- [first lines]
- Louise Ellison: [in her newspaper article] To build the Transcontinental Railroad, Thomas 'Doc' Durant once said, "A man must face his demons and destroy them, or become undone by them." The Hell on Wheels of 1868 is no place for bashful men, the deluded, or unassured. No place for sloppy men, drunk and disorderly in their heavenly vestments, on their way to an early grave. The railroad has contained the West these last three years, with its iron horse and rails pinned to the ground. Each passing day brings with it civilization, if not civility. And men in suits, who do now with their pens what earlier rougher men did with their guns.
- Louise Ellison: Cullen Bohannan, late of the Union Pacific, is more gunman than suit. His return to Cheyenne, these days referred to as the Magic City of the Plains, after months lost to the prairie and presumed dead, with a Mormon wife and child in tow, might be just the grease we need to turn the wheels of our national obsession. Buried these long winter months in snow, and now up to his wheel wells in mud. Or, might he be the match-strike of self-emolation, for Mr. Bohannan has always worn his integrity like a millstone around his neck.
- Psalms: Never thought I'd see the day where I'd be the boss of the boss.
- Cullen Bohannan: Don't get used to it Psalms.
- Eva: [with a knife to her throat] I don't want my money back, I swear. I just want to know how you cheated me.
- Gambler: You cheated yourself, woman, by sitting down at a table with the likes of me. Now you are either desperate, greedy, or stupid.
- Eva: I'm desperate. And stupid. And I need to know how you did it.
- Gambler: That's dangerous knowledge for someone who doesn't know how to use it.
- Eva: I know how to use it.
- Eva: I've considered you a friend, Mr. Bohannan. I expect that might mean something to you, since you ain't had many.
- Cullen Bohannan: Well, one fewer now.
- Cullen Bohannan: Everything I put my had to - all the death and destruction and was put to me - all that is for naught if I don't finish this road.
- Louise Ellison: I'm interested in your story, Mr. Bohannan. My readers will be, as well.
- Cullen Bohannan: [chuckles] Ain't a story, Miss Ellison, just a life. It's mine to live. Nobody's to read about.
- Cullen Bohannan: You know, ain't none of this is your fault, son.
- Ezra Dutson: You traded yourself for me.
- Cullen Bohannan: Come on, you would have done the same.
- Ezra Dutson: Anyways, thank you.
- Cullen Bohannan: You're welcome.
- [last lines]
- Louise Ellison: [in her newspaper article] The defrocked Chief Engineer's return to Cheyenne means another actor has entered the play, already half finished. With the bombastic dreamer, his legacy depending on completing this road. And the carpetbagging bureaucrat, tasked with bringing civilization to a land that, just yesterday, boasted wild and free. Cullen Bohannon, for reasons this reporter has yet to divine, seems determined to see this road through. Whether he does it as laborer or boss, alive or dead, only time will tell, dear reader. Only time will tell.