Page 44 of Charlotte's Reckoning
“Next stop, Laramie!”the conductor called ashe entered thepassenger car.
They were the sweetest words Charlotte had heard in a very long time. She would have jumped from her seat with a joyous cheer if it wouldn’t have drawn undue attention. With stopovers in Kansas City and Cheyenne and an overnight stay in Omaha to catch a connection west, they’d spent thirty hours over four days in what Fenton called a stinkin’ rail car. But finally—after eighteen stops, one of which was to get a cow off the track—they had arrived.
She couldn’t imagine making the same trip, nearly 1000 miles, by wagon train, which was how she and Carson had planned it. As she gazed out the window atthemountains inthedistance, the biggest she’d ever seen, she reflected on that long-ago rail journey plagued with fear and death. She dashed away a tear, as the horror of that awful day came rushing back. This uneventful trip seemed like a springtime stroll through the park in comparison, and she shouldn’t complain.
Fenton wasn’t much of a traveling companion, grumbling or snoring practically the entire way. But he took care of the bags, bought the tickets, arranged for their hotel—the inn they stayed at for their one overnight in Omaha, waiting for a connection west, had been lovely—and he had a knack for finding his way around a strange city and always got them to the depot on time.
As the train slowed, Charlotte peered out the window, hoping to get a glimpse of the town, but all she saw were rail-yard buildings and the depot coming into view. She nudged the sleeping man beside her. “Fen.”
When he went right on snoring, she shook his shoulder. “Fen, wake up!”
“What is it? Can’t a man sleep?”
Slack-jawed and rendered speechless, she stared at him a moment before exclaiming, “You have snored loud enough to wake the dead for 950 miles.”
“Laramie, folks,”the conductor repeated as he moved down the center aisle. “For those traveling on, we have an hour stopover. If you leave the train, be sure to be back on time. With a strict schedule to keep, the First Transcontinental Railroad waits for no one.”
Fen sat up and began straightening his clothes. “About damn time.”
“I need to talk to you about this.”
He glanced at the newspaper in her hand. “What of it?”
“I’m not sure Laramie is where we want to settle.”
“You say this now when we’re pulling into the station?”
“Did I mention you’ve been asleep the entire trip?”
“Don’t get lippy with me, woman.”
“Fen. Listen,”she said in a softer tone. “The railroad only came to Laramie a short time ago. A few lucky residents live in shacks. The rest are in tents. In fact, that’s what they call it—a tent city.”
“It’s gonna be fine.”
“I’m not so sure after reading this newspaper article. The only permanent structures aside from the depot are a small hotel, a sawmill, a barbershop because heaven knows a shave and a haircut are top priority, a two-cell jail, and the new general store. There are several bathhouses, saloons, and brothels—all operating from tents. And the crime sounds worse than St. Louis.”She held up the paper to emphasize her next point. “There are details of gunfights in the streets, which are reported to be a daily occurrence.”
“Let me see that.”He snatched the paper from her hand and looked at the front page. “For fuck’s sake, Charlotte. This is from last year.”
She snatched it back and looked at the date—right month, wrong year.
“Oh,”she replied, slightly embarrassed she hadn’t noticed but also annoyed. “It was on a table at the last depot we stopped at. Silly me for assuming it was current.”That it was old news didn’t allay her fears. “Do you think they have actual buildings now?”
“They had better.”
“Or what?”she asked, unimpressed by his vague threat. “The man who lost it to you is long gone. I can’t believe we uprooted ourselves without seeing it first.”
“I have the deed with a description of a building that specifies walls, a roof, and floors made of wood. If it’s otherwise, someone’s sure as hell gonna pay—in blood. Now, enough with the nagging. I’m seriously rethinking not leaving you in St. Louis.”
Charlotte glanced around, meeting the stunned gaze of a woman across the way. She gave her an embarrassed smile. “He’s joking. We’re tired from the trip. Aren’t you?”
When she turned around, she said to Fenton in a whisper, “Kindly keep your voice down while threatening murder and mayhem. And, when we get there, can you refrain from actually doing it? If you hang, where does that leave me except alone among what the newspaper called the dregs of society?”
“Your concern for my neck is underwhelming,”he muttered, not lowering his voice while finger-combing his hair. “Besides, you’ve been among the dregs before.”
She would have volunteered to do it for him because he had beautiful, thick, and shiny hair, and when it was overlong, like it was now, it curled up on the ends because of its natural wave. But his reference to her time at the Pleasure Palace, combined with the account she just read,no matter howout of date, made her already nervous stomach twist into knots, and she didn’t offer.
“Relax,”he murmured as he took her hand in his. “The railroad changed everything in Laramie. They are now a freight hub for the region, and the land agent told me ranchers, farmers, and family types have settled here because of it.”
