“Oh,” Pamela said. “I don’t believe I have ever walked this far in my entire life.”
“You did well,” Hawke said.
“Well? Ha! That’s because you don’t see the bruises and blisters I have on my feet now.”
“No, I mean you did well because you didn’t complain all the way here,” Hawke said. “You’re a strong woman, Miss Dorchester.”
“It’s the Brit in me,” Pamela said. “And the fact that my father would have it no other way.” She sat down and gingerly unlaced her moccasins.
“Your father must be quite a man.”
“Brigadier Emeritus of the Northumberland Fusiliers, Sir James Spencer Dorchester, Earl of Preston, Viscount of Davencourt,” Pamela said as she rubbed her feet.
“That’s quite a mouthful.”
“Of course, here in America he is simply Mr. Dorchester. He gave up his title and his holdings when we left England.”
“And your title too,” Hawke said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You would be Lady Dorchester. No, that’s not right, it’s your father’s title, not your husband’s, so it would be Lady Pamela.”
Pamela tilted her head and looked up at Hawke with a quizzical expression. “Oh, my, I’m very impressed, Mr. Hawke. How is it that you know such a thing?”
“I picked it up somewhere,” he replied.
“I’m beginning to suspect that you are not quite the itinerant you appear to be.”
Hawke chuckled. “Thanks. I think.”
“I don’t suppose you have a watch?”
“As a matter of fact I do,” he said, and pulled his watch from his pocket. “It is lacking fifteen minutes of seven.”
“Ah, very good. We shall have no more than a fifteen minute wait.”
“You carry a timetable in your head, do you?”
“In a manner of speaking. The westbound train reaches Green River at nine P.M. every day. We are forty miles from Green River, and the train proceeds at a velocity of twenty miles each hour. Therefore, it will be here at seven o’clock.”
“I can’t argue with that logic.”
As Pamela had predicted, fifteen minutes later they saw a train approaching. Hawke knew that it was running at a respectable enough speed, but because of the vastness of the prairie, it appeared to be barely moving. Against the great panorama of the wide open spaces, the train seemed very small, and even the smoke that poured from its stack made but a tiny mark on the big, empty sky.
He could hear the train quite easily now, the sound of its puffing engine reaching him across the wide flat ground the way sound travels across water. He stepped up onto the track and began waving. When he heard the steam valve close and the train began braking, he knew that the engineer had spotted him and was going to stop. As the engine approached, it gave some perspective as to just how large the prairie really was. The train that had appeared so tiny before was now a behemoth, blocking out the sky. It ground to a reluctant halt, its stack puffing black smoke and its driver wheels wreathed in tendrils of white steam that purpled as they drifted away in the fading light.
“Perhaps you had better stay down here until I call you,” Hawke cautioned.
“That’s all right by me,” Pamela agreed. “I don’t feel like walking, or even standing up, until I have to.”
The engineer’s face appeared in the window, backlit by the orange light of the cab lamps. Hawke felt a prickly sensation and realized that someone was holding a gun on him. He couldn’t see it, but he knew that whoever it was—probably the fireman—had to be hiding in the tender.
“What do you want, mister? Why did you stop us?” the engineer asked.
Hawke knew that his appearance was not all that reassuring.
“My horse went down,” he explained without going into detail. “I need a ride.”
“You’ll have to take that up with the conductor,” the engineer said.
Even as the engineer was talking, the conductor came walking up alongside the train to see why they had made an unscheduled stop. He was holding an open watch in his hand.
“Smitty, what’s going on? Why are we stopped?” he asked. “We’ve got a schedule to keep.”
“This here fella wants a ride,” the engineer replied. “His horse went down.”
The conductor studied Hawke, obviously put off by his trail-worn appearance. He shook his head no and waved his hand dismissively.
“We don’t pick up drifters,” the conductor said to Hawke.
“Are you saying you’d leave a man stranded out here?” Hawke asked.
“When we reach the next stop, I will inform someone that you are out here,” the conductor replied.
“Well now, that certainly isn’t very Christian of you, Mr. Marshal,” Pamela said, coming up from her place of seclusion.
The conductor gasped. “Miss Dorchester! My Lord, what are you doing out here in the middle of nowhere? Did you know the whole line has been looking for you? What happened? Did you fall from the train?”
“I was kidnapped,” Pamela said.
“Kidnapped? What do you mean, kidnapped?”
“I mean that when the train stopped for water, someone came on board and kidnapped me.”
“Oh, heavens!”
“This gentleman saved my life. Now we are trying to get back to Green River. That is, unless you plan to make us rely on shank’s mare.” Pamela looked over at Hawke and smiled, calling his attention to the fact that she had acquired the Americanism for her own.
“No, of course I would never do anything like that,” the conductor said, falling all over himself now to please her. “I can find accommodations in one of the first-class cars for you, and your friend can ride—”
“In the first-class car, with me,” Pamela said, interrupting the conductor.
The conductor cleared his throat. “Uh, yes, ma’am. Yes, of course, he can ride with you as well.”
“I appreciate that,” Hawke replied. “Oh, and by the way—Smitty, is it?” Hawke called up to the engineer.
“That’s what folks call me. My real name is Malcolm Smith.”
“Well, Mr. Malcolm Smith, you can tell your fireman to take his gun off me? I’m just another passenger now.”
“Billy,” the engineer called. “Come on out.”
There was a rustling sound as the fireman climbed out of the pile of wood. He leaned the shotgun against the edge of the tender, then began brushing himself off.
“How’d you know he was there?” Pamela asked.
“He had to be somewhere,” Hawke said. “It takes two men to drive a train, and Mr. Smith was the only one in the cab.”
“Billy, you were pointing your gun at me?” Pamela asked.
“No, ma’am, not you,” Billy replied. “I was just pointin’ it at him.” He nodded toward Hawke. “Hope you didn’t take no offense at it, mister,” he added.
“No offense taken,” Hawke replied. “Under the circumstances, it was the prudent thing to do.”
“This way, please,” the conductor said, starting toward the rear of the train.
“Do have someone bring us some food from the dining car, would you?” Pamela said. “I haven’t eaten for some time now, and I am famished.”
“Oh, that won’t be possible, I’m afraid. The dining car is closed,” the conductor replied.
“Open it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Hawke followed Pamela onto the train, dropping his saddle on the platform deck just before they went into the car. There were two men and two women in the car, all sitting in overstuffed, comfortable chairs. They were well-dressed, as befit their station, and they looked up in curiosity and ill-concealed irritation as Hawke and Pamela invaded their domain.
“Good evening,” Pamela said, smiling brightly at the others in the car. No one returned her greeting, and a moment later Hawke overheard one of the men grumbling to the others.