The lead carriage was fitted out with toilets, six sleeping compartments, a small private study c.u.m bedroom reserved for Bull, and closest to the loco, the room housing the computer workstation, the radio equipment that kept Bull in touch with Cloudlands and the railway control system, and the battery of small videoscreens linked to the tv cameras that displayed views of the roof, sides and underside of the train and the track beneath.

Steve helped Fran out of her dress and caught the sullen look in her eye. 'Don't tell me you're still upset about - ' 'The race? Of course not. While you were down the line, I had to listen to my mother telling me what a wonderful person you were, and how they both couldn't wait for me to marry you."

Steve concealed his own feelings. 'Would that be so terrible?"

'It would if I had a baby."

'Which is what they want .... '

'Don't try to pretend you didn't know."

'I didn't. And you've got to believe that. None of that means anything to me."

'Not even the child you had with Clearwater?"

Steve shrugged. 'That was an accident."

Fran gave him a searching look. 'Yes, well, all this mother, wife and baby talk has given me a headache."

She hung up the yellow dress then flopped down onto the bunk bed and vented her exasperation by pummelling the mattress.

Steve opened the-door, placed the 'Do not disturb' sign into the eye-level slot, then looked back and smiled. 'See you later."

Emerging into the corridor, he walked past the other sleeping compartments, knocked on the door of Bull's stateroom then, receiving no reply, entered and went on through to the communications room. One of the two ensigns detailed to watch the screens turned in his swivel chair. 'Can I help you, sir?"

Steve looked around the room. There was another door on the far side, marked 'Toilet'. 'Is Captain Chisum through there?"

'No, sir. I haven't seen him in a while."

'Okay, thanks."

Steve closed the door behind him, exited from the stateroom and checked the other five sleeping compartments.

One of the doors was shut, the other four were empty. He knocked on the locked door. 'John . . . ?"

No reply. He knocked again, but there was no response.

Pausing in the doorway to the crowded centre carriage, he surveyed the interior then walked through into the last carriage.

In the crowded galley, some of the Mute staff were catching a late lunch while others washed up the dishes from the picnic. He went past the guard's cabin, towards the door that led to the rear observation platform. It had a gla.s.s panel in the top half with a view of the track running away into the distance behind them. He opened it, fully expecting to find John Chisum admiring the view.

The platform was empty. Where the h.e.l.l had he got to...?

There was only one answer - Chisum had to be in the second occupied sleeping compartment. And if he hadn't answered, it was because he'd got lucky and didn't wish to be interrupted. So why hadn't he put out the 'Do not disturb' sign?

Steve felt his stomach tighten. He had started out with the idea of pinning down Chisum for that promised talk while Fran was asleep and out of the way. The observation platform would have been ideal. But now a more alarming idea was creeping into his brain. He went back inside, checked the guard's compartment, baggage room, store and galley on his way through.

As he came back into the centre carriage he suddenly felt giddy. He steadied himself in the doorway. Ahead of him was a sea of blurred, animated faces. Their laughter sounded tinny and their voices echoed sharply - as if the sound was coming down a long tunnel. And then other voices filled his head, a growing whisper that swelled to a warning crescendo like the wind building to a storm-force gust. Steve suddenly realised what he had to do, and knew he had only seconds in which to do it.

He stepped across to the nearest free-standing armchair, grabbed hold of its female occupant, threw her aside, picked up the chair, hurled it through the nearest window then, to a chorus of startled cries, launched himself head-first through the gaping hole in the shattered gla.s.s.

The window was only some eight feet above the track bed but it seemed an eternity before he hit the ground.

He stretched out his hands in an instinctive effort to break his fall.

As he curved downwards he saw the observation platform flash past him, and as it did so, all three carriages exploded sideways and upwards, throwing the rear of the tender and loco up in the air and Steve's own world blew apart ....

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

Roz's eyes opened wide with the shock. She staggered forward as her legs buckled under her. Clearwater and Cadillac caught her outstretched arms and saved her from falling. They eased her gently to the ground and knelt beside her.

'What happened?!" cried Cadillac. 'Is it the baby?!" Roz leaned back and tried to regulate her breathing as she clutched her swollen belly.

'No, no... I It's, uh...

uh, someone just tried to kill Steve!" She drew in several deep breaths through her nostrils. 'But it's. it's okay.

He's... alive. It's all right!" The M'Kenzi elder who had come with them to act as a midwife, brought a waterbag from the ox-cart and applied some to her patient's forehead. True to the promise he had made, Cadillac was bringing Roz back to the place where the M'Calls'

settlement had been to wait out the last month of her pregancy. She had been riding on the ox-cart, but had insisted on taking a short walk.

Cadillac looked worriedly at Clearwater. 'What are we going to do?"

'Pray to the Great Sky Mother that he comes to no harm. What else can we do?" The idea of losing Steve and Roz did not bear thinking about.

Roz clutched at her left shoulder and gasped: 'Oh!

Jeezuss!" 'Steve...?" asked Clearwater.

'Yes." Roz's mind got on top of the pain. 'Feels as if he's broken a collarbone."

'Don't move,' said Cadillac. 'I'll fetch the cart."

The impact with the ground knocked all the breath out of Steve's body.

He tried to drag some air down his throat but his chest seemed to have locked up. In fact, he seemed to be paralysed from head to toe.

Eventually, as the shock wore off, some movement returned to his limbs, but despite the high threshold of pain he was supposed to possess as a Mute, it hurt like h.e.l.l whenever he tried to move anything - especially up near his left shoulder.

He kicked and rolled himself over onto his right side and found himself looking at the smouldering carca.s.s of a Mute - with no head or arms and only one leg. There was debris everywhere, and more mangled bodies with most of the clothes stripped off them. The three carriages had been turned into matchwood. The bogies had been tossed carelessly off the track, and the loco he had seen lifted into the air by the force of the explosion had been sent. into a sideways spin, rolling along the track before splitting open and spewing red-hot coals and scalding steam.

It was still spewing out now. Steve was glad he hadn't been riding the footplate - or in any other part of the train for that matter. He lay back and thanked the Great Sky Mother. The sixth sense that had saved his neck so many times in the past had come to his aid again. But how long would his luck hold? And where - a.s.suming he could walk - was he going to go from here? He would never know whether Chisum had been in that locked sleeping compartment or not, but it no longer mattered.

There was only one person who had both the means and the motive to destroy the train and everybody on it - Karlstrom, perhaps with the tacit approval of the P-G. And you could bet your last meal credit Karlstrom had a list of the people who'd been invited to the picnic.

Yehh, and he'd decided that 8902 Brickman, S.R. was surplus to requirements. Steve wiped the dust off his tongue and lips, then rubbed his forehead. Pulling his hand away he saw the palm was smeared with blood.

What a mess. and he had no one to turn to. Now that Karlstrom had pulled the plug, he couldn't go back to Cloudlands. Annie - the only person that might help him - was locked up tight with Crazy Uncle Bart. He was going to have to get out of the Federation - but how?