They were entering open country now, marshy in places near the river, mostly cattle graze and farmland stretching beyond. The steady, throbbing rhythm of steel on steel had a welcome muting effect on the youngsters’ piping voices. A strand of Sabina’s hair had come loose from its coil; she was in the process of repinning it when she felt John stiffen beside her. The reason, she saw then, was that Morgan was rising from his seat. He yawned, stretched, and then stepped into the aisle with the satchel still clutched in both hands. Balanced against the swaying motion of the car, he walked past where she and John were sitting without so much as an eye flick in their direction.
As soon as he passed through the connecting door to the coach behind, John was on his feet. He gestured for her to remain seated, followed after Morgan.
Sabina sat tensely, waiting.
25
Quincannon
Morgan went through the packed third day coach, through the first-class Pullman and the dining and lounge cars, past men’s and women’s lavatories into the smoking car. Quincannon had no chance to brace him along the way, for Morgan moved at a smart pace and there were other people in the aisles in all four cars.
Quincannon paused outside the smoking car door; through the glass he watched his quarry sit down at the far end, facing back toward the entrance, then produce a cigar from his coat pocket, fit it into the amber holder, and snip off the end with a pair of gold cutters. Settling in there, evidently, as he’d settled into the day coach. Blast the man and blast the luck!
He debated the advisability of entering, decided to take the chance. Morgan paid no attention to him when he claimed a seat just inside the door. The car was three-quarters full, smoke from cigars, pipes, cigarettes creating a thickly swirling haze. Quincannon tugged his briar and tobacco pouch from an inside coat pocket, opened the pouch — and then stayed his hand as he was about to dip the pipe bowl inside.
Morgan was on his feet again. His cigar unlit, an expression of mild distress on his lean features, he came striding forward with eyes front as he passed where Quincannon sat. What was this? Ah, the sudden call of nature, evidently, for he stopped at the door to the men’s lavatory, found it unoccupied, and closed himself inside.
Quincannon’s mouth pinched into a tight smile. This might well be the break he’d been waiting for. He stowed his pipe and pouch, stood, and took up a position near the lavatory door as if waiting his turn to enter. If no one was in the immediate vicinity when Morgan emerged, he would crowd the man back inside and use his superior size and strength in that small space to subdue and disarm him — club him into unconsciousness if such proved necessary.
Waiting, watching the lavatory door, he gripped the handle of the Webley revolver in his coat pocket. A hefty individual in the flashy dress of a traveling drummer came in from the lounge, staggering slightly when couplings clashed and the car lurched as its wheels passed over a rough section of track. Outside the windows, a series of low hills, shadowed by the waning afternoon light, created a barren backdrop for a patchwork of plowed and unplowed fields.
The door to the lavatory remained closed.
A prickly sensation formed between Quincannon’s shoulder blades. How long had Morgan been in there? It had to be more than five minutes now. One of the other occupants left the smoking car; a fat man, his round face adorned with a thicket of muttonchop whiskers, came in. The fat gent paused, glancing around, then turned to the lavatory door and tried the latch. When he found it locked, he rapped on the panel. There was no response.
The prickly sensation grew as hot as a fire-rash. Quincannon prodded the fat man aside, ignoring the indignant oath this brought him, and laid an ear against the panel. All he could hear were train sounds: the pound of beating trucks on the fishplates, the creek and groan of axle play, the whisper of the wheels. He hammered on the panel with his fist, much harder than the fat fellow had. Once, twice, three times. This likewise produced no response.
“Hell and damn!”
The ejaculation brought him the attention of the remaining smokers, and so startled the fat man that he did a quick about-face and went through the connecting door onto the iron-plated vestibule, where he nearly collided with another man just stepping through. The newcomer was the conductor, Bridges, who had evidently heard the hammering and outcry while passing through the lounge car.
“Here, now, what’s all the commotion?”
Quincannon snapped, “A man went into the lavatory some time ago, hasn’t come out. And hasn’t made a sound.”
“Well, perhaps he isn’t feeling well—”
“Use your master key and we’ll soon know.”
“I can’t do that, sir, on your word alone—”
Quincannon took hold of the conductor’s coat sleeve, drew him back into the vestibule out of earshot. He said, low and sharp, “I am a San Francisco detective — Quincannon, John Frederick Quincannon. The man who went into the lavatory is a dangerous fugitive. The only reason I haven’t taken him into custody is concern for the safety of the other passengers.”
The fervency of Quincannon’s words and demeanor brooked no argument, and brought none. “Good Lord!” the conductor said in shocked tones. “What did he do? Who is he?”
“I’ll explain later; there’s no time now.”
“You don’t think he—”
“Open the door, Mr. Bridges, and be quick about it.”
The conductor unlocked the lavatory door. Quincannon pushed in first, his hand on the butt of the Webley revolver — and immediately blistered the air with a five-jointed oath.
The cubicle was empty.
“By all the saints!” Bridges said behind him. “He must have gone through the window and jumped.”
The lone window was small, designed for ventilation, but not too small for a man Morgan’s size to wiggle through. Quincannon, if he’d tried it, would have gotten stuck halfway through. It was shut but not latched; he hoisted the sash, poked his head out. The stinging slipstream made him pull it back in again. A futile effort at any rate, for there had been nothing worth seeing.
“Gone, yes,” he said, “but I’ll eat my hat if he jumped at the rate of speed we’ve been traveling.”
“But... he must have. The only other place he could have gone...”
“Up atop the car. That’s where he did go.”
The conductor didn’t want to believe it. His thinking was plain: if the dangerous fugitive Quincannon was after had leaped out, he was rid of a threat to his passengers’ security. He said, “A climb like that can be almost as lethal as jumping.”
“Not for an agile and desperate man.”
“He couldn’t hide up there. Nor for long on top of any of the cars. There is nowhere for him to hide inside, either — the only possible places are too easily searched. He must know that if he’s familiar with trains.”
Quincannon had nothing to say to that.
Bridges asked, “Do you think he crawled along the roofs, then climbed back down between two other cars?”
“It’s the likeliest explanation.”
“Why would he do such a thing?”
Why? The answer was obvious enough to Quincannon, bitterly so. Morgan must have recognized him on the platform or in the coach, from a description furnished by Walrus Ben, and confirmed the recognition when he was followed into the smoking car. He also must have guessed that J. F. Quinn was a detective employed to investigate the high-grading — the primary reason he’d left Patch Creek so abruptly on Sunday. For all Morgan knew now there were other lawmen on board or waiting at the Capitol Express’s first stop in Vacaville; he couldn’t take the chance of waiting to find out, not with the stolen gold dust in his possession, as it surely was in a belt buckled around his middle. If there had been anything of value in the satchel, he had removed whatever it was before chucking the bag through the window and climbing out.