The Striker (Isaac Bell 6)

“Denver, Colorado,” said Jim Higgins. “The Western Miners are helping the fellows striking the smelting companies. It’s an opportunity to all pull together. If we can threaten an enormous general strike that spans the continent, that’ll make the owners listen.”

Alongside the rail yard were the trolley barn and last station stop of a branch of the Fairmont & Clarksburg Traction inter-urban railroad. But when they ventured close, they saw coal cops patrolling the platform. They retreated toward the rail yard. Bell and Mary hid in the woods. Jim returned in an hour and pointed out a string of boxcars on a siding. A freight engine was backing up to it.

“The boys said that empty freight is headed back to Pittsburgh. They put a word in with the brakeman. But look out for the yard bulls. Grab that middle car with the open door. Wait ’til she’s rolling and run aboard. Good luck.”

“Did you get a ride?” Mary asked.

“The boys’ll get me out of here, somehow, don’t you worry. Take care, Isaac. Thank you for looking out for her.”

They shook hands. Mary hugged her brother fiercely, and when she wheeled away Bell saw her eyes were bright with tears. Keeping to the shadows, they walked out of the freight yard and along the main line and waited, shivering, in a cold wind blowing off the river. An hour later they heard a locomotive whistle blow the double Ahead signal and then the heavy chug of steam as it pulled the slack out of its train’s couplers and hauled it toward the main line.

Bell and Mary ducked from the blaze of its headlamp and, when the locomotive passed, started running along the railbed.

“Ever hopped a freight before?” he asked her.

“I’m pretending it’s a carousel.”

“Careful you don’t trip on your skirts.”

“I never trip on my skirts. I hem them four inches short.”

“You first. I’m right behind you.”

They scrambled up the rock-ballast embankment of the railbed, ran alongside the moving train, and jumped into the boxcar.

Bell watched behind the train until he was sure the yard bulls had not spotted them. Then he slid the door shut against the cold, which had little effect on the temperature as the freight picked up speed and an icy wind began whistling through cracks in the walls. His ribs were throbbing and he felt suddenly too weary to stand. The train lurched and, the next thing he knew, he was sprawled on the wooden floor, flat on his back, and Mary was speaking to him as if from across a room.

“I saw your face in the headlight. White as a ghost. Is the bullet inside?”

“No, no, no. Only creased me.”

He closed his eyes and heard cloth ripping. She was tearing a petticoat into strips. “Let’s get your coat off,” she said, peeling it and his shirt away from the wound.

Bell heard the clink of a flask being opened and smelled whiskey. “What are you doing?”

“Dressing your wound,” she said. “This will sting, unless you prefer septicemia.”

“Dress away— Ahh!” Bell caught his breath. “You’re right, it does sting, just a mite. Where’d you learn to dress wounds?”

“When the strikebreakers retreat and the thugs are done with their pick handles, there’s nursing to be done.”

It occurred to Isaac Bell that Mary Higgins spoke sentences as if they were written on posters. But he loved the sound of her voice. Here, in the dark, the beat of iron wheels clattering on steel tracks rang like music. He was dead tired and he ached all over, but at this moment he could not think of anywhere else in the world he would rather be than riding the rails with this girl Mary Higgins.

“You’re shivering,” sh

e said. “Are you in shock?”

“Just a little. But I’m cold. Aren’t you?”

“Freezing. I’m concerned that your wound is worse than you think.”

Bell had been shot before — winged once in Wyoming, and rather more seriously in Chicago — and had a very clear concept of the difference between a penetrating wound and a graze. “No,” he assured her, “it’s just the shock of the impact. I had heard that a heavy slug like that will really floor you just passing by. Seems it’s true. But it’s cold in here. Maybe you’re right, maybe it’s shock making me cold. I wish we had blankets to keep warm.”

“Lay close to me,” she said. “We’ll keep each other warm.”

“Good idea,” said Isaac Bell.

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