Alistair MacLean - Breakheart Pass

Deakin hurried soft-footed down the passageway, a white-faced, badly shaken Marica behind with a singularly unflustered Claremont bringing up the rear. They walked quickly through the dining-room and moved out on to the rear platform. Wordlessly, Deakin gestured towards the roof. Claremont glanced at him in momentary puzzlement, then nodded his understanding. With an assist from Deakin he was swiftly on the roof, clinging to a ventilator with one hand while reaching for Marica with the other. Soon all three were on the roof, huddled together, their backs to the driving snow.

'This is dreadful!' Marica's voice was shaking, but it was with cold and not from fear. 'We'll freeze to death up here.'

'Don't speak ill of train roofs.' Deakin said reprovingly. 'They've become a kind of second home to me. Besides, at this moment, it's the safest place on this train. Bend down!'

At the urging of both his voice and arms they bent down as a thick broom of feathery conifer needles brushed their backs. Deakin said : 'The safest place if, that is, you watch out for those damned low-lying branches.'

'And now?' Claremont was very calm, with the faint air of a man who expected to be enjoying himself any moment.

'We wait. We wait and we listen.' Deakin stretched himself out on the roof and put his ear to the ventilator. Claremont at once did the same. Deakin reached out an arm and pulled Marica down beside them.

She said coldly: 'You don't have to keep your arm round me.'

'It's the romantic surroundings,' Deakin explained, i'm very susceptible to that sort of thing.'

'Are you indeed?' Her voice was icy as the night.

'I don't want you to fall off the damned train.' She lapsed into hurt silence.

'They're there,' Claremont said softly. Deakin nodded.

O'Brien, Pearce and Henry, all with guns in their hands, stood in momentary indecision in the dining compartment.

Pearce said: 'If Henry heard a scream and Deakin did have a fight with Carlos, maybe they both fell off the train and–'

In so far as it was possible for the Governor to run, he came running into the compartment. Two yards and he was out of breath.

'My niece! She's gone!'

There was a brief, baffled silence from which O'Brien was the first to recover. He said to Henry: 'Go see if Colonel Claremont – no, I'll go myself.'

Deakin and Claremont exchanged glances, then Deakin twisted and peered over the rear edge just in time to see O'Brien crossing swiftly between the first and second coaches. O'Brien, Deakin noted, had forgotten the elementary courtesy of holstering his pistol before going calling on his commanding officer. Deakin moved back to the ventilator, absent-mindedly putting his arm round the girl's shoulders. If she had objections, she failed to voice them.

Claremont said: 'You and Carlos had differences?'

'Some. On the roof of the supply wagon. He fell off.'

'Carlos? Fell off? That nice big cheerful man?' Marica's capacity for absorbing fresh and increasingly unwelcome information was about exhausted. 'But – but he may be badly hurt. I mean, lying back there on the track-side, perhaps freezing to death in this awful cold.'

'He's badly hurt all right. But he's not on the track-side and he isn't feeling a thing. We were passing over a bridge at the time. He fell a long, long way down to the bottom of a ravine.'

'You killed him.' Deakin could barely catch the husky words. 'But that's murder!'

'Every man needs a hobby.' Deakin tightened his grip on her shoulders. 'Or perhaps you'd rather I was lying at the bottom of that ravine? I damn nearly was.'

She was silent for a few moments, then said: 'I'm sorry. I am a fool.'

'Yes,' Claremont said ungallantly. 'Well, Mr Deakin, what's next?'

'We take over the locomotive.'

'We'd be safe there?'

'Once we've disposed of our friend Banlon we will.' Claremont looked at him without understanding. 'I'm afraid so, Colonel. Banlon.'

'I can't believe it.'

'The shades of the three men he's already killed would believe it all right.'

'Three men?'

'To my certain knowledge.'

It took Claremont a very brief time only to come to terms with the fresh reality. He said in a calm voice: 'So he's armed?'

'I don't know. I think so. Anyway, Rafferty has his rifle with him. Banlon would use that – after shoving Rafferty over the side.'

'He could hear us coming? He could hold us off?' 'It's an uncertain world, Colonel.'

'We could take our stand in the train. In a passageway. In a doorway. I've got my revolver–'

'Hopeless. They're desperate men. With all respect, Colonel, I doubt whether you could match either Pearce or O'Brien with a hand gun. And even if you could hold them off there would still be an awful lot of gunfire. And the first shot Banlon hears he's on his guard. Nobody could get near his cab – and he'd drive straight through to Fort Humboldt without stopping.'

'So? We'd be among friends.'

'I'm afraid not.' He held up a warning finger, looked cautiously over the rear edge of the roof in time to see O'Brien crossing from the second to the first coach. He put his ear to the ventilator again. From the tone of his voice O'Brien's relaxed urbanity appeared to have abandoned him.

The Colonel's gone too! Henry, stay here, see no one passes you – either way. Shoot on sight. Kill on sight. Nathan, Governor – we'll start from the back and search every inch of this damned train.'

Deakin gestured urgently forward but Claremont, on his knees now, was staring towards the rear of the train.

The horse wagons! They're gone!'

'Later! Later! Come on.'

Soundlessly, the three edged their way along the centre line of the leading coach's roof. Arrived at the other end, Deakin lowered himself to the platform and peered through the coach's front observation window. Henry was clearly visible at the far end of the passageway, strategically placed with his back to the side of the dining compartment, where his constantly moving eyes could cover both the front and rear approaches. Cradled in his right hand in an unpleasantly purposeful fashion was a Peacemaker Colt.

Deakin glanced upwards, put a finger, perhaps unnecessarily, to his lips, pointed to the interior of the coach, reached up and helped both Marica and Claremont on to the platform. Still silently, he reached out a hand to Claremont, who hesitated, then handed him his gun. Deakin made a downward patting motion with his hand to indicate that they should stay where they were, climbed over the safety rail, reached for the rear of the tender and transferred his weight to one of the buffers. Slowly he hoisted himself upwards until his eyes cleared the stacked cordwood at the rear of the tender.

Banlon was peering ahead through the driving window. Rafferty had the glowing fire-box open and was busily engaged in stoking it. Leaving the door open, he turned and made for the tender: Deakin's head swiftly disappeared from sight. Rafferty lifted two more baulks of cordwood and had hardly begun to move forward again when Deakin pulled himself upward until he was in full view of either of the two men who cared to turn round. He made his way quickly but with great care over the stacked cordwood, then lowered himself noiselessly to the floor of the tender.

Banlon had suddenly become very still. Something, almost certainly a fleeting reflection or movement in his driving window, had caught his attention. He looked slowly away from the window and glanced at Rafferty, who caught his eye at the same moment. Both men turned round and looked to the rear. Deakin was four feet away and the Colt in his hand was pointed at the middle of Banlon's body.

Deakin said to Rafferty: 'I see your rifle there. Don't try to get it. Read this.'

Reluctantly almost, Rafferty took the card from Deakin's hand, stopped and read it by the light from the fire-box. He handed it back to Deakin, his face puzzled and uncertain.