It was bad enough that they were carrying the payroll for the Cumberland garrison. Greer guessed the mysterious car held nothing more interesting than good whiskey for the general at Cumberland, or possibly even a couple of Baltimore whores for the officers. He had heard of such things, and while he didn't necessarily approve, he knew better than to question them out loud.
Schmidt spread butter on a biscuit, wolfed it down, then slurped noisily at his coffee.
"Damn goot," he said. "This should hold me until lunch in Harpers Ferry."
Greer laughed. "Always thinking of your belly, aren't you, Oscar?"
"A man can't work on an empty stomach."
The three men laughed and went on eating.
As Greer went to take another sip of coffee, his gaze settled on the train across the river. He stopped laughing, and his coffee cup froze halfway to his mouth.
"What is wrong?" Schmidt asked.
Greer barely heard him. He was busy watching a plume of thick, black smoke coming from the Chesapeake’s funnel, a telltale sign that someone was stoking the firebox.
"Look at that," he said, aghast. His two companions turned, just in time to see the train lurch ahead, then start down the tracks.
Schmidt swore. "Someone's taking our train!"
In the distance, they could barely hear someone shouting, "Thieves! Brigands!"
Suddenly the dining room exploded into action as the three men jumped up from the table. Coffee spilled, chairs fell over and a plate of biscuits clattered to the floor.
"Where are ya'll goin'?" called Mrs. Sykes, running from the kitchen in alarm, but the railroad men were already out the door, sprinting for the bridge across the Patapsco.
Aboard the train, the passengers appeared only mildly concerned that the Chesapeake was slowly rolling out of Sykesville, even though several of their fellow passengers were still having breakfast at Sykes's Hotel.
"What's going on?" a fat matron demanded of Flynn, who had just come from outside.
"Not to worry, ma'am," he said, tipping his hat. "I believe there's something to load on the last car, and the engineer had to pull the train ahead a few feet to bring the car even with the platform."
Flynn spoke in a voice loud enough for the other passengers to hear, and his explanation seemed to satisfy the woman, who settled back down in her seat.
"Well, we're going awfully fast," she huffed.
The train gathered speed. Flynn expected at any moment to hear the shooting begin, but all was quiet except for the growing noise of the iron wheels turning ever faster on the rails beneath them.
"Young man, I don't believe we're going to stop," the matron spoke up, sounding annoyed, as if she knew Flynn had misled her.
"The engineer must be drunk," he said lamely. "It's been known to happen."
No one took exception to that. It seemed as good an explanation as any. Flynn looked out the window. They were moving much faster. The train rolled past a man on foot, quickly outpacing him. Trees flickered past. The brown autumn grass was a blur.
Flynn thought of all those Yankee soldiers nearby and expected at any moment to hear gunshots. Seconds passed, and the only sound was the scrape and clatter of iron wheels on the rails. He realized his armpits were damp and his palms sweaty.
Damn, he thought. We did it.
"Stay here, lad, and don't move until I tell you," he ordered Benjamin, and stepped out into the aisle. He made his way to the front of the car. Flynn didn't want any of the passengers to leave the car, but he also didn't want to make it seem as if he were guarding the door. That would come soon enough. He stood by the stove in the corner of the car and spent some time fishing a cigar out of his pocket, then patting down his coat in a search for matches.
"Someone ought to go up and tell that engineer to stop," the fat matron said. "People have been left behind at the station."
Flynn didn't volunteer.
She cleared her throat loudly. "Young man— "
"I'm sure the engineer knows what he's doing, ma'am," he said easily, although he felt his armpits become more damp. Trouble was starting.
She turned to her husband, a white-haired gentleman beside her. "Alfred, pull the signal cord. That engineer must stop this train."
The signal cord was suspended by straps from the ceiling of the passenger car. The cord ran the length of the train, all the way to the locomotive, and was used when the conductor wished to signal the engineer. Tugging on the cord sounded a bell up in the locomotive's cab. This system saved the conductor from making a somewhat perilous trip across the tender to the locomotive itself.
From the resigned way in which her husband silently complied, it was easy to see he knew better than to argue with his wife. He was past sixty, paunchy, and puffed a bit as he stood up and reached for the signal cord overhead.
Flynn gave his pockets a final pat, then let his hand rest beneath his coat on the butt of his Le Mat revolver.
"I'm afraid you'll have to sit back down, sir," said Flynn, as he walked down the aisle and came up beside the man.
"What are you talking about?"
"Conductor's orders, sir. Please sit down."
"I'll do no such thing." The old man was as stubborn as his wife. "Now, if you'll kindly step aside— "
Almost casually, Flynn pulled out the Le Mat and leveled it at the man's belly. The old man's eyes grew wide in disbelief. "What's all this about?"
"Sit down."
Wide-eyed, the old fellow retreated to his seat. His back had blocked Flynn's gun from view of most of the passengers, but some up front had seen the huge revolver. A woman gasped. A man cried out, "Now see here— "
"Shut up," Flynn said harshly, and he moved down the aisle, the brutal-looking Le Mat revolver in plain view. "Listen up everyone. I am a Confederate soldier. Several of us on board have commandeered this train. We're taking it west. Now, we're not in the business of shooting civilians, but we will if we must. The best way not to get shot is to stay in your seat and keep quiet."
The portly matron began muttering indignantly. "This is a travesty. Where's your uniform? Soldiers? I doubt it! You're nothing but common thieves."
Flynn moved toward her.
"Shut up, Henrietta," her husband said, clapping a hand over her mouth. "He's an outlaw. He'll shoot you."
"That's right, sir. I'll shoot her if she opens that big mouth of hers again." He winked. "From the looks of it, I may be doing you a favor."
No one else spoke. The train was moving even faster. Flynn was just beginning to think everything was going well when two hard-looking men who were sharing a seat stood up.
Damn, thought Flynn. Quickly, he glanced at Benjamin, who nodded and quietly slipped his own revolver from a coat pocket.
One of the men spoke up. "Way I see it, they ain't but one of you," said one of the men. He smiled. "And they's two of us."
"Don't do it, lads," Flynn said.
Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. Both men clumsily drew revolvers. Someone screamed.
Flynn fired. His bullet missed and blew out one of the windows at the back of the car. He fired again and his bullet ricocheted off the stove pipe in a flash of sparks. More women were wailing. A bullet snicked past his ear.
To his right, Johnny Benjamin jumped up and shot one of the men through the head. Flynn got off another shot, and this time he was dead-on, the Le Mat's .40-caliber slug knocking the remaining man into the seat behind him.
"Nobody move!" Flynn shouted.
The gunfight had lasted only seconds. Flynn's ears rang. The car was filled with bluish smoke and stank of sulfur. A woman cried hysterically, while a terrified hush had fallen over the other passengers.