David Healey - Rebel Train

“That’s better,” he managed.

“What do you fools want with this train, anyhow?” she asked. “You’re ruining everything.”

“I could speak easier without that knife against my throat.”

She studied him with hard, shrewd eyes. Green in this dim light, he noticed. Eyes like a cat. Or a whore.

“All right,” she said. Her hand moved away, although she kept her eyes locked on Flynn’s face. He shifted slightly, preparing to grab for her wrist.

But the blade was suddenly back, thrust into the space between his legs and poking up into his crotch. She grinned wickedly.

Flynn’s heart leapt into his throat. He spoke, his voice an octave higher. “Mother of God, be careful, woman.”

“You’re the one who should be careful,” she said. “Now tell me. Where are you going with the train?”

“Just south of Cumberland to a town called Romney,” Flynn said. “Then we’ll head down the Shenandoah Valley to Richmond on horseback.”

She looked puzzled. “Why?”

“To give the Yankees hell,” he explained.

It was clear she knew nothing about Abraham Lincoln being aboard the train, Flynn thought, and he wasn’t about to enlighten her. Stealing a train to raise hell seemed about as good a reason as any.

“You mean you’re not after the money?”

“What money?”

She didn’t answer him. Instead, she said, “You’re Flynn. I overheard you telling that old busybody back there your name.”

“Yes.”

“I’m Nellie.” The pressure of the knife eased. “So, Flynn, you like to raise hell, do you?”

“You could say that,” Flynn answered, wondering what the woman was getting at.

“You’re Irish,” Nellie said. “The Irish are brave. And lucky.”

Flynn was losing patience with this Baltimore whore. “Sure, and we piss green, too. What’s your point, woman?”

“I need your help, Flynn. Charlie’s dead, and I can’t do it alone.”

“Do what?”

Steel flashed, and the razor-edged stiletto disappeared up her sleeve. He had passed some kind of test. Flynn knew he should fetch her a good slap for nearly cutting his throat, then drag her back to the passenger car. But he was curious to know what all this was about.

“What do you think is in all these boxes around us?” she asked.

“Why don’t you tell me.”

She leaned toward him. “Money.”

“What are you talking about?”

“It’s the payroll for the Union garrison at Cumberland, Flynn. Six months of pay for 12,000 soldiers.”

Flynn felt as if he had been struck. Now the guards on the train at Sykesville made sense. The soldiers weren’t guarding Lincoln. They were guarding the money. “How much?”

“Charlie and I figured around four hundred thousand.”

“Sweet Jesus,” Flynn muttered.

For the first time, he looked more closely around him. Because of the near darkness, it was hard to distinguish much except a jumble of boxes and parcels.

“Let’s let in a bit of light,” he said, and pulled back a flap of canvas that covered a window. The sunlight revealed several strongboxes, built of dark oak and bound with iron. Each box was about two feet square and must have contained thousands of dollars. He counted six boxes altogether.

“They’re not locked,” Nellie said, reading his mind. “I guess the army doesn’t worry about being robbed.”

Flynn walked over and examined a strongbox. There was a hasp and clasp, but no lock. He flipped back the lid. A stack of Yankee greenbacks, neatly arranged, lay inside. He took out a bundle, fanned the edge of the stack with his thumb, then put it back.

“Look at that,” he said in an awed voice. He had seen his share of black market cash in Richmond, but never so much money in one place. “There’s a fortune in that one box alone.”

It was indeed a fortune, far more than an honest man could ever hope to earn, considering a soldier’s pay was sixteen dollars a month, and that in near-worthless Confederate scrip. Even a skilled worker in Washington City earned just two dollars per day.

Flynn’s black market boss paid him well, but this was money the like of which he had never seen before. All thoughts of loyalty to anyone in Richmond evaporated at the thought of the wealth in the strongboxes.

“Let’s split it, Flynn,” Nellie urged. “Just me and you. That’s two hundred thousand dollars apiece.”

“How the hell do we get this off the train?” he wondered out loud.

“That means you’ll help?”

“For two hundred thousand dollars, Nellie Jones, there’s not much I wouldn’t do.”

“Even desert your friends?”

Flynn gave a short laugh. “They’re not exactly my friends, but that’s a long story. Besides, they’ll do just fine without me. I just hope none of them come in here and see these strongboxes.”

She beckoned him toward the door. “First thing we have to do is get out of here. We don’t want the others to come looking for us and find the money. We can talk later.”

Flynn grinned wolfishly. “The lads will be suspicious anyway, me being alone with a beautiful woman.”

“Then we’ll have to put their minds to rest, won’t we?” Before Flynn could react, Nellie gave him a hard, stinging slap that brought tears to his eyes.

“Damn you, woman!” Flynn rubbed his face.

“That will convince them, won’t it?”

They crossed between the cars, Flynn’s face smarting and red, and pushed through the door into the passenger car.

Thanks to the arrival of Hazlett and Pettibone, everything remained under control and the passengers sat in their seats, afraid to move. Charles Gilmore’s body still lay in the aisle in a pool of blood.

All eyes were on them as they walked in. Nellie stared for a long moment at Gilmore’s body, then turned to Flynn and whispered so that only he could hear: “This one’s for Charlie.”

She slapped him again. This time, she hit him so hard that Flynn’s ears rang.

The other raiders laughed and hooted as Nellie hurried toward her seat, looking flustered. Stunned, Flynn shook his head to clear it. He had taken on prizefighters who hadn’t hit him that hard.

“That’ll learn you, Irish,” Hazlett shouted. “Saucy women are too much for the likes of you to handle.”

Flynn scowled and rubbed his aching face. Still, it was all he could do not to smile, thinking about all that money in the baggage car.

He glanced at Nellie, who was in her seat, staring straight ahead and appearing very different from the woman who just minutes before had almost cut his throat. Looking at her now, Flynn couldn’t help but wonder if he had just cast his lot with the devil.

The plume of smoke behind them appeared as a smudge against the blue sky. Colonel Percy had known this moment would come, but he had dreaded it all the same. They were, at last, being pursued by another locomotive.

“Looks like them Yankees finally wisened up,” Hank Cunningham said, nodding at the telltale smoke as he hurried past with an armful of wood. “They found themselves a locomotive to chase us.”

“Open the throttle,” Percy said. They were not yet at full speed and this locomotive could do better than a mile a minute on a level track. With the lead they had, he doubted there was anything that could catch them. “We’ll run for it.”

“We’re getting low on water,” Wilson reminded him.

“I don’t give a damn,” Percy said. “Give her full throttle and put that Johnson bar as far forward as it will go.”

“Yes, sir,” Wilson said. Cunningham, hearing Percy’s order, scrambled to fetch more wood for the Chesapeake’s firebox. “One thing, sir. We’re coming up on Parr’s Ridge. It’s quite a grade, and it’s going to slow us down plenty.”