Breakheart Pass

Almost buried in the depths of the armchair and reading a book through a pair of steel-rimmed and steel-legged glasses was a man who could only, in all fairness to the ancient cliche, be described as a grizzled veteran. He had a four-day growth of white beard on his face; his hair, if hair he had, was invisible beneath what looked like a Dutch bargee’s peaked hat, pulled low over the ears, no doubt to keep out the cold. He was cocooned in considerable but indeterminate layers of clothing, the whole topped off with an Eskimo-type anorak made from equally indeterminate furs. To defeat the ill intent of even the most cunning of draughts, a heavy Navajo blanket stretched from his waist to his ankles.

As Claremont entered, the brakeman stirred, courteously removed his glasses and peered at Claremont with pale blue watery eyes. He blinked in surprise, then said: ‘This is indeed an honour, Colonel Claremont.’ Although over sixty years had passed since the brakeman had made his one and only crossing of the Atlantic, his Irish brogue was still so pronounced that he could have left his native Connemara only the previous day. He struggled to rise - no easy task from the position into which he had wedged himself - but Claremont waved him to sit down. The brake-man complied willingly and cast a meaningful glance towards the opened door.

Claremont made haste to close it and said: ‘Devlin, isn’t it?’

‘Seamus Devlin at your service, sir.’ ‘Bit of a lonely life you lead here, isn’t it?’ ‘It all depends upon what you mean by lonely, sir. Sure, I’m alone but I’m never lonely.’ He closed the book he had been reading and clasped it tight in both hands. ‘If you want a lonely job, Colonel, it’s up there in the driver’s cab. Sure, you’ve got your fireman, but you can’t talk to him, not with all that racket up front there. And when it’s raining or snowing or sleeting you’ve got to keep looking out to see where you’re going, so that you’re either frying or freezing. I should know, I spent forty-five years on the footplate but I got a bit past it a few years ago.’ He looked around him with some pride. ‘Reckon I’ve got the best job in the Union Pacific here. My own stove, my own food, my own bed, my own armchair -’

‘I was going to ask you about that,’ Claremont said curiously. ‘Hardly Union Pacific standard issue, I should have thought.’

‘I must have picked it up somewhere,’ Devlin said vaguely.

‘Many more years to retirement?’

Devlin smiled, almost conspiratorially. ‘The Colonel is very - what do you say? - diplomatic. Yes, that’s right, diplomatic. Well, sir, you’re right, I’m afraid I’m a mite old for the job but I kind of lost my birth certificate years ago and that made things a bit difficult for the Union Pacific. This is my last trip, Colonel. When I get back east, it’s my grand-daughter’s home and the old fireside for me.’

‘May heaven rain cordwood upon you,’ Claremont murmured.

‘Eh? I mean, I beg the Colonel’s pardon.’

‘Nothing. Tell me, Devlin, how do you pass the time here?’

‘Well, I cook and eat and sleep and -’

‘Yes, now. How about sleep? If you’re asleep and a bad corner or a steep descent comes up what -’

‘No trouble, sir. Chris - that’s Banlon the engineer - and I have what they call these days communication. Just a wire inside a tube, but it works. Chris gives half a dozen pulls, the bell rings in here and I give one pull back to show that I’m in the land of the living, like. Then he gives one, two, three or four pulls, all depends how much pressure he wants me to put on the wheel. Never failed yet, sir.’

‘But you can’t spend all your time just eating and sleeping?’

‘I read, sir. I read a lot. Hours every day.’

Claremont looked around. ‘You’ve got your library pretty well hidden.’

‘I haven’t got a library. Colonel. Just this one book. It’s all I ever read.’ He turned the book he held in his hand and showed it to Claremont: it was an ancient and sadly battered family Bible.

‘I see.’ Colonel Claremont, a strictly non-churchgoer whose closest brushes with religion came in his not infrequent conducting of burial services, felt and looked slightly uncomfortable. ‘Well, Devlin, let’s hope for a safe trip to Fort Humboldt and a safe last passage back east for you.’

‘Thank you, sir. Much obliged, I’m sure.’ Devlin had resumed his steel spectacles and had the Bible opened even before the Colonel had the brake van door closed behind him.

Claremont walked briskly towards the front of the train. Bellew and half a dozen of his men were busy dismantling the horse wagon ramps. Claremont said: ‘Livestock and men. All accounted for?’

‘Indeed, sir.’

‘Five minutes?’

‘Easily, Colonel.’

Claremont nodded and continued on his way. Pearce appeared round the corner of the depot building and hurried towards him. Pearce said: ‘I know you’ll never do it. Colonel, but you really do owe Bellew and his men an apology.’

‘No signs of them? None at all?’

‘Wherever they are, they’re not in Reese City. My life on it.’

Claremont’s first reaction, oddly enough, had been one almost of relief - relief that Pearce and his derelict posse had not succeeded where his own men had failed. But now the full implication of their apparent desertion or unforgivably delayed absence returned with renewed force and he said without unclenching his teeth: ‘I’ll have them court-martialled and dismissed the service for this.’

Pearce looked at him speculatively and said: ‘I never met them, of course. Like that, were they?’

‘No, dammit, they weren’t.’ Claremont slashed viciously at the side of his riding boot and barely repressed his wince of pain. ‘Oakland and Newell were two of the finest officers I’ve ever had serve under me. But no exceptions, no exceptions. Fine officers, all the same, fine officers - Come on, Marshal. Time we were gone.’

Pearce boarded the train. Claremont looked back to check that the horse wagon doors were closed, then turned and raised his hand. Banlon gave an acknowledging wave from his cab, moved inside and opened the steam regulator. The driving wheels slipped once, twice, three times; then they began to bite.

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