A Touch of Frost

by Jo Goodman

  “Ma’am?”

  Phoebe raised her head. The man who had addressed her was peering over the back of his seat. His bowler sat at an angle on his head that might have been jaunty once but was now merely askew. He regarded her out of widely spaced gray eyes that indicated he was experiencing some pain. He did not ask for help. There was a trickle of blood at one corner of his mouth and another just below his left ear. He alternately dabbed at the wounds with two fingertips and then patted the breast pocket of his jacket for a handkerchief. He merely shrugged when he came away empty-handed.

  “He was trying to move toward your end of the car,” he said. “Perhaps to go to that mother and her child. I don’t know what he hit when he went down, but I heard a crack. Or at least I think I did. You might want to look for a bump. I’m going to go forward. Seems to be the heart of most of the commotion.”

  Phoebe reached into her reticule, felt for her handkerchief, and passed it to him. “For your lip.”

  He thanked her for it and smiled unevenly as he pressed it to his mouth. He got to his feet, wobbled a bit before he found his bearings, and then began to move to the forward car.

  Phoebe watched his progress to make sure he didn’t stumble and fall. At the same time, she made a careful search of the stranger’s thick thatch of dark hair. She found no obvious lump and her fingertips were clean when she removed them from his scalp. She located the contusion at the side of his forehead, just above the gentle depression of his temple. There was no laceration and that made her suspect that he had not fallen against anything sharp. More likely he had banged his head on a wrought iron armrest.

  She was on the point of trying to rouse him again by taking his shoulder in the cup of her palm when she heard the first shot. She remembered thinking that the sudden silence of the train had been eerie, but that silence was nothing compared the dead quiet that followed the gun blast. Phoebe quickly looked over her shoulder at Mrs. Tyler. That worthy was wide-eyed but still as stone. The man who had been nursing a bloody nose was sliding back into his seat. The mother and daughter continued to clutch each other. Phoebe could not see the child’s expression, but the mother was clearly terrified.

  Another shot.

  Phoebe jerked. While the sound echoed in her ears, the man under her hand never stirred. Oh, to be unconscious. She envied him his oblivion and could not call herself a coward for wishing that state had been visited upon her.

  Two male passengers at the very front of the car had taken cover under the seats and were now belly-crawling toward the rear. As a strategy for escape, it was not a bad one. It lacked speed and dignity, one of those being infinitely more important than the other.

  Phoebe gestured to Mrs. Tyler to flee the car, and when the older woman stood and turned, Phoebe believed she had been successful in encouraging her. It was not the case, however. Mrs. Tyler took only as many steps as necessary to reach the mother and daughter and slipped in beside them.

  “You really should wake now,” Phoebe whispered to the stranger. “Whatever is happening is coming this way. I can feel it.” The words had barely left her lips when the forward door to the car was flung open.

  The first man to enter was not dressed so differently from the unconscious man she was trying to rouse. Black hat. Black duster. Black boots. All of it was a little more battered, more weather-beaten, but essentially indistinguishable. She wondered if there was a uniform for men in the West or only men on trains in Colorado. Phoebe recognized the absurdity of the errant thought but that did not help her tamp down the nervous laughter that bubbled to her lips.

  The man’s broad shoulders filled the doorway, but he had enough room to bring up his gun and point it at her. The way he did it was not a menacing gesture, merely a casual one. Phoebe instantly felt cold and the placement of her lips was frozen on her face. That was perhaps unfortunate, but at least she was no longer laughing.

  Chapter Two

  Mr. Shoulders—that was how Phoebe thought of him—stepped into the car and moved to the left. He was followed by two men, similarly dressed but with less imposing figures. Sweat-stained blue bandannas folded into triangles covered their faces from nose to chin. Mr. Shoulders used a black scarf to achieve the same masking effect.

  Phoebe looked to their eyes for differences, but all three pairs were brown. At her present distance she could not make out any variation in the coloring. It was the same with their hair. All brown. Plain brown. Mr. Shoulders had very little of it showing below his hat, but the Blue Bandannas wore their hair longer so that it covered their ears. It made her wonder about their ears. Small? Large? Jug handles or pinned back?

  It occurred to her that the three men might be brothers or at least related, and her mind wandered to gangs like the James boys or the Youngers. Regardless of their affiliation, there was no question in Phoebe’s mind that Mr. Shoulders was their leader.

  “What do we have here?” Mr. Shoulders asked.

  At first Phoebe thought he was addressing her, but then she realized his stare had shifted and encompassed the car as a whole. He jerked his chin toward the row of seats on her right. “Seems like two sidewinders are making their getaway. Can you see them?”

  Phoebe understood that he was referring to the men on their bellies under the seats. They had already squirmed past her and were likely only a few feet to the rear of where she knelt.

  Neither of Mr. Shoulders’ companions had the same vantage of height or position to glimpse the sidewinders, but that did not keep them from acting. They strode down the center aisle in tandem, careless of the injured man blocking their path. Phoebe was able to shift to avoid them, but her patient was summarily pushed out of the way, and what wasn’t pushed was stepped on. Phoebe winced when the stranger’s right hand was ground under a boot heel.

  The pair under the seats did not require encouragement to come out of hiding. They gave themselves over without guns being drawn. Phoebe understood, but she was disappointed with their immediate surrender. Apparently it was the same for Mr. Shoulders. Out of the corner of her eye, Phoebe saw him shake his head in what she thought was a disgusted, pitying gesture. She would have known for sure if she could have seen the placement of his lips.

  Mr. Shoulders lowered his gun but did not holster it. “Get their valuables,” he told his men. “And their guns if they’re carrying, though that doesn’t seem likely. Put them down if you have to, but I’m not thinking that will be necessary. Get the farmer with the bloody nose next and then see to the women behind you. Go gentle. Don’t alarm the little girl.”

  Before she could think better of it, Phoebe snorted. It was perfectly audible in the quiet of the car and immediately garnered the attention of Mr. Shoulders.

  “There’s something you want to say?”

  Phoebe lifted her chin, met his eyes, and said, “Where I come from, the snort speaks for itself. Anything I could add is simply gilding the lily.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “You are correct, sir. I don’t say.” Phoebe held her ground when his eyes narrowed and bored into hers. He was smart enough to know she was poking fun at him and clear in his own mind that he did not like it one bit. She was not surprised when he changed the subject.

  “How about you empty that little bag hanging on your wrist? You probably have a reason for holding it so close. Leastways that’s been my experience with women. What do you have in there that will make taking it from you such a pleasure?”

  Phoebe began to slowly unwind the reticule’s strings. A cry of distress behind her made her stop and turn her head. Even before she looked, she recognized the cry as coming from Mrs. Tyler.

  “Not my ring!” Mrs. Jacob C. Tyler placed her hand over her heart and covered the pear shape diamond ring protectively with her other hand. “I cannot surrender it.” Her voice was touched by defiance now. “I could not forgive myself. It’s engraved. It can be identified. You don’t w
ant it.”

  The Blue Bandannas exchanged sideways glances and without a word passing between them came to a decision that satisfied them both. One of them said, “That’s thoughtful of you, ma’am, thinking we wouldn’t want to be connected to a piece that might mark us as thieves.”

  The second man nodded and finished the thought of the first. “But we know our business. Won’t be the first diamond we plucked or gold that we melted to a little nugget.”

  Mrs. Tyler actually wailed then.

  “Stop bullying her!” Phoebe said, rising her to her feet. “What you are doing is unconscionable. It makes you small men and even smaller-minded.”

  Mr. Shoulders said, “You got the small-minded part right. I’ve been telling them that for years now.” He addressed his men. “Get the ring, boys. No more foolin’ around. Ma’am, you best lower yourself to the floor again or take a seat. Seems to me you’re bent on some foolishness.”

  Phoebe had no response to that except to obey the edict. She did have a plan in mind, and he had correctly divined it. It was some foolishness. The best she could do as her knees began to fold was give him the benefit of a narrow-eyed stare. She thought he might have chuckled behind his scarf.

  Mr. Shoulders stepped forward until he was standing at the boots of the man Phoebe was tending. He held out a hand toward her, palm up. “Might as well surrender your ring. Doesn’t seem fair to take from one and not the other.”

  Phoebe set her lips mutinously, but she complied, twisting the ring until she was able to slide it off her finger. She dropped it in his palm and quickly retracted her hand.

  “A mite tight, wasn’t it?” he asked, folding his fingers around the band. His eyes dropped to her belly. “That’d be because of the baby, I imagine. I recollect womenfolk talking about fingers swolled up like little sausages when they’re in the family way.”

  Phoebe protectively placed her hands over the curve of her abdomen, interlacing her fingers.

  Mr. Shoulders jerked his chin at his companions. “You done there?” When they nodded, showing him the trinkets they had collected, he indicated the last car. “Check it out, and do it quickly. Folks there have had some time to consider their situation so have a care you don’t walk into an ambush.”

  It occurred to Phoebe that the passengers to the rear had had enough time to flee. She hoped they had. Dusk was upon them and soon they would have cover of night, but regardless of cover, she did not think these train robbers would want to run them to ground. It was difficult to imagine the reward would outweigh the risk.

  Thinking about the reward-to-risk ratio had Phoebe inquiring in practical accents, “Shouldn’t you be robbing the mail car? There is one, I believe. It probably has a safe. Don’t you want to blow it up?”

  “You have some experience with safes?”

  “No. Robberies. This is my third. First on a train, though.” When Mr. Shoulders used a forefinger to tip his hat brim a fraction and cock an eyebrow at her, Phoebe took it as an invitation to explain. “I was standing at the teller window at the bank on Fifth the first time I witnessed a robbery. The second was at the theater. The thieves were after the opening night take, but the performance was a benefit for the policemen’s widows and orphans fund, so it did not end well for the robbers. They had to sit through the play, which I believe was its own form of punishment, and then they were frog marched to the station.”

  “I see.” His eyes dropped to the beaded bag hanging from her wrist. “Now about your bag there. Seems to me it would be easier to open than a safe. Why don’t you toss it here?”

  “There’s no money. I have a comb. An etui. My spectacles. A notepad and a stub of a pencil. Oh, and a photograph of my husband. I can show you, if you like.” She saw him hesitate, and while he was thinking it over, she used the opportunity to slip the strings off her wrist and open the bag. “See?” she said. The reticule was lined in black satin so that even when she offered him a look inside, the contents were barely visible.

  “Just a moment.” Phoebe told herself it was nerves that made her smile just then, but it might also have been that she meant to communicate an apology. She had never shot anyone before.

  • • •

  Remington Frost opened his eyes. He could not orient himself immediately in the dim light. He blinked several times before he realized he was lying flat out on the floor of a train car, and what light there was, was coming from lit candles in two wall sconces. Outside it was dark. It came to him slowly that someone near his head was bending over him, shaking his shoulder.

  “Mister. Wake up, mister. You’re not dead. Mama says you’re not dead.”

  In response, he groaned. It was not enough for her to stop shaking him. He recognized the girl as the one who had been sitting beside her mother when the train ground to a halt. The train. Oh, yes. It was coming back to him. It explained what he was doing on the floor. He remembered leaping to his feet and never quite getting them under him. He had stumbled, staggered, and finally dropped. The memory of the ignominious fall had him searching for the source of the throbbing near his temple. He gingerly explored the injury with his fingertips, wincing once when he found it and pressed too hard.

  “Are you going to cry, mister? Don’t cry.”

  He wasn’t, but he thought she looked perilously close to tears. Looking up and past her, Remington saw her mother hovering and recognized that she was similarly poised to weep. To avoid that end, Remington asked the child, who had flirted shamelessly with him while playing peek-a-boo, what her name was.

  “Madeleine,” she said. She pointed to her mother. “This is Mama. And that”—here she pointed to a second woman hovering nearby—“is Mrs. Tyler. Can you sit up? You should sit up and tell us your name.”

  Remington discovered it did not hurt too much to smile, although the placement of his lips felt more like a grimace. He made the effort because it was not in him to disoblige a fair-haired coquette, especially one under the age of six. He swept his hat off his chest and returned it to his head as he sat up. He drew his knees forward and swiveled around in the narrow aisle so he was not presenting his back to Madeleine, Mama, or Mrs. Tyler.

  Touching a finger to his hat, he nodded once in way of acknowledging them. “Remington Frost, ladies.” He placed his palms on the armrests on either side of him and used them to lever himself to his feet. Getting his bearings, he looked around. They were alone in the car. “Where are the others?” He asked the question more sharply than he meant to. Madeleine scrambled to her feet and clutched her mother’s skirts. He was sorry for that. He hadn’t meant to frighten her, but he didn’t apologize. Perhaps he would later. There wasn’t time now.

  Because Mama was attending to soothing her daughter, Remington addressed Mrs. Tyler. “Where are the other passengers who were in here?”

  “I can’t say about the man wearing the bowler. He went forward early. If you’re talking about the farmer and sidewinders, they’re working to repair the track so the train can move on.”

  “The farmer and the sidewinders.” He had no idea what that meant. “What happened to Phoebe Apple? Why isn’t she here?”

  Mrs. Tyler regarded him narrowly. The severity of the expression did not favor her rounded features, but it clearly communicated suspicion. She did not answer his questions; she asked one of her own instead. “How do you know her?”

  “I don’t.” Impatient, he asked, “Where is she?”

  “She doesn’t know you. She told me so.”

  “That’s right, but it has no bearing on what I’m asking. I need to find her.”

  Mrs. Tyler’s suspicion shifted to confusion. “I don’t understand, but the answer is that I don’t know where she is. They took her.”

  “They?”

  “Who else? The robbers. They took her, or she went with them, I’m not sure any longer. It was all a muddle the moment she shot the leader.”
/>   Remington closed his eyes briefly and rubbed his forehead with his fingertips. The ache on the side of his head was nothing compared to what was forming behind his eyes. “She shot someone?”

  Mrs. Tyler nodded. “Him. The big fella.”

  “The big fella.”

  “That’s right. I figure him for the leader. Others thought the same.”

  Remington tapped into a well of patience that he thought had gone dry. “Mrs. Tyler. I believe I need to point out that—” He stopped because she was shaking her head vigorously, one hand raised to her mouth, her eyes no longer suspicious but sympathetic. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking that you were unconscious for all of it, but it seems you were. Is that right?”

  “I was not playing possum,” he said dryly.

  “Oh, I did not mean to imply that you were. That would demonstrate extreme cowardice in the face of Mrs. Apple’s actions.”

  There was a steady thrum in his head that Remington was manfully trying to ignore. Behind his eyes, a hundred little men were all marching to the same drummer. “Mrs. Apple? You’re speaking of Phoebe Apple?”

  “Yes. They took her wedding band same as they took my ring.” Mrs. Tyler’s eyes were instantly awash in tears. She blinked them back while she searched for a handkerchief. “They have my bag, too. I have no—”

  Remington dug his handkerchief out of a pocket and gave it to Mrs. Tyler. It was not the gesture of a gallant, more like the thrust of a combatant.

  Madeleine, who had finally stepped outside of her mother’s skirts, took a step closer. In spite of that, she said, “They took Mama’s ring. One of the blue men said they would melt it into nuggets with the others.”