"What the hell!" Territorial Marshal Sam Cain awoke with a start when the passenger car he and his family were traveling on ground to a screeching, jostling halt, nearly throwing him out of the bunk he had been sleeping in with his wife Emma.
He crawled out of the bunk and moved over to the line of windows across from the bunk. He brushed aside the curtains and peered out into the dark night and was surprised to see that it was snowing heavily. As far as he had known, snow had not been on the horizon, although it was not out of character weather for this time of the year.
"Sam, what is it?"
Sam turned away from the window to see Emma blinking sleepy brown eyes at him. "I don't know Sweetheart, but I'm going to find out."
He dressed in the pants and shirt he had on the night before, slipped on his boots, and strapped on his gun and holster, before leaving the car they were in.
Emma slipped out of bed and checked on their still sleeping children, Melinda and Sammy. Both could sleep through a herd of rampaging buffalo without waking up. She pulled the covers up around them, and gently pushed Sammy away from the edge of the top bunk. As she knew he would, Sammy instinctively rolled over onto his other side and cuddled closer to Melinda.
Emma used the built in water closer while she waited for Sam to return to their car and tell her what he had learned about their abrupt stop. She did not have too long to wait.
"Well, what's going on?"
"A long stretch of the tracks is under several feet of snow. The engineer thinks that an avalanche happened in response to the echoing sound of the train's engine as it came closer to the area. It's going to take awhile for the railroad workers to dig the tracks out enough for us to travel safely through."
"How long do you think it's going to take them to do that?" Emma asked, her heard sinking at the thought of them missing Christmas with the rest of their PX family.
"A day at least, maybe longer, as it is they aren't going to be able to start the digging until daylight. The area is too treacherous for them to be moving around with just lantern light to guide them." Sam took a seat next to her on the bottom bunk.
"I so wanted to spend Christmas with everyone." Emma said softly.
"I know you did," Sam replied. "Don't give up on doing that just yet. We still have two days to go until its Christmas."
Emma smiled. "You're right. We'll just have to make do. Guess this is a better place for us to be than somewhere else or traveling by horses through this mess."
Sam nodded. "I sure hope Buck and Cherokee, Jimmy and Amanda, and their kids made it to Sweetwater before the snow started falling."
"I hope so too. The youn'uns don't need to be out in this kind of weather." Emma fretted.
"Buck and Jimmy are resourceful men, Emma. They'll make sure their families are taken care of."
"I suppose you are right."
"Let's try and get some more sleep before the children wake up." Sam suggested, unbuttoning his shirt and slipping it off, before he pulled his boots off, and then stripped out of his denims once again.
Emma slipped back under the covers, sighing at their warmth, and held them up for Sam to slip underneath beside her. Sam put his arm around her and Emma cuddled close, and soon sleep claimed both of them.
The railroad workers worked hard the next day to clear the snow from the tracks, and by late afternoon, the train was on the move again toward the Wyoming Territory.