Breakheart Pass. Alistair MacLean
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never would devise, a safety-valve for his only failing as an officer and a man. Not for him the gradual release of or sublimation for the rapid and rapidly increasing frustration-based anger that simmered just below boiling point and did all sorts of bad things to his blood pressure. In geological terms, he neither vented volcanic gases nor released surplus superheated energy in the form of spouts and geysers: like Krakatoa, he just blew his top, and the results, at least for those in his immediate vicinity, were, more often than not, only a slight degree less devastating.
The Colonel had an audience of eight. A rather apprehensive Governor, Marica, chaplain and doctor stood just outside the main entrance to the Imperial: some little way along the boardwalk O’Brien, Pearce and Deakin were also watching the Colonel in full cry, although it was noticeable that Pearce had an even closer eye for Deakin than he did for the Colonel. The eighth member was the unfortunate Sergeant Bellew. He was rigidly at attention, or as rigid as one can be when seated on a highly restive horse, with his gaze studiously fixed on a point about a couple of light years beyond the Colonel’s left shoulder. The afternoon had turned cold but Bellew was sweating profusely.
‘Everywhere?’ Claremont’s disbelief was total and he made no attempt to hide it. ‘You’ve searched everywhere?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Officers of the United States Cavalry can hardly be a common sight hereabouts. Someone’s bound to have seen them.’
‘No one we talked to, sir. And we talked to everyone we saw.’
‘Impossible, man, impossible!’
‘Yes, sir. I mean, no, sir.’ Bellew abandoned his rapt contemplation of infinity, focused his eyes on the Colonel’s face and said, almost in quiet desperation: ‘We can’t find them, sir.’
The colour of the Colonel’s complexion deepened to a dangerous hue. It required no great feat of the imagination to see that the lava of his fury was about to erupt. Pearce took a couple of hasty steps forward and said: ‘Maybe I can. Colonel. I can pick twenty, thirty men who know every hole and corner in this town - and heaven knows there are not a great number of those. Twenty minutes and we’ll find them, if they’re here to be found.’
‘What the devil do you mean - if?’
‘What I say.’ It was obvious that Pearce was in no placatory mood. ‘I’m offering to be of assistance - and I don’t have to offer. I don’t expect a “thank you”, I don’t even expect an acceptance. A little courtesy would help, though. Yes or no.’
Claremont hesitated, his blood pressure fractionally easing. He’d been brought up short by Pearce’s curt tone and had to remind himself, painfully and almost forcibly, that he was dealing with a civilian, one of that unfortunate majority over whom he had neither control nor authority. Claremont kept his contact with civilians to a basic minimum, with the result that he had almost forgotten how to talk to them. But the root cause of his temporary indecision was the galling and humiliating prospect that those unwashed and undisciplined derelicts of Reese City might succeed where his own beloved troops had failed. When he did reply it cost him a very considerable effort to speak as he did.
‘Very well. Marshal. Please do that. And thank you. Departure time, then, twenty minutes. We’ll wait down at the depot.’
‘I’ll be there. A favour in return. Colonel. Could you detail two or three of your men to escort the prisoner to the train?’
‘An escort?’ Claremont was openly contemptuous. ‘Hardly, I would have thought, a man of violence, Marshal.’
Pearce said mildly: ‘It depends upon what you mean by violence, Colonel. Where the violence involves himself - well, we’ve seen he’s no lover of bar-room brawls. But on his past record he’s quite capable of burning down the Imperial or blowing up your precious troop train the moment my back is turned.’
Leaving Claremont with this cheerful thought, Pearce hurried into the Imperial. Claremont said to Bellew: ‘Call off your men. Take the prisoner down to the train. Have his hands tied behind his back and put him on an eighteen-inch hobble. Our friend here seems to have the habit of disappearing into thin air.’
‘Who do you think you are? God almighty?’ There was a trace, slight though the combination was, of self-righteous anger and quavering defiance in Deakin’s voice. ‘You can’t do this to me. You’re not a lawman. You’re only a soldier.’
‘Only a soldier. Why, you -’ Claremont held himself in check then said with some satisfaction: ‘A twelve-inch hobble. Sergeant Bellew.’
‘That will be a pleasure, sir.’ It was obviously an even greater pleasure for Sergeant Bellew to have his and his Colonel’s displeasure directed against a common antagonist, however innocuous that antagonist might seem, rather than have the Colonel’s wrath directed against him personally. Bellew withdrew a whistle from his tunic, took a deep breath and blew three ear-piercing blasts in rapid succession. Claremont winced, made a gesture that the others should follow him and led the way down towards the depot. After about a hundred yards, Claremont, O’Brien by his side, stopped and looked back. There was issuing forth from the doors of the Imperial what must have been an unprecedented exodus in the annals of Reese City. The motley crew could hardly have been classified under the heading of the halt and the lame and the blind, but they came pretty close to qualifying for it.
Due to the fact that the dilution of their whisky with water would have brought immediate and permanent ostracism to any of the Imperial’s devoted clientele, at least half of those who emerged had the rolling, weaving gait of a windjammer sailor who had spent too long at sea. Two of them limped badly and one, no soberer than the rest, was making remarkably good time on a pair of crutches; he at least had the support that the others lacked. Pearce joined them and issued what appeared to be a series of rapid instructions. O’Brien watched the grey-bearded band disperse in a variety of directions and slowly shook his head from side to side.
He said: ‘If they were on a treasure hunt for a buried bottle of bourbon, I’d have my money on them any day. As it is -’
‘I know, I know,’ Claremont turned dispiritedly and resumed the trek to the depot. Smoke and steam were issuing profusely and Banlon, clearly, had a full head of steam up. The engineer looked out.
‘Any signs, sir?’
‘I’m afraid not, Banlon.’
Banlon hesitated. ‘Still want me to keep a full head of steam up, Colonel?’
‘And why not?’
‘You mean - we’re going to pull out with or without the Captain and the Lieutenant?’
‘That’s precisely what I mean. Fifteen minutes, Banlon. Just fifteen minutes.’
‘But Captain Oakland and Lieutenant Newell -’
‘They’ll just have to catch the next train, won’t they?’
‘But, sir, that might be days -’
‘At the moment, I’m hardly in the mood to worry over the welfare of the Captain and the Lieutenant.’ He turned to the others and gestured towards the steps leading up to the front of the first coach. ‘It’s cold and it’s going to be a damned sight colder. Governor, with your permission, I’d like Major O’Brien stay with me a little. Just until this fellow Deakin is brought along. Nothing against my own men, mind you, none better, but I don’t trust them to cope with a slippery customer like Deakin. But I think the Major can cope admirably - and without exerting himself unduly. Just till Pearce gets back.’
O’Brien smiled and said nothing. Governor Fairchild nodded his agreement, then hastily mounted the steps. Even in the past fifteen minutes the late afternoon had become noticeably colder.
Claremont nodded briefly to O’Brien, then slowly began to walk the length of the train, from time to time slapping his very English swagger-stick - his sole concession to individuality or eccentricity, it all depended upon how one viewed it - against his leather riding boots. Colonel Claremont knew next