David Healey - Rebel Train

“Hazlett?”

“All right, Colonel.”

“We move again in five minutes.”

The men drifted away. Some found a spring near the tracks and drank deeply. They pulled biscuits and cold fried chicken from their pockets and ate it standing near the train. A soldier learned to eat and drink when he could.

“I could use some coffee,” John Cook said wistfully. “Real coffee like we had this morning, not what we’re used to drinking back home that’s made out of chicory.”

“Ain’t no time for making coffee.”

“I just said it would be nice, is all,” Cook said, then stared hungrily at the bundle of food the other man had taken from his pocket and unwrapped. “You gonna eat that biscuit?”

Further down the tracks, Colonel Percy fell into step beside Pettibone.

“What’s with those two?” Percy asked. “I think they would have killed each other.”

“It’s like two roosters in a barnyard, Colonel,” Pettibone said philosophically. “Sooner or later, they’s goin’ to fight. This ain’t the end of it, neither.”

“But why those two?” Percy wondered aloud. If there was trouble between his men, he wanted to know the cause.

“Hazlett is a son-of-a-bitch and a no-good troublemaker,” Pettibone said, then added, “Sir. I know he’s married to your cousin. But he always was a bully back home, and a man like that thrives in army life, ’specially if he wears stripes. Now Flynn, he won’t abide a man like that. He’s quick to make a joke, I reckon, but make no mistake, he’s a hard man. Someone like him stands up to a piece of horse shit like Hazlett. And Hazlett don’t like that.”

Percy shook his head. He supposed he had known as much all along. “It ain’t enough that the Yankees want to kill us. We have to try and kill each other, too.”

Shaking his head, Percy stomped toward the locomotive. He would much rather have been on horseback, where a man felt free and easy, instead of riding this steam locomotive. Some called a locomotive an iron horse, but in Percy’s mind the Chesapeake was as far as you could get from four hooves and a saddle. It wasn’t natural. This damn train was making them all nervous.

“Colonel!”

Percy turned. Lieutenant Cater had jumped down from the last car and was waving his arms and shouting. “Colonel! Colonel!”

Percy looked beyond Cater and saw at once what all the shouting was about. Something was coming at them down the tracks. He squinted, trying to make it out, but his near-sighted eyes saw only a distant blur.

“What is it?”

“Hand car, sir,” Pettibone drawled. “Coming right at us.”

“How many men on her?”

“Just three, sir.”

Percy squinted again, and could begin to make out the up-and-down pumping motion. He knew his small band of raiders could easily overwhelm three men, but if his pursuers were armed, the victory might come at a bloody price.

“Everyone on the train!” he shouted. “Let’s go.”

He turned and ran for the engine. Wilson had already heard the commotion and pulled back the Johnson bar, getting the Chesapeake underway. At first, the huge drive wheels slipped uselessly on the slick, polished rails. Wilson pulled a lever, sand dropped on the rails, and the wheels caught. The train began to creep ahead, although the pursuers were gaining on them. Percy swung into the cab.

“She won’t go no faster, Colonel,” Wilson said, working the lever to the sandbox again. Too slowly, the locomotive was gathering speed. “There’s just no traction.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Percy said. He nodded at the gap in the rails behind them. “They won’t be getting any closer.”

“We’ve got them now,” Greer shouted. “Faster!”

He laughed at the sight of the thieves up ahead scrambling aboard the train. Cowards, he thought, every last one of them. The Chesapeake was just ahead. Sweat streamed down the faces of the three railroad men and the muscles of their arms burned as they pumped harder and harder.

Greer spotted the train ahead and laughed out loud. The hand car flew over the rails, closing the distance between the pursuers and the creeping train, which was just beyond the Twin Arch Bridge.

“I knew we’d find them sooner or later,” Greer crowed as they rushed closer. On the last car, he could make out two men watching them come on. Briefly, he wondered if they were armed. However, Greer’s excitement over the first glimpse of his train overwhelmed his sense of caution. At this point, he really didn’t give a damn if they had guns. All Greer could think about was catching up to the stolen train. By God, he would teach those train thieves a lesson.

Too late, Greer saw the missing rails ahead. Schmidt saw it an instant later and his mouth fell open. The push car lacked brakes, so they hurtled helplessly toward disaster.

“Jump!” Greer shouted.

The three men launched themselves into thin air. The hand car hurtled on, the pump handle still beating up and down as if to invisible hands. At the gap, it ran out of rail and the front wheels churned up dirt and rocks. The car careened wildly onto its side, then flipped end over end and landed upside down in the brush lining the tracks. The four wheels went on spinning silently. If its momentum had carried it just a few more feet, the car would have sailed clear off the bridge ahead.

Greer picked himself off the ground. His left knee hurt fiercely, and his right ankle felt as if it had been twisted. He tested his legs, gradually putting his full weight on them. Nothing broken, he thought. Up ahead, he watched the train— his train — move faster and faster down the tracks, spouting great gouts of thick, black smoke as the locomotive picked up speed.

He clenched his fists in helpless rage. He should have known the thieves would tear up the rails. How could he have been so stupid?

“We’ll never catch her now,” said Schmidt, shaking himself like a bear as he crawled out of the brush lining the tracks. He uttered some choice Teutonic oaths, untangled a prickly strand of thorns from his sleeve, and dabbed at a gash on his forehead. “If we hadn’t jumped, we’d have broken our necks.”

They both stared down at the overturned push car. Aside from being upside down, it otherwise appeared undamaged. The wheels spun on, like a dog chasing rabbits in its dreams.

“At least it didn’t go all the way down the ravine,” Schmidt commented.

“We won’t be getting that out of there anytime soon,” Greer said. “Damn those bastards.”

“Who are they, do you think?” Schmidt asked. “What do they want with our train?”

“To hell if I know. I guess it must be the payroll money they’re after,” Greer replied. He looked around. “Now, where the hell is Frost?”

They had been expecting him to appear out of the brush at any moment, but Frost was nowhere to be seen. Concerned, Greer and Schmidt began searching for him in the thick undergrowth that lined the tracks. The tangle of sumac, briars and poison ivy could hide a man until you stepped on him. Brush and rocks also were a favorite lair for poisonous copperhead snakes, so the two men kicked at the brush carefully.

“Frost?” Greer called. “Where in hell are you?”

“I hope he didn’t break his Gott damn neck,” Schmidt said. “I don’t want to carry him all the way back to Baltimore.”

“Just keep looking.”

They heard a groan, and both men rushed toward the noise. Frost was on all fours, trying to extricate himself from a tangle of thorns. Schmidt reached down with a hand the size of a ham and pulled him free. Groggily, Frost got to his feet. He shook his head to clear it, coughed, and spat a stream of bloody phlegm toward the tracks. The thorns had carved a mosaic of cuts and scrapes on his face.