David Healey - Rebel Train

“We’ll take care of Flynn and the colonel, then I’ll go forward and stop the train,” Hazlett said. “Willie Forbes will see it our way, just as long as we promise him a bottle of whiskey. Come on.”

They went out the baggage car, crossed the open platform, and threw open the door to the passenger car.

Percy was there. And Flynn. Johnny Benjamin lounged near the back of the car. The woman, Nellie Jones, was sponging Lieutenant Cater’s face with a damp rag. Cater had come around, although his eyes were bright and feverish. His face was pale as a boiled shirt from all the blood he had lost. Hazlett stepped around Lieutenant Cater and the woman to face Percy.

“What’s going on?” Percy demanded. “The three of you should be back in the boxcar. What’s wrong?”

For a moment, Hazlett just stared at Percy. Then everything happened quickly. Hazlett suddenly had a gun in his hand. Benjamin began to draw his own gun, but Cook hit him with a fist to the jaw that knocked the boy off his feet. Cook took his gun away.

Too startled to move, Percy and Flynn found themselves staring into the muzzles of three revolvers.

“What the hell is going on?” Percy repeated eyes steely with anger. “Have you boys turned into Yankees on me?”

“It ain’t like that, Percy,” Hazlett said, not bothering to call him “Colonel” or “sir.” “We just want to be rich.”

“This is about that payroll money isn’t it? Damn it all! I knew I should have thrown that money off the train when I had the chance.”

“I reckon it’s a good thing for us you didn’t,” Hazlett said. “Besides, the boys and I know this raid will end in some hangings, and we don’t want to swing. So, Percy, what you’re goin’ to do is order the train to stop. We’re goin’ to take that payroll money, and then me, Fletcher and Cook are gettin’ off this wreck.”

“You’ll do no such thing.”

Hazlett thumbed back the hammer on the Colt. “We ain’t askin’. We’re tellin’. You ain’t got no choice, Percy.”

“I’m disappointed in you, Hazlett. Truly I am.”

Hazlett smirked. “I’m real sorry to hear that. Now stop the goddamn train. I ain’t goin’ to ask nice again.”

“Hazlett, I won’t lie to you,” Percy went on as if he had not heard Hazlett’s demands and the sergeant was not waving a gun in his face. “I always thought you were no-account back home. You and Cook both. At first I put you in my regiment and made you a sergeant because you’re married to my cousin. Thing is, you turned out to be a pretty good soldier. You’re good in a fight and the men listen to you.” Percy jerked his chin at Captain Fletcher. “Now Fletcher here, I can see him doing this cowardly thing — this mutiny . He’s not one of us. But I can’t understand why you’re doing this. Don’t turn yellow on me. Not after all we’ve been through so far. Not now.”

Hazlett snorted. “You can save your damned pretty speeches, Percy. You always did think you was better than me. Better than anyone else, to tell the truth. You ain’t got all the answers. You’re about to get us all killed, for one thing.”

“Well, Hazlett, at least I have not forgotten my duty.” Up until that point, Percy had been speaking calmly. Now his eyes sparked with anger, and he spoke with stinging truthfulness. “You’re a coward. White trash. That’s all you are, and that’s all you’ll ever be.”

Hazlett’s face twisted in rage, making it even uglier than usual. He raised the revolver until it was pointed at Percy’s head. “Damn you to hell, Percy!”

Flynn took a step toward Hazlett, but stopped when Cook leveled a revolver at him. Flynn started to say, “Now, Hazlett, maybe we can work this out about the money—”

“Shut up, Irish,” Hazlett snapped, without taking his eyes off Percy. “I want to enjoy watching the high and mighty lord of the manor get hisself shot without listening to you flap your jaw. If Irish here opens his mouth again, Cook, shoot him.”

“All right,” Cook said. He looked uneasy. It was one thing to shoot a man in battle, but it was altogether different to kill him in cold blood, face to face.

Hazlett’s whole arm shook with fury. His finger began to tighten on the trigger. Percy stood calmly, waiting to take the bullet in the chest.

Nearby, Nellie gasped. “My God, he’s going to shoot him.”

On the floor at Hazlett’s feet, Silas Cater lay quietly, forgotten. He raised himself on one elbow and kicked Hazlett just under the knee. It was a feeble kick, but the boot struck with enough force to knock Hazlett off balance.

The gun fired, missing Percy’s head by inches. Hazlett swore, swung the revolver down, and shot Cater in the chest. He turned the gun toward Percy as the colonel rushed him. Percy managed to catch Hazlett’s wrist and slam his hand into a corner of a bench. The gun slid away under the seats. Percy was just reaching for his own revolver when Cook tackled him.

Flynn drew the Le Mat revolver, but before he could get off a shot he had to dive for the cover offered by the benches as Fletcher snapped off two shots at him. The bullets scattered bits of horsehair stuffing from the seats.

“Damn you, Fletcher!” Flynn shouted. In reply, another shot tore through the seats.

“Shoot him and be done with it,” Hazlett snarled at Fletcher. He was trying to help Cook wrestle Percy to the floor.

“I can’t see him!”

“Not the Paddy, you jackass! Shoot the colonel!” Hazlett let go of Percy and stepped away.

But Fletcher did not have a chance because Percy and Cook were still wrestling with each other, gouging and punching. He couldn’t shoot one without hitting the other.

Hazlett swore. “Take care of him, Fletcher. I’m going to stop the train. We ain’t got much time.” He dashed out the doorway in the direction of the locomotive.

Flynn popped up and fired at Captain Fletcher, but a sudden jolt of the train sent his shot wide. Before he could get off another shot, Fletcher yelped and ran out the back doorway, toward the baggage car.

Flynn knew he had to catch Hazlett. Although Hazlett had lost his gun, he might still be able to stop the locomotive, in which case the Yankees would soon overtake them. If that happened, the raiders would all be hanged or shot.

Flynn flung open the door and crossed the platform, rushing into the next passenger car, revolver at the ready.

The car was empty.

Where the hell was Hazlett? He could not have reached the locomotive that quickly. Flynn dashed to the opposite door, threw it open, and ran out. Above the roaring wind, he heard a metallic click.

Flynn ducked.

A searing flash came from the roof of the car and a bullet slashed past his ear, so close he could feel the heat of the lead. He twisted, fired upwards, but there was only empty sky above him.

Hazlett was on the roof of the car. That explained how he had disappeared so quickly. He must have been carrying another pistol besides the one he had lost in the scuffle. Knowing Hazlett, it had been stuffed in his boot. He knew someone would chase him and had planned an ambush. Only the constant lurching of the train had spoiled Hazlett’s aim and saved Flynn’s life.

“Bastard,” Flynn growled, then started up the short ladder that led to the roof.

Carefully, Flynn raised his head above the edge of the roof, expecting another shot at any moment. However, he could see that Hazlett was halfway down the car, moving away from him.

“Hazlett!” he shouted, and pulled himself onto the roof.

Hazlett turned and fired. Flynn snapped off a shot in reply, but it was nearly impossible to hit anything more than a few feet away on the swaying, wind-whipped roof. The train was moving at sixty miles per hour and wind howled in Flynn’s ears. It was like being on the deck of a ship during a storm, with the motion threatening to pitch both men off at any moment.