Family Lessons. Allie Pleiter

      Chapter Two

      “Mercy!” Miss Sterling fanned herself, clutching her chest as she draped herself against a rock. “I believe I was going to faint without some air.”

      Holly mused that the woman could have had a career in the theater. Miss Sterling was a stunning beauty, and had quite the gift for producing a fit of the vapors on command. It had only helped matters when one of the little girls yelped out a need to “use the necessary.” Within minutes all the children “needed” to get off the train and relieve themselves, giving Holly—and Liam—the perfect opportunity.

      “Just get them kiddies done with their business and get back on the train, lady.” Their beefy captor was annoyed but clearly in no mood to deal with the mess ignoring the children would have brought.

      “This is the last one,” Holly called to him, holding the hand of a little girl named Lizzie while Mr. Arlington pretended to be watching over Liam’s ministrations. He had led the boys as a group to the edge of the clearing on the pretense of tending to their needs. Rebecca was to send up just enough of a fuss to keep the robbers from counting heads as the children filed back into the passenger car. Trying not to stare at the scraggly bush behind which Liam disappeared, Holly said a desperate prayer. Father, let him reach town in time. Guide his steps along the directions I gave. Send help. Save us from these men!

      Holly caught the eyes of Rebecca and Mr. Arlington as they filed back into the car as casually as possible. How awful and odd to be so close to home and in such a spot. When the brutal storm hit Evans Grove last month, she’d thought that the low point. When the subsequent flood washed mercilessly through the low parts of town, she’d thought then that things had looked their worst. As Holly stood on the rocky soil, casting a worried gaze toward the express car where the banging noises had now stopped, she couldn’t help but wonder if the worst was still to come. Had they gotten the safe open? What of Mr. Brooks? Even if he should be all right, the funds were surely gone by now. If the bank wouldn’t replace them, Holly worried Evans Grove wouldn’t survive this final blow.

      A volley of sharp yells echoed across the clearing. After a loud clang, Holly saw the doors of the express car slide open and a pair of hands push Mr. Brooks down out of the car. He’d barely regained his footing from the leap when a large black box crashed to the ground at his feet. He was nearly crushed by the metal cabinet, which made a strange, chinging sound as it tumbled to settle heavily onto the ground. The safe. Mr. Brooks’s jacket was off. He looked as if he’d been roughed up, but he was remarkably calm.

      “I told you it wouldn’t work!” The bandit leader’s voice pitched in frustration as he followed Mr. Brooks out of the express car, gun trained on the banker. “More n’ likely you’ve busted up the mechanism and we’ll never get it open now.”

      The third and fourth bandits climbed from the car. “Do we go get the horses now? Time to take the safe and run?”

      Holly was tempted to point out that one does not just take a safe and run, but kept her mouth shut in remembrance of the backhanding Liam had endured. Short of a wagon or a stick of dynamite, that safe was not going anywhere. Nor did it look as if it would open. Taking a step toward Mr. Brooks, Holly scanned the area and tried to think of where she would hide horses nearby.

      “Time,” sneered the leader as he raised the gun to Mr. Brooks’s temple, “to up the ante. You’re making me wonder, bankerman, if you ain’t hiding the real key.”

      “Stop it!” Holly cried before she could think better of interfering. “Give him our money, Mr. Brooks. Nothing is worth a life.”

      “I assure you, Miss Sanders,” Mr. Brooks said, his voice winding tighter with every passing second, “I am doing my level best to do just that.” He held the key up to his captor. “Look at the numbers on this key.” He was trying to make the bandit see reason, but it only seemed to anger the man. “They match the markings on the safe. This is the right key, but it won’t work. Have sense, man. All your gun pointing can’t change the fact that this key will not unlock a damaged mechanism.”

      Holly heard Mr. Arlington’s voice behind her. She turned to find him holding out a hat filled with watches, wallets and the fine beaded reticule she’d seen on Miss Sterling. “Take what we’ve got and let us be. There are children here, for goodness’ sake. We’ve no way to pursue you. Why don’t you just leave?”

      Holly heard a horse’s whinny off to her right. Was it the robbers’ accomplice or had Liam been even faster than she’d hoped? Father, protect us!

      The leader turned to Mr. Arlington, eyes blazing in fury. “Howsabout you just shut your mouth?” he yelled loudly. Then to Holly’s great horror, the bandit raised his pistol and fired.

      She heard the terrible sound. She saw the dust rise up as the hat full of loot hit the ground. She felt the impact as if it sucked the air from her lungs. Someone screamed. A woman, a child, or perhaps it was both. It couldn’t have been her—she had no voice, no breath. The entire world boiled down to the smell of gunpowder and the red stain blossoming under Mr. Arlington’s hand as he clutched his chest. The look of shock in his eyes as he tilted forward turned Holly’s heart to ice.

      Nothing. They’d shot him for nothing. Who would they shoot next and for what?

      * * *

      The sound of the gunshot pounded in Mason’s chest, and he urged Ace faster toward the spot on the railway line just east of town Liam had described. The boy had told him enough to chill his blood. If they were the clever kind, who knew what these men were capable of, what lengths they would go to succeed? “Give me a dim-witted thief any day,” he said to himself as he swung down off his saddle, glad to see townsfolk coming a half mile behind him.

      “You might get your wish,” Liam commented as he slid off the saddle and they scrambled up the rock outcropping that gave both of them a view down onto the track clearing. “They didn’t seem too smart to— Oh, no!” Liam gasped, covering his mouth in horror as he saw what Mason saw: Holly Sanders and two other people crouched in panic over a bleeding man. “They shot Mr. Arlington!” His voice was a whispered yell, full of shock and fear. He looked up to Mason with panicked eyes. “How could they have shot Mr. Arlington like that? Mr. Brooks had the key to the safe. Mr. Arlington didn’t know nothin’!”

      Mason didn’t know what to say. His brain was churning through options, working furiously to find some way out of this. One thing was clear from the chaos below: these men weren’t killing by plan, they were killing by panic. Panic was far more dangerous than clever, and from the looks of the safe dumped out on the packed earth just a few yards away, and the yelling going on between the bandits, things had gotten out of hand.

      Within minutes, Bucky Wyler came up crouching behind Mason, rifle ready in his hand. “Aw criminey,” he muttered as he took in the scene, “what now?”

      “Act fast. Too much longer, and things will go from bad to worse.” Mason looked over his shoulder at the four other men coming up the path, motioning for them to come closer but to keep down.

      “Worse already, if you’re asking me.” Bucky settled onto his stomach and pulled his rifle up to rest on the rock. “What