Some minutes later, Danner heard them pull up behind him but he didn't look around. He found another place where a handcar had been derailed while a crew replaced defective crossties and he examined it carefully before moving on.
At dusk, Danner found a creek near the tracks and unsaddled. His two companions watched silently from their saddles. Then he moved off into the brush, scared up a couple of rabbits and shot off their heads. Returning to the campsite, he found Melinda and Wainright right where he had left them—in their saddles. Wainright darted a glance from the rabbits to Danner.
"It seems to me we should be finding some shelter for the night instead of wasting time here."
"I'm spending the night here."
"You what?" Wainright's mouth hung open, his eyes wide. "You surely don't expect us to stay out here all night in the middle of nowhere without shelter or even bedding."
Danner hunkered down and gathered twigs in a neat pile, then touched a match to the stack. "If you ride fast enough," he said without looking up, "you can reach Richfield before sunrise."
"You'd like that, wouldn't you," Wainright said sneeringly. "You'd like to get rid of us." Then Danner heard him jump to the ground and smiled to himself. But he continued to blow on the smoldering twigs until he heard Wainright speak again.
"You won't get rid of us that easily," he snapped. Then he sat down crosslegged on the far side of the fire and Melinda joined him without enthusiasm. Tired lines were etched deeply in the faces of both.
Danner skinned the rabbits and soon had them roasting over the small fire. His knees on the ground, he watched the juice bubble from the carcasses. A slight breeze carried smoke from the fire into the faces of Melinda and Wainright. They moved around closer to Danner—too close to suit Melinda. With a slight flush she seemed to recall an earlier time when she got too close to him. Now she edged a little farther away and Danner felt a hint of amusement. She'd promised that it would never happen again. Strangely, now, he could almost feel the heat from that stolen kiss and he adjusted the bed of coals to get his mind off of it.
The smell from the roasting meat brought hunger pains to his stomach and Danner turned the stick so the rabbits would cook on the other side.
His silent companions gazed hungrily at the meat, yet neither appeared to have enough energy left to eat. For a moment Danner felt a touch of admiration for the grit displayed today by both of them. Not many people hardened to rough living would have gone through as much physical misery without complaint. And neither of them could be considered hardened to rough living. Now Danner found himself comparing Melinda to Lona, which was getting to be a habit; one he didn't care for.
After the meat had disappeared, Danner spread his bedroll near the fire, then nodded to Melinda. "You sleep here," he said.
An objection reached her lips, but never escaped. She appeared too exhausted to care.
Danner unsaddled the other two horses and tossed a sweaty saddle blanket to Wainright. "Cover yourself with that," he said, "and use the saddle for a pillow."
Wainright sniffed the blanket and his lips curled with scorn, but he kept quiet as he dragged the saddle over by the fire. When Danner was ready to stretch out, both Melinda and Wainright were asleep.
But sleep didn't come easily to Danner. His mind remained active, seeking an answer to a situation which couldn't exist. A train can't vanish, he told himself just before he dozed off.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Dust-laden winds lashed out of the south, obscuring the early morning sun. Danner pulled his hatbrim low over the right side of his face, then reined down the north side of the roadbed to wait out the storm. Dismounted, he watched Wainright send his horse down the incline, Melinda following. For a while the storm lashing over their heads increased in tempo, then leveled off to a steady slashing. Danner hunkered down, hardly aware of his companions.
By now the winds would have removed any signs along the track, even if any existed; but Spaulding lay almost in sight to the east. Whatever had happened to the train likely had occurred elsewhere.
Melinda used a dainty handkerchief—now soiled—to wipe the dust from her face. Again Danner felt a fleeting admiration for her and Wainright for the silence in which they endured the discomfort. Neither had ever spent a night away from a soft bed. Their bodies must be alive with stiff soreness this morning.
Half an hour passed before the winds slackened to an occasional eddy which whirled dust and tumbleweeds in a circle. Danner dusted himself off, mounted without a word to his shadows and rode on eastward. The dust limited visibility to a dim outline of the Spaulding substation, but gradually the air cleared. Soon a trace of the sun could be seen. He slowed his horse to a walk, aware of Wainright pulling up on his right.
"Well, what now, Danner?"
Danner shrugged without taking his gaze off the buildings ahead. Frustration had kept him awake most of the night and was a bitter taste in his mouth now.
The shapeless bulk of Ma Grim moved out the back door of the station. She lumbered to the well, drew a bucket of water and started back. Spotting them, she paused to shade her eyes for a better look, then disappeared inside.
An oversized tumbleweed bounded by, frightening Melinda's mare, and she dropped back, fighting to regain control. She caught up again as Danner dismounted at the back of the station. Ma Grim came out, inspected each of them as she dried her hands on a tattered but clean apron, then ducked her head in greeting.
"Howdy, Jeff," she bellowed. Then she favored Wainright and Melinda with silent nods. "You must have camped out last night to get here this early. Had breakfast?"
Danner shook his head and Ma invited them inside. The back of the depot, long ago converted into single-room living quarters for Ma, contained a half-bed along the east wall, a table and two chairs in the center, and a cook stove and cabinet near the west wall. The only other furniture in the room was a chest of drawers by the door leading into the waiting room.
Ma Grim knew Melinda and after greeting her, acknowledged an introduction to Wainright with a man-like handshake. Wainright didn't seem to know what to say to the rough old woman.
Then Ma busied herself at the stove, dropping slabs of bacon into the skillet and shoving a pan of biscuits into the oven. Danner moved over to the cabinet and filled a washbasin from the water bucket. He gestured to Melinda and she came over to wash the dust from her face and hands. By the time Wainright and Danner had refreshed themselves, Ma had a second skillet filled with eggs. Danner brought in two additional chairs from the waiting room.
All four of them attacked the food with silent gusto, Wainright as adept with his one hand as the others with two. With the food gone, the two women cleared the table and went to work on the dishes, Ma washing and Melinda drying. Strangely, Melinda didn't seem out of place in the domestic task, though Danner wondered if she'd had much experience. At least, she seemed willing enough. Twice Ma glanced over her shoulder at Danner and Wainright. Danner knew she was trying to reconcile their riding together and camping out all night with Melinda. But in plainsman fashion Ma held her silence.
The chatter of the telegraph key from the front of the depot brought his mind back to the task at hand and, tilting back his chair, he retraced his trail from Richfield, searching for whatever it was he surely had missed. The train just wasn't on the tracks between Spaulding and Richfield, even though it couldn't be anywhere else. It couldn't have gotten by Ma, here, or Dick Boley in Richfield.
Then a new possibility leaped into Danner's mind and hope flickered alive. Usually quite a few boxcars stood idle in the yard at Richfield. There was a slight possibility that the missing train could have been returned to the yards the same night without passing Dick Boley at the depot. Half the cars might have been left in plain sight, unnoticed for a day or two, and the locomotive and other cars could have been hidden in the loading lean-to at Browder's elevator. Then a day or two later they could have been moved east or west as a special train without arousing much suspicion. It would have been risky, but it just possibly could have been done. Danner brought the front legs of his chair down solidly and stood up.