An American Bullet Read online

  She stiffens. “Let me see your badge again.”

  Whicher thinks about it—doesn't respond.

  Her eyes widen. “Who told you to come here?”

  He hutches his shoulders against the cold.

  She looks to the saloon, to where the sheriff's deputy is still standing beneath the porch roof.

  “Y’all were riding the train?” Whicher says.

  She doesn't answer.

  “Where were you traveling? Was Marshal Corrigan with you when the train collided with the car?”

  She nods, brushes a strand of hair from her mouth.

  “Right with you? Sitting with you?”

  “The brakes went on suddenly,” she says. “It was obvious something was wrong—very wrong. There was noise, lots of noise, screeching, the train was shaking. Then a bang, a horrible bang. We stopped. He told me to stay where I was. He said he was going to check on what had happened. That's the last I saw him.”

  The marshal looks into her face.

  “We started to reverse,” she says. Her eyes are hooded, deep in thought. “They told us we had to get off, I haven't seen him since he left his seat.”

  Whicher glances down the slope to the track. “And this all is how long?”

  She lifts her arm, pushes back the cuff of her heavy coat. “Almost an hour.”

  Whicher thinks of his department boss, Evans, calling on the interstate. Corrigan must have called it in—there was no other way USMS could have known so fast.

  He stares at the double-height passenger train. “I have to go speak with somebody.” He points at the saloon building. “Go on back, wait with the deputy.”

  For a moment she looks about to argue. Something in her face changes, she turns, walks away to the saloon.

  Whicher pulls out his cell, keys a number, clamps the cell against his ear.

  Nothing.

  He checks the screen, the network’s down at barely one bar.

  Lauren DeLuca enters the saloon building.

  The deputy turns, grins as she passes.

  At the train, Sheriff Dubois is walking with two men dressed in Amtrak blue. Whicher steps down the slope, hustling toward them. He raises a hand.

  The sheriff spots him. “Did you find her?”

  “I found her.”

  “See what I mean?”

  The marshal doesn’t answer.

  He takes out his badge, shows it to the two crewmen, the metal cold against his exposed skin. “Like to speak with y’all.”

  Snow is thick on the shoulders of their coats. “We’re having a bad night already,” the elder man says.

  “I ain’t looking to aggravate it. But you want to run me through what happened?”

  “My name's Ross,” the man says. “The train's in my charge.” He indicates the crewman beside him. “This here’s Mister Tanner, the engineer.”

  Whicher feels the cold already seeping through his leather boots. “You were driving?”

  Tanner nods.

  “I have to get to my unit,” Sheriff Dubois says. “I need the radio.” She strides off down the side of a passenger car.

  “Sheriff said somebody left a station wagon parked up on the rail line, that right?”

  Tanner shoves his hands down into his pockets. “We came into Fisherville below the limit for the track. The horn was sounding, everything was done right...”

  “I only want to know what happened.”

  The engineer gives a shake of his head. “It was damn near dark already, the snow was bad. We saw a car. I put the train into full emergency, that’s the fastest way I can get it stopped.”

  “There’s no chance we could’ve avoided hitting it,” the conductor says. “We can't steer around.”

  “I hit the button, called dispatch,” Tanner says. “We reported the collision immediately.”

  “Dispatch put out the call to roll an ambulance,” the conductor says. “They had our position, the time...”

  Whicher looks up the line toward the front of the train.

  “I got out,” the conductor says, “the station wagon was spun around on its front axle, the rear all smashed to hell. I had a flashlight, I could see nobody was inside. I checked, just in case it was something weird. There was no sign of a body thrown clear.”

  Whicher nods.

  “We checked the train,” Tanner says, “checked the engine for fuel leaks, for fire. The passenger cars were alright, there was no sign of derailment...”

  “We backed up into Fisherville,” Ross says. “Tried to keep spectators away.”

  The marshal lifts the Resistol hat off his head, knocks snow from the brim and crown.

  “Five minutes later the sheriff's department was here,” Tanner says.

  Whicher runs a hand through his head of fine brown hair. “One last question. Do y'all have a Marshal Corrigan on board?”

  “Sheriff Dubois asked us that already,” the conductor says. “We weren’t notified of any law enforcement personnel traveling. I checked the passenger list, a hundred-twenty-plus people. No Corrigan.”

  “Y’all sure?” Whicher blows the air from his cheeks. “Have y'all done a head count?”

  The conductor stares through the dark, eyes hunted. “There's an issue with that...”

  Whicher replaces his hat, pulls the brim forward.

  “Three people got off at Raton,” the conductor says, “the last stop. Two tickets were bought for cash at the automated vending machine in Raton—according to our system. We can’t be a hundred percent sure two people actually boarded there. The door attendant thinks it was only one.”

  “You’re a man down?” Whicher says.

  “We may or may not be. Anybody can buy a ticket,” the conductor says, “it doesn't mean they have to get on board. It's not like an aircraft, people get on and off all the time. But based on tickets sold against a straight head-count—we could be one person light.”

  Whicher pushes up the slope toward the old saloon, boots slipping in the fresh fall of snow. Moving fast, he tries to work some heat into his body. At the door, the deputy exchanges glances with him.

  Inside, in the bar room, the marshal scans the folks seated. He turns on his heel, walks back outside. “That blonde lady in the long coat? She walk out of here?”

  “No, marshal.”

  “She didn't leave the building?”

  The deputy looks at him. “She’s not in there?”

  The marshal re-enters the saloon, walks the length of the counter, all the way to the back of the room.

  An older couple is seated at a table. He turns to them. “You folks see a lady come in here wearing a long coat? Long coat with a fur-lined hood?”

  “She stepped out in back,” the man replies.

  “We thought she might be looking for a restroom...” the woman says.

  The man raises an arm, points to a doorway right at the end.

  Whicher strides to it, walks through, tries the light switch. It’s not working.

  He steps into a pitch-dark corridor. “Anybody back here?”

  He works his way along the black space, arm out, feeling his way. A void opens into another room, he enters, sees light from a single, dirt-smeared window. He can just make out piles of boxes—shapes, broken furniture, general garbage. At one side of the room is another door. He steps to it, grabs the handle. It opens.

  Outside, in the snow on the ground he sees footprints.

  Wide-spaced.

  Somebody's run.

  The tracks in the white-over ground lead along the back of an adjacent house. A wood-panel fence marks the edge of the property, the marshal follows down a gap between the fence and the forest’s edge.

  Back out on the frontage road, one set of footprints blurs into another, half the train passengers have walked the area. The marshal scans left to right—searching for anything that sticks out.

  At the rear-end of the train, the rail line disappears into the Raton Pass. He stands, stares into the black sky, snow flurries
swirling.

  No way she was headed up there—up in the high mountains, on foot. She was supposed to wait in the saloon with the deputy. But she’d run. She’d run out the back.

  He sets off at a jog, runs the full length of the stationary train. In the pulsing lights from ER vehicles, he can see about a quarter of a mile.

  Nobody notices.

  A thought hits him—if she's run, nobody will notice her either.

  Trees and a rocky-sided pass hide the road out of Fisherville—beyond it, the interstate is miles away. But where else could she go?

  His eye comes to rest on his Silverado.

  He runs down to his truck, drags snow off the windshield with the arm of his coat. He gets in, fires the motor. Switches on the headlights, stares at the radio transmitter on the dash.

  A woman asks to be arrested. Next minute, she runs.

  He moves the shifter from park into drive, swings around onto the road.

  Passing the city-limit sign, he throws his hat on the empty passenger seat.

  The wipers fight snow, headlights drilling out into the night.

  He keeps his speed low, feels the steering light, the tires losing traction.

  No other vehicle is headed out of Fisherville—the road's white over, no wheel tracks—nothing’s recently left.

  In the edge of the headlight beam, a shape moves—he takes his foot off the gas.

  Something is at the side of the road.

  Then gone again.

  Whicher stares out into the dark.

  A hooded figure.

  The truck lights pick out a face—turning to look back toward him.

  He’s sees a flash of blonde hair.

  Pressing down on the gas, he accelerates in the truck.

  He draws level.

  The figure turns to look at him—it’s her, she looks in through the window—shocked, now, at the sight of him.

  He stops. Pushes open the passenger door. “Ma’am? What the hell are you doing?”

  She spins away, lunging through the deep snow, headed for the woods.

  The marshal stares after her. He grabs a flashlight, snaps it on, pulls the keys from the ignition.

  Running around back of the Silverado, he’s already struggling to see.

  Pushing into the tree line, the ground is harder, the air scented. “Ma'am,” he calls out. “I'm a law officer. Ma'am you need to stop...”

  Sweeping back and forth with the flashlight, he sees nothing, just the narrow beam glaring from the trunks of pines, then vanishing into black.

  Something moves to his right, he turns the light in its direction, sees the back of her coat.

  She's running, twisting, turning.

  He sprints after her, light beam bouncing, the air cold, dead-feeling against his skin.

  Running flat out, he feels his lungs begin to burn. “Stay where you are...”

  She glances back for just a moment—leaps sideways.

  Whicher tears by a deadfall of branches, sees her scramble for an incline through the dense-packed trees.

  Reaching into his coat, he pulls a Ruger revolver from his shoulder-holster.

  His foot hits a root, he trips, rolls, comes up again, onto his knees.

  She's blocked now, blocked in—trapped by a bank of sheer rock.

  She turns.

  “Please...” her voice catches in her throat.

  Whicher kneels in the cold earth, lungs heaving, gun arm outstretched.

  She fights for breath; “Don’t kill me. Please don't kill me...”

  Chapter Four

  The lumber yard office is cramped and cluttered—Whicher leans against a paint-chipped radiator at the window.

  The woman in the fur-lined coat stares at a spot on the floor.

  Outside, in the warehouse, a sheriff's deputy stands guard.

  “My name is Lauren DeLuca,” the woman says. “I was traveling on the train with a Marshal Dale Corrigan.” She sits forward in the office chair. “I'm in the witness protection program. I'm traveling to attend a trial.”

  “Marshal Corrigan is your escort?”

  She shifts her weight. Nods. “He’s supposed to get me there, to Chicago.”

  “Why’d you run out?”

  She doesn’t reply.

  The marshal lets out a breath. Two hours back he was on the interstate, thinking only of the long drive home to Texas. Warm in the cab of the Silverado. “You have no idea where Marshal Corrigan is at now?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Why did you run?”

  She wraps her arms about her sides.

  The marshal eyes her.

  She looks up. “I'm afraid for my life. The train hit that car,” she says. “Corrigan got off. I don't know what's happened, since then.”

  “I need to make a call,” Whicher says.

  No reaction.

  “I need you to step outside.”

  Her face blanches.

  “There’s a deputy out there,” Whicher says, “assigned by Sheriff Dubois. I want you to step outside and stand right with him, while I make a call. You need protecting any, he'll protect you.”

  Her eyes drill him.

  He looks toward the phone on the desk. “I make the call, you can step right back in here.”

  She rises from her seat.

  Whicher opens the office door, stares out into the warehouse—it’s dark, piled with cut planks and beams.

  A diesel space-heater drones by the back wall. Beside it, a bearded deputy warms his hands.

  The marshal fixes the man with a look. “The woman in here with me is stepping on out,” he says. “I got to make a call. But she stays right by your side.”

  The deputy nods, taps at a pair of cuffs clipped to his duty belt.

  “You don’t need to cuff her.” Whicher steps aside, unblocking the door.

  Lauren DeLuca walks out of the office, takes the few paces to the deputy.

  Whicher shuts the door, picks the phone off the desk.

  He punches in a number for US Marshals Service, Abilene. Stares out of the window at the falling snow.

  The call picks up.

  “Evans.”

  “Sir, this is Whicher. I’m in Fisherville.”

  “With Corrigan?”

  “No sir, we’ve got some kind of a problem out here. I got to Fisherville forty, fifty minutes back, I found the train. There's a sheriff in charge of the first response—Sheriff Dubois. I asked her did she have a Marshal Corrigan present, she told me no. But she said a woman was asking after him.”

  “Have you seen the woman?”

  “She's right outside the door. With a sheriff's deputy.”

  “Corrigan called,” Evans says, “straight after the train collision.”

  “There’s a hundred-odd passengers here,” Whicher says, “plus the sheriff’s department, plus fire and ambulance crews. But no sign of him. Sir, if he’s here, I can’t find him. Which office is he out of?”

  “Albuquerque.”

  Whicher thinks it over. “This train hit a car abandoned on the track. The woman, Miss DeLuca, says he left his seat to check out what happened when it hit. She hasn’t seen him since.”

  “Lauren DeLuca is in the witness security program,” Evans says, his voice tight. “She tell you that?”

  “Yes sir. She did.”

  “She's a federal witness in a major trial.”

  Whicher nods at his own reflection in the window glass.

  “She’s traveling to Chicago,” Evans says, “she’s a key witness, the trial’s due to start.”

  “What kind of a case?”

  “Organized crime.”

  “Mob crime?”

  “Corrigan is her close security officer. She's considered at high risk of attack. You need to find Corrigan and keep the witness safe.”

  “The train conductor says there's no record of him being on the train...”

  “That's standard security, there won't be.”

  Whicher reaches for
the door, pulls it open, covering the phone with one hand. “Miss DeLuca—step back in here, please...”

  “Look for Corrigan again,” Evans says, “I'll call back in five minutes...”

  “Use this number, sir,” Whicher says, “there’s no cell reception here.”

  “Five minutes,” Evans says. “You be by that phone.”

  Out at the grade crossing, a fire truck shines working lights at the point of collision with the car. A tow-truck winches the wrecked Buick clear. In the spill of light at the side of the track, Whicher sees the handful of people watching.

  He recognizes Tanner and Ross, the engineer and conductor stepping forward to look at the rails.

  Sheriff Dubois is at the edge of the group. Whicher peers into the pine woods lining the track beyond the road.

  The sheriff strides a few yards from the track side into the snow. She nestles her chin into the collar of the duck down ski-jacket. “Don't tell me your date ran out again?”

  The marshal looks back down to Fisherville, to the yellow square of light in the dark—the office window of the lumber business. “Your deputy has her down at the wood yard.”

  “You figure out what's going on?”

  “I can’t find hide nor hair of Corrigan,” Whicher says. “But the woman's in the witness security program.”

  The sheriff makes an 'o' shape with her mouth.

  “Corrigan’s supposed to be security, the woman's in transit.”

  “I put the word out,” the sheriff says, “but none of my people here have seen him. If he presents himself to anybody, they’ll whistle.”

  Whicher looks off into the snow-laden trees. “Anybody searched them woods?”

  Sheriff Dubois glances over her shoulder.

  “Somebody dumped that Buick,” Whicher says. “They had to go someplace.”

  “Those woods go on for miles. I've had a couple units take a look up the road,” the sheriff says. “Just to make sure it's not some kid—some meth-head getting his rocks off derailing a train.”

  “No sign?”

  The sheriff shakes her head. “Whoever it was, they most likely dumped the car then went back down to Fisherville. Nobody would've seen them, it was dark already, everybody’s keeping inside.”

  “How about if they’re out there?”

  “To search those woods, I need to keep everybody here for hours, freezing. You think your Marshal Corrigan is out there?” the sheriff says. “I'll lend you my flashlight.”