The End of the Line (5 page)

“Steele asked me to have a look into some difficulty,” said Durrant.

“Where?”

“End of the line. The Kicking Horse Pass.”

•  •  •

By now, the legend of the Kicking Horse River was well known to people as far east as Winnipeg, and Durrant had certainly heard the tale many times. Captain James Hector was one of Palliser's men assigned the task, in 1858, of exploring the Rocky Mountains to survey the land for the future Dominion of Canada. As he was leading his horse along the treacherous rock falls where a tributary of the now-named river enters the main stem, the beast kicked Hector in the chest. The explorer dropped to the ground, and was presumed stone-cold dead. His men dug a shallow grave along the side of the creek and meant to bury him. But at the last moment, Hector batted an eyelash and the men decided to hold off on the funeral. He was moved to a location near present-day Holt City where a group of Stoney Indians were camping. They pronounced his recovery miraculous. The story was a testament to the isolated and dangerous nature of that perilous country.

“You understand that it may not be the most comfortable of accommodations. This is the end of steel, see. It's nothin' but wilderness. There's no town, no comforts but what we take with us,” said Durrant. He was standing in the open door of the barn, facing the yard where the boy named Charlie stood, backlit by the brightening morning. “And I don't really know what we're getting into there. A man has been killed, and it's likely that the murderer is still in the camp. He's not going to want to be found.”

The boy made no move. He seemed to recognize that Durrant was speaking as much to himself as to him.

“What I'm trying to say, son, is that if you'd like the opportunity, I'd like you to come along. You're little, but you work real hard. I just need you to know this ain't no spring picnic. You understand?”

Charlie nodded. He stepped into the barn and made for the far corner.

“Paddy tells me you're not too big on talking.”

The boy continued toward what Durrant figured was the tack room. He looked back at Durrant and motioned with one hand for the man to follow him. Durrant crossed the floor and stopped next to the boy. He was not five and a half feet tall, and though Paddy said that the youth's age was sixteen, he looked more like fourteen. His skin was smooth and unblemished. His hair was cut short, and stuck like straw from under the wool cap he wore pulled down to his ears. The youth's eyes were startlingly blue, piercing the observer in a way that Durrant almost envied. Eyes of that sort would no doubt unsettle a man if he were held by them too long.

The boy pushed open the door and motioned for Durrant to look. The room was indeed a tack shed, with saddles and halters and bridles arranged on a wall. Lengths of lead ropes were neatly coiled in one long peg. Charlie pointed to the floor. In a small space cleared of tack was a thin bedroll with two woolen blankets over it.

Durrant's eyes met Charlie's. “So what you're telling me is that hard conditions ain't new to you, is that it?” Charlie nodded. He fetched a small black slate from his bag. He pulled a piece of chalk from his pants pocket and tapped on the board. He turned it to Durrant. Durrant read aloud, “When do we go?” The Mountie smiled. “How about now?”

•  •  •

The inky soot from the locomotive momentarily blotted out the sky as the train rumbled over the new track west of Fort Calgary. Durrant and Charlie sat in the caboose. This ramshackle affair had been built onto a flatbed, and as the train started up the first grade out of the valley of the Bow River, the car pitching precariously from side to side. Durrant gripped the seat of the rough bench.

Durrant and Charlie were not alone. Two brakemen and a lineman rode along with them, their coats and wool caps encrusted in a thick layer of black coal soot. The long, narrow room was stacked with supplies that had been added to the freight train's consignment that morning: crates of canned goods and tobacco products, two heaping piles of woolen blankets that toppled over the moment the train began to lurch out of the Bow River Valley, several bags of mail, and three crates labelled “livestock” that immediately began to cluck as the caboose pitched and rolled. Durrant eyed them suspiciously, as the brakemen and lineman eyed
him
with misgiving. It hadn't taken long for word to pass along the line at the
CPR
's station at Fort Calgary that a man had been murdered at the end of track, and that the one legged Mountie with the fire-brand temper was being sent there to find the killer.

Durrant pulled the collar of his bison coat up around his ears and closed his eyes as the swaying of the caboose became more rhythmic. Durrant opened his eyes with a start when Charlie pulled on the sleeve of his heavy coat.

“What is it?” he said, his voice gruff. He scanned the caboose for signs of trouble. The lineman and the two brakemen were asleep, propped up on the crates of tinned peaches.

He looked at Charlie and in the dim light could see the boy's eyes were bright. “What is it?” he repeated.

Charlie tugged at Durrant's coat sleeve again. The Mountie pushed himself to standing and bracing himself against the rocking of the railway car, stepped over to where Charlie was kneeling next to a tiny soot stained window. The boy pressed his face against the bevelled, blackened glass for a second, and then turned to look at Durrant, his icy blue eyes shining. He pointed.

The train was passing through a broad, flat prairie with rolling snow-covered foothills on either side; the broad dale of the Bow River was behind them. To the north and to the west the implacable eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains rose. The train was steaming towards the sheer cliffs of the mountains, their east facing crags rising and falling in what Durrant concluded was an endless chain of ramparts. He knew that the steel rail followed the same Bow River that passed through Fort Calgary until it reached Holt City.

He had even found a map in the
CPR
station and managed to talk the stationmaster into loaning it to him for his official police business. With the train gambolling toward the limestone cliffs, Durrant could understand what a daunting barrier these mountains had posed. Pushing the rail through the Rockies was dangerous and costly, both in terms of human lives, and the treasury, and it was more than a decade behind schedule.

“You've never seen the mountains?” Durrant asked, looking at his travelling companion. The boy shook his head.

“Gonna see lots of those where we're going,” Durrant finally said. The boy's eyes remained transfixed on the peaks.

•  •  •

It was nearly dark when the train reached Padmore, just inside the mountains. As the train came to a halt, the lineman had taken his lanterns and walked a quarter mile back along the track to set the caution, though no other trains were expected along the new
CPR
mainline.

“Be about twenty minutes here, Sergeant.” The engineer stuck his head into the caboose and addressed Durrant. “You can stretch your legs if you like,” he said, and then swallowed hard. “I mean, you can . . .”

“Just leave it,” Durrant growled. “I know what you mean.” He turned to Charlie. “Have a look around if you like, but mind the whistle.”

The boy hopped down from the rear of the train and looked around him. Durrant drew a deep breath. It was cold. He exhaled and his breath froze before him. He buried his hands in his pockets. He could hear men moving crates from one of the box cars onto the siding. Grabbing one of the handles along the railing Durrant peered around the end of the caboose and could see the two brakemen aiding a station master. Charlie was there too, helping one of the men carry a crate nearly as big as he was.

In a few minutes the whistle sounded and Durrant watched Charlie climb the ladder at the car in front of the caboose and he joined the boy inside. The train lurched as they sat back down, side by side in the darkness. When one of the brakemen entered he lit a lantern that cast a warm glow over the tiny space, made more cramped by the presence of its extra cargo.

“You like to work,” said Durrant to Charlie, who was looking out the window into the darkness. Charlie nodded.

“He's strong for his age,” said one of the brakemen.

Durrant nodded and mumbled, “I'm glad to have you along, lad.”

•  •  •

The world around them was devoid of human life. With every mile they covered on the thin ribbon of steel, they outstripped the reach of civilization and the prospect of aid should it be required.

When they reached Holt City it was close to midnight. Compared to the tiny sidings at Padmore and Banff, Holt City seemed immense. At the end of the construction season there had been nearly ten thousand men working along the mainline where the Bow River veered north, and the rail line would ascend the gentle eastern grade of the Kicking Horse Pass. Now five hundred men remained, but the winter quarters spread out along the confluence of the Bow and Pipestone Rivers for half a mile.

When Durrant stepped off the train the cold hit him in the face like a frozen fist. The sky was now completely clear, and the veil of stars seemed so close that a man on horseback might reach up and scoop up a gloveful to line his pockets.

Charlie stepped off the train behind him, tucking his coat around himself, and dug his hands into his pockets. The soot from the engine and the steam from the brakes swirled along the wooden platform next to the stationhouse. The boardwalk had been scraped clear of snow to facilitate the ease of loading and unloading cargo, but the banks of snow beyond were above Durrant's head. For a moment he saw an image of himself trying to find his way between buildings at the end of the line through icy tunnels of snow.

A lantern's pale light emerged from the darkness and soon it illuminated the man who carried it. He looked the train up and down as he passed the boxcars, and Durrant heard him say a few words to the brakemen. One of them pointed towards Durrant and Charlie.

The lantern bearer was a big man with broad shoulders, and as he came closer Durrant could see his thick moustache and beard. Between his teeth he clenched a pipe that glowed red when he drew on it. His beaverskin hat was pulled down tight against his thick black eyebrows. But he smiled when he saw the two at the end of the train and extended a hand toward Durrant, which the Mountie took. The grip was firm.

“Bob Pen,” said the man with a genial smile, the pipe nodding.

“Durrant Wallace.”

“Welcome, Sergeant. I'm glad you're here.”

“I'd like to say the same, but . . .”

“But a man is dead, and his killer at large, and that's not exactly cause for glad tidings,” said Pen.

“No. No, it isn't. I had expected to meet Hep Wilcox, the general manager of this camp,” said Durrant.

Pen was examining the train. “Well, Mr. Wilcox asked me to come and meet you. I'm in charge of the labour force for Holt City, and for the camp that's being raised at the Kicking Horse Pass. I meet the trains and make sure the lads coming in find their way to where they are needed. Guess it seemed to make sense that I come and receive you as well.”

Durrant nodded.

“You must be tired. Let's get you settled. Who is this?” asked Pen.

“This is my . . . my assistant, Charlie,” said Durrant. “He's here to help with my things on account of . . .”

“Yes, yes, on account of your leg. I know the story. No need to explain. Can't see how I could do a lick of good without my two legs. You're a better man than I for continuing to serve your Queen and Country. Good for you, Sergeant.”

For a moment Durrant thought to protest, but he just nodded and said to Charlie, “Let's haul our stuff along.” Then to Pen, “I understand the
NWMP
barracks from last summer are still in good effect?”

“I haven't looked in on the cabin, but I assume it is. Let me show you. Come on, boy, you take one end of that trunk and I'll grab the other. It's not far.”

Charlie and Pen hauled the trunk along the station platform to where a deep path was beaten into the banks of snow. Once off the platform Durrant's crutch sunk into the snow so that he had to move along hunched over, making an effort to keep upright. The simple covering on the prosthetic's base slipped on the hard-packed snow, and Durrant had to struggle to keep up with Pen and Charlie. After only a few minutes they came to the
NWMP
cabin that had been built from squared-off timbers the summer before.

Charlie and Pen put the trunk down. “It isn't much to look at. The two lads who was here last summer spent most of the time up and down the line. There's a stove and a couple of bunks and lots of blankets. You should be fine.”

“We'll manage,” said Durrant. “This isn't a tourist vacation.”

“No, it isn't,” said Pen, opening the door and pushing it in. There was a thin film of snow on the floor. He held his lantern up and stepped inside. Charlie and Durrant followed. Pen stood next to the wall, the lantern casting its pale light into the coal-black room. On the floor between the two cots, laid out on a burlap tarp, was the body of Deek Penner.

DURRANT WOKE TO A COLD
so piercing that he felt as though he was entombed in ice. His face was under the blankets, and even so, it felt as if there was ice hanging from his nose. He drew a breath and the musty scent of old wool permeated his senses. And something else: wood smoke.

He pushed the blankets back with his game right hand. His left cradled the sturdy heft of the British Bulldog. The cold bit at his face. He blinked open his eyes; he felt as though his eyelashes had frozen shut in the numbing cold. He heard the stove door creak open with an audible protest.

He had slept the night with his gloved right hand tucked in his left armpit, but even so, it felt as though it was on fire, burning with the reawakened frostbite that had almost claimed it three years earlier. He pushed himself upright under the heavy weight of the blankets and watched as the lad Charlie dropped a heavy load of lodgepole pine on the floor of the cabin. The tiny square-board shack shook.