McDaniel was the first to speak, his voice filled with enthusiasm. "We've just about pulled it off, Jeff, and not a sign of trouble from Browder."
Danner nodded thoughtfully.
"Huh," Olie snorted. "I'll do my cheering when I see the amount of the bank draft from those Junction City people." He mopped his bald head with a shirt sleeve, then stared at Danner. "When will they start this train on its way?"
Danner squinted up at the late afternoon sun, then checked his pocket watch. "Afternoon eastbound will be here in about twenty minutes. Anytime after that, probably within half an hour to forty-five minutes."
Olie nodded sourly.
The sounds of footsteps on cinders brought Danner around in time to see Wainright come up—a harried Wainright with lines of bitterness burned deeper than ever in his face. He nodded to them.
"I realize this is rather late notice," Wainright said, "but I'm afraid you'll have to cancel this shipment, or at least postpone it until I can get some railroad agents here and stop these robberies against the line."
Danner shook his head. "The shipment goes through as scheduled."
"No." Wainright's mouth thinned. "On top of everything else, we had a train derailed and looted earlier this week. I've decided there'll be no more big shipments until this trouble is stopped and the men responsible are jailed. We can't risk another big loss."
"We ship as scheduled," Danner insisted.
Anger washed across the countenance of Wainright, deepening the harsh lines already there. "The railroad won't be responsible for any losses if you ship against our warning. It'll be your loss, nor ours."
"Now wait a minute," Olie Swensen exploded. "We can't accept the risk of losing a year's crops."
Wainright shrugged. "The choice is up to you. If you want the railroad to stand good for it, you'll just have to let us hold the train here until our agents stop these robberies."
McDaniel stepped in front of Danner. "What about it, Jeff?"
"We ship—at least, you and I do. The rest can do what they want to. You know how many days and wagons it took to get that wheat here and loaded. It would take just as many men and wagons and days to take it back, and we still would be faced with the problem of disposing of it. But if we ship and the train should fail to pass Spaulding or reach Junction City on time, we could get to it before very much wheat could be hauled off."
"I don't like it," Olie snorted. "We agreed to this plan of yours, thinking the railroad would guarantee safe shipment. It seems to me we better let them keep the train on a siding for a few days until they will guarantee it."
Danner turned to Wainright then. "Will you accept responsibility for the load within a few days?"
"Not until these bandits are behind bars."
"That could take weeks, or months," Danner countered. "You could go broke refusing to accept freight for that length of time."
"That's the way it is," Wainright insisted.
"I still don't like it," Olie fumed.
Danner spoke coldly. "Then back out of it and start unloading—your wheat, that is."
Olie glared, stomped around in a circle and glanced at the other grangers. None of them liked it, but they liked backing down even less. One by one they nodded to Olie. But Olie wasn't ready to give in yet. He mopped his bald scalp nervously and paced some more. Then he turned to Danner and nodded sourly.
"All right. You win. But Billy here," and he jerked his thumb at McDaniel, "and Mr. Gustafson will go with the train to Junction City. They'll sell the load and bring back the bank drafts." A not so subtle challenge filtered into his voice. "Is that agreeable with you?"
Danner silently cursed the day when he had stood up before the grangers to suggest the plan.
How much easier it would have been to have let them do what they wanted, while he shipped his grain to Junction City.
Then McDaniel protested with a sharp cry. "Jeff's got a right to come along and ramrod things. This is all his plan. If it wasn't for him—"
"Forget it, Billy," Danner snapped. "I'm going to catch the four-twenty to Junction City and make connections there with a train to Topeka. I have some personal business to 'tend to in Topeka that will take several days."
"Huh?" Surprise loosened McDaniel's heavy features. "You never mentioned—"
"I just now decided," Danner said. "It's something I should have done several weeks ago."
"Then it's all settled," Olie nodded with obvious satisfaction.
Danner grasped McDaniel by the shoulder and shook him lightly, his tight face relaxing slightly. "Take care of yourself, Billy. I'll see you in a few days, as soon as I get back from Topeka. Tell Lona where I've gone, so she won't worry or wonder, and that I'll explain it to her when I get back."
"Sure, Jeff," McDaniel said uncertainly.
Wicked rage burned through Danner as he strode swiftly to his horse, mounted, and jogged eastward along the main street. He finally had all he could take of Richfield and vicinity and all of the block-headed citizens of both. He was getting out and Lona could stay here or come with him as she saw fit. He'd long ago learned to live with few friends and even fewer social contacts. But now he knew if he was subjected to much more of the charges and suspicions of men like Olie, he was likely to break some heads. As for the train, well, Browder wouldn't be foolish enough to wreck it because he couldn't possibly get away with the load. The wheat could be salvaged, even if the train was wrecked.
Leaving his horse in the stable, Danner hurried back toward the depot. It had been more than a year since he was offered a special agent's job with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe, but maybe the job was still open. He'd know soon enough.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Before dawn of the second morning after leaving Richfield, Danner arrived in Topeka, rump-numbed and soot-covered. He found an all-night barbershop near the depot and awaited daylight in a hot bath. A sleepy Negro porter brushed off Danner's wrinkled clothes and polished his boots. A shave lifted the rest of his depression and he left the shop somewhat more mellowed than he had been in several days. He reached the depot again with the morning sun and strode around to the track side. To his left sprawled a long two-storied frame structure alive with people leaving and entering.
The World's First Harvey House, a sign above the door said. Entering, Danner sat down at a table near the front and placed his order for steak and eggs. Then he gazed out the open doorway at the rail terminal gradually awakening to a new day. An army of railroaders moved about the workshops across the rows of tracks. Danner counted twenty-three handcars loaded with section crews leaving the shops before his breakfast arrived. Half the patrons of the Harvey House wore the rough garb of railroaders and their talk centered on various aspects of their profession. Danner only half-listened to their discussions until a burly trackman at the next table mentioned Richfield.
"—made off with the entire train," the trackman finished.
"Aw, come off it, Barney," a second trackman scoffed. "A locomotive and thirty boxcars loaded with wheat couldn't just vanish."
"That's what the telegrapher said," Barney insisted. "The way I got it, this here train left Richfield about dark and was supposed to pass a substation called Spaulding in about two hours, only it never got there. They've searched all the track between the two points and found nothing. Now they're trying to locate a soured-up ex-employee of the railroad who they think engineered the job—a man named Danner."
Danner threw his tab and a silver dollar on the counter and hurried out of the Harvey House. In the depot, he learned that he would have to wait over an hour for the next train west. Impatience prodded him. Savagely he jammed his hands into his pockets and paced about the loading platform.