotta make a transfer; you’re going to stop this thing.”

The engineer hesitated, considered his assistant and the fireman who, with his thin, coal-smeared face was staring blankly at the gangster, bootlegger, or whatever he was.

“But we only just stopped at Maidstone — we’re up to speed now.”

“Do it,” barked the big man, and he raised the shotgun so that it was eye level with the engine cab trio.

The engineer wised up quick. “Like you said, mister.” He and his assistant started pulling this and turning that — all the things they needed to do to make a sudden, unscheduled stop. The fireman stood aside and waited for further orders.

It was quickly becoming dark. The bootlegger kept his shotgun fixed on the railmen while he looked outside for his markers: Three oil-drum fires in a farmer’s field.

“Is that Sexton Sideroad coming up?” he asked the engineer.

“Yep.”

“Okay, you’ll be stopping somewhere before you cross Middle Road, so get ready. Is that cord the train whistle?”

“Yes, but —”

The bootlegger gave it a couple pulls and continued to check for his markers.

Four men in black sitting two-by-two and facing each other in the back corner of one of the passenger cars felt the train slowing and checked their wristwatches. One of them immediately got up and started making his way through the car in the direction of the engine. Another followed very shortly. The third remained seated while the fourth took up a position at the back door of the car. They moved in silence, with ease and precision.

The car was dimly lit, making it even more difficult to see their faces beneath their wide-brim hats, to judge the cut of their clothes, or to understand their intent. They were like shadows; rather than reflect light, they actually seemed to absorb it. After some murmuring among the passengers, the car fell silent again and no one interfered or so much as mentioned them. To many of the passengers they were invisible, and to others they seemed to represent something otherworldly. Those passengers looked away.

The train was slowing to a stop. The side of the first baggage car opened to a blast of swirling snow. A man in a big coat leaned out and started swinging a lantern. A much larger man came to the door dragging a couple of heavy suitcases. He staggered like a drunk but it was just the rhythm of the train that was throwing him off.

“There they are. See?”

“But can you see the haystack?” said the one with the suitcases. “We don’t want to be waiting around here any longer than we have to.”

“It’s right there in front of you.”

“Hey, I’m not the one with the lantern, am I? And stop swinging it around like that.”

“Like what?”

“You almost hit me.”

“Would you relax?” said the lantern-bearer. “I swear you’re worse than my old lady.”

“Drop dead, Mouse.”

Barney, the one doing the heavy lifting, grabbed one of the suitcases by the handle and, with both hands, swung it back and forth to give it some momentum and then heaved it toward the haystack just beyond the narrow ditch.

The farmer got out of his Model T pickup and retrieved the suitcase. He opened it in the headlight beams. Inside the case were about a dozen bottles of rye packed in newspaper. The farmer gave his “okay.” Barney started tossing the rest of the order onto the haystack. Two younger men hopped out of the back of the pickup to help retrieve it.

“Why has this train stopped?”

The first man in black had reached the engine cab just as the train had come to a halt. He didn’t come by way of the fuel car but rather off the shoulder of the track, surprising the bootlegger.

“His orders,” said the engineer, pointing at the bootlegger.

The bootlegger couldn’t get a good look at the shadowy figure, couldn’t make him out. “You a cop?”

“No.”

A light flickered in the bootlegger’s head. “Hey, wait a minute — this is my caper. If you want in, you’re a bit late.”

“This train is scheduled to arrive at Michigan Central station in Windsor at 9:15 p.m.”

The bootlegger cocked his head at the shadow. “You’re not after the booze?”

“No.”

“Then why don’t you just go back to your seat and finish your crossword before you get hurt, okay?”

It got crowded in the engine all of a sudden: the engineer and his assistant backed up against the hissing wall of dials and gauges as soon as they saw that one of the bootlegger’s partners had appeared out of nowhere and was positioning himself behind the man in black. His partner was just as big, and in all likelihood just as stupid.

“Need any help finding your seat, fella?” he said.

Without hesitation and with very little effort, the man in black grabbed the fireman’s coal shovel out of his hands, spun, and bashed the second bootlegger across the face with it. An explosion of teeth, blood, and snot followed. The bootlegger staggered back and down onto the gravel shoulder, rolling into the frozen ditch that ran between the track and the farmer’s field.

The first bootlegger, stunned, pivoted his shotgun toward the man in black, but in one swift motion the dark figure grabbed the barrel with one hand and the bootlegger’s neck with the other. The bootlegger let go of the shotgun in order to better defend himself but the figure was already pressing the bootlegger’s face against the fire door. It made a sizzling sound and the bootlegger started wailing. The figure then picked him up effortlessly by his lapels and tossed him out the cab, landing him somewhere near his partner. The figure then calmly shifted his attention to the engineers and the fireman.

“You have some time to make up,” he told them and handed the fireman back his coal shovel. “Get stoking.”

The team didn’t ask any questions and got right to work. They noticed there was a second man in black in the cab now. They looked identical, but still indescribable. They were all shadow and seemed to blend together, moving like a two-headed beast.

“Don’t stop until we get to the station,” one of them said. Or was it both of them?

“But Pelton —” started the engineer, pointing his thumb up the track.

“Don’t stop until we get to the station,” the voice repeated.

Just as Barney was preparing to heave another of the booze-laden suitcases toward the haystack, the train lurched forward and he staggered back, almost falling over with it.

Mouse obviously couldn’t see it, but the farmer’s face fell. He shouted something toward the baggage car that the bootleggers couldn’t hear and then ran back to his pickup. He told his boys plain and simple that the deal had gone south, but not to worry, he had an idea. He suspected that his suppliers either got cold feet or just needed a little help with the personnel on the train. He told his eldest boy to hide what landed in the haystack, and his youngest boy to accompany him. The farmer threw his truck into gear, mashed the pedal, and beat a path over to 9th Concession, where he dropped down and hung a right onto Middle Road. “It’ll take us out of the way a bit, but then we’ll shoot back up 8th and head them off.”

Barney and Mouse looked at each other. What happened? Were there Mounties on board? Mouse stayed put and kept watch on what was left of the shipment while Barney went to investigate. The big man reached outside around the still-open baggage car door for the ladder to the roof. He wasn’t fast but he was surprisingly agile; as a kid he was always the one elected to climb the tree to retrieve a kite. What he hadn’t bargained for was tonight’s near-blizzard conditions.

Everyone in the car heard the noise on the roof. The third man in black rose from his seat and walked to the front of the car. The fourth man followed, exchanging his position at the back door for one at the front. The third then made his way outside and onto the roof. The train wasn’t moving so fast yet, but the snow was blowing like mad and it was bitter cold. Also, ice was building up on the rungs that ran along the top of the car. The bootlegger didn’t see the man in black until he was practically face to face with him. At first he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him. Who the hell else would be crawling on all fours on the roof of a moving train in a snowstorm?

Even this close, the figure had to shout in order to be heard. “Where are you going?”

“I need to use the john.”

“Where are you going?” the figure repeated.

“You wanna punch my ticket?” said the bootlegger, cracking wise again.

“Yes.” The man in black pulled a Webley out of a holster inside his coat and used it to blow a hole clean through Barney’s head. The bootlegger tumbled off the roof of the car and landed in a snowdrift, limbs outstretched and looking like a big, ugly snow angel. The man in black replaced his Webley, turned back the way he came, and re-entered the passenger car, walking past the fourth, who was still guarding the front door. There was a new face in the crowd: a conductor was across in the aisle seat. The old man was sweating bullets, fiddling with the hem of his jacket but staring straight ahead, not making eye contact with the shadowy man as he entered and sat down. The train was picking up speed again, travelling faster now than it had been before its unscheduled stop. The fourth man proceeded up the aisle and left the car at the rear.

When he reached the still-open baggage car, he found Mouse positioned near the door, sitting on one of the remaining suitcases of rye and frantically waving his lantern at the farmer’s speeding pickup truck. Mouse caught the figure out of the corner of his eye.

“Shit — you a cop?”

“No.”

“You with the railway?”

“No.”

“Then who are you?”

Back in the engine cab, the first man in black checked his watch while the second noticed a vehicle tearing up the service road, heading in the same direction and gaining speed.

The farmer made a sharp left down the next concession and stopped right on the level crossing. He put his brake on and flashed his headlamps. His boy, unconvinced that the train would stop in time, bailed out of the truck and started running home. The farmer cursed him and his mother and then sat back and lit his pipe. He was determined to get the rest of that rye. There were folks in roadhouses all along St. Clair’s shores counting on him. His reputation was at stake. And then of course there was the money; he would make a tidy sum that would at least partly make up for that lousy corn crop last year. He puffed away on his pipe and thought for all his trouble that he should hold back some of his payment.

“I’ll teach those fuckers.”

The train was racing now and, what with no news about what was going on, the passengers were becoming a little uneasy, and not just in the car hosting the dark figures. A few looked to the conductor, but he was busy twisting his hat in his hands. Minutes later they were shaken by a sudden impact, but the train kept barrelling down the track. Debris flew past the windows in the first passenger car. It looked like automobile parts flying past. The locomotive had thoroughly demolished the pickup. The farmer managed to jump out in time.

The train breezed through Pelton Junction, normally the last stop before the city limits. Toward the end of the long stretch broken by only one county road, they passed the Kenilworth and Devonshire racetracks and the roundhouse. Soon there were lights in the distance and a glow in the night sky, indicating downtown Windsor and Detroit. The train was charging right into the city now. The lit surroundings were giving passengers a more accurate sense of just how fast they were travelling, and tension mounted. People were gripping their armrests, purses, and bags tighter. A few of the older women muttered prayers while the men remained quiet. They were bracing themselves for the worst.

Back in the baggage car, the fourth man in black had become bored with Mouse and hurled him through a wooden fence they were passing. A few suitcases of liquor followed. The figure then made its way back to the passenger car and took a seat next to the third. The first and second figures reappeared, made their way up the aisle and took seats across from their partners, completing the dark quartet. The rest of the car remained silent. All that could be heard was the rhythm of the rails.

The train finally began to slow and the four checked their watches: 9:12 p.m. The engineer started fiddling with the gauges and his assistant began applying the brakes, something he normally didn’t have to do this soon and so aggressively.

They were entering the rail yard. A signalman in the first tower rang his contact at the station and told him to get everyone off the platform. Something was clearly wrong.

Both the engineers had their hands on the brake now. The assistant had his foot against the wall of the furnace for leverage. Their ears were filled with the head-splitting, stomach-churning sound of steel on steel. The engine cab was vibrating, almost shaking. The engineer noticed his assistant’s eyes were closed; sweat streamed down and mixed with the soot on his face, black tears running down his cheek and off his chin. His teeth were clenched, the engineer could tell.

The train finally stopped, the first car about thirty yards beyond the platform. It was 9:14 p.m.

Passengers, shaken and stirred and white as snow, disembarked slowly. Many took a deep breath of the cold, crisp air as soon as they got outside. It cut the motion sickness. Red caps helped the women passengers climb down off the train and through the snow toward the platform.

“Watch that last step, miss.”

“Thanks a bunch,” said Vera Maude, a little wobbly. She was adjusting her hat and coat when she stopped and shuddered.

“Something wrong, miss?”

“No,” she said, “just got a sudden chill.”

“It’s this cold snap we’re having. People getting chilled right to the bone.”

“Yeah? Say, can you call me a cab?”

The four dark shadows stepped off on the other side of the train, boarded a freight elevator that dropped them below track level, resurfaced at the end of a tunnel on the Wellington side, and disappeared into the night.