Fragment by Douglas D. Armstrong

DOUGLAS D. ARMSTRONG

NIGHT TRAIN TO ROLLA

Chapter One

April 1930

The click of the iron wheels slowed and the mail car rocked gently over the siding switch at Breckenridge. For an instant, a long, shrieking blast from the locomotive whistle masked the huff of the steam pistons. It was the station signal, Junior alerting him to a pickup. Jed slid back the door and felt a hot breeze in his face as he adjusted the cinder guard. He extended the catcher arm, fixed his eyes on the canvas pouch that was stretched in the crane ahead and hooked it neatly as the train swooped by. Then he kicked out the Breckenridge delivery sack and saw it tumble across the platform.
The timing was perfect. All he had left to do

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was crank in the pickup, heft the sack aboard and close the door before a spark could blow in out of the stream of soot belching from the engine's smokestack. Jed hesitated, thinking it would be pleasant to leave the door ajar or open one of the barred windows on a close April morning like this. His suspenders had already begun to cut into his shoulders. But the car was second in line after the locomotive boiler and would have to stay buttoned up until they turned north into a cross wind 50 miles away.
As the tiny depot receded into the distance, Jed verified the time through the cracked crystal of his pocket watch - 8:08. Frisco Line Train 630 running on schedule, 28 minutes out of Enid. He made a note of the pouch in his pickup log, unlocked the canvas sack's battered leather top and dumped the mail onto the sorting table. Then he worked the pile, flipping envelopes into routing pouches on the metal frame, destined for other trains. They would be at Hunter in 27 minutes where another pouch would be waiting.

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