Walker of the Secret ServicePost, Melville Davisson
General
Walker of the Secret Service
Post, Melville Davisson
Secret service -- Fiction
There was no suspicion of the events that were going forward a few
feet beyond the door and I doubt, even if it had been known, whether
any one would have taken the chance of coming out of the door.
I must have been a formidable, mysterious figure. Although the
youngest, I was the largest of the three men, and with the pistol in
my hand and the “spook cap,” as Mooney called it, it would have
taken courage to have advanced against me.
It was the plan that when Mooney had finished with his work and had
the loot in the sack ready to go he would pull the emergency air
brake. This would stop the train instantly and we should all get off
on the fireman’s side of the train. He had explained to us in his
lecture behind the water tank that train officials always look on
the engineer’s side when any trouble arises.
I do not know how it happened, but for some reason Mooney directed
White to make this signal and by mistake he pulled the wrong cord.
That warned the engineer.
I felt the automatic air begin to clamp the brake shoes. The
engineer blew four long sharp blasts to call the conductor forward.
The conductor with the flagman at his heels started on the run. They
had been sitting in the car before me, all the time under my eyes.
Now they plunged through the door on to the platform.
I shouted at them as they advanced.
“Go back or I’ll shoot you to death.”
In my excitement I roared the words. They stopped suddenly like men
who had come up against an invisible wall, dropped back through the
door and closed it with a bang.
I heard Mooney call to me as he jumped down. I jumped with him.
By this time the train had stopped. The engineer was still blowing.
The conductor had run to the rear of the train, it seems, when I had
driven him back, and got a rifle, and was on the ground when I got
off. He was shooting at Mooney and White as they disappeared through
the bushes. He was almost up to me as I stood there on the step
uncertain what to do. Then I remembered the direction Mooney had
given, elevated the muzzle of the automatic and fired it in his
face.
I did not hit him, but I got the result Mooney predicted.
He dropped the gun and fell back with a startled cry. I took the
chance and plunged into the bushes after my companions. But my
assault on his mind did not permanently disable him; he stooped
over, groped for the rifle, got it in his hands, and began firing at
me as I ran. Once he hit a tree so close to me that the splinters
flew in my face, but in a moment I was covered by the wood.
I ran on for some distance and then squatted down behind a tree. But
no one followed. For some time there were confused noises, voices
scarcely audible at the distance; then the train moved on.
It was Mooney’s direction that after the train had passed we should
return to the water tank. “It would be better to go back at once,”
he said. There would be no posse for the train to leave, but later
the authorities would be informed and search would be made for us.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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