“What?”
“Sam, it’s them.”
His tone puzzled me. An instant later, as something hard jammed into my back, spurring terrible memories of Le Caron behind me in the Newark station, I realized with sickening clarity who he meant. All my body systems seemed to hit the brakes.
“Move on up there,” a voice growled in my ear.
We were prodded toward a poker table in the far corner of the room, where McDermott and Le Caron sat holding cards, eyes fixed on us. With them were four others, two I didn’t recognize, and two I did: Jackson and Colbourn, the taciturn pair from our car.
“Attend to you in a wee bit, Mr. Fowler,” said McDermott nonchalantly, as if I were his early-arriving client. To the one behind us he said, “Any shenanigans, kill the big boyo first, then the nigger.”
Le Caron’s jet eyes stared into mine. He smiled dreamily, as if all his fondest hopes had come true. I cursed my stupidity. Why hadn’t I guessed that this would be the interception point? The only place between Omaha and Sacramento where everybody had to detrain.
The gun nudged my back, almost probing, in that same place. Something very strange began to happen to me. I thought I smelled earth and wet leaves, and my vision grew milky.
It couldn’t have lasted more than a second or two, but while the images and sensations took over me, time stretched into an infinity. It’s impossible to describe accurately, but at exactly the place where the gun was prodding me I seemed to feel my skin explode, the flesh ripping—but outward, as if a projectile were exiting, not entering—and then a bright tracer shone through my chest like a laser beam, impaling me, and I hurtled backward, arm flung high in a tunnel of light formed by walls of encircling greenery; for an instant before my body blended with the loam I glimpsed leaves and birds and a terrified face, a face I recognized though it was grimy and younger, the glass-blue eyes crazy above a smoking pistol. . . .
It’s fairly unsettling to learn that your body seems to remember its own death and that your brain holds a picture of your killer. And now I was to die again. The gambling room was washed in milky half-light. Roaring filled my ears. I must have slumped, for the gun jabbed me abruptly—but in a different place. The pain presented a focus, helped bring me back.
“Some sort of trouble here?” The pale man was talking. Jackson. I squinted. He sat two places left of McDermott, across from Le Caron. On his right was the older one, Colbourn.
“No trouble.” McDermott sounded expansive, jovial. “Not now.”
Maybe I could yell. Scream they were going to kill us. Hope Jackson would do something. But although I was tracking better, speech seemed beyond my capacity. I realized that Jackson was studying me quizzically. He glanced away and with a lazy movement pulled his coat back to reveal the handles of his pistols. It was a gesture few in the room could have missed.
“A gun out in the open turns me skittish,” he said softly.
“Play out the hand,” McDermott said. “Then we’ll be about our business.” He nodded to Le Caron, who was dealing.
Speech returned to me suddenly. “Why’d he kill Colm?” The words erupted harshly.
McDermott stared in surprise, then grinned. “Who?” he said. “Me?”
“O’Donovan,” I said. “Just like he sent you. But why’d he shoot Colm?”
“Oh, ‘shoot’ is it, now? You know that, too?”
“We playin’ cards here or not?” Colbourn demanded.
McDermott waved a peremptory hand. Colbourn’s scowl deepened.
“To your queries I’ll say aye and leave you the why,” McDermott said, laughing at his rhyme. “You’ll have ample time to ponder it.” His voice hardened. “Shoot the bastard if he opens his mouth again.”
Jackson was studying him curiously. Colbourn still looked pissed. If only I could figure a way to get them on our side. I tried to forget the gun in my back and concentrate on what was happening before me.
Gold littered the table, a pot of at least five hundred dollars. The game was seven-card stud. Each of the six players had two cards down and three up: McDermott showed a pair of tens; Jackson two kings; Colbourn two clubs with nothing else; one of the others looked straightish with a ten, jack, and ace. Le Caron, already folded, dealt the fourth up-card around: no help for McDermott’s tens, a third king to Jackson, another club to Colbourn, no help to the straight builder, who folded Jackson’s fifty-dollar opener. McDermott raised fifty. Colbourn pushed his hundred in reluctantly, probably sitting on a flush but worried that he was already beaten. Jackson raised a hundred back. McDermott matched it. Colbourn folded his hand, eyeing the pot morosely.
I moved my head slightly to see the man behind us.
“Turn around.”
I’d caught a glimpse. He was well back. I tried to catch Johnny’s eye. He was oblivious, staring intently at Le Caron. No chance for signals between us. Jesus. My mind was thawing, but it came up with nothing.
Le Caron dealt McDermott and Jackson their final down cards. Jackson bent the corner of his up and peeked at it. His pallid face showed nothing, but his shoulders squared slightly as he spoke.
“I’ll go five hundred dollars.” He moved stacks of gold eagles to the center of the table.
“I’m thinking I’ll raise you back the same,” said McDermott, counting out a thousand dollars.
Jackson looked at Colbourn. Some message passed between them. Colbourn reached into his coat and produced a leather pouch from which he poured coins.
“Raise you the same again,” Jackson said.
McDermott, who had not looked at his seventh card, now did so. His eyes flicked to Le Caron, then away. “It’ll clean my pockets, to be sure,” he said
