Dreadnought (The Clockwork Century 2)

“Yes sir. It’ll just take us a minute. ”

“Then do it, and do it now. I’m going to make my way up front. I need to have a talk with the captain,” he said, his mouth set in a grim, angry line.

The two porters shifted, begged pardons, and climbed past Mercy and the ranger, who all but crawled their way to the forward doors. Mercy was behind him, and she grabbed his foot in order to seize his attention. “Korman, that captain isn’t going to let you anywhere near that car up front. ”

“Is that where they’re holed up? Not in the first sleeper?”

“Yes,” she said quickly, still holding on to the instep of his boot. “There’s no one in the first passenger car at all, I don’t think. But they’ll never let you inside their little fort. Hell, I only got inside because the captain got himself hurt. ”

He reached up for the door latch, gripped it, and looked back down at her. “They let you see it? What’s inside?”

“What do you care? You’ve said so yourself, and more than once, how you don’t care what goes on right now between the blues and the grays. ”

“I said it, and I meant it, and I pretty much mean it still,” he said. “But this does change things. ”

“How?”

He turned the latch, and the door cracked open to allow a stream of blistering cold to billow through. It ruffled his mustache and rattled his hat, and he raised his voice so he could be heard over it. “Because until you said that, I was going to tell you to stay here. But now I think you’d better come with me. I need someone they’re less likely to shoot. ”

“Goddammit, Mr. Korman. ”

“You said it, ma’am,” he said, and shoved the door open far enough to rise to a stooped standing position. He dived for the next door and opened it, and Mercy was right behind him, swearing all the way.

Once more, back along the winnowing length of the passenger cars, Mercy’s aching back and bent-?up legs carried her slowly through the tubes filled with luggage and frightened people. Finally they reached the first passenger car, which was still abandoned, though a few bullet holes in the windows gave the atmosphere a whistling howl that sounded like the singing of the dead.

Horatio Korman pulled himself into a sleeper compartment and drew Mercy along behind him. He said, “I don’t want any surprises in there. You tell me what they’ve got going on, up in that next car. What are they protecting?”

“Do you really think Cyrus Berry was a spy?” she asked, as if she hadn’t heard him.

“Yes, but I don’t think it’s what got him killed. I think Purdue believed the boy knew what was back there, and he didn’t want anyone else to get wind of it. Now, tell me, what’s going on up front?”

She pointed a finger at his nose and said, “I’m trusting you on this. ”

“You’re a damn fool. For all you know, I could’ve shot Berry myself. ”

“But if you had,” she said, speaking above the wind and leaning forward, “the doctor or the porter would’ve said something, and they didn’t. ” She looked him in the eyes one more time and then said, “It’s gold! Gold! They’re moving gold, tons of it. ”

“Whatever the hell for?” he asked. “Surely they aren’t shoring up against a Rebel victory?”

“I don’t know why!” she insisted. As she leaned back in the seat, she heard a crumple of paper coming from her apron. She fiddled it out of the place where it’d been riding for half an hour now.

“What’s that?”

“I don’t know, I found it in that car,” she said. “I can’t hardly read it, though. Do you have a light?”

He said, “Hang on,” and opened up his coat to reveal a vest with many pockets and a holster with a large, shiny six-?shooter in it.

She said, “I thought the porter said they’d took your guns. ”

“Malverne Purdue is an idiot,” he said flatly. “He took the two I had out in front, but he didn’t search me. He may be some kind of brilliant scientist, but he doesn’t know a thing about self-?preservation. ”

Mercy said, “I don’t know,” for what felt like the hundredth time that day. Then she said, “He shot Cyrus Berry. That must count for something. ”

“No,” said the ranger. “Because he wasn’t protecting himself. He was protecting whatever’s in that back car. And whatever’s there, he thinks it’s worth dying or killing over, and shoots like a man who believes that the law is on his side. ”

“Oh, he does, does he?”

“I know it when I see it. ” Out from a side vest pocket, he retrieved a device the size of his palm. It was shaped like a cucumber, one half made of metal, the other made out of glass. He pressed a button and the glass end glowed red.