"Yes." Chiun allowed a trace of pride in his eyes. "There is something sublime about steam travel."
Remo interrupted. "How come I never heard about this?"
"The next time we are in Pyongyang, I will treat you to a ride. If you do not displease me before then."
"No, thanks. I'm not big on trains."
"What's a matter?" Melvis grunted. "Never own a Lionel set when you were a shaver?"
"No," said Remo.
"You missed out big, then. I feel sorry for a man what never owned a train set growin' up."
"Save it," said Remo, scanning the horizon.
There were over the flat heartland of Nebraska now. Cornfields as far as the eye could see. Below, the corn was tassling, showing golden gleams here and there.
"Avert your eyes, Remo," Chiun warned.
"I'm looking for whatever it is we're looking for," Remo complained. "I am not thinking of corn."
Chiun confided in Melvis. "Recently he has become a corn addict."
"White lightning?"
"Worse. Yellow kernels."
"Never heard of that brand of moonshine."
"He has Indian blood, and you know how they are about corn," whispered Chiun.
"Say no more. We had piles of Injuns down in the Big Empty-before we chased their savage asses off."
"I see something ahead," said Remo. Melvis leaned past the pilot.
"What? Where? I don't see nothin'" Melvis gave the pilot's right earphone a snap. "Do you?" The pilot shook his annoyed head.
"Train wreck," said Remo. "It over on its side?"
"No."
"Well, you're lookin' at the rear end. It's the head end I'm frettin'," Melvis said, leaning back and licking his lips. "Brace yourselves. A cornfield meet is one hellacious sight if you've never taken one in."
"I see the cornfield," said Remo, "but not the meet part. Is that meet with two e's or meat like in beef?"
Melvis shuddered visibly. "If it's as bad as I fear, it could be a bloody blend of both."
It was, Remo saw as the helicopter buzzed the train.
There was an Amtrak passenger train down below. Twelve cars long. The last car sat perfectly on the rails as if waiting at a crossing. The rest were all over the place. Two trailing Amtrak coaches, still coupled, formed a big silver V across the right-of-way. Another lay on its side. One was split open like a foilwrapped package that had exploded.
The train resembled a long silver snake with a broken and dislocated spine.
The head end was where it was really messy. And as they overflew it, Remo understood exactly what a cornfield meet was.
Both engines were still on the rails. The silvery Amtrak engine was mashed into the nose of another engine, a black one. It looked old and spidery some how, even though it had telescoped in a third of its length. The Amtrak engine had come through the impact no better. It had taken hits in both directions. The following car had slammed into its rear. Consequently the Amtrak engine body had folded up like an accordion.
"Oh, man," Melvis moaned. "Headlight to headlight. They're the worst kind of head-ons."
As they dropped down, they could see the fatigue pup tents where the injured were being treated. Stretchers lay in rows, empty but spattered with red. A few were completely red like flags. Ambulances sat about the cornfield, but it was obvious the worst of the triage was over.
All at once Melvis Cupper began moaning, "Oh, Christ. O sweet Jesus. Tell me it ain't so."
"What do you see?"
"Oh, the horror. I can't look at it no more." And he tore his eyes from the engine. A second later they gravitated back. It was as if he were seeing it for the first time all over again.
"Oh, my momma. I just wanna bust out cryin'. Oh, to die so young like that."
"What're you talking about?" asked Remo, not seeing any bodies.
"The damn engine! Look at it. Oh, will you look at that sweet monocoque body all banged up to hell and gone."
"Which engine?" asked Remo.
"The Amtrak, you idjit. That there's a brandspankin'-new Genesis Series 1. GE built. Unibody monocoque design. Bolsterless trucks. They even got a Holster cab at the rear of the unit so one crewman can move it forward and back. Jesus, there ain't hardly five or six in operation yet and now one's dead."
Remo looked at Melvis.
Melvis looked back. "Hell, I'm about fixin' to cry. Excuse me."
And he grabbed a handkerchief and busied it about his eyes.
Remo looked to the Master of Sinanju. "Who knows how many people are dead, and he's weeping over the engine."
"He is a fool. Only steam is worthy of his tears."
Remo said nothing. His eyes were on the wreck, which was growing larger every second.
The chopper settled, flattening the prairie grass like hair under a blow dryer. They got out.
Melvis walked up to the engine, saying, "Oh man, I just hope she ain't derail prone. Cause if she is, then you can kiss Amtrak goodbye. This was supposed to be the locomotive of the future. One of 'em, anyways."
"What's this other thing?" Remo asked, pointing to the black engine.
"That? Why, it's a . . ."
They looked at him.
"Give me a second now. It'll come to me."
Melvis scratched his head on both sides and scrutinized the scrunched engine from front, back and sides.
"Don't rightly know," he admitted. "Looks like it might be some kind of switcher or work train."
"What is it doing on the same track as Amtrak?"
"Fair question. Over yonder lies the Union Pacific lines. They haul freight. Uncle Pete livery is what they call Armor yellow, so this ain't one of theirs.
Don't know what else runs on this line. This ain't exactly my neck of the woods."
Melvis led them around to the other side of the joined-at-the-nose Siamese engines. The stink of diesel fuel was high in their nostrils.
When they rounded on the other side, they walked into a camera. It went click in their faces.
Reacting to the sound, Remo and Chiun suddenly broke in opposite directions. They came to a dead stop, a safe distance away.
Feeling the breeze, Melvis turned. "Thought you boys was right behind me."
"Who are you talking to?" a musical, twangy voice asked.
Melvis took one look at the willowy girl in fringed buckskin jacket and bright blue bib jeans and asked, "Who in heck are you?"
The woman let her camera hang down in one hand as she dug a business card out of her jeans. "K. C. Crockett. Rail Fan magazine."
Melvis's face lit up. "Rail Fan! Why, I subscribe to that." He yanked out a card. "Melvis O. Cupper, NTSB. And if I gotta tell you what the initials stand for, you ain't who you say you are."
"Thank you kindly," said K.C., taking the card. She had a corn-fed smile and hair only slightly less red than copper. Her eyes were electric blue.
Remo and Chiun came up.
Melvis jerked a thumb at them. "These here are two boys from DOT."
"Can I have your cards too?" K.C. asked brightly.
"I do not have a card," said Chiun.
Remo offered his. "Can I keep it? I collect them," K.C. asked.
"Sorry," said Remo, taking it back. "Only one."
"They're from back East," Melvis told K.C. Eyeing Chiun, he added, "Way back East."
"Pleased to meet you all. I was riding the California Zephyr when it hit. Sure was an experience, let me tell you. But I got some nifty shots of the wreck. Maybe I can make the cover this time."
"You were on the train?" Remo asked.
"Last car. We were going along right smooth when smash! Lights out, boom-boom-bang-ba-boom and we were in the ditch faster than pooh through a possum."
"You're a right lucky lady," said Melvis.
"All except for being defiled in the middle of the Nebraska flatlands," K.C. said ruefully.
"That's means left behind," Melvis told Remo and Chiun.