The train headed east, crossing the great green valley and ascending into the mountains, winding ever higher as they followed the broad, back-and-forth swoops of the track. As the stars assembled it looked to Lucy that the train was hurrying the night along by plunging into the stomach of the sky. He slept sitting up, propped by a body on either side of him.
In the night there occurred an untoward happening. Lucy awoke or partially awoke to find two men, one tall and one small, creeping into the compartment. Their movements were stealthy beyond the call of good manners, and this, combined with the fact of their faces being obscured behind the upturned collars of their coats, brought about a wary interest in Lucy, and he watched them with half-shut eyes.
The compartment was quiet, the dozing occupants’ faces cast in silvery moonlight, and the men moved to stand before a bony older woman clutching a tartan satchel to her chest. Her mouth hung slackly and a rill of spittle drew down the side of her face; the larger of the men regarded her with a cocked head, then set to work removing her fingers from her bag. This was accomplished in delicate stages, one finger at a time, and Lucy was expectant that at any moment the woman would come to and let fly a bloodcurdling shriek. But the man was so adept, as though he were precisely aware to what extent he might molest the woman’s person without interfering with her slumber, that she gave no indication of disturbance. Soon her grip was unfurled, and so the man could gain access to her bag, from which he removed unknown objects, passing these to the smaller man, who tucked the booty away in his long coat. After gleaning all he could or cared to, the larger man returned the bag to the woman’s grip and stepped to the side, that he might focus on the body to the woman’s left. It was in this workaday manner that the duo robbed each person on the bench opposite Lucy; and now they were doubling back to do the same to him and his benchmates.
As the men drew closer, a fearsome unease came over Lucy, for he had not a clue what he should do. He might put up a fight, but there were two men against his one, and it was a safe assumption that these bandits were all the more familiar with the ways of violence than he. Mightn’t he leave the compartment? Simply stand and go, without a glance back over his shoulder? But no, the men would notice his exit, and perhaps it was that they wouldn’t want him to leave. What option remained, then? In the end he could think of no alternative other than feigning sleep and letting the men make away with his meager possessions. A shameful conclusion, it was true, but still preferable to the other chilling possibilities, and so there Lucy sat, awaiting the inevitable.
The men were just setting upon him when a train traveling on the westbound track hurtled past, rocking the compartment, drenching it in flashing light, and disturbing most everyone’s rest. The thieves quit the compartment like shadows thrown across the wall; and though many passengers were momentarily awakened by the passing train, none had seen the pair go, and so none realized they had been robbed. Lucy looked about for a body to speak with, but all had resumed sleeping. He buttoned his coat to the throat and looked out the window at the world of night. The moon held its position admirably and unwaveringly, pegged as it was to its corner of the sky.