Chapter 6

As Lonegan and Andy reached the depot, there was the sound of a train whistle in the distance. The deputy marshal helped Andy dismount and led him around toward the platform. As they went slowly up the steps, Andy spotted his brother and Cowboy chained to the support post. “Where’s Christina?” he called to his brother.

Emil shrugged. “She was here a minute ago,” he replied.

Jacob Baylor was over by the ticket window, the shock at the sight of his son-in-law evident on his face. “My god, Andy! Oh, ah, Christina’s run to the store. She’ll be right back.”

To the south, in the shimmering distance, a long trail of smoke marked the railroad locomotive’s progress. There was another series of plaintive wails from its whistle. A minute later it came into view, rounding the last curve before crossing the Rio Isabella and the straight run up the mild grade into town.

Edwards rode up, an empty water pail in hand. After dismounting, he headed for the well pump next to the horse trough at the front of the depot. Looking toward Andy as he worked the pump, he called, “Your missus’ll be right along, Mister Malik.”

“You best sit here on the bench, Mister Malik,” Lonegan instructed, giving Andy a hand toward the bench against the building, facing the tracks.

“Andy, how are you doing?” Malik asked.

“Better. Mostly my ribs need healin’.”

Just then, Christina came around the corner, a paper-wrapped bundle in her arms. She stopped abruptly at the platform steps. “Oh, Andy, no!” Her hand went to her mouth and tears welled up in her eyes. She started up the steps.

Lonegan held up a hand. “Stay back, Missus Malik. Nothing you can do here except make it worse.”

Andy grinned at her and said, “Just some sore ribs, Darlin’. Mostly I just need a bath.”

Edwards, filling the bucket from the pump, said, “Go over by your father, Missus Malik.”

Christina looked from Lonegan to Malik, then back at Andy, who added, “Best do as he says, Christina.”

She walked off toward the street entrance of the depot, emerging shortly through the door near the ticket window. She again stared at her husband, a kerchief in her hand, held in front of her mouth. Her father came up to her, whispered in her ear, and pressed a piece of paper into her hand. She looked quickly at the paper, then turned to cry into her father’s shoulder. He kept one arm around her while his other hand fished several gold and silver coins from his pocket. He also pressed these into her hand.

At this point, the train’s huffing, hissing engine pulled abreast of the station, surprisingly quiet, for all its size and moving machinery. After its loud whistle for the Jackson Street crossing, it came to a stop several car lengths beyond the platform, with a screeching release of excess steam from the pressure valves near the piston and the clanking of the connecting gear, as slack was gathered between the cars. When it stopped at the depot, the train, a combination of freight cars with two passenger coaches at the end, blocked the Jackson Street grade crossing.

Lonegan stood and grabbed Andy by the elbow. “Let’s get on board, Mister Malik.” Andy struggled to his feet once more, but when he looked back for his wife, she was not to be seen. His father-in-law smiled, nodded and, looking around to see who might be watching, added a wink.

Edwards, with the bucket of water suspended from one hand, approached them and said to Lonegan, “Marshal, might be better if Mister Andy stayed out of the coach, maybe sat on the steps on the back platform, bein’ as how dirty he was kept in the jail.”

“Mister Edwards, you seem to have things in hand, so I’ll leave you to it.”

The train’s consist (pronounced CON-sist In referring to a set of railroad cars forming a complete train), from the front end, included two flat cars, each with a new, large, freight wagon chained to it, three box cars with padlocked and wire-sealed, closed doors, two livestock cars, from which could be herd the shuffling and lowing of cattle, a crew car with a trainman on its bottom step, a baggage and express car, and finally two passenger coaches, which the engineer had spotted at the depot’s platform. Edwards helped Andy toward the rear of the train, then boosted him to sit on the top step. At that point, Edwards took hold of the bucket he was carrying and said, “Mister Malik, this next thing is going to seem peculiar, but it will all make sense in a few minutes.” He then slowly poured the bucket of water over Andy’s head and shoulders, leaving his prisoner blinking and sputtering, while Edwards hurried back to refill the bucket.

Meanwhile, Lonegan had released the other two prisoners from the post and again manacled their hands in front of them. Trombley led the prisoners onto the second passenger coach while Goodson worked with the trainman to get their packs and equipment into the express and baggage car. Lonegan went to the ticket window to arrange for a message to be sent to the livery stable to pick up the horses. He’d been assured that they had a reciprocal agreement with the livery stable in Shepherds Crossing. Rather than sending a telegram, the stationmaster pointed out a boy standing on the street by the corner of the depot and told the Marshal to turn the horses over to him, advising Lonegan that it was the accepted practice. Lonegan did so, giving the boy a generous three-cent tip.

Edwards returned, hurrying with a full bucket, at which Andy looked askance. “Not to worry, this is for later.” Then he squeezed past Andy and set the water-filled pail down on the train car’s rear deck. He stood close behind Andy, still seated on the steps, and laid a steadying hand on his shoulder.

Then, with the conductor’s wave and a final call of, “All aboard,” there were two short blasts on the locomotive’s whistle and, with a clanking of the connecting gear as the train stretched out, it began to huff out of the station. Only Jacob Baylor remained to see it off, giving a short wave and a wry grin to Andy as the end of the train pulled away from the station platform.

A few seconds later a mustachioed man ran up, huffing from the exertion, a six-point tin star on his shirt with “Deputy Sheriff Jackson County” stamped into it. He looked at the departing train, but it was too far along for him to determine who was on the back platform.

He looked over at Jacob Baylor. “Baylor! Is your son-in-law on that train?”

“Yes, Michael, he is. He, his brother, Emil, and Cowboy Tsosie have all been taken into custody by deputy US marshals, something about kidnap and murder.”

“What deputy US marshal?”

“The man in charge said his name was Lonegan, out of Fort Birney.”

“Lonegan, huh? Where they headed now?”

“North.”

The sheriff’s deputy gave the storekeeper a hard look. Baylor said, “What? I’m supposed to know what all the lawmen intend who arrest my daughter’s husband? I know as much now as when you boys arrested him.”

“Where is your daughter, Baylor?”

“She’s gone to stay with relatives. She’ll be back when this business with Andy is cleared up.”

“It’ll clear up once we get our hands on that slippery brother a’ his.”

“Well, good luck with that.”

“Hell with you, Baylor.”

Jacob walked down off the platform while Chief Deputy Michael Williams strode up to the ticket window, where he barked at Joshua Trent, “Send this wire to Jackson Deputy Frank Porter, care of the Shepherds Rest hotel. Write this down: ‘Both Maliks on northbound train today. Take custody. Serve papers. Signed Chief Deputy Williams.’ Charge that to the county.”

The stationmaster looked up at him from his desk inside the window. “Deputy Williams, there’s four marshals on that train. Don’t you think you ought a’ warn Frank that he’ll be walking into a hornet’s nest?”

“What, I’m supposed to tell him to tiptoe in and curtsy? Like hell. He’s got a job to do. Just send the wire. Quit tryin’ to run up the fee.”

About a mile north of Waypoint, the surveying engineers of the Kansas & Arizona Southern Railroad had determined that a shallow “S” curve would avoid the time and expense of cutting through and bracing the cut banks through two low hills. When the northbound train moved around the first part of the reverse radius curve, it passed out of sight of the depot and Waypoint proper.

Christina, who’d been watching the town recede through the window in the rear door of the last car, chose this moment to emerge onto the car’s rear platform with the paper-wrapped bundle still in hand. As she stepped out, Edwards tapped Andy on his shoulder. Andy turned his head to see what Edwards wanted and spotted his wife on the platform. A broad smile crossed his face, to be immediately replaced with a grimace as he tried to rise and the pain in his side was renewed. Christina went through the same sequence of facial expressions as her joy at being reunited with Andy was replaced by her distress at his pain.

Edwards again took charge. “Mister Malik, your Missus is gonna help you finish the bath that I started with that water I dumped on you. She’s brought some new clothes for you, too.” He was speaking loud enough for both to hear. “To help you stand up, I’m gonna reach down and grab your britches on both sides and lift. You grab hold the handrails and help as much as you can. Tell me when you’re ready.”

Andy said, “Let’s do it,” and leaned out a bit to get his feet under him. With a grimace and gritted teeth, he rose to a standing position on the lower step as Edwards used his grip on the waistband of his dungarees to pull him up, keeping the lifting force below Andy’s ribs.

Edwards said, “First turn around, then the same plan to go up the steps. You call it.”

Within a short time Andy had been maneuvered to stand on the rear platform and hold on to the back rail, but not before a quick kiss with Christina. Using the water in the bucket and some of the items in her package—a bar of strong lye soap, a soft scrub brush, several flannel rags, and a couple cotton towels—she and Edwards managed to get Andy within whistling distance of clean. Then he was dressed in new clothing from the skin out, courtesy of the dry-goods stocked in her father’s store. His filthy clothing left a damning trail between the rails as the train swayed its way north out of Jackson County.

The deputy marshals and their prisoners were the only passengers in the rear car; Lonegan had requested that the others be moved to the first car for their own safety. Fergus Healy, the train’s conductor, though perplexed by these developments, complied without protest.

Lonegan had been concentrating on some papers in his lap, then scribbling on a form with a pencil, both of which had been provided by the conductor. Edwards, meanwhile, had assisted Andy to a seat at the rear of the car where he and Christina had remained sequestered, heads in close proximity, for several long minutes. That scene was interrupted, though, when Lonegan rose and said, “Gents, let’s palaver,” then led the way to the rear of the car.

The last two seats on either side of the aisle faced one another, two of the seats facing backward to the forward motion of the train. The deputies gathered on one side of the aisle, Christina and the now-unshackled prisoners on the other. Malik and Andy sat on the aisle seats opposite Lonegan and Trombley.

“I’ve coded a telegram to send to Judge Westcott when we stop at Texas Bend. The conductor says they have to switch some freight, so it’ll be a half hour or so. You men,” he nodded toward Malik’s group, “will have to stay aboard and not show yourselves without the cuffs.”

Malik asked, “When you say you ‘coded’ a message...?”

“Yeah. There’s a federal code book, but we have our own that we use. One of the courtroom bailiffs had been in the telegraphy department of the army. He worked out some code phrases for us to use when we had messages we wanted to keep confidential when telegraphin’ Fort Birney. They change around, depending on the date. They’re mostly silly stuff like, ‘Chicken with vegetables, oven hot.’ Trust me, I get the squinty eyeball a’plenty from telegraphy clerks.

“With any luck, I’ll get a reply before we leave Texas Bend, but more likely I’ll get one at Shepherds Crossing.

“My plan, for right now, is to lock you three up in the Franklin County jail, until some better situation arises, either with your appeal to the state court, or on instructions from Marshal Nolan or Judge Westcott. We’ll keep one of us at the jail all the time to watch over things. You’ll be allowed no visitors—sorry, Missus Malik—so that we can keep that Jackson County deputy at bay. The only visitor we’ll permit will be the state court clerk.”

Malik said, “I’ll need a nib pen or a quill, some ink, and a few sheets of blank folio paper ... oh, and a decent writing surface. The writing supplies can be had at the mercantile at the Crossing. We have an account there. Christina can collect them, if you would,” he said as he turned her way. “Perhaps we can borrow the sheriff’s blotter from his desk. I can use a bunk, then, to write on. I may need a volume or two from the state clerk’s library. Probably will, come to think of it. Will all that be manageable?”

“Don’t see why not, except if the sheriff or the court clerk won’t cooperate.”

Edwards said, “Likely they will, I think. They’re both reasonable men with no regard for the tomfoolery that Jackson County’s been gettin’ into.”

“Then, for now, that’s the plan.”

Jacob Baylor sidled up to the ticket counter inside the Waypoint depot. No one, except the stationmaster, was in the building, as Jacob had waited to be sure.

“Joshua?”

“Mister Baylor?”

“Joshua, it’s Jacob. You know that.”

“K and ASR rules, Mister Baylor. Can’t be helped.”

“Ah, well. But tell me ... uh, that train gonna stop in Texas Bend?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There’s a telegraph office in Texas Bend, right?”

“Yes ... sir.”

“Could I, uh...”

“Mister Baylor, you want to send a message to someone on that train?”

“Why, yes, Joshua, I think I might. Or do the K and ASR rules require I call you ‘Mister Trent’?”

The stationmaster glanced around the empty waiting room and leaned closer to the counter. “What are you up to, Jacob?” he asked, in hushed tones.

“Well, Joshua, I, uh, lingered at the well pump outside that window over there. You know, to wet my face, take a cool drink. Couldn’t help but overhear Michael’s message to Frank, up there at the Crossin’.”

“I can’t talk to you about telegraph messages, Jacob. That’s all confidential, save for a state or federal court order.”

“Not asking you to. But my message would likewise be confidential, save for a state or federal court order?”

“Yes, of course.”

“And if I send a message to that train, the telegrapher in Texas Bend will see that it’s delivered when the train stops?”

“Even if it didn’t stop. The stationmaster can pass messages and train orders on the fly. But that train will be at the Texas Bend station for a half hour or more, as they have to do some switchin’.”

“Then I want to send a message to Deputy US Marshal Lonegan on that train at Texas Bend.”

The stationmaster bent to his desk, “What message, Mister Baylor?”

“Send this. ‘Jackson deputy at Shepherds Crossing ordered to take custody of your prisoners and serve papers.’ Sign my name, please, Joshua.”

He wrote for a few seconds. “Let me save you some money, Mister Baylor. I’ll send this message,” and he moved the page for Baylor to see as Trent read aloud,

Jackson Deputy at Shepcross ordered take prisoners serve papers. JBaylor’

“Will that suit you?”

“Yes, thanks, Joshua. How much?”

“Ten words or less, one dollar, Mister Baylor.”