I decided to give the scene of the crime a more thorough inspection. 

 

The Baggage Car was at the very rear of the train–an area seldom frequented by visitors. When I entered, Charles Pearson was probing amongst the leather bags and wooden crates that had once been neatly arranged on either side of a narrow aisle. 

 

“Anything amiss, Charles?” I asked, as I stepped delicately around Emilia’s body. It had been covered with a white sheet at my request.

 

“Well, Detective, most of the luggage seems to be present.”

 

“Most of the luggage?”

 

“Yes, I don’t know how else to say it.” he said, shifting bags from one shelf to another. Each had a manila tag stamped with a number. “Emilia’s suitcase is the only one unaccounted for.”

 

Pursing my lips, I stroked my chin and replied, “Well, Charles, isn’t that very interesting?”

 

“I thought so. And, Detective, there are other…discrepancies.”

 

He crossed his tree trunk arms and brought a hand to his chin, seemingly deep in thought.

 

“Discrepancies, Charles?”

 

“Well, Detective: the artifact crates have been opened–each and every one of them.”

 

“Oh, my... how is such a thing even possible? Are the artifacts themselves accounted for?”

 

“I’m working with Mrs. Stewart to see that they are. She is closely guarding her inventory log, but, as far as I know, Crate #4 appears to be the only one with missing contents. I barely know what I’m looking at, though.” he said, rotating a book in his hands--turning it this way and that, as if a different angle might finally make the baffling chart inside resolve into sense.”

 

I ran my fingers along the top edge of the crates as he spoke. The nails had been pried from each lid and were now missing. Searching each crate in turn, I found the interiors in total disarray. What had once been a neatly organized and meticulously packaged collection was now a scattered mess of rope, cloth, and dismantled artifacts. I was as if, rather than steal them, someone had torn them apart.

 

“You aren’t the one responsible for the mess are you, Charles?”

 

“No, sir. I found them like that. It was only by accident that I even knew to look inside at all.”

 

“Oh?”

 

“I was rifling through the luggage when I clumsily elbowed the lid from Crate #3. It fell freely onto the floor. I then checked the others. Each lid had been pried and replaced in the same way.”

 

“Oh my…well…keep up the good work, then. Thank you, Charles.” 

 

Squeezing past his hulking frame, at the far end of the car I found a rear door that led to an outside loading platform. On my approach, I noticed above the door, at a twelve o’clock position, a bullet mark had been chipped into the black paint of the metal wall.

 

While searching the area for possible shards, a frigid draft caught me at the neck, and I noticed that the rear door was standing slightly ajar.

 

Walking over, I put my shoulder into the heavy slab. It creaked in the worst metallic way, opening just enough to allow me through. I found myself on the rear loading platform, in the midst of a dark and still night. Under the dim light of a waning moon, hundreds of cacti dotted the landscape; jagged cliffs towered like skyscrapers around the track.

 

Moving forward, my foot struck against something heavy. I had to kneel to make any sense of the object, my eyes still adjusting to the dark.

 

“Charles!! Come here!!” I shouted, fumbling with the thing in front of me.

 

“What is it, sir?” 

 

His massive frame thundered its way to my position, pushing the door open as easily as if it were basswood. A yellow clamp of light flooded the platform in his wake.

 

Pulling him beside me and pointing, I said,  "Look! Another body!"

 

“Oh, he looks quite dead, Detective. Is he?” 

 

“Very much so. No pulse.”

 

“Well, sir, it’s a fitting find given the battle inside. Wouldn’t you say?”

 

The man was lying facedown. He wore a black, knee-length duster coat with black pants and black dress shoes. By all appearances, he was a man of money. I recognized the coat to be of substantial quality and, having felt for a pulse on his wrist, his gold watch suggested the same.

 

“Careful, Detective! He’s armed!”

 

Charles pushed me aside and grabbed a silver revolver from the man’s other hand.

 

“Don’t disturb the scene, Charles! No, no! Leave it!”

 

“It must be collected, sir. We can’t afford to risk leaving a loaded gun just lying around.”

 

“You're certain it's loaded?”

 

I rose and stood next to him. He nodded, deftly popping the central cylindrical chamber open and dumping the contents into his hand. 

 

“Six total casings. Three have been fired, Detective. It was too heavy to be unloaded.”

 

“Let me have the casings. I supposed I can trust you to keep watch of the firearm.”

 

I put the casings in my pocket and returned to the body. It was still warm. As I delicately turned his head to face us, I spotted the tattoo of a devil snaking its way up the left side of his neck. Angling his head into the light of the Baggage Car behind me, I saw, in the center of his forehead, a single entry wound. Blood spilled down his face and had only just started caking in his eyebrows. 

 

I recognized him as of Mexican heritage but could take nothing further from his appearance. 

 

Sifting through his pockets, I found no items of identification–not even a wallet. When I had finished my search of his person, I laid his effects on the floor in front of me:

Picking up the key, I raised it toward Charles and asked, “Do you recognize this?”

 

“Hmm, looks like a handcuff key to me, sir.”

“Exactly. Very strange.” 

 

I leaned over the body, where Charles had taken the gun from the man’s other hand, and pulled on the sleeve of his jacket. There, on the dead man's wrist, was a handcuff bracelet. The short chain linking the cuffs had been shattered, a single bullet mark on the floor just below it. Strangely, the other bracelet was missing entirely. 

 

“Someone broke the handcuffs in two? Do you think this man cuffed something to himself?”

 

“A good question, Detective. I’ve seen it done only very rarely.”

 

We spent some additional time investigating the corpse, finding little else of interest. 

 

Moving back inside, we made our way past the rows of bags and toward the Dining Car entrance. On the inner wall, opposite that of the rear door, I spotted two additional bullet marks.

 

“Well, I suppose we know where his shots went.”

 

“Two beside the door and one in Emilia?” 

 

“Precisely. But how could he possibly miss Emilia twice? It’s almost unbelievable that from such a close distance two shots could be missed.”

 

“You think Emilia wasn’t his target?”

 

“Perhaps not. Maybe whoever killed him was the real focus of his efforts.”

 

I took careful notes of the state of the scene before concluding my search.