The Capture of Wily Jackson

“What’s wrong with me?” Sarah inwardly moaned. She bit her lip trying to hold back the tears. She had been doing so much crying recently she was really getting sick of it. She turned to look out the window of the train so no one would see when the tears came. Why couldn’t she just get over this she wondered as she gazed out the window at the endless prairie. She listened as the train whistle was given a loud, long blast. Well, here she was on this train heading for home. It was over and done with and there was nothing she could do about it anymore. She heaved a sigh. She would have never thought that the year 1881 would be so full of hardships.

To divert her mind from her troubles, Sarah looked around at the other passengers, but she found that that didn’t help at all. Why was it that everything she looked at reminded her of William? The gentlemen snoozing with a hat over his face in the seat in front of her she recognized as the same exact hat that William loved to wear, and the lady across the aisle had his mother’s nose. So, she had almost married him, did that mean it was always to be this way? After all, she had not been the one who had called off the wedding, it had all been William’s doing! They had needed a place to live after they were married and William had not had the funds to buy a place, so he had asked her if they could post pone the wedding for a while. Sarah had saved up quite a lot of money from being a schoolteacher, so she had offered to help pay for a house. But William, being the proud man that he was, had downright refused her assistance and had insisted that he would be the one to provide for her if she was just willing to wait a little bit. Sarah had been utterly hurt by his words and so they hard quarreled, and by the end of the argument the wedding had been cancelled and they hard parted ways, and Sarah had found herself on a train bound for her parents home.

She rummaged through her handbag and pulled out her handkerchief. She blew her nose and then adjusted her hat to make sure it was straight. She didn’t want her parents to think that she had been crying the whole way on the train. She watched as a rough looking cowboy marched up to the front of the coach and began talking to the conductor. She observed them from her seat as the conversation seemed to turn into a very heated argument and then she gasped when the cowboy suddenly drew his gun! The conductor backed up against the wall while the cowboy held him there at gunpoint and three more cowboys, all with guns drawn, joined him.

“Nobody move now!” The first cowboy shouted at the passengers on the train. “We’re taking over this here train!” He bawled out commands to the other two men to head up to the locomotive and take control of it while he stayed here with the passengers. “Now if everybody cooperates nobody will get hurt,” he said with an evil grin on his face. “I don’t like to kill but I will if I have to!”

Sarah sat tensely in her seat. Why were these men trying to take over the train? Couldn’t somebody stop them? For the umpteenth time in the past twenty-four hours she blinked back tears, thinking that her life couldn’t possibly get any worse.

 The next few hours were very strained, and everyone sat in deathly silence on the train. Nobody moved and they hardly even dared to breathe. The only sound that could be heard was the ever constant clickety-clack of the train wheels speeding along the track. The cowboy paced up and down the aisle like a sentry on guard duty, eyeing everyone as he walked by. The silence was starting to get to Sarah. It was making her feel so crazy that she felt like letting out a scream, but a lot of good that was going to do her she knew. What she wished she knew was how long they were going to have to sit like this and if they would get off this train alive.

Suddenly, someone burst in the back door of the coach with a cry of “Sarah!” Recognizing the sound of the voice Sarah hastily turned around in her seat. It was William! What on earth was he doing here?

“Sarah!” he cried out again.

She stood up. “William! How did you get here?”

The cowboy turned around to block William’s path. “Where do you think you are going?”

With one swift motion William’s fist flew for the cowboy’s face knocking him to the ground, out cold. William ran for Sarah. “I had to see you! I couldn’t let you leave like this!” he cried, grabbing her by the arms.

“William, I don’t understand. How did you get here?” Sarah said, trying to make sense of the whole situation.

“I leaped on a horse right after you left and rode hard until I caught up with you,” he told her. “I had to talk to you!”

She freed herself from his grasp and folded her arms. “William, I thought we had said everything there was to say.”

“But we haven’t!” he insisted. “Not if it means I am going to lose you forever!”

“That was your decision, not mine,” she sniffed.

“Sarah, I rode for miles trying to catch you. The least you can do is to try and be reasonable,” William scolded her.

Her mouth fell open. “You think that I am the one being unreasonable?” she cried out.

“Yes!” William cried; his eyes flickered with a spark of anger. “Is it so unreasonable to ask you to wait until I can provide for you?” His face clouded and the anger left his eyes. “I love you Sarah! I want to prove to you I can care for you!”

“Well said son,” a man abruptly interrupted and patted William on the back. “And congratulations on the capture of Wily Jackson. He’s wiggled his way out of my hands for years!”

William turned to the man in confusion. “Wily Jackson? I am sorry, who are you?”

“Sheriff Harrington from Sun Prairie,” the man introduced himself. “I had a hunch Wily Jackson and his boys would try to take over this train to intercept a gold shipment it was secretly going to be stopping to pick up, so I rode along in the box car.”

Seeing the bewildered expression written all over William’s face, Sarah jumped in to explain to him what had been happening on the train. “You knocked the man out!” she finished.

“You surely did!” the Sheriff agreed. “I had the other two in handcuffs but was biding my time with this last one so none of the passenger would get hurt, but then you stormed in and saved the day. You deserve every bit of that reward.”

A line appeared between William’s brows. “Reward?”

“Why yes. Wily Jackson has a price on his head. Two thousand dollars to be exact,” the Sheriff replied.

William gave a loud whoop and threw his hat in the air. “Sarah, do you know what this means? We can get married now!” He was practically shouting at the top of his lungs. He abruptly got down on one knee. “That is if you still want me. Please won’t you marry me Sarah?”

Sarah’s face broke into a smile. “Of course, I will William,” she said, then added: “It was really only the waiting that bothered me anyway.”

William sprang up from the floor and gave her a tight squeeze. Sarah felt her eyes begin to water. Oh no! Here came the tears again, but this time they were tears of joy! She smiled to herself. She would have never imagined the year 1881 would go from being so sad to so happy in such a short time.