Outlaw Train

by Cameron Judd

  Luke pondered it and put it all together. “Wait…are you saying he was one of those injured in that inn?”

  “He was. He was lucky to survive, even luckier to escape afterward. His head was crushed, you see, his brain damaged. Another traveler in the place got him out of there and found a physician. Simon survived, but at a cost. Since that time he has been unable to bear anything but the most limited human company. Strangers or difficult situations can cause him to fall into a deep and ruinous panic.”

  “That’s a sad story, sir. I regret his misfortune.”

  “You would regret all the more if had you known him prior to his injury. He was a remarkable, intelligent, articulate man. It was Simon, far more than me, who brought the Montague family into the railroad industry. Simon, whose wisdom and skill led us to our success. I was simply privileged to follow the trail he blazed and to reap the benefit of his work, and to try to fill his shoes when he became unable to continue. You must know, Marshal, that as far as the world is concerned, Simon Montague is dead. Dead of massive apoplexy for these many years now. We managed to get the story into the newspapers. There is even an empty grave in Missouri with his name on the stone.”

  “But he is not actually dead, just hidden away in the attic of this building.”

  Montague nodded. “Precisely. And he is determined to remain so.”

  “He bears a resemblance to you, Simon does? But wears whiskers?”

  “Indeed. Obviously it was Simon’s face that has been seen at the window. I must urge him to be more cautious, and perhaps install a darker glass to better hide him when he looks out onto the world he can no longer be a part of.” Montague frowned. “How much can he be asked to bear? After all that’s been taken from him, is he to be expected not even to freely enjoy his one link with the world outside: his small window?”

  “Oliver Wicks said his father, Philip, has done some recent carpentry work for you upstairs. Does Philip know about Simon?”

  “No. I hired Mr. Wicks to make improvements to Simon’s quarters. But he never knew of Simon. I told Wicks I had a guest coming to stay temporarily in the part of the building he was working on, and that I wanted a livable space upstairs to accommodate him, and also in case I should ever hire a resident manager for the store. In the meantime I had already sneaked Simon out and lodged him in a hotel in Hutchinson, and hidden evidence of his prior occupation of the space upstairs. I joined Simon by the end of his first day in Hutchinson, leaving Mr. Wicks to complete the work I’d asked him to do. He did not fail my trust. He did a fine job of improving the living space. When Simon returned he was delighted with it. But Simon’s stay in Hutchinson had stirred some restlessness in him. I suspect it was after that that he began looking out his window with less caution than would have been prudent.”

  “Why are you telling me this? I’ve not known before that anyone was living upstairs. Is there a particular reason I need to know now?”

  “I’m rather embarrassed to tell you.”

  “Embarrassed?”

  “Marshal, Macky had a dream. He saw the town devastated, buildings destroyed, the emporium in ruins. And apparently, in this dream, he found Simon’s corpse in the rubble.”

  “So you believe this dream was some kind of prophecy?”

  Montague shook his head and relit his cigar, which had gone out from inattention. “No. I’m not a superstitious man. But Macky’s dream made me realize that for the sake of Simon’s safety, in case this place should catch fire or be damaged in a storm, it is important that someone besides me and Macky should know about him. Someone trustworthy and with a degree of authority and credibility. When you showed up today, I knew the time was right for me to share the secret in a limited way.”

  “Why limited? Perhaps that secret should be revealed at large. It would save a lot of confusion caused by people seeing a face peering out of a window in what is supposed to be an empty attic.”

  “Simon would never give his consent for a general revelation of his existence. And it would rouse some concern on my part, too: the people who hurt Simon in that inn in Labette County are still alive and on the loose.” Montague’s face went hard and he held silence for five seconds. “One of those people, I believe, may even now be in this very…never mind. I should not make speculative accusations.”

  “If it makes any difference to you, sir, if you’re implying what I think you are, I’ve had the same suspicion. But I’m reluctant to broach the matter openly for fear of generating hostility and even violence that may be misplaced. That kind of thing has already happened in other places, travelers and strangers being wrongly suspected of being part of that family of fugitive murderers.”

  Montague nodded and puffed out another smoke ring. With the closed transom window reducing the air circulation in the room, the ring merely hung in the air over Montague’s desk, slowly dissolving into empty atmosphere.

  “Ah well,” Montague said, rolling his shoulders. “Ah well.”

  A man with a large scar down the right side of his stubbled face sat astride his big black horse with the ease of one accustomed to long riding. His shoulders had an easy slump and his belly the slight bulge of middle age, but nothing about him suggested softness. His shoulders were sufficiently broad to appropriately platform the boulder of a head that filled his wide-brimmed hat. His shoulders looked like smokehouse hams inflating the sleeves of a very faded blue shirt.

  The man shifted in his saddle and was glad to know that he was now within two miles of the town of Wiles. He knew nothing about the town except its location and reputation as a generally mild kind of place. No wild cow town, this one. He would have preferred it otherwise, but when a man was trying to find someone, he had to go where that someone could be found.

  If Wiles didn’t offer much by way of excitement, at the very least it would have a hotel and a bed. And surely a saloon or two where a man could have a drink and enjoy some solitude.

  It didn’t much matter, anyway. He didn’t anticipate being in this town for long.

  As he grew nearer the town, he began to notice the occasional house, some far away, others nearer the road. He passed one house whose yard fronted directly against the roadside, marked off by a picket fence painted milky white. As he rode by, an aging woman stepped out of the front door onto the porch. He smiled and tipped his hat in her direction and she smiled back in motherly fashion. “Beautiful evening, sir,” she called.

  “Indeed, ma’am.” On impulse, he pulled his horse to a stop. “Ma’am, if I might ask, am I on the right road to reach Wiles?” He asked merely to generate conversation. He already knew the answer.

  “Yes, sir,” she told him, and he had a strong impression she was staring at his scar. “You’ll be there in a very short time.”

  He touched his hat again and nudged his horse back into motion. He’d hoped for a supper invitation—he could smell chicken frying from inside the house, and the woman had on a kitchen apron—but no such invitation came.

  He was in view of the eastern side of Wiles when he saw a flyer on the side of a telegraph pole. He rode over and scanned it, then tore it from the pole, read it more closely in the last dusky light of the day, and muttered, “I’ll be damned! This may prove easier than I thought!”

  He folded the flyer and put it into the inside pocket of his vest, then rode on.

  PART TWO

  DEAD OUTLAWS

  CHAPTER NINE

  That night, Luke Cable’s sleep was restless, filled with distressing dreams.

  In the worst of the nightmares, he was riding through a rainy dusk across Kansas flatlands, weary and eager for food and rest. He saw and approached a small, lonely house with a sign advertising meals. He rode toward it, though some voice in his dream consciousness warned him to ride on. He did not heed the voice.

  He then saw himself seated at a table, his luggage beneath the table and between his feet. He was the only diner in the restaurant, if such the simple room with a bit of rough furniture could be
properly called. He was seated with his face toward the front of the house, his back nearly against a filthy and oddly stained curtain that hung from ceiling to floor.

  A plate of food was set before him and he began to eat. From behind the curtain came shuffling, whispering sounds, and the clump of a footstep. In the dream, Luke began to turn and look behind him. The curtain bulged toward him and something heavy and tremendously hard struck him brutally atop the head, sending him pitching to the floor, blood and brains spilling. In the dream, Luke saw himself dead on the floor. He watched wretchedly as his corpse drained, quivered, and settled, then looked up to see Katrina Haus standing in the corner of the room, smiling as she watched his death.

  “Might you have a dead loved one you wish to speak with, Marshal?” she asked in her bell-like Germanic voice.

  With that, the dream vanished and Luke Cable of the real world awakened and stared breathlessly at the ceiling above his bed, welcoming the realization that what had just happened was nothing but nocturnal imagination. Even so, he reflexively reached up to gingerly touch the top of his skull, half expecting to find it cracked open like a dropped egg. It was whole, uninjured. His respiratory paralysis passed and he sucked in air as if he’d just run a mile.

  The rest of the night passed with little sleep. Each time Luke dozed off he found himself back in that Kansas prairie inn, hearing the noises behind the stained curtain and knowing what was going to come next. So he mostly lay awake, shunning dreams. He mentally listed the oddities of recent days to keep his mind occupied and awake.

  He’d never encountered such a flurry of strangeness: a mysterious severed leg beside a railroad track—not only severed, but impossibly mummified; an unusually beautiful young woman coming to town and promising to communicate with the dead relatives of locals, while meanwhile practicing the old and dishonorable profession of prostitution; an injured old man living in the attic of the emporium, hiding from the world the shame of his impairments; a traveling town marshal who had gone off to Kentucky and then seemingly vanished from the earth…

  “Well,” Luke said aloud to the night, “with things this strange, at least it’s not likely to get any stranger any time soon.”

  He stared across his bedroom and hoped it was true.

  Around dawn, he was very nearly asleep again, but his rest was broken prematurely by the persistent hammering of a fist against his front door. Luke rolled over, swearing softly, then got out of bed and pulled on his trousers.

  Dewitt Stamps was at the door, apologetic for having disturbed his boss at such an early hour.

  “Luke, there’s something I need to tell you,” he said. “It’s Ben Keely. I think he might be back in Wiles.”

  “Come on in, Dewitt,” Luke said, suddenly alert. “I’ll make us some coffee.”

  Dewitt concentrated on his coffee with the same intensity he once reserved for alcohol. After two cups and meaningless chatter about everything from the death of a local dairy cow to the need for a good window washing at the jail, Luke put Dewitt onto track.

  “Why do you believe Ben is back?”

  “I seen him.”

  “What? Where?”

  “Just outside of town. Near the jail, yesterday about half past four in the afternoon. I went to go to the privy and seen him through that gap in the trees. Riding, he was.”

  “What did he have to say for himself?”

  “Never got to talk to him, Luke. He was riding t’other direction and I don’t know he ever seen that I’d seen him.”

  “You didn’t holler at him?”

  “I was going to after I got done in the outhouse, but he was gone by then. I know I should have hollered at him quick as I seen him, but the outhouse couldn’t wait, you know what I mean. Besides, I was surprised to see him, and I figured I’d best wait until I could see him better to be sure.”

  “You saw his face?”

  “Uh…no. But it was Ben’s horse, I’m right sure.”

  “Right sure. But not full sure.”

  “Well…no.”

  “Ben’s horse has nothing about it that would make it easy to recognize from any distance. From fifty feet away it looks like a hundred other horses you see in this town.”

  “I know.” Dewitt stood and paced. “But the way this fellow sat his saddle, the way he wore his hat, everything about him, it just made me think it was Ben.”

  “Let me think through this, Dewitt. Ben left for Kentucky by train. He took his horse with him on the stable car so he’d have it to ride when he was in Kentucky. So assuming that really was Ben you saw, that means he came back, got his horse off the train’s stable car, and saddled it up. He wouldn’t do that just to ride to the jail from the train station, Dewitt. Too close. He’d just put his horse in the livery and walk over here.”

  “Well, I figured he was going home and would come around into town later.”

  “Tell you what, Dewitt, let’s check. You and me, we’ll ride out to Ben’s place and see if he’s there.”

  Luke enjoyed the ride, largely owing to amusement at getting to watch Dewitt’s locally famous means of transportation: a large, aged mule that, for reasons known only to Dewitt, was named Eric the Mighty. The beast was slightly arthritic, limped, and was prone to make loud, threatening brays at all who came too near—all but Dewitt, anyway. The animal seemed to hold Dewitt in great affection. Everyone in Wiles County knew Dewitt and his mule.

  Eric was doing well today, stepping gamely along with Dewitt firmly rooted on his back. “I don’t believe Eric is limping as much as he used to,” Luke said.

  “Yeah, he’s better,” Dewitt replied.

  “You’ve been praying for him, right?”

  “I have. But I didn’t want to say that because I didn’t want you laughing. Ought not laugh at praying.”

  “I wouldn’t laugh,” Luke said. “I think your prayers might have helped that old mule. Something surely has.”

  “Lord loves mules, too,” Dewitt said.

  “I’ll take your word for it, Dewitt.”

  They rode westward, to where the Kansas flatlands gave way to a more broken and hilly region. It was in this terrain, in a small, lonely farmhouse, that Ben Keely lived his bachelor existence while serving as Wiles town marshal.

  “We just going to ride down to the house?” Dewitt asked.

  “Let’s get up on that little woody ridge south of Ben’s place and have a look from there. We can probably tell from there if somebody’s been about the place.”

  “You don’t believe me when I say I seen him, do you!”

  “I figure you saw somebody, but I still can’t believe Ben would have come back and not looked me up right away.”

  “All I can tell you, Luke, is that it sure looked like Ben. Mostly the way he carried himself, sat the saddle, and wore his hat kind of turned down toward the front. You know what I mean.”

  “That does sound like Ben.”

  “It was him, I tell you!”

  With horse and mule tied off to trees, the two men slipped through the grove at the top of the sloping ridge until Ben Keely’s small farmhouse came into view. They watched it silently for several minutes, but there was no evidence of movement or life. At length, though, something moved in the breezeway of the barn that sat near the house. A small-framed figure emerged, and Luke squinted and looked closely.

  It wasn’t Ben. It was Jakey Wills, a boy who lived with his family on a ranch that adjoined Ben’s small piece of property and who also happened to be the little brother of Jimmy Wills, desk clerk at the Gable House Hotel. Jakey had been recruited by Ben to feed, while Ben was away, the three stray cats that Ben allowed to live under his porch. That Jakey was still doing so lent support to the notion that Ben was not in fact back in Kansas. Luke said as much to Dewitt.

  “I seen what I seen,” Dewitt replied stubbornly.

  “Let’s go down and ask Jakey if he knows anything.”

  Jakey, distracted by his efforts to lure a recalcitrant feline fro
m beneath the porch for a pan of milk-soaked bread, did not see the two lawmen riding down toward the house. When he realized they were there, he bumped his head soundly while trying to get out from beneath the porch. The cat he’d been trying to lure followed him but ignored its food and raced around the house to the barn.

  “Ow! I felt that clean over here, Jakey!” Luke said as the boy rubbed his injured head. “You didn’t break skin, did you?”

  “No…don’t think so.” Jakey examined his hand for blood and found none. “Howdy, Luke. Dewitt.”

  “Didn’t mean to startle you, son,” said Luke. “Dewitt and me were just riding out this way and I wanted to check and see if you’d heard anything about Ben getting back.”

  “He’s back?”

  “Well, Dewitt believes he caught a glimpse of him the other day. But he was looking through some trees and never really saw his face. The horse looked to be Ben’s, or it least one just like his.”

  “If he’s back, he ain’t come around here,” Jakey said. “I been coming every day and bringing scraps to these danged cats just like he wanted me to. But I’m tired of it, and what he paid me before he left wasn’t enough to cover me still taking care of these cats for all this time.”

  “You’re a good boy to do it, Jakey,” Dewitt said.

  “Thank you, Dewitt. How’s Eric the Mighty doing?”

  “Still pokey, but he’s making it. Ain’t limping so much as before.”

  Luke said, “I kind of know how you’re feeling about Ben, Jakey. I’ve been left doing a job for longer than I expected, too. I was looking for Ben to come back weeks ago.”

  “Yeah. Hey, Luke, is it true what my brother told me?”

  “If it’s something Jimmy said, there’s no telling. What was it?”

  “He says that Kate Bender is in Wiles, living in the hotel and pretending to be somebody else.”