The Trainmasters (6 page)

“Looking for something, Egan?” he said, with a smirk. He was still hiding something behind his back.

“He’s got it,” someone else said.

“That I have,” Henneberry said, lifting the fiddle up over his head. “And I aim to hear it no more.”

“Give it to me, Tom,” Egan said, moving swiftly over to the larger man. He held his hand out toward the fiddle, but Henneberry
snatched the instrument away.

“Now Egan,” he said, grinning playfully.

“Hand it over, I said.”

“Fuck off,” Henneberry said. The hate that he had been unsuccessfully masking, now showed in full force. “Get lost, Egan O’Rahilly.”

And then he brought his other meaty hand up over his head, and laughing, he snapped the instrument in two and then crushed
it.

Egan was swarming onto Henneberry before he had finished his act of destruction, but he was too enraged in the first instant
of his fury to do the bigger man much damage.

The other men were cheering both of them on, though it was clear who they favored. Tom Henneberry was no favorite with the
laborers working the Gallitzin Tunnel.

And Henneberry, who had managed in the heat of the moment, to shake off some of the confusion of his drunkenness, then wrapped
the remnants of the fiddle around Egan’s head.

“It looks better as a hat,” he said. “Sounds better, too.”

Egan backed away and then clawed at his face to get rid of the thing. Those in front of the crowd retreated to give the two
men room to fight.

“Back further off,” Egan shouted, not liking at all the small space he’d have to fight in. His only hope against Henneberry’s
strength and size, he knew, was his own speed and quickness.

A few of the men pushed farther back against those behind them, but because the room was so tightly packed, there was no place
for them to go.

Henneberry must have realized much the same thing, for he came at Egan then with a great, lumbering rush, stumbling a couple
of times as he moved.

That pleased Egan. The booze in Henneberry’s brain was making its presence felt. It would be Egan’s best ally.

Then Henneberry crashed into Egan, pummeling him with his fists. Egan darted away, flicking four or five jabs into the big
man’s gut, but Henneberry kept coming, landing no more than one blow for every three of Egan’s. Yet his every blow hurt Egan
greatly.

Henneberry had a cut over his eye and in his mouth, and he was breathing hard and heavy. Egan’s jabs were taking their toll.

Tom stumbled again, and then he seemed to stagger. And Egan let down his attention for a moment. But the bigger man recovered
in a flash—indeed the whole move was a feint—and suddenly his arms were around Egan’s arms and body in a crushing vise of
a grasp. There was no way Egan could retaliate as long as Tom held his grip. And if he didn’t get out of it, he would be in
trouble, for the breath was being squeezed out of him.

The crowd groaned.

Henneberry was trying to force Egan to the floor, and Egan seemed unable to stop him. The big man roared to celebrate his
success. Then he squeezed harder. Egan gasped and choked, overwhelmed by a sickening rush of unconsciousness.

Now it was Egan’s turn for a surprise move: He stopped struggling against Henneberry’s attempts to force him to the floor.
Instead, he threw all of his own energy and momentum downward, and the two men crashed into the dirt. Before Henneberry could
recover, Egan had squirmed away and leapt to his feet. And while the big man was pulling himself together, Egan kicked him
in the head.

Henneberry swung a paw unsteadily at Egan’s leg but missed his aim by several inches, and Egan kicked him again. And again.
This time in the gut. Henneberry was roaring, but in pain this time. Still, he wasn’t beaten yet. One of his flailing hands
finally caught Egan’s pants’ leg, and with a quick twist, Henneberry brought Egan down once more into the dirt. Then his other
hand snaked out and grabbed Egan’s shirt below his throat. He turned and pounded Egan’s face with his other fist, but Henneberry
was too hurt and tired and drunk to do Egan serious damage. Then Egan once again slipped away from him and was back on his
feet, kicking the other man in the head and body. He kicked Henneberry until he stopped moving. Then he backed away and circled
the big man, making sure he was truly unconscious.

The crowd sent out a raucous, happy cheer. They yelled again when Egan made a break through the circle the crowd had made
for the fighters. As he moved among the men, their faces blurred in his unclear vision. He suddenly saw a glass in front of
his face. It was brimful of rum. A hand was attached to it. The hand belonged to Patrick Geraghty. He was saying something,
but Egan was having a hard time making out his friend’s words.

“Drink this, boy. It’ll do you powerful good,” Patrick said.

Egan waved his friend off once he finally understood. He wanted fresh air now.

Moments later, outside, Egan stood and breathed in the air, gasping. Then he walked a little way and stopped to look up at
the sky. The stars were lovely, and they seemed so close. There was a sliver of the moon overhead, shining brightly in the
clear sky.

He threw up, heaving again and again until there was nothing left inside of his stomach. After that he walked up the hill
and found a large flattened boulder, and he collapsed onto it.

He closed his eyes. When he opened them, young Ferdy O’Dowd was standing over him. Ferdy held a damp rag in his hand, and
he began washing Egan’s bloody, grimy face.

“You all right, Egan?” he asked softly, with concern in his voice.

“Not bad,” Egan said. He tried to sit up, but he failed. “And not good.”

“Tom Henneberry’s still out cold, I guess. At least he was when I left.”

“Aye.”

“When he wakes up, he’s goin’ to come lookin’ for you.”

“I know.”

“You stayin’?”

“Aye. I’ll work Monday. That’s for sure.”

“You’re mad, Egan O’Rahilly. I’d go. I’d run a thousand miles away. That man will try to kill you. And he has hundreds of
ways to do it.”

“He’s been in fights before. He’ll be in fights again. One fight to him is pretty much like any other.”

“But he
hates
you, Egan. Don’t you see that? It’s not just any kind of brawl. It took evil in his heart to break that fiddle of yours.”

Egan looked at the boy, agreeing with him but not able to bring himself to say it. Henneberry was going to be more dangerous
than a bear uprooted from winter’s sleep. But Egan was not going to run. Not from him.

And then grief over the lost fiddle swelled up in his heart —not just for the fiddle itself but for his father, whose fiddle
it had been and who had taught him to play, and for his mother and his two younger sisters. All lost.

He wept softly, while Ferdy O’Dowd stood and helplessly watched.

Late that same Saturday evening, long after the dedication ceremony had ended and the Carlysles had returned to Sturdivant’s
Hotel on Chestnut Street, Kitty Lancaster was sitting in the parlor of her father’s home. After her husband had died, Kitty
had returned to live with her father. She needed a home and he needed her, for her mother had died when Kitty was still a
girl.

Kitty held a book in her hands, and now and again she read from it. But her mind was not really on the novel. She was waiting
restlessly for Edgar Thomson to return. Her father was not only the chief engineer of the Pennsylvania line, he was a member
of its board of directors. He and the other directors of the line were attending a dinner meeting that evening. And Kitty
was most interested in finding out what had gone on there, for the dinner meeting was vital to the railroad’s immediate future.
It was the primary reason for the presence in Philadelphia this day of the financiers William Astor, Daniel Drew, and Cornelius
Vanderbilt.

The Pennsylvania needed money—a lot of it, at least five million dollars—in order to complete the mountain division. In the
past, the state of Pennsylvania and the cities of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh had provided the major part of the capital the
line required. In consequence, the state and the cities owned nearly half of the railroad’s outstanding stock. But that source
of capital was almost spent. The state and the cities had invested in the line to the limit of their revenues.

This meant that William Patterson, the railroad’s president, had to find other sources of capital. So far, at his direction
the line had issued sixty thousand new shares of stock. But there had been few takers. If these shares didn’t sell quickly,
or if some other source of funds was not found, then work on the mountain division would have to be halted.

On the other hand, if William Patterson failed in his efforts to bring in new capital, the board of directors would surely
have to replace him. And his most likely successor was John Edgar Thomson.

Kitty believed that William Patterson was cheerful, amiable, and agreeable, but weak. He was more suited in her mind to preside
over church functions and civic banquets than to run a precarious—and exciting—new enterprise. He placated government officials
with skill and finesse; he was a pleasant companion at gatherings of the Philadelphia business community; and he struck a
nice pose when necessary, but he was not ruthless enough for Kitty Lancaster, nor ferocious enough in his ambition. He was
more interested in being liked and respected than in planting the Pennsylvania’s rails across the mountains and making the
resulting line the richest and most powerful one on the continent. He was not, in short, anything close to the man her father
was.

So if he failed and was thrown out, Kitty would be quite pleased. She wanted her father to become the president of the Pennsylvania
Railroad.

Kitty was dressed for bed, wearing a robe over her sleeping gown. The day’s excitement had exhausted her, yet she was instantly
wide awake when her father finally arrived home. It was after midnight.

Edgar Thomson smiled broadly when he saw that she had waited up for him. He was delighted to have companionship after the
trying board meeting. Edgar Thomson adored Kitty Lancaster. He had no friend better than Kitty. Their was no one who could
give him greater comfort, or who could heal his wounds as she could.

In her entire life she had only failed him three times: she had been born a woman; she had married Charles Lancaster, a man
who at first had looked promising, but who turned out to be weak and lacking in ambition; and for a time, she had let herself
fall in love with a man who had hurt her. This relationship had come not long after Charles’s death, and perhaps that explained
why it happened at all. But, to Edgar Thomson’s immense relief, the relationship had fortunately ended, for the man was an
employee of the railroad.

Thomson stood in the doorway of the parlor before entering the room. He waited there until Kitty noticed him.

“Hello, Father,” she said, finally looking up from her book.

“Hello, Kitty,” he said. “You waited up for me?”

“I couldn’t sleep tonight. Not with all that is going on.”

She made a move to turn down the lamp that was on the table beside her chair, but Thomson raised his hand to stop her. “Don’t
do that, Kitty. You look very good sitting there under the light,” he said. “It turns your skin into gold, and your cheeks
into roses.”

“I should have married you,” she said, smiling at his compliments. “I would have, if that were possible.”

“I like you as you are,” Thomson said. “You are utter perfection as my daughter.”

She smiled again and blushed. “You’ve been reading?” he asked.

She raised the book for him to see. “
David Copperfield
by Charles Dickens.”

“Do you like it?”

“Oh, yes! It’s a delicious book. I’ve laughed and cried again and again.”

“Should I read it, then?” he said.

“You should, Father. But I don’t know that you will. I can’t remember the last novel that you read.”

“Nor can I,” he said with a chuckle, slipping out of his jacket and vest. “There, that’s better,” he said with a deep, tired
sigh. “God, I think I’d almost rather wear a suit of armor than evening clothes.”

“So how did the meeting go?” Kitty asked, marking her place and laying the book down on the table next to her reading chair.

He paused a moment before he started to talk. A part of him did not want to talk business with her. It was the part that wished
her to remain forever innocent and maidenly. But there was another part of Edgar Thomson, a part that welcomed Kitty’s drive
and energy and love of railroading.

That part won out now, and he started to tell her everything.

“The evening was tense, I should say. And indecisive. Will Patterson, as usual, was smooth and expansive, but now and again
I wondered about him. He seemed to be unusually strained.”

“He
does
have to come up with five million dollars or so, after all,” she said, “and rather soon.”

“Yes,” he said, “but that kind of challenge never seemed to disturb his equanimity in the past.”