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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..11ae708 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #54111 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54111) diff --git a/old/54111-0.txt b/old/54111-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index b4d186f..0000000 --- a/old/54111-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,10193 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of On The Iron At Big Cloud, by Frank L. Packard - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: On The Iron At Big Cloud - -Author: Frank L. Packard - -Release Date: February 23, 2017 [EBook #54111] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - - - -ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD - -By Frank L. Packard - -McClelland & Goodchild Limited - -Prospect Press, Printers New York, U.S.A. - -1911 - -[Illustration: 0001] - -[Illustration: 0006] - -[Illustration: 0007] - - -TO - -MY FATHER - -_LUCIUS HENRY PACKARD_ - - - - - -ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD - - - - -I--RAFFERTY’S RULE - -The General Manager of the Transcontinental System glared at the young -man who stood facing him across the office desk. “Why, you wouldn’t last -three months!” he snapped. - -“I’d like to try, uncle.” - -“Humph!” - -“I’m qualified for the position,” young Holman went on. “I’ve done -my stint with the construction gangs and I’ve spent four years in the -Eastern shops. You promised me that if I’d stick I’d have my chance.” - -“Well, if I did, I didn’t promise to put you in the way of making a -fool of yourself and a laughing-stock of me, did I? You may be qualified -technically, I don’t say you’re not. In fact, I’ve been rather pleased -with you; that’s one reason why you’re not going out there to tackle -something you can’t handle. If men like Rawson and Williams can’t hold -down the job, what do you expect to do?” - -“No worse than they, at least,” Holman answered, quietly. “Look here, -uncle, that’s just the point. There aren’t any of the men want the -position, so I’m not jumping anybody to take it. I’ll not make any -laughing-stock of you, either. I’m not going out as the Old Man’s -nephew; just plain Dick Holman. If I don’t make good you can wash your -hands of my railroad career.” - -“Young man,” said the General Manager, severely, “don’t make rash -statements.” - -He pushed the papers on his desk irritably to one side. Then he frowned. -Two years ago, when the road had dug, blasted, burrowed, and trestled -its right of way through the mountains, they had built the repair shops -for the maintenance of the rolling stock, and from the moment the first -brass time-check had been issued the locomotive-foremanship of the Hill -Division was no subject to be introduced with temerity anywhere within -the precincts of the executive offices. One man after another had -gone out there, and one after another they had resigned. “Hard lot -to handle,” Carleton, the division superintendent, had replied to the -numerous requests for explanation that had been fired at him. And now -Dick wanted to go. The general manager’s fingers beat a tattoo on the -desk and his frown deepened into a scowl. “You’re a young fool,” he -grunted at last. - -And Holman knew that he had gained his point “That’s very good of you, -uncle,” he cried. “I knew you’d see it my way. When may I start?” - -“I guess you’ll get there soon enough,” his uncle answered grimly. He -rose from his chair and accompanied Holman to the door. “Well, go if you -want to, but remember this, young man, you’re going on your own -terms. When you resign from _that_ position, you resign from the road, -understand!” - -“All right, uncle,” Holman laughed in reply. “It’s a bargain.” - -Three days later, as Number One pulled into Big Cloud, Holman swung -himself to the platform. Up past the mail and baggage cars, the steam -drumming at her safety, a big ten-wheeler was backing down to couple on -for the run through the Rockies. There was the pride of proprietorship -in his glance as his eyes swept the great mogul critically, for in his -pocket was his official appointment as Locomotive Foreman of the Hill -Division, vice Williams, resigned. - -It was not until the last of the Pullmans had rolled smoothly past him -that he turned to take stock in his surroundings. The first impression -was not prepossessing. Before him, just across the yard filled with -strings of freight cars, were the low, rambling, smoke-begrimed shops -and running shed, while beyond these again the town straggled out -monotonously. - -To the westward, through the mountains, were the curves and grades -that wrenched and racked and tore the equipment he would hereafter be -accountable for. To the eastward--but “eastward” was only two hundred -yards away, for there his eye caught the “Yard Limit” post, that -likewise marked the end of the division. - -If after this cursory survey there still lingered any illusions of the -picturesque in Holman’s mind, they were rudely dispelled by the interior -of the barn-like structure at the side of the platform that did duty -for station, division headquarters, general storeroom, and anything -else that might seek the shelter of its protecting roof. The walls -were adorned with such works of art as are afforded by the Sunday -supplements, interspersed here and there with an occasional blue-print -and time schedule. The furnishings bore unmistakable evidence of having -seen service with the construction staff when the road was in the -making. At the right of the door, as Holman entered, the despatcher was -poring over the train sheet. - -“Sure,” said he in answer to Holman’s inquiry, “that’s the super over -there.” - -Holman crossed the room and proffered his credentials. - -“Glad you’ve come,” was Carleton’s greeting, as he rose and extended -his hand. “We’ve been expecting you. Williams went East this morning on -Number Two. Sit down. That’s your desk there.” - -Holman glanced at the battered table toward which the other pointed, -then back again to the four days’ growth on the super’s face. - -Carleton grinned. “Fixings aren’t up to what you boiled-shirt fellows -down East are used to. Out here on the firing line most anything goes. -I’ve been requisitioning office fixtures for months. Ain’t seen -any way-bill of them yet, Davis, have you?” he called across to the -despatcher. - -Davis got up with a laugh and joined the other two. “No,” said he, -shaking hands with Holman, “not yet.” - -“And not likely to, either,” continued the super. “It’s rough and ready -out here, Holman. The staff quarters up there,” he jerked his thumb -toward the ceiling, “are all-fired crude, and the Chinese cook is a -gilt-edge thief and most persuasive liar; but we’ve got the finest -division of the best railroad in the world, and we’re pushing stuff -through the mountains on a schedule that makes Southern competition -sick. We’re young here yet. Some day, when the roadbed’s shaken down to -stay, we’ll build the extras.” - -The enthusiasm and bluff heartiness of the super was contagious. Holman -put out his hand impulsively. “We’ve heard a lot of you fellows down -East,” he said, “and I’m glad I’ve got a chance to chip in.” His eyes -swept around the room and came back to meet the super’s smilingly. “Even -if accommodations _are_ below ‘Tourist Class,’” he added. - -So Holman came to the division and joined the staff. Spence, chief -dispatcher, had shaken his head. “Twenty-eight and locomotive foreman -of _this_ division with the roughest, toughest bunch on the system’s -pay-roll to handle! Hanged if he isn’t a decent sort, though, even if he -will shave and wear collars. Imagine Williams with creased trousers! -And say, his wardrobe--he’s actually got a dress suit with him! Wouldn’t -that ground the wires! Who is he, Carleton? Got a pull with the Old -Man?” - -“Didn’t inquire,” returned Carleton bluntly. “Let him try out.” - -If the super waited before passing judgment on the latest addition to -the staff of the Hill Division, the shop hands did likewise--but -for another reason. They waited for Rafferty. Rafferty was boss. Who -Rafferty’s boss was, was his affair, and it did not concern them. What -Rafferty said--went. It was two weeks before he delivered his verdict. - -“A damned pink-faced dude!” he announced and terminated his remark with -a stream of black-strap juice by way of an exclamation mark. - -The fiat had gone forth! - -Down in the pits, stripping the engines of their motion gear, the -fitters passed resolutions of confidence in Rafferty’s judgment, -and among the lathes and planers the machinists did likewise. The -concurrence of the forge gang was expressed by a vicious wielding of -the big sledges that sent showers of sparks flying from the spluttering -metal whenever Holman was sighted coming down the shop on a tour of -inspection--a significant intimation to him to keep his distance. And -that the sentiment of the shops might not be lacking in unanimity, the -boilermakers, should Holman have the temerity to pause for an instant -before a shell on which they were at work, would send up a din from -their clattering hammers intolerable to any but the men themselves whose -ears were plugged with cotton waste. - -As for Holman, he might have been entirely unconscious of the hostility -and ill-will of his subordinates for all the evidence he gave of being -aware of it. He was busy mastering the routine and details of his -new position. For a month he said nothing; then one morning over at -headquarters he turned to Carle-ton, who was reading the train mail that -had just come in. - -“Why did Williams resign?” he asked quietly. - -“Eh?” said Carleton, startled out of his calm by reason of the -suddenness of the question. - -“Why did Williams resign?” Holman repeated. - -“Oh, I don’t know. Tired of the life out here, I guess,” Carleton -evaded. - -“Was it Rafferty?” - -Carleton turned sharply to scrutinize the other’s countenance. Holman -was gazing out of the window. - -“It was Rafferty,” Carleton admitted after a moment. - -Holman’s gaze never shifted from the window. “Why wasn’t Rafferty -fired?” he asked in the same quiet tones, but this time there was just -the faintest tinge of accusation in his voice. - -Carleton’s face flushed. An instant’s hesitation, then he answered -bluntly: “He weighed more, that’s why!” - -“Oh!” said Holman significantly. “Then why didn’t you recommend Rafferty -for the position long ago and save all the trouble?” - -“I would have if he could do anything more than sign his name.” - -Holman turned angrily to face the super. “So,” he cried, “when a -fellow comes out here he has to play a lone hand, eh? A show-down with -Rafferty, shop hands, and the whole division drawing cards against him. -You, Carleton, I didn’t put you down as a man with a pet.” - -Carleton got up and put his hand on Holman’s shoulder. “Don’t do it, -either,” he said quietly. “Don’t run off your schedule that way, son. It -has always been man to man, and I wasn’t appealed to. So far it has been -all Rafferty. It’s easier to get a new foreman than a new shop crew, so -I haven’t interfered.” - -“I don’t understand,” said Holman blankly. - -The super laughed shortly. “Rafferty has the men where he wants them. -If he got on his ear he could tie us up so quick we wouldn’t know what -happened. A nice thing for me to admit, isn’t it? But it’s so. I suppose -I should have nipped the whole business in the bud, but I kept on hoping -that each new man would beat Rafferty at his own game. Has he got you -going, too?” - -Holman gathered up the repair reports from his desk and started for the -door. “Game’s young yet,” he flung over his shoulder as he went out. - -From the office Holman walked up the yard to the spur tracks at the end -of the shops where three or four engines were waiting their turn for an -empty pit. He glanced at their numbers, comparing them with the papers -he held in his hand, then turned and walked back, pausing on the way to -inspect an engine, bright and clean as fresh paint and gold leaf would -make her, that had been hauled out of the shops that morning. He passed -in through the upper doors to the fitting-shop. Already another -engine had been shunted in to replace the one that had gone out. Her -guard-plates, links, cross-heads, main and connecting rods were lying on -the floor beside her, and the labor gang were jacking and blocking her -up preparatory to running the wheels out from underneath her. - -There was a trace of heightened color in Holman’s face as he turned to -look for Rafferty. - -The boss fitter was in his usual place. Down the shop, hands dug deep in -his trousers pockets, legs spread wide apart, he swung slowly round and -round on the little iron turntable that intersected the handcar tracks -where they branched out in all directions through the shops. As Holman -approached he stopped the motion indolently by allowing the toe of his -boot to trail along the floor around the table. - -Holman’s manner was quiet and his voice was soft, almost deferential, as -he spoke: “I see you have 483 finished, Mr. Rafferty.” - -Rafferty looked down from his superior two inches and said: “Yis.” - -“And,” continued Holman, “you’ve run in 840 in her place?’ - -“Yis,” said Rafferty again, this time even more indifferently than -before. - -“Well, now, really, Mr. Rafferty, I’d like to know why you did it? You -know I told you yesterday to be particular to take 522 next.” Holman’s -tones were more nearly those of apology than of expostulation. - -For answer Rafferty gave a little shove with his foot and the turntable -began to revolve slowly. During the circuit Rafferty coolly gave some -directions to the men nearest him, and then as he once more came round -facing Holman he stopped. “Fwhat was ut you was sayin’, Mr. Holman?” he -drawled. - -“This is the biggest division on the system, isn’t it?” Holman asked -inconsequently. - -“Eh?” demanded Rafferty. - -“Longest division--most mileage--covers quite a stretch of country,” - Holman amplified. - -“Oh!” returned the other with a grin. “Well, you’ll be thinkin’ so if -you ever sthay long enough to git acquainted wid ut.” - -“Perhaps that’s the reason I am beginning to feel cramped--I’ve only -been here a month, you know,” Holman smiled. - -“Fwhat d’ye mean?” - -“Why, curiously, it doesn’t seem big enough or wide enough or long -enough for even _two_ men.” - -Holman purred his words in soft, mild accents, and Rafferty, -understanding, sneered in quick retort: “Was you thinkin’ av lavin’, Mr. -Holman?” - -“No,” said Holman, slowly, “I don’t know that I was. I thought perhaps -the matter might be adjusted, and I’d like to ask your advice. Now, if -you were locomotive foreman and you found that the foreman of this shop, -in a dirty, low, underhanded fashion was discrediting you with the men, -and furthermore flatly disobeyed your orders, what would you do, Mr. -Rafferty?” - -By the time Holman had completed his arraignment, Rafferty was -mad--fighting mad. “I’ll tell you fwhat I’d do,” he yelled, shaking -a great horny fist under Holman’s nose. “I’d plug him good an’ hard, -that’s fwhat I’d do! See!” - -“Rather drastic,” Holman commented after a pause, during which Rafferty -drew back and with hands on hips stood scowling belligerently. “But -desperate cases sometimes require desperate remedies, and I don’t -know--but--that--” his fist shot out and caught Rafferty fairly on the -point of the jaw--“you’re right!” - -Rafferty, staggering back from the impact of the blow, set the table -whirling. His feet went out from under him and he fell sprawling to the -floor. As he picked himself up, Holman sprang toward him and swinging -twice landed two vicious smashes on Rafferty’s face. Then, except for a -confused recollection of a rush of men, that was all Holman remembered -until he opened his eyes to find himself in his bunk at headquarters -with Carleton bending over him. - -“You’re a sight,” Carleton commented grimly. “What was the muss about?” - -Holman explained. “I took Rafferty’s advice and plugged him, you see, -and after that------” - -“After that if it hadn’t been for old Joe, the turner, running over here -to tell us, they’d have killed you. Don’t you know any better than to -stack up against Rafferty like that, let alone the whole gang? Did you -expect to do them all up?” - -“No, not exactly. I expected there’d be something coming to me, but I -had to do it. I’ll admit, Carleton, I was in a blue funk, but I just -_had_ to. Moral effect, you know.” - -“Yes,” said Carleton savagely, “the moral effect is great! It will be -as much as your life is worth to put your head inside those shops again. -You don’t know the men you’re dealing with out here.” - -“You’re wrong, dead wrong, Carleton, I do. You said it was man to man, -didn’t you? Well, then, either I’m running the shops or Rafferty is. -Rafferty has the men with him because he’s a bully and they’re afraid of -him. It was mere force of habit made them pile on to me. You wait until -they’re cooled off a bit and see.” - -But Carleton shook his head. “You’re a bloomin’ fool,” he summed up -judicially, “but here, shake! You’ve got your grit with you, if you did -leave your sense behind.” - -For the rest of the morning Holman nursed his injuries, but at one -o’clock he was at his desk again. Five minutes afterward Rafferty came -in. He was not a pretty sight with his cut lip and battered eye as -he limped past both Spence and Holman. With a vindictive glare at the -latter he marched straight across the room to where Carleton sat. He -leaned both hands on the super’s desk. - -“Ut’ll be just a show-down, Mr. Carleton, that’s all there is to ut. Me -or him, which?” he announced. - -Carleton tilted his chair back, put his feet up on the desk and his -thumbs in the armholes of his vest. “State your case; Rafferty,” he said -calmly. - -“Case!” Rafferty spluttered. “Case is ut? I’m sick av bein’ bossed bye -kids out av school that was buildin’ blocks whin I was buildin’ enjines. -I quit or he does!” Rafferty jerked his thumb in Holman’s direction. - -“Is that all you have to say, Rafferty?” - -“That’s about the size av ut.” - -“Very well, Rafferty, you can get your time,” said Carleton quietly. - -For a moment Rafferty stared as though he had not heard aright, then -he swung round on his heel only to turn again and face the super with -a short laugh. “All right, Mr. Carleton, you’re the docthor. It’s -satisfied I am. Whin I go out, every bloomin’ man in the shops ‘ull go -out wid me!” - -Carleton’s feet came off the desk like a shot, his chair came down to -the floor with a bang, and the next instant he was standing in front of -the boss fitter. - -“See here, Rafferty,” he blazed, “you know me--the men know me. While -I’ve held the bank there’s been fifty-two cards in the case and every -mother’s son of you has had a square deal. You know it, don’t you? No -man on this division ever came to me with just cause for complaint but -had a chance to state his grievance on a clear track and no limit on his -permit either. Now, I’m entitled to the same line of treatment I hand -out, and I won’t stand for threats!” - -Rafferty shifted uneasily and to hide his confusion reached for his -“chewing.” - -“We’ve nothin’ agin you, Mr. Carleton, an’ I’m givin’ you fair warnin’,” - he mumbled as his teeth met in the plug. - -“When you make trouble on this division you make trouble for me,” said -Carleton bluntly. “As for warning, I give you warning now that if you -start any disturbance in those shops it will be the worse for you. Now -go!” - -They watched him through the windows as he crossed the tracks. Finally, -as he disappeared inside the shops, Carleton turned with a grave face. - -“I’m afraid it’s going to be a bad business,” he said. - -“You don’t mean to say,” Holman burst out, “that the men are fools -enough to quit just because one man with a grouch says so, do you?” - -“I told you that you didn’t know the class of men out here--they’re -partisan to the core--it’s bred in them. I’m not blaming you, -Holman--not for a minute! As I said this morning, I’ve seen it coming -for a long while--long before Williams gave up the ghost. Now it’s here, -we’ll face the music, what?” - -“It’s mighty good of you to say so, old man,” said Holman, slowly, “but -I’ve put you in a bad hole, and it’s up to me to get you out of it. -Inside of two weeks with the repair shops on strike our rolling stock -won’t be able to handle the traffic.” He put on his hat and started for -the door. - -“Where are you going?” Carleton demanded. - -“Rafferty’s not going to have this all his own way. The men have no -grievance, and I don’t believe they’ll follow him out if they’re talked -to right. I’m going over.” - -“Not if I know it, you’re not,” said Carleton grimly. “There may be a -coroner’s inquest before this affair is settled, perhaps more than one -if things get nasty, but I’m hanged if I propose starting in that way -this afternoon.” - -“That’s all right,” Holman replied doggedly. - -“Just the same, I’m--Eh? What’s up, Carleton? What’s wrong?” - -Spence had bent suddenly over the key, and Carleton, with a startled -exclamation, was staring at the words the dispatcher was hastily -scribbling on the pad. Holman leaned over the super’s shoulder and even -as he saw Carleton reach to plug in the telephone connection with the -roundhouse, he read the message: “Number Two wrecked Eagle Pass. Send -wrecker and medical assistance at once.” The next instant he was flying -across the yard to the shops. - -As he burst in through the door he was greeted with a snarl. The men -were massed in a body around one of the locomotives in the fitting-shop, -and Rafferty, from the cab, was talking in fierce, heated tones. At -sight of the master mechanic he stopped short and with an oath leaped -from his perch straight for Holman. The crowd divided, making a lane -between the two men, then, with startling suddenness, breaking the -ominous silence that had fallen, there came three short blasts from -the shop whistle--the wrecker’s signal. It halted Rafferty when but an -arm’s-length from the locomotive foreman. Then Holman spoke: - -“You hear that, men? Number Two has gone to glory up in Eagle Pass. You, -Rafferty, get the wrecking crew together, _quick!_ The rest of you get -back to work.” - -“You’re a liar!” Rafferty yelled. “A measly, putty-faced, starch-shirted -liar, d’ye hear? Ut’s a plant! You can’t work any sharp trick loike that -on me!” - -There was a low, menacing growl from the men and they edged in close. -But Holman gave them no heed; he took a step nearer Rafferty, looking -straight into the other’s eyes. - -“Rafferty,” he said quietly, “you’ve a wife and kids, haven’t you? And -you’re a railroad man, aren’t you? Well, there’s wives and kids and -mates up there in that wreck. The other affair can wait until we get -back. Now, will you go?” - -And Rafferty went--at the head of the wreckers--out into the yard where -the switching crew were working like beavers making up the relief train. -Two passenger coaches to serve as ambulances, behind them a flat, then -the wrecking crane, the tool car, and a caboose. As Rafferty was piling -his men into the train, Holman raced across the tracks to the station. -On the platform the doctors, hastily summoned, were crowded around -Carleton. Holman stopped beside them. “We’re all ready, Carleton,” he -announced; then to the others: “You fellows had better get aboard; we’ll -be off as soon as we get the track.” - -“Spence will have the line clear in a minute,” said Carleton, as the -doctors started for the coaches. “I’m sending a dispatcher up with you; -he can tap in on the wires. How many men did you scrape up?” - -“The regular crew.” - -“And Rafferty?” - -“He’s going along.” - -“I don’t know how you did it, and there’s no time for explanations now; -but I think, Holman, you’d better leave Rafferty behind.” - -“And have the whole crew quit, too? It’s no use, Carleton, he’s got to -go. That’s all there is to it.” - -Carleton shook his head doubtfully. “I don’t like the idea of you two -getting up there together. There’s no need of you going, and you’d -better not go. You don’t know the man; if you think he’ll forget----” - -“You’re wrong, I do. I told you so before; anyway, it’s too late -now--we’re off. Here’s Spence with the orders.” - -Before Carleton could reply, Holman had grabbed the tissue and was -running for the train. As he swung himself into the cab of the engine -and handed Hurley, the driver, his orders, Rafferty climbed in from the -other side. - -At sight of Holman, Rafferty hesitated and half turned around in the -gangway to go back to the caboose; but Holman reached out and caught his -arm. - -“Stay where you are, Rafferty,” he said quietly. And during the -nerve-racking thirty-mile run to Eagle Pass no other words passed -between them. Sometimes in the mad slur of the locomotive as she hit the -tangents their bodies touched; that was all. - -Holman, by virtue of railroad etiquette, had climbed to the fireman’s -seat and once or twice he had glanced around at the great bulk of the -man behind him, at the grim, set features, at the eyes that would -not meet his, and wondered at his own temerity in inviting a physical -encounter. And what good had it done? Was Carleton right after all? -Perhaps. And yet behind the stubbornness, the self-will, the purely -physical, there must be the other side of the man. If he could only -reach it--only touch it. He _had_ touched it. His appeal for the -injured. - -Hurley was eating up the miles as only a man at the throttle of a -wrecker with clear rights could do it. A long scream from the whistle -that echoed through the mountains above the pounding, deafening rush -of the train brought Holman back to his immediate surroundings. Another -minute and they had swung round the curve and thundered over the trestle -that made the approach to the Pass. - -Half a mile ahead of them up the track they saw the horror. Hurley -latched in his throttle and began to check. As the brake-shoes bit into -the tires, Holman slipped off his seat and faced Rafferty. There was a -curious look in the other’s eyes, and Holman understood. Understood that -here Rafferty was his master--and knew it. So this was the meaning of -it. This was how he had touched the other’s better nature! Rafferty -had cunningly seized the opportunity of placing him at an even greater -disadvantage than before. For an instant he hesitated as he bit his lip, -then he canceled the personal equation. “Go ahead, Rafferty,” he said -quietly, answering the unspoken challenge, “you’re better up in this -sort of thing than I am. You’re in charge.” - -And Rafferty without a word swung himself from the cab. - -To Holman the first five minutes was unnerving. It was his first bad -wreck. Down East it had never been his province to go out with the -crew--nor was it here, he reflected grimly, and at that moment was -grateful for the veteran Rafferty. It was like some hideous nightmare to -him. All along the line of burning wreckage lay the dead, their silence -the more awful by contrast with the shrieks and cries of the wounded -still imprisoned in the wreck. And then the feeling passed and he -worked--worked like a madman. - -Once a woman had caught his arm and, sobbing, dragged him toward the -stateroom end of one of the Pullmans. Through the smoke and scorching -heat of the flames he had fought his way in, then back with the child. -The woman had thrown her arms hysterically around his neck. - -It was all a mad, furious turmoil, and he gloried in it. The crunch -of the ax through glass and woodwork, the wild rush into the heart of -things to stagger back blinded and choked with his helpless burden. The -fierce joy if life still lingered; the tender reverence if life were -gone. - -Up the track toward the engine there was a crash and a chorus of excited -cries. He rushed in that direction. A half-dozen of the wrecking crew -were grouped around the forward baggage-car. As Holman reached them, -disheveled, clothes torn and scorched, face blackened with smoke and -daubed with blood where glass and splinters had cut him, the men drew -back aghast, staring white-faced. - -“By God!” one cried. “It’s _him!_” - -“Of course it’s me! Are you crazy? What’s the matter with you?” - -The man pointed to the blazing car. “Some one said you was in there, and -he went in after you just before she crumpled up.” - -“Who?” Holman shouted. - -“Rafferty.” - -Holman made a dash for the car. The men held him back. “Don’t try it, -sir; it’s too late to do any good.” - -He shook them off, and with his arms crossed in front of his head to -protect his face he half stumbled, half fell through the opening that -had once been a door. The car was half over on its side. The trunks, -dashed into a heap on top of each other when the car had left the track, -were all that supported the burning roof timbers. Between the trunks and -the edge of the car there was a little space with the floor at an -angle of forty-five degrees, and along this, head down, Holman crawled -blindly. The floor was already beginning to smolder, the metal-bound -edges of the trunks blistered his hands as he touched them. His senses -reeled, but on and on he crawled, and in his mind over and over again -the one thought: “Rafferty! My God, Rafferty!” - -Then his hands touched something soft, and slowly, painfully, inch by -inch, he struggled back dragging Rafferty after him. Somehow he reached -the door, then a confused jumble of noises and nothing more until he -returned to consciousness, and to the knowledge that he was back in his -room at Big Cloud with the almond-eyed factotum in attendance. - -“Belly much better? Likee eat?” inquired that individual solicitously. - -Holman grinned in spite of the pain. “No,” he answered; then as he -closed his eyes again he muttered: “Tell Carleton I was right.” - -And he was, for two days afterward Rafferty publicly abdicated. He -gathered the men in the fitting-shop and mounted to the cab of an engine -jacked halfway up to the ceiling as before, only on this occasion it was -at noon hour and not in the company’s time. His words were few and to -the point, delivered with a force and eloquence that was all his own: - -“I sed he was a damned pink-faced dude, so I did. Well, I take ut back, -d’ye moind? An’ fwhat’s more, I’ll flatten the face av any man fwhat sez -I iver sed ut!” - - - - -II--THE LITTLE SUPER - -Tommy Regan backed the big compound mogul down past the string of -dark-green coaches that he had pulled for a hundred and fifty miles, -took the table with a slight jolt, and came to a stop in the roundhouse. -As he swung himself from the cab, Healy, the turner, came up to him. - -“He’s a great lad, that av yours,” Healy began, with a shake of his -head--“a great lad; but mind ye this, Tommy Regan, there’ll be trouble -for me an’ you an’ him an’ the whole av us, if you don’t watch him.” - -“What’s the matter this time, John?” - -“Matter,” said Healy, ruefully; “there’s matter enough. The little cuss -come blame near running 429 into the pit a while back, so he did.” - -“Where is he now?” Regan asked, with a grin. - -“Devil a bit I know. I chased him out, an’ he started for over by the -shops. An’ about an hour ago your missus come down an’ said the bhoy was -no-wheres to be found, an’ that you was to look for him.” Regan pulled -out his watch. “Six-thirty. Well,” he said, “I’ll go over and see if -Grumpy knows anything about him. Next time the kid shows up around here, -John, you give him the soft side of a tommy-bar, and send him home.” - -Healy scratched his head. “I will,” he said; “I’ll do ut. He’s a foine -lad.” - -Regan crossed the yard to the gates of the big shops. They were still -unlocked, and he went through into the storekeeper’s office. Grumpy was -sorting the brass time-checks. He glanced up as Regan came in. - -“I suppose you’re lookin’ fer yer kid again,” he said sourly. - -“That’s what I am, Steve,” Regan returned, diplomatically dispensing -with the other’s nickname. - -“Well, he ain’t here,” Grumpy announced, returning to his checks. “I’ve -just been through the shops, an’ I’d seen him if he was.” - -The engineer’s face clouded. “He must be somewhere about, Steve. John -said he saw him come over here, and the wife was down to the roundhouse -looking for him, so he didn’t go home. Let’s go through the shops and -see if we can’t find him.” - -“I don’t get no overtime fer chasin’ lost kids,” growled Grumpy. - -Nevertheless, he got up and walked through the door leading into the -forge-shop, which Regan held open for him. The place was gloomy and -deserted. Here and there a forge-fire, dying, still glowed dully. At -the end of the room the men stopped, and Grumpy, noting Regan’s growing -anxiety, gave surly comfort. - -“Wouldn’t likely be here, anyhow,” he said. “Fitting-shop fer him; but -we’ll try the machine-shop first on the way through.” - -The two men went forward, prying behind planers, drills, shapers, and -lathes. The machines took grotesque shapes in the deepening twilight, -and in the silence, so incongruous with the usual noisy clang and clash -of his surroundings, Regan’s nervousness increased. - -He hurried forward to the fitting-shop. Engines on every hand were -standing over their respective pits in all stages of demolition, some on -wheels, some blocked high toward the rafters, some stripped to the bare -boiler-shell. Regan climbed in and out of the cabs, while Grumpy peered -into the pits. - -“Aw! he ain’t here,” said Grumpy in disgust, wiping his hands on a piece -of waste. “I told you he wasn’t. He’s home, mabbe, by now.” - -Regan shook his head. “Bunty! Ho, Bunt-_ee_” he called. And again: -“Bun-_tee!_” - -There was no answer, and he turned to retrace his steps when Grumpy -caught him by the shoulder. The big iron door of the engine before them -swung slowly back on its hinges, and from the front end there emerged -a diminutive pair of shoes, topped by little short socks that had once -been white, but now hung in grimy folds over the tops of the boots. A -pair of sturdy, but very dirty, bare legs came gradually into view as -their owner propelled himself forward on his stomach. They dangled for -a moment, seeking footing on the plate beneath; then a very small boy, -aged four, in an erstwhile immaculate linen sailor suit, stood upright -on the foot-plate. The yellow curls were tangled with engine grease and -cemented with cinders and soot. Here and there in spots upon his face -the skin still retained its natural color. - -Bunty paused for a moment after his exertions to regain his breath, -then, still gripping a hammer in his small fist, he straddled the -draw-bar, and slid down the pilot to the floor. - -Grumpy burst into a guffaw. - -Bunty blinked at him reprovingly, and turned to his father. - -“I’s been fixin’ the ‘iger-’ed,” he announced gravely. - -Regan surveyed his son grimly. “Fixing what?” he demanded. - -“The ‘iger-’ed,” Bunty repeated. Then reproachfully: “Don’t know w’at -a ‘iger-’ed is?” - -“Oh,” said Regan, “the nigger-head, eh? Well, I guess there’s another -nigger-head will get some fixing when your mother sees you, son.” - -He picked the lad up in his arms, and Bunty nestled confidingly, with -one arm around his father’s neck. His tired little head sank down on the -paternal shoulder, and before they had reached the gates Bunty was sound -asleep. - -In the days that followed, Bunty found it no easy matter to elude his -mother’s vigilance; but that was only the beginning of his troubles. The -shop gates were always shut, and the latch was beyond his reach. Once -he had found them open, and had marched boldly through, to find his -way barred by the only man of whom he stood in awe. Grumpy had curtly -ordered him away, and Bunty had taken to his heels and run until his -small body was breathless. - -The roundhouse was no better. Old John would have none of him, and Bunty -marveled at the change. - -He was a railroad man, and the shops were his heritage. His soul -protested vigorously at the outrage that was being heaped upon him. - -It took him some time to solve the problem, but at last he found the -way. Each afternoon Bunty would trudge sturdily along the track for a -quarter of a mile to the upper end of the shops, where the big, wide -engine doors were always open. Here four spur-tracks ran into the -erecting-shop, and Bunty found no difficulty in gaining admittance. Once -safe among the fitting-gang, the little Super, as the men called him, -would strut around with important air, inspecting the work with critical -eyes. - -One lesson Bunty learned. Remembering his last interview with his -mother, he took good care not to be locked in the shops again. So each -night when the whistle blew he fell into line with the men, and, secure -in their protection, would file with them past Grumpy as they handed in -their time-checks. And Grumpy, unmindful of the spur-tracks, wondered -how he got there, and scowled savagely. - -When Bunty was six, his father was holding down the swivel-chair in the -Master Mechanic’s office of the Hill Division, and Bunty’s allegiance -to the shops wavered. Not from any sense of disloyalty; but with his -father’s promotion a new world opened to Bunty, and fascinated him. It -was now the yard-shunter and headquarters that engaged his attention. -The years, too, brought other changes to Bunty. The curls had -disappeared, and his hair was cut now like his father’s. Long stockings -had replaced the socks, and he wore real trousers; short ones, it is -true, but real trousers none the less, with pockets in them. - -When school was over, he would fly up and down the yard on the stubby -little engine, and Healy, doing the shunting then and forgetting past -grievances, would let Bunty sit on the driver’s seat. In time Bunty -learned to pull the throttle, but the reversing-lever was too much for -his small stature, and the intricacies of the “air” were still a little -beyond him. But Healy swore he’d make a driver of him--and he did. - -The evenings at the office Bunty loved fully as well. Headquarters -were not much to boast about in those days. That was before competition -forced a doubletrack system, and the train-dispatcher, with his tissue -sheets, still held undisputed sway. They called them “offices” at Big -Cloud out of courtesy--just the attic floor over the station, with one -room to it. The floor space each man’s desk occupied was his office. - -Here Bunty would sit curled up in his father’s chair and listen to -the men as they talked. If it was anything about a locomotive, he -understood; if it was traffic or bridges or road-bed or dispatching, he -would pucker his brows perplexedly and ask innumerable questions. But -most of all he held Spence, the chief dispatcher, in deep reverence. - -Once, to his huge delight, Spence, holding his hand, had let him tap out -an order. It is true that with the O. K. came back an inquiry as to the -brand the dispatcher had been indulging in; but the sarcasm was lost on -Bunty, for when Spence with a chuckle read off the reply, Bunty gravely -asked if there was any answer. Spence shook his head and laughed. “No, -son; I guess not,” he said. “We’ve got to maintain our dignity, you -know.” - -That winter, on top of the regular traffic, and that was not light, they -began to push supplies from the East over the Hill Division, preparing -to double track the road from the western side of the foothills as soon -as spring opened up. And while the thermometer crept steadily to zero, -the Hill Division sweltered. - -Everybody and everything got it, the shops and the road-beds, the train -crews and the rolling-stock. What little sleep Carleton, the super, got, -he spent in formulating dream plans to handle the business. Those that -seemed good to him when he awoke were promptly vetoed by the barons of -the General Office in the far-off East. - -Regan got no sleep. He raced from one end of the division to the other, -and he did his best. Engine crews had to tinker anything less than a -major injury for themselves: there was no room in the shops for them. - -But the men on the keys got it most of all. As the days wore into -months, Spence’s face grew careworn and haggard; and the irritability -from overwork of the men about him added to his discomfort. Human nature -needs a safety-valve, and one night near the end of January when Regan -and Carleton and Spence were gathered at the office, with Bunty in his -accustomed place in his father’s chair, the master mechanic cut loose. - -“It’s up to you, Spence,” he cried savagely, bringing his fist down with -a crash on the desk. “There ain’t a pair of wheels on the division fit -to pull a hand-car. Every engine’s a cripple, and getting lamer every -day. The engine ain’t built, nor never will be, that’ll stand the -schedule you’re putting them on through the hills, especially through -the Gap. That’s a three per cent, with the bed like an S. You can’t make -time there; you’ve got to crawl. You’re pulling the stay-bolts out of my -engines, that’s what you’re doing.” - -Carleton, being in no angelic mood, and glad to vent his feelings, -growled assent. - -Spence raised his head from the keys, a red tinge of resentment on his -cheeks. He picked up his pipe, packing it slowly as he looked at Regan -and the super. “I’m taking all they’re sending,” he said quietly. He -reached over for the train-sheet and handed it to the super. “You -and Regan here are growling about the schedule. It’s your division, -Carleton; but I’m not sure _you_ know just what we’re handling every -twenty-four hours. It’s push them through on top of each other somehow, -or tell them down-East we can’t handle them. Do you want to do that?” - -“No,” said Carleton, “I don’t; and what’s more, I won’t.” - -Spence nodded. “I rather figured that was your idea. Well, we’ve about -all we can do without nagging one another. I’m near in now, and so are -you and Regan here, both of you. I’ve got to make time, Gap or no Gap. -There’s so much moving there isn’t siding enough to cross them.” - -“You’re right,” said Carleton; “we can’t afford to jump each other. -We’re all doing our best, and each of us knows it. How’s Number One and -Two tonight?” - -Spence studied for a moment before he answered: “Number One is forty -minutes off, and Number Two’s an hour to the bad.” - -Carleton groaned. The Imperial Limited West and East, officially known -on the train-sheets as One and Two, carried both the transcontinental -mail and the de-luxe passengers. Of late the East had been making -pertinent suggestions to the Division Superintendent that it would be as -well if those trains ran off the Hill Division with a little more regard -for their established schedule. So Carleton groaned. He got up and put -on his hat and coat preparatory to going home. “Look here,” he said from -the doorway, “they’ll stand for ‘most anything if we don’t misuse One -and Two. They’re getting mighty savage about that, and they’ll drop -hard before long. You fellows have got to take care of those trains, -if nothing else on the division moves. That’s orders. I’ll shoulder all -kicks coming on the rest of the traffic. Good-night.” - -When Bunty left the office that night and walked home with his father, -he had learned that there was another side to railroading besides the -building and repairing of engines, and the delivery of magic tissue -sheets to train crews that told them when and where to stop, and how to -thread their way through hills and plains on a single-track road, with -heaps of other trains, some going one way, some another. He understood -vaguely and in a hazy kind of way that somewhere, many, many miles away, -were men who sat in judgment on the doings of his father and Spence and -Carleton; that these men were to be obeyed, that their word was law, and -that their names were President and Directors. - -So Bunty, trotting beside his father, pondered these things. Being too -weighty for him, he appealed: “Daddy, what’s president and directors?” - -Regan’s temper being still ruffled, he answered shortly: “Fools, -mostly.” - -Bunty nodded gravely, and his education as a railroad man was almost -complete. The rest came quickly, and the Gap did it. - -The Gap! There was not a man on the division, from track-walker to -superintendent, who would not jump like a nervous colt if you said -“Gap!” to them offhand and short-like. A peaceful stretch of track -it looked, a little crooked, as Regan said, hugging the side of the -mountain at the highest point of the division. The surroundings were -undeniably grand. A sheer drop of eighteen-hundred feet to the canon -below, with the surrounding mountains rearing their snow-capped peaks -skyward, completed a picture of which the road had electrotypes and -which it used in their magazine-advertising. What the picture did not -show was the two-mile drop, where the road-bed took a straight three -per cent and sometimes better, to the lower levels. So when Carleton -or Spence or Regan, reading their magazines, saw the picture, they -shuddered, and, remembering past history and fearful of the future, -turned the page hurriedly. - -But to Bunty the Gap possessed the fascination of the unknown. He was -wakened early the next morning by his father’s voice talking excitedly -over the special wire with headquarters about the Gap and a wreck. -He sat bolt upright, and listened with all his might; then he crawled -noiselessly out of bed, and began to dress hastily. He heard his father -speaking to his mother, and presently the front door banged. Bunty was -dressed by that time and he crept downstairs and opened the door softly. - -It was just turning daylight as he started on a run for the yard. It was -not far to the office,--a hundred yards or so,--and Bunty reached there -in record time. Across the tracks by the roundhouse they were coupling -on to the wrecker; and answering hasty summons, men, running from all -directions, were quickly gathering. - -Bunty hesitated a minute on the platform, then he entered the station -and tiptoed softly up the stairs. The office door was open, and from -the top stair Bunty could see into the room. The night lamp was still -burning on the dispatcher’s desk, and Spence was sitting there, working -with frantic haste to clear the line. In the center of the room, the -super, his father, and Flannagan, the wrecking boss, were standing. - -“It’s a freight smash,” Carleton was saying to Flannagan--“east edge of -the Gap. You’ll have rights through, and no limit on your permit. Tell -Emmons if he doesn’t make it in better than ninety minutes he’ll talk to -me afterward. By the time you get there, Number Two will be crawling -up the grade. She’s pulling the Old Man’s car, and that means get her -through somehow if you have to drop the wreck, over the cliff. You -can back down to Riley’s to let her pass. We’ll do the patching up -afterward. Understand?” - -Flannagan nodded, and glanced impatiently at Spence. - -The super opened and shut his watch. “Ready, Spence?” he asked shortly. - -“Just a minute,” Spence answered quietly. - -Bunty waited to hear no more. He turned and ran down the stairs and -across the tracks as fast as his legs would carry him. He scrambled -breathlessly up the steps of the tool-car and edged his way in among the -men grouped near the door. He was fairly inside before they noticed him. - -“Hello,” cried Allan, Bunty’s bosom friend of the fitting-gang days, -“here’s the little Super! What you doin’ here, kid?” - -“I’m going up to the wreck,” Bunty announced sturdily. - -The men laughed. - -“Well, I guess _not_ much, you’re not,” said Allan. “What do you think -your father would say?” - -“Nothing,” said Bunty, airily. “I just comed from the office,” he added -artfully, “and I’ll tell you about the wreck if you like.” - -The men grouped around him in a circle. - -“It’s at the Gap,” Bunty began, sparring for time as through the window -he saw Flannagan coming from the office at a run. “And it’s a freight -train, and--and it’s all smashed up, and----” - -The train started with a jerk that nearly took the men off their feet. -At the same time Flannagan’s face appeared at the car door. - -“All here, boys?” he called. Then he announced cheerfully: “The devil’s -to pay up the line!” - -Meanwhile, Bunty, taking advantage of the interruption, had squirmed his -way through the men to the far end of the car, and the train had bumped -over the switches on to the main line before they remembered him. Then -it was too late. They hauled him out from behind a rampart of tools, -where he had intrenched himself, and Flannagan shook his fist, -half-angrily, half-playfully, in Bunty’s face. - -“You little devil, what are you doing here, eh?” he demanded. - -And Bunty answered as before: “I’m going up to the wreck.” - -“Humph!” said Flannagan, with a grin. “Well, I guess you are, and I -guess you’ll be sorry, too, when you get back and your dad gets hold of -you.” - -But Bunty was safe now, and he only laughed. - -Breakfastless, he shared the men’s grub and listened wide-eyed as they -talked of wrecks in times gone by; but most of all he listened to the -story of how his father, when he was pulling Number One, had saved the -Limited by sticking to his post almost in the face of certain death. -Bunty’s father was his hero, and his small soul glowed with happiness at -the tale. He begged so hard for the story over again that Allan told -it, and when he had finished, he slapped Bunty on the back. “And I guess -you’re a chip of the old block,” he said. - -And Bunty was very proud, squaring his shoulders, and planting his feet -firmly to swing with the motion of the car. - -The speed of the train slackened as they struck the grade leading up -the eastern side of the Gap. Flannagan set the men busily at work -overhauling the kit. He paused an instant before Bunty. “Look here, -kid,” he said, shaking a warning finger, “you keep out of the way, and -don’t get into trouble.” - -It would have taken more than words from Flanna-gan to have curbed -Bunty’s eagerness; so when the train came to a stop and the men tumbled -out of the car with a rush, he followed. What he saw caused him to purse -his lips and cry excitedly, “Gee!” - -Right in front of him a big mogul had turned turtle. Ditched by a spread -rail, she had pulled three boxcars with her, and piled them up, mostly -in splinters, on the tender. They had taken fire, and were burning -furiously. Behind these were eight or ten cars still on the road-bed, -but badly demolished from bumping over the ties when they had left the -rails. Still farther down the track in the rear were the rest of the -string, apparently uninjured. The snow was knee-deep at the side of the -track, but Bunty plowed manfully through it, climbing up the embankment -to a place of vantage. - -His eyes blazed with excitement as he watched the scene before him and -listened to the hoarse shouts of the men, the crash of pick and ax, and, -above it all, the sharp crackle of the fire as the flames, growing -in volume, bit deeper and deeper into the wreck. Fiercely as the men -fought, the fire, with its long start, kept them from making any headway -against it. Already it had reached some of the cars standing on the -track. - -From where Bunty stood he could see the track dipping away in a long -grade to the valley below. They called that grade the Devil’s Slide, and -the wreck was on the edge of it, with the caboose and some half-dozen -cars still resting on the incline. As he looked, far below him he saw a -trail of smoke. It was Number Two climbing the grade. By this time the -excitement of his surroundings had worn off a little, and the arrival of -the Limited offered a new attraction. - -He clambered down from his perch and began to pick his way past the -wreck. Flannagan, begrimed and dirty, was talking to Emmons. “I don’t -like to do it,” Bunty heard Flannagan say, “but we’ll have to blow up -that box-car if we can’t stop the fire any other way, or we’ll have a -blaze down the whole line. The train crew says there’s turpentine--two -cars of it--next the flat there, and if that catches--Hi, there, kid,” - he broke off to yell, as he caught sight of Bunty, “you get back to the -tool-car, and stay there!” - -And Bunty ran--in the other direction. He knew Number Two would stop a -little the other side of the wreck, and that there would be a great big -ten-wheeler pulling her, all as bright as a new dollar and glistening in -paint and gold-leaf. When he pulled up breathless and happy by the -side of Number Two, Masters, the engineer, was giving Engine 901 an oil -round, touching the journals critically with the back of his hand as he -moved along. - -At sight of Bunty, the engineer laid his oil-can on the slide-bars and -grinned as he extended his hand. “How are you, Bunty?” he asked. - -And Bunty, accepting the proffered hand, replied gravely: “I’m pretty -well, Mr. Masters, thank you.” - -“Glad to hear it, Bunty. How did you get here?” - -“I comed up with the wrecker-train. It’s a’ awful smash.” - -“Is it, now! Think they’ll have the line cleared soon?” - -“Oh, no,” Bunty replied, eyeing the cab of the big engine wistfully. -“Not for ever and ever so long.” - -Masters’ eyes followed Bunty’s glance. “Want to get up in the cab, -Bunty?” - -“Oh, please!” Bunty cried breathlessly. - -“All right,” said Masters, boosting the lad through the gangway. Then -warningly: “Don’t touch anything.” - -And Bunty promised. - -It was only four hundred yards up to the wreck; but that was enough. -Masters and his firemen left their train and went to get a view at close -quarters. When it was all over, it was up to the wrecking boss and the -engine crew of Number Two. Flannagan swore he blocked the trucks of the -cars on the incline; but Flannagan lied, and he got clear. Masters and -his mate had no chance to lie, for they broke rules, and they got their -time. - -Be that as it may, Bunty sat on the driver’s seat of the Imperial -Limited and watched the engineer and fireman start up the track. He lost -sight of the men long before they reached the wreck. They were still in -view, but he was very busy: he was playing “pretend.” - -Bunty’s imagination was vivid enough to make the game a fascinating one -whenever he indulged in it, and that was often. But now it was almost -reality, and his fancy was little taxed to supply what was lacking. He -was engineer of the Limited, and they had just stopped at a station. He -leaned out of the cab window to get the “go-ahead” signal. Then his hand -went through the motion of throwing over the reversing-lever and opening -the throttle. And now he was off; faster and faster. He rocked his -body to and fro to supply the motion of the cab. He sat very grim and -determined, peering straight ahead. He was booming along now at full -speed. They were coming to a crossing. “_Too-oo-o, toot, toot!_” cried -Bunty at the top of his shrill treble, for the rules said you must -whistle at every crossing, and Bunty knew the rules. Now they were -coming to the next station, and he began to slow up. “_Ding-dong, -ding--_” - -_BANG!_ - -Bunty nearly fell from his seat with fright. Ahead of him, up the track, -there was a column of smoke as a mass of wreckage rose in the air, and -then a crash. Flannagan had blown up a car. Bunty stared, fascinated, -not at the explosion, but at the rear end of the wreck on the grade. He -rubbed his eyes in bewilderment, then he scrambled over the side of the -seat. He paused half-way off, looking again through the front window -to make sure. There was no doubt of it: the cars were beginning to roll -down the track toward him. He waited for no more, but rushed to the -gangway to jump off. Then he stopped as the story Allan had told about -his father came back to him. Bunty’s heart thumped wildly as he turned -white-faced and determined. No truly engineer would leave his train; his -father had not, and Bunty did not. - -The reversing-lever was in the back notch where Masters had left it -when he stopped the train. It was Bunty’s task to reach and open the -throttle. He climbed up on the seat and stood on tiptoe. Leaning over, -he grasped the lever with both hands and pulled it open. What little -science of engine-driving Bunty possessed, was lost in the terror that -gripped him. The runaway cars were only a couple of hundred yards away -now, and, gaining speed with every rail they traveled, spelt death and’ -destruction to the Imperial Limited, if they ever reached her. The men -at the top of the grade were yelling their lungs out and waving their -arms in frantic warning. - -The train started with a jolt that threw Bunty back on the seat. For an -instant the big drivers raced like pin-wheels, then they bit into the -rails, and aided by the grade, Number Two began to back slowly down the -hill. - -Bunty picked himself up, his little frame shaking with dry sobs. The -freight-cars had gained on him in the last minute, and had nearly -reached him. Again he leaned over for the throttle, and hanging grimly -to it, pulled it open another notch, and then another, and then wide -open. 901 took it like a frightened thoroughbred. Rearing herself from -the track under her two hundred and ten pounds of steam, she jumped into -the cars behind her for a starter with a shock that played havoc with -the passengers’ nerves. Then she settled down to travel. The Devil’s -Slide is two miles long, and some pretty fair running has been made on -it in times of stress; but Bunty holds the record,--it’s good yet,--and -Bunty was only an amateur! - -It was neck and neck for a while, and there was almost a pile-up on -the nose of 901’s pilot before she began to hold her own. Gradually she -began to pull away, and by the time they were half-way down the hill the -distance between her and the truant freight-cars was widening. The speed -was terrific. - -Pale and terror-stricken, Bunty now crouched on the driver’s seat. Time -and again the engineer’s whistle in the cab over his head signaled, now -entreatingly, now with frantic insistence. But Bunty gave it no heed; -his only thought was for those cars in front of him that were always -there. He cried to himself with little moans. - -There was a sickening slur as they flew round a curve. 901 heeled to the -tangent, one set of drivers fairly lifted from the track. When she found -her wheel base again, Bunty, shaken from his hold, was clinging to the -reversing-lever. He shut his eyes as he pulled himself back to his seat. -When he looked again, he saw the freight-cars hit the curve above him, -then slew as they jumped the track and, with a crash that reached him -above the roar and rattle of the train, the booming whir of the great -drivers beneath him, go pitching headlong down the embankment. - -Bunty rose to his knees, and for the first time looked out of the side -window, to find a new terror there as the rocks and trees and poles -flashed dizzily by him. He turned and looked behind. A man was clinging -to the hand-rail of the mail-car, and another, lying flat, was crawling -over the coal heaped high on the tender. Bunty dashed the tears from his -eyes; he was no “fraidy” kid. He stood up, and holding on to the frame -of the window, staggered toward the throttle. As he reached for it, 901 -lurched madly, and Bunty lost his balance and fell headlong upon the -iron floor plate of the cab. Then it was all dark. - -***** - -Number Two pulled into Big Cloud that night ten hours late, and it -brought Bunty. His father and Carleton and Spence and the shop-hands -were on the platform. From the private car, which carried the -tail-lights, an elderly gentleman got off with Bunty in his arms. The -men cheered, and while the master mechanic rushed forward to take his -son, the super and Spence drew back respectfully. - -“Mr. Regan,” said the old gentleman, with tears in his eyes, “you ought -to be pretty proud of this little lad.” - -Regan tried to speak, but the words choked somehow. - -The old gentleman swung himself back upon the car. “Good-by, Bunty!” he -called. - -And Bunty, from the depths of the blanket they had wrapped around him, -called back, “Good-by, sir!” When Bunty was propped up in bed, his -father told him how the express messenger had stopped the train and -carried him back into the Pullmans. - -Bunty listened gravely. “Yes,” he said, nodding his head; “they was -awful good to me, and the man that tooked me off the train told me -stories, and then I told him some, too.” - -“What did you tell him?” Regan asked. - -“Oh, ’bout trains and shops and presidents and directors and--and lots of -things.” - -“Presidents and directors!” said Regan, in surprise. “What did you tell -him about them?” - -“I told him what you said--that they was fools, and you knew, ’cause -you’d seen them.” - -Regan whistled softly. - -“And,” continued Bunty, “he laughed, and when I asked him what he was -laughing at, he gived me a piece of paper and told me to give it to you, -and you’d tell me.” - -Regan groaned. “Guess it’s my time all right,” he muttered. “Where’s the -paper, Bunty?” - -“He putted it in my pocket.” - -Regan drew the chair with Bunty’s clothing on it toward him, and began a -hurried search. He fished out a narrow slip of paper and unfolded it -on his knee. It was a check for one thousand dollars payable to Master -Bunty Regan, and signed by the President of the road. - - - - -III--“IF A MAN DIE” - -East and West now, the Transcontinental is doubletracked, all except -the Hill Division--and that, in the nature of things, probably never -will be. If you know the mountains, you know the Hill Division. From the -divisional point, Big Cloud, that snuggles at the eastern foothills, -the right of way, like the trail of a great sinewy serpent, twists and -curves through the mountains, through the Rockies, through the Sierras, -and finally emerges to link its steel with a sister division, that -stretches onward to the great blue of the Pacific Ocean. - -It is a stupendous piece of track. It has cost fabulous sums, and the -lives of many men; it has made the fame of some, and been the graveyard -of more. The history of the world, in big things, in little things, -in battles, in strife, in suddenf death, in peace, in progress, and in -achievement, has its counterpart, in miniature, in the history of the -Hill Division. There is a page in that history that belongs to “Angel” - Breen. This is Breen’s story. - -It has been written much, and said oftener, that men in every walk -of life, save one, may make mistakes and live them down, but that the -dispatcher who falls once is damned forever. And it is true. I am a -dispatcher. I know. - -Where he got the nickname “Angel” from, is more than I can tell you, -and I’ve wondered at it often enough myself. Contrast, I guess it was. -Contrast with the boisterous, rough and ready men around him, for this -happened back in the early days when men were what a life of hardship -and no comfort made them. No, Breen wasn’t soft--far from it. He was -just quiet and mild-mannered. It must have been that--contrast. -Anyway, he was “Angel” when I first knew him, and you can draw your own -conclusions as to what he is now--I’m not saying anything at all about -that. - -Where did he come from? What was he before he came here? I don’t know. I -don’t believe anybody knew, or ever gave the matter a thought. That -sort of question was never asked--it was too delicate and pointed in the -majority of cases. A man was what he was out here, not what he had been; -he made good, or he didn’t. Not that I mean to imply that there was -anything crooked or anything wrong with Breen’s past, I’m sure there -wasn’t for that matter, but I’m just trying to make you understand that -when I say Breen had the night trick in the dispatcher’s office here in -Big Cloud, I’m beginning at the beginning. - -Breen wasn’t popular. He wasn’t a good enough mixer for that. -Personally, it isn’t anything I’d hold up against him, or any other man. -Popularity is too often cheap, and being a “good fellow” isn’t always a -license for a man to puff out his chest--though most of them do it, and -that’s the high sign that what I say is right. No, I’m not moralizing, -I’m telling a story, you’ll see what I mean before I get through. I say -Breen wasn’t popular. He got the reputation of thinking himself a little -above the rank and file of those around him, stuck-up, to put it in cold -English, and that’s where they did him an injustice. It was the man’s -nature, unobtrusive, retiring--different from theirs, if you get my -point, and they couldn’t understand just because it was different. The -limitations weren’t all up to Breen. - -If they had known, or taken the trouble to know, as much about him as -they could have known before passing judgment on him, perhaps things -might have been a little different; perhaps not, I won’t say, for it’s -pretty generally accepted in railroad law that a dispatcher’s slip is a -capital offense, and there’s no court of appeal, no stay of execution, -no anything, and to all intents and purposes he’s dead from the moment -that slip is made. There have been lots of cases like that, lots of -them, and there’s no class of men I pity more--a slip, and damned for -the rest of their lives! I don’t say that because I’m a dispatcher -myself. We’re only human, aren’t we? Mistakes like that, God knows, -aren’t made intentionally. Sometimes a man is overworked, sometimes -queer brain kinks happen to him just as they do to every other man. -We’re ranked as human in everything but our work. I’m not saying it’s -not right. In the last analysis I suppose it has to be that way. It’s -part of the game, and we know the rules when we “sit in.” We’ve no -reason to complain, only I get a shiver every time I read a newspaper -headline that I know, besides being a death-warrant, is tearing the -heart out of some poor devil. You’ve seen the kind I mean, read scores -of them--“Dispatcher’s Blunder Costs Many Lives”--or something to the -same effect. Maybe you’ll think it queer, but for days afterward I can’t -handle an order book or a train sheet when I’m on duty without my heart -being in my mouth half the time. - -What’s this got to do with Breen? Well, in one way, it hasn’t anything -to do with him; and, then again, in another way, it has. I want you to -know that a blunder means something to a dispatcher besides the loss of -his job. Do you think they’re a coldblooded, calloused lot? I want you -to know that they care. Oh, yes, they’re human. They’ve got a heart and -they’ve got a soul; the one to break, the other to sear. My God! think -of it--a slip. That’s the ghastly horror of it all--a _slip!_ don’t -you think they can _feel?_ don’t you think their own agony of mind -is punishment enough without the added reproach, and worse, of their -fellows? But let it go, it’s the Law of the Game. - -I said they didn’t know much about Breen out here then except that he -was a pretty good dispatcher, but as far as that goes it didn’t help -him any, rather the reverse, when the smash came. The better the man the -harder the fall, what? It’s generally that way, isn’t it? Perhaps you’re -wondering what I know about him. I’ll tell you. If any one knew Breen, I -knew him. I was only a kid then, I’m a man now. I hadn’t even a -coat--Breen gave me one. I’m a dispatcher--Breen taught me, and no -better man on the “key” than Breen ever lived, a better man than I could -ever hope to be, yet he slipped. Do you wonder I shiver when I read -those things? I’m not a religious man, but I’ve asked God on my bended -knees, over and over again, to keep me from the horror, the suffering, -the blasted life that came to Breen and many another man--through a -slip. Yes, if any one knew Breen, I did. All I know, all I’ve got, -everything in this whole wide world, I owe to Breen--“Angel” Breen. - -You probably read of the Elktail wreck at the time it happened, but -you’ve forgotten about it by now. Those things don’t live long in the -mind unless they come pretty close home to you; there’s too many -other things happening every hour in this big pulsing world to make it -anything more than the sensation of the moment. But out here the details -have cause enough to be fixed in the minds of most of us, not only of -the wreck itself, but of what happened afterward as well--and I don’t -know which of the two was the worse. You can judge for yourself -I’m not going into technicalities. You’ll understand better if I don’t. -You’ll remember I said that the Hill Division is only single-tracked. -That means, I don’t need to tell you, that it’s up to the dispatcher -every second, and all that stands between the trains and eternity is the -bit of tissue tucked in the engineer’s blouse and its duplicate crammed -in the conductor’s side pocket. Orders, meeting points, single track, -you understand? The dispatcher holds them all, every last one of them, -for life or death, men, women and children, train crews and company -property, all--and Breen slipped! - -No one knows to this day how it happened. I daresay some eminent -authority on psychology might explain it, but the explanation would be -too high-browed and too far over my head to understand it even if he -did. I only know the facts and the result. Breen sent out a lap order -on Number One, the Imperial Limited, westbound, and Number Eighty-Two, a -fast freight, perishable, streaking east. Both were off schedule, and he -was nursing them along for every second he could squeeze. Back through -the mountains, both ways, all through the night, he’d given them the -best of everything--the Imperial clear rights, and Eighty-Two pretty -nearly, if not quite, as good. Then he fixed the meeting point for the -two trains. - -I read a story once where the dispatcher sent out a lap order on two -trains and his mistake was staring at him all the time from his order -book. I guess that was a slip of the pen, and he never noticed it. That -was queer enough, but what Breen did was queerer still. His order book -showed straight as a string. The freight was to hold at Muddy Lake, ten -miles west of Elktail, for Number One. Number One, of course, as I told -you, running free. Somehow, I don’t know how, it’s one of those things -you can’t explain, a subconscious break between the mind and the -mechanical, physical action, you’ve noticed it in little things -you’ve done yourself, Breen wired the word “Elktail” instead of -“Muddy Lake”--and never knew it--never had a hint that anything was -wrong--never caught it on the repeat, and gave back his O. K. The order, -the written order in the book, was exactly as it should be. It read -Muddy Lake--that was right, Muddy Lake. You see what happened? There -wasn’t time for the freight to make Elktail, but she got within three -miles of it--and that’s as far as she ever got! In a nasty piece of -track, full of trestles and gorges, where the right of way bends worse -than the letter S, they met, the two of them, head on--Number One and -Number Eighty-Two! - -And Breen didn’t know what he had done even after the details began -to pour in. How could he know? What was Eighty-Two doing east of Muddy -Lake? She should have been waiting there for Number One to pass her. The -order book showed that plain enough. And all through the rest of that -night, while he worked like a madman clearing the line, getting up -hospital relief, and wrecking trains--with Carle-ton, he was super then, -gray-faced and haggard, like the master of a storm-tossed liner on -his bridge giving orders, pacing the room, cursing at times at his own -impotency--Breen didn’t know, neither of them knew, where the blame lay. -But the horror of the thing had Breen in its grip even then. I was -there that night, and I can see him now bent over under the green-shaded -lamp--I can see Carleton’s face, and it wasn’t a pleasant face to see. -One thing I remember Breen said. Once, as the sounder pitilessly clicked -a message more ghastly than any that had gone before, adding to the -number of those whose lives had gone out forever, adding to the tale of -the wounded, to the wild, mad story of chaos and ruin, Breen lifted his -head from the key for a moment, pushed his hair out of his eyes with a -nervous, shaky sweep of his hand, and looked at Carleton. - -“It’s horrible, horrible,” he whispered; “_but think of the man who did -it_. Death would be easy compared to what he must feel. It makes me as -weak as a kitten to think of it, Carleton. My God, man, don’t you see! -I, or any other dispatcher, might do this same thing to-morrow, the -next day, or the day after. Tell me again, Carleton, tell me again, that -order’s straight.” - -“Don’t lose your nerve,” Carleton answered sharply. “Whoever has -blundered, it’s not you.” - -Irony? No. It’s beyond all that, isn’t it? It’s getting about as near -to the tragedy of a man’s life as you can get. It’s getting as deep and -tapping as near bed-rock as we’ll ever do this side of the Great Divide. -Think of it! Think of Breen that night--it’s too big to get, isn’t it? -God pity him! Those words of his have rung in my ears all these years, -and that scene I can see over again in every detail every time I close -my eyes. - -In the few hours left before dawn that morning, there wasn’t time to -give much attention to the cause. There was enough else to think -of, enough to give every last man on the division from car tink to -superintendent all, and more, than they could handle--the investigation -could come later. But it never came. - -There was no need for one. How did they find out? It came like the crack -of doom, and Breen got it--got it--and it seemed to burst the floodgates -of his memory open, seemed to touch that dormant chord, and he knew, -knew as he knew that he had a God, what he had done. - -They found the order that made the meeting point Elktail tucked in -Mooney’s jumper when, after they got the crane at work, they hauled him -out from under his engine. Who was Mooney? Engineer of the freight. They -found him before they did any of his train crew, or his fireman either, -for that matter. Dead? Yes. I’m a dispatcher, look at it from the other -side if you want to, it’s only fair. That bit of tissue cleared Mooney, -of course--but it sent him to his death. Yes, I know, good God, don’t -you think I _know_ what it means--to slip? - -It was just before Davis, Breen’s relief, came on for the morning trick, -in fact Davis was in the room, when Breen got the report. He scribbled -it on a pad, word by word as it came in, for Carleton to see. For a -minute it didn’t seem to mean anything to him, and then, as I say, he -got it. I never saw such a look on a man’s face before, and I pray God -I never may again. He seemed to wither up, blasted as the oak is blasted -by a lightning stroke. The horror, the despair, the agony in his eyes -are beyond any words of mine to describe, and you wouldn’t want to hear -it if I could tell you. He held out his arms pitifully like a pleading -child. His lips moved, but he had to try over and over again before -any sound came from them. There was no thought of throwing the blame on -anybody else. Breen wasn’t that kind. Oh, yes, he could have done it. -He could have put the blunder on the night man at the Gap where Mooney -received his Elktail holding order, and Breen’s order book would -have left it an open question as to which of the two had made the -mistake--would probably have let him out and damned the other. You -say from the way he acted he didn’t think of that and therefore the -temptation didn’t come to him. Yes, I know what you mean. Not so much to -Breen’s credit, what? Well, I don’t know, it depends on the way you look -at it. I’d rather believe the thought didn’t come because the man’s soul -was too _clean_. It was clean them--no matter what he did afterward. - -There have been death scenes of dispatchers before, many of them--there -will be others in the days to come, many of them. So long as there are -railroads and so long as men are frail as men, lacking the infallibility -of a higher power, just so long will they be inevitable. But no death -scene of a dispatcher’s career was ever as this one was. Breen was his -own judge, his own jury, his own executioner. Do you think I could ever -forget his words? He pointed his hand toward the window that faced the -western stretch of track, toward the foothills, toward the mighty peaks -of the Rockies that towered beyond them, and the life, the being of the -man was in his voice. They came slowly, those words, wrenched from a -broken heart, torn from a shuddering soul. - -“I wish to God that it were me in their stead. Christ be merciful! I did -it, Carleton. I don’t know how. I did it.” - -No one answered him. No one spoke. For a moment that seemed like all -eternity there was silence, then Breen, his arms still held out before -him, walked across the room as a blind man walks in his own utter -darkness, walked to the door and passed out--alone. Those few steps -across the room--alone! I’ve thought of that pretty often since--they -seemed so horribly, grimly, significantly in keeping with what there -was of life left for the stricken man--_alone_. It’s a pretty hard word, -that, sometimes, and sometimes it brings the tears. - -I don’t know how I let him go like that. I was too stunned to move I -guess, but I reached him at the foot of the stairs as he stepped out -onto the platform. There wasn’t anything I could say, was there? What -would you have said? - -No man knew better than Breen himself what this would mean to him. He -was wrecked, wrecked worse than that other wreck, for his was a living -death. There weren’t any grand jurys or things of that kind out here -then, not that it would have made any difference to Breen if there had -been. You can’t put any more water in a pail when it’s already full, -can you? You can’t add to the maximum, can you? don’t you think Breen’s -punishment was beyond the reach of man or men to add to, or, for that -matter, to abate by so much as the smallest fraction? It was, God knows -it was--all except one final twinge, that I believe now settled him, -though I’ll say here that whatever it did to Breen it’s not for me to -judge her. Who am I, that I should? It is between her and her Maker. -I’ll come to that in a minute. - -Yes, Breen knew well enough what it meant to him, but his thoughts -that morning as we walked up the street weren’t, I know right well, on -himself--he was thinking of those others. And I, well, I was thinking -of Breen. Wouldn’t you? I told you I owed Breen everything I had in the -world. Neither of us said a word all the way up to his boarding-house. -It was almost as though I wasn’t with him for all the attention he paid -to me. But he knew I was there just the same. I like to think of that. -I wasn’t very old then--I’m not offering that as an excuse, for I’m not -ashamed to admit that I was near to tears--if I’d been older perhaps I -could have said or done something to help. As it was, all I could do was -to turn that one black thought over and over and over again in my mind. -Breen’s living death, death, death, death. That’s the way it hit me, the -way it caught me, and the word clung and repeated itself as I kept step -beside him. - -He was dead, dead to hope, ambition, future, everything, as dead as -though he lay outstretched before me in his coffin. It seemed as if I -could see him that way. And then, don’t ask me why, I don’t know, I only -know such things happen, come upon you unconsciously, suddenly, there -flashed into my mind that bit of verse from the Bible, you know it--“if -a man die, shall he live again?” I must have said it out loud without -knowing it, for he whirled upon me quick as lightning, placed his two -hands upon my shoulders, and stared with a startled gaze into my eyes. -I say startled. It was, but there was more. There seemed for a second a -gleam of hope awakened, hungry, oh, how hungry, pitiful in its yearning, -and then the uselessness, the futility of that hope crushed it back, -stamped it out, and the light in his eyes grew dull and died away. - -We had halted at the door of his boarding-house and I made as though to -go upstairs with him to his room, but he stopped me. - -“Not now, Charlie, boy,” he said, shaking his head and trying to smile; -“not now. I want to be alone.” - -And so I left him. - -Alone! _He wanted to be alone_. Were ever words more full of cruel -mockery! It seems hard to understand sometimes, doesn’t it? And we get -to questioning things we’d far better leave alone. I know at first I -used to wonder why Almighty God ever let Breen make that slip. He could -have stopped it, couldn’t He? But that’s riot right. We’re running on -train orders from the Great Dispatcher, and the finite can’t span the -infinite. - -Maybe you’ll think it queer that I left Breen like that, let him go -to his room alone. You’re thinking that in his condition he might do -himself harm--end it all, to put it bluntly. Well, that thought didn’t -come to me then, it did afterward, but not then. Why? It must have been -just the innate consciousness that he wouldn’t do that sort of thing. -Some men face things one way, some face them another. It’s a question -of individuality and temperament. I don’t think Breen could have done -anything like that, I know he seemed so far apart from it in my mind -that, as I say, the thought didn’t come to me. He was too big a man, big -enough to have faced what was before him, faced conditions, faced the -men, though God knows they treated him like skulking coyote, if it had -not been for her. I want to stand right on this. Breen would never have -done what he did if she had $cted differently. That much I know. But, I -want to say it again, I’ve no right to judge her. - -Perhaps you’ve read that story of Kipling’s about the Black Tyrone -Regiment that saw their dead? Well, Breen, as I told you, at the -beginning, wasn’t popular, and the boys had seen their dead. Do you -understand? Pariah, outcast, what you like, they made him, all except -pity they gave him, and I say he would have taken it all, accepted it -all, only there are some things too heavy for a man to bear, aren’t -there? Load limit, the engineers call it when they build their bridge. -Well, there’s a load limit on the heart and brain and soul of a man just -as there is on a bridge; and while one, strained beyond the breaking -point, goes crashing in a horrid mass of twisted wreckage to the bottom -of the canon, to the bottom of the gorge, into the rushing, boiling -waters of the river beneath, the other crashes, a damned soul, to -the bottom of hell. Kitty Mooney had seen her dead. Kitty Mooney, the -engineer’s sister! And Breen loved her, was going to marry her. That’s -all. - -How do I know? How do you know? Perhaps it was grief, perhaps it was -hysteria, perhaps it was according to the light God gave her and she -couldn’t understand, perhaps it was only wild, unreasoning, frantic -passion. I don’t know. I only know she called him--a _murderer_. She -couldn’t have loved him, you say. Perhaps no, perhaps yes. Does it make -any difference? Breen thought she did, and Breen loved _her_. I don’t -know. I only know that where he looked for a ray of mercy, _her_ mercy, -to light the blackened depths, for the touch, _her_ touch, that would -have held him back from the brink, for the word of comfort, _her_ word, -that would have bid him stand like a gallant soldier facing untold odds, -he received, instead, a condemnation more terrible than any that had -gone before, and a bleeding heart dried bitter as gall, a patient, -grief-stricken man became a vicious snapping wolf, and “Angel” Breen--a -devil. - -Would I have been a stronger man than Breen? Would you? Would I have -done differently than Kitty Mooney did if I had been in her place? Would -you? We don’t know, do we? No one knows. God keep us from ever knowing. -The poor devil in the gutters, the wretched, ruined lives of women who -have lost their grip and drunk the dregs, the human, stranded, battered -wrecks we see around us, were once like you and me. We don’t know, do -we? God pity them! God keep us from the sneer! Our strength has never -been measured. It may be no greater than theirs. To-morrow it may be you -or I. - -It was pretty lawless out here in those days. We had the riff-raff of -the East, and worse; and there was nothing to restrain them, nothing -much to keep them in check, and they did about as they liked. They -brought the touch into the picture of the West that the West hasn’t -lived down yet, and I’m not sure ever will. The brawling, gambling, -gun-handling type, the thief, the desperado, the bad man, rotten bad, -bad to the core. They’ve been stamped out now most of them, but it was -different then. _They_ didn’t turn a cold shoulder to Breen. Why should -they? They were outcasts and pariahs, too, weren’t they? And Breen, -well, I guess you understand as well as I do, and you know as I know -that when a man like that goes he goes the limit. There’s no middle -course for some men, they’re not made that way. - -Whatever holds them for good, or whatever holds them for bad, it holds -them all, either way, all, body, mind and spirit, all. And that is true -in spite of the fact that, often enough, there’s some one thing, it may -be a little thing, it may be a big thing, but some one thing that the -worst of us balk at, can’t do. It’s not morality, it’s not conscience, -a man gets way beyond all that; it’s a memory of the past perhaps, a -something bred in him from babyhood. I don’t know. You can’t treat -human nature like a specimen on the glass slide under a microscope. -There is no specimen. As there are millions of people, so is each one -in some way different from the other. You can’t classify, you can’t -tabulate the different kinks into a list and learn it by heart, can you? -The man who says he knows human nature says he is as wise as the God who -made him, and that man is a poor fool. That’s right, isn’t it? And so I -say that, strange as it may seem, in the worst of us, fall as low as -we will, there’s generally some one thing our soul, what’s left of -it, revolts at doing. Breen was a railroad man. Railroading was in his -blood. I want you to get that. It was part of him. Any man that’s worth -his salt in this business is that way. It’s in the blood or it isn’t; -you’re a railroad man or you’re not. - -Breen disappeared from Big Cloud and I didn’t see him from the day -Kitty Mooney turned him from her door until the night--but I’m coming -to that--that’s the end. There’s a word or two that goes before--so that -you’ll understand. He disappeared from Big Cloud, but he didn’t leave -the mountains. Maybe back of it all, an almost impossible theory if you -like, but I can understand it, a something in him wouldn’t let him run -away. He did run away, you say. Yes, but there’s the queer brain kink -again. Perhaps he temporized. You temporize. I temporize. We try to fool -and delude sometimes, snatch at loopholes, snatch at straws, to bolster -up our self-respect, don’t we? That’s what I mean when I say it’s -possible he couldn’t run away. He clung to the straw, the loophole, that -running away was measured in _miles_. I don’t say that was it, for I -don’t know. It’s possible. We heard of him from time to time as the -months went by, and the things we heard weren’t pleasant things to hear. -He drifted from bad to worse, until that something that he couldn’t do -brought him to a halt--brought the end. - -Don’t ask me when Breen threw in his lot with Black Dempsey and the band -of fiends that called him leader--the ugliest, soul-blackened set of -fiends that ever polluted the West, and that’s using pretty strong -language. Don’t ask me how Breen got to Big Cloud that night away from -the others waiting to begin their hellish work. Don’t ask me. I don’t -know. _Why_ he did it--is different. That, I can tell you. What they -wanted him to do, to have a part in, was that one thing I was speaking -about, the one thing he couldn’t do. Breen was a railroad -man, railroading was in his blood, that’s all--but it’s -everything--railroading was in his blood. As for the rest, maybe he -didn’t know what they were really up to until the last moment, and then -stole away from them. Maybe they found it out, suspected him, and some -of them followed him, tried to stop him, tried to keep him from reaching -here. But what’s the use of speculating? I never knew, I never will -know. Breen can’t tell me, can he? And all that I can tell you is what I -saw and heard that night. - -I had the night trick then--Breen’s job--they gave me Breen’s job. -It seemed somehow at first like sacrilege to take it--as though I -was robbing him of it, taking it away from him, wronging, stripping, -impoverishing the man to whom I owed even the knowledge that made me -fit, that made it possible, to hold down a key--his key. Of course, that -was only sensitiveness, but you understand, don’t you? It caught me hard -when I first “sat in,” but gradually the feeling wore off; not that I -ever forgot, I haven’t yet for that matter, only time blunts the sharp -edges, and routine, habit, and custom do the rest. I don’t need to tell -you that I remember that night. Remember it! - -That was before this station was built, and in those days we had an old -wooden shack here that did duty for freight house, station, division -headquarters, and everything else all rolled into one. The dispatcher’s -room was upstairs. - -Things were moving slick as a whistle that night. No extra traffic, -no road troubles, in--out, in--out, all along the line the trains were -running like clockwork from one end of the division to the other. If -there was anything on my mind at all it was the Limited, Number Two, -eastbound. We were handling a good deal of gold in those days, there was -a lot of it being shipped East then--is still, from the Klondyke now, -you know--and we were getting a fair share of the business away from -the southern competition. We hadn’t had any trouble, weren’t looking for -any, but it was pretty generally understood that all shipments of that -kind were to get special attention. Number Two was carrying an extra -express car with a consignment for the mint that night, so, naturally, -I had kept my eye on her more closely than usual all the way through the -mountains from the time I got her from the Pacific Division. At the time -I’m speaking about, four o’clock in the morning, I was almost clear of -her, for she wasn’t much west of Coyote Bend, fifteen miles from here, -and she had rights all the way in. Half an hour more at the most, and -she would be off my hands and up to the dispatchers of the Prairie -Division. She had held her schedule to the tick every foot of the way, -and all I was waiting for was the call from Coyote Bend that would -report her in and out again into the clear for Big Cloud. Coyote Bend is -the first station west of here, you understand? There’s nothing between. -She was due at Coyote at 4.05, and I want you to remember this--I said -it before, but I want to repeat it. I want you to get it _hard_--she had -run to the second all through the night. - -My watch was open on the table before me, and I watched the minute hand -creep round the dial. 4.03, 4.04, 4.05, 4.06, 4.07, 4.08. I was alone in -the office. The night caller had gone out perhaps ten minutes before to -call the train crew of the five o’clock local. There wasn’t anything -to be nervous about. I don’t put it down to that. Three minutes wasn’t -anything. Perhaps it was just impatience, fretfulness. You know how it -is when you’re waiting for something to happen, and I was expecting the -sounder to break every second with that report from Coyote Bend, Anyway, -put it down to what you like, though I didn’t want a drink particularly -I pushed back my chair, got up, and walked over to the water cooler. The -dispatcher’s table was on the east side of the room, the door opened on -the south side, and the water cooler was over in the opposite corner. -I’m explaining this so that you’ll understand that the door was -_between_ the water cooler and the table. That old shack was rough and -ready, and I’ve wondered more than once what ever kept it from falling -to pieces. It didn’t take more than a breath of wind to set every -window-sash in the outfit rattling like a corps of snare drums. That’s -why, I guess, I didn’t hear any one coming up the stairs. It was blowing -pretty hard that night. But I heard the door open. I thought it was the -caller back again, and I wondered how he’d made his rounds in such quick -time. With the tumbler half up to my lips I turned around--then the -glass slipped from my fingers and crashed into slivers on the floor. -My mouth went dry, my heart seemed to stop. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t -move. It was Breen--“Angel” Breen! - -I saw him start at the noise of the splintering glass, but he didn’t -look at me. He clung swaying to the door jamb for an instant, his face -chalky white, then he reeled across the room--_and dropped into his old -chair_. I saw him glance at my watch and his face seemed to go whiter -than before, then he snatched at the train sheet and a smile--no, it -wasn’t exactly a smile, you couldn’t call it that, his whole face seemed -to change, light up, and his lips moved--I know now in a prayer of -gratitude. You understand, don’t you? He knew the time-card, knew that -Number Two, after he had seen my watch, should have been _out_ of Coyote -Bend four, perhaps five, minutes before, but the train sheet showed her: -still unreported. His fingers closed on the key and he began to make the -Coyote Bend call. Over and over, quick, sharp, clear, incisive, with -all the old masterful touch of his sending Breen was rattling the -call--cc,cx--cc,cx--cc,cx--cc,cx. - -And then I found my voice. - -“God in Heaven, Breen!” I stammered, and started toward him. “You! -What------” - -The sounder broke. Coyote Bend answered. And on the instant Breen -flashed this order over the wire. - -“Hold Number Two. Hold Number Two”--twice the sender spelled out the -words. - -Then Coyote Bend repeated the order, and Breen gave back the O. K. - -“Breen!” I shouted. “What are you doing? Are you crazy! What are you -doing here? Speak, man, what----” - -He had straightened in his chair, and a sort of low, catchy gasp came -from his lips. It seemed as though it took all his power, all his -strength, to lift his eyes to mine. I sprang for the key, but he jerked -himself suddenly forward and pushed me desperately away. And then he -called me by the old name, not much above a whisper, I could hardly -catch the words, and I didn’t understand, didn’t know, that the man -before me was a wounded, _dying man_. My brain was whirling, full of -that other night, full of the days and months that had followed. I -couldn’t think. I---- - -“Charlie--boy, it’s all right. Black Dempsey in the Cut. I was afraid -I was too late--too late. They shot--me--here”--he was tearing with his -fingers at his waistcoat. - -And then I understood--too late. As I reached for him, he swayed forward -and toppled over, a huddled heap, over the key, over the order book, -over the train sheet that once had taken his life and now had given it -back to him--dead. - -What is there to say? Whatever he may have done, however far he may have -fallen, back of it all, through it all, bigger than himself, stronger -than any other bond was the railroading that was in his blood. Breen was -a railroad man. - -I don’t know why, do I? You don’t know why, after Number Two had run -to schedule all that night, it happened just when it did. It might have -happened at some other time--but it didn’t. Luck or chance if you like, -more than that if you’d rather think of it in another way, but just a -few miles west of Coyote Bend something went wrong in the cab of Number -Two. Nothing much, I don’t remember now what it was, don’t know that I -ever knew, nothing much. Just enough to hold her back a few minutes, the -few minutes that let Breen sit in again on the night dispatcher’s trick, -sit in again at the key, hold down his old job once more before he quit -railroading forever with the order that he gave his life to send, to -keep Number Two from rushing to death and destruction against the rocks -and boulders Black Dempsey and his gang had piled across the track in -the Cut five miles east of Coyote Bend. - -I don’t know. “If a man die, shall he live again?” I leave it to you. I -only know that they think a lot of him out here, think a lot of Breen, -“Angel” Breen--now. - - - - -IV--SPITZER - -Spitzer was just naturally born diffident. Sometimes that sort of thing -wears off as one grows older, sometimes it doesn’t. When it doesn’t, -it is worse than the most virulent disease--it had been virulent with -Spitzer for all of his twenty-two years. - -Spitzer wasn’t much to look at, neither was he of much account on -the Hill Division. Some men rise to occasions, others don’t; as for -Spitzer--well, he was a snubby-nosed, peaked-faced, touzled-haired -little fellow with washed-out blue eyes that always seemed to carry -around an apology in their depths that their owner existed, and this -idea was backed up a good bit by Spitzer’s voice. Spitzer had a weak -voice and that militated against him. The ordinary voice of the ordinary -man on the Hill Division was not weak--it was assertive. Spitzer -suffered thereby because everybody crawled over him. Nobody thought -anything of Spitzer. They all knew him, of course, that is, those -whose duties brought them within the zone of Spitzer’s orbit, which -was restricted to Big Cloud or, rather, to the roundhouse at Big Cloud. -Nobody ever gave him credit for courage enough to call his soul his -own. Even when it came to pay day he took his check as though it was a -mistake and that it really wasn’t meant for him. He just dubbed along, -doing his work day after day like a faithful dog, only he was a -hanged sight less obtrusive. Summed up in a word, Spitzer ranked as a -nonentity, physically, mentally, professionally. - -Of course he never got ahead. He just kept on sweeping out the -roundhouse and puttering around playing bell-boy to every Tom, Dick and -Harry that lifted a finger at him. Year in, year out, he swept and wiped -in the roundhouse. As far as seniority went he was it, but when it came -to promotion he wasn’t. Promotion and Spitzer were so obviously, so -ostentatiously at variance with each other that no one ever thought of -such a thing. When there was a vacancy others got it. Spitzer saw them -move along, firing, driving spare, up to full-fledged regulars on the -right-hand side of the cabs, men that had started after he did; but -Spitzer still wiped and swept out the roundhouse. - -Carleton, the super, called him a landmark, and that hit the -bull’s-eye. Summer, winter, fall, spring, good weather, bad weather, -five-foot-five-with-his-boots-on Spitzer, lugging a little tin -dinner-pail, trudged down Main Street in Big Cloud as regular as -clockwork, and reported at the roundhouse at precisely the same hour -every morning--five minutes of seven. Never a miss, never a slip--five -minutes of seven. The train crews got to setting their watches by him, -and the dispatchers wired the meteorological observatory every time -their chronometors didn’t tally--that is, tally with Spitzer--and the -meteorological crowd put Spitzer first across the tape every shot. - -It was just the same at night, only then Spitzer went by the six o’clock -whistle. Ten hours a day, Sundays off--sometimes--wiping, sweeping, -sweeping, wiping, from his boarding-house to the roundhouse in the -morning, from the roundhouse to his boarding-house at night--that was -Spitzer, self-effaced, self-obliterated, innocuous, modest Spitzer. - -Night times? Spitzer didn’t exist, there was no Spitzer--it wasn’t -expected of him! If any one had been asked they would have looked their -amazement, but then no one ever was asked--or asked, which is the same -thing the other way. Spitzer was like a tool laid away after the -day’s work and forgotten absolutely and profoundly until the following -morning. No one knew anything about Spitzer after the six o’clock -whistle blew, no one knew and cared less--that is, none of the railroad -crowd knew, and they, when all is said and done, were Big Cloud, they -owned it, ran it, absorbed it, and properly so, since Big Cloud was the -divisional point on the Hill Division. - -In the ineffable perversity of things is the spice and variety of life. -Tommy Regan, the master mechanic, was a man not easily jolted, not -easily disturbed. He was very short, very broad, with little black eyes, -and a long, scraggly, drooping-at-the-corners, brown mustache. Also, he -was blessed with a well-defined, well-nourished paunch--which is a -sign irrefutable of contentment, a calm and placid outlook upon life in -general and particular, and a freedom from the ills of haste and worry. -A man with a paunch is a man apart and greatly to be envied, even when -that paunch, as was the case with Regan, is of Irish extraction, for -then the accompanying touch of Celtic temper makes him more like an -ordinary, cross-grained, irritable, everyday mortal and less of a -temperamental curiosity. Regan was justly proud of both--his paunch and -his nationality. Regan put it the other way--his nationality and his -paunch. That, however, is a matter for individual decision and the -relative importance of things is as one sees it; the main thing is that -one permitted him to use fiery words on occasion, and the other enabled -him to preserve, ordinarily, a much to be commended state of equanimity. - -Perversity of perversities! It was Spitzer that jolted Regan--not once, -more than once. And before he got through, jolted him so hard that Regan -hasn’t got over the wonder of it yet. - -“Think of it,” he’ll say, when the subject is brought up. “Think of it! -You know Spitzer, h’m? Well, _think_ of it! SPITZER!” And if it’s summer -he’ll mop his beady brow, and if it’s winter he’ll twiddle his thumbs -with his fingers laced over his _embonpoint_, which is to say over the -lower button of his waistcoat. - -Regan’s first jolt came to him one morning as, after a critical -inspection of his pets in the roundhouse--big six- and eight-wheeled -mountain engines---he strolled out and leaned against the push-bar on -the turntable, mentally debating the respective merits of a rust-joint -and a straight patch as specifically applied to number 583 that had been -run into the shops the day before for repairs. - -A figure emerged from the engine doors at the far end of the roundhouse -and came toward him. Regan’s eyes, attracted, barely glanced in that -direction, and then went down again in meditation, as he kicked a little -hole in the cinders with the toe of his boot--it was only Spitzer. - -When he looked up again Spitzer was nearer, quite near. Spitzer had -halted before him and was standing there patiently, an embarrassed flush -on his cheeks, wiping his hands nervously on an exceedingly dirty piece -of packing which in his abstraction, for Spitzer was plainly abstracted, -he had picked up for a piece of waste. - -“Huh!” said Regan, staring at Spitzer’s hands, “what you trying to do? -Black up for a minstrel show?” - -Spitzer dropped the packing as though it had been a handful of thistles, -and rubbed his hands up and down the legs of his overalls. - -“Well?” Regan invited. - -Spitzer began to talk, rapidly, hurriedly--that is, his lips moved -rapidly, hurriedly. - -Regan listened attentively and with a strained and hopeless expression, -as he strove to catch a word and hence the drift of Spitzer’s remarks. - -“How?” he demanded, when he saw Spitzer was at an end. “Speak out, man. -You won’t wake the baby up.” - -Spitzer began all over again. This time he did a little better. - -“A dollar twenty-five,” repeated the master mechanic numbly. - -Spitzer brightened visibly, and nodded. - -Regan stared, bewildered and dumfounded. Gradually, impossible, -incomprehensible, incongruous as it appeared, it dawned on him that -Spitzer, even Spitzer, _Spitzer_ was asking for a _raise!_ - -“A dollar twenty-five.” was all Regan could repeat over again, and the -words came away with a gasp. - -Spitzer, misinterpreting the tone, his face grew rueful and full of -trouble. He was appalled at his own temerity in broaching the subject in -the first place, but now he had overstepped the bounds--he had asked for -too much! - -“A dollar twenty,” he ventured, in timid compromise--Spitzer was getting -a dollar fifteen. - -“How long you been working here?” inquired Regan, recovering a little -and beginning to get a grip on himself. - -“Four years,” said Spitzer faintly. - -“Good Lord!” mumbled Regan. “Four years. A dollar twenty-five, h’m? -Well, I dunno, I guess we can manage that.” And then, as a new thought -suddenly struck him: “What the blazes would _you_ do with more money, -h’m?” - -But Spitzer only grinned sheepishly as, after murmuring his thanks, he -walked back and disappeared in the roundhouse. - -“Good Lord!” muttered Regan, looking after him. - -“Four years, and a dollar and a quarter, _and_ Spitzer! Good Lord!” - -Regan went around more or less dazed all that day. He ordered the patch -on 583 when he had definitely decided on the rust-joint as the best -tonic for the engine’s complaint, and he figured out how much one dollar -and fifteen cents a day came to for a year barring Sundays, then he did -the same with a dollar twenty-five as the multiplicand and compared -the results. Spitzer’s demand was not exorbitant, and it wasn’t much -to upset any man--that was just it--it was Spitzer, and Spitzer wasn’t -much. Effect, psychological or otherwise, is by no manner of means to -be measured by the mere magnitude of the cause, it is the phenomenal -and unusual that is to be treated with wholesome respect, and for safe -handling requires a double-tracked, block system with the cautionary -signals up from start to finish--the master mechanic found it that way -anyhow, and he ought to know. - -He unburdened himself that night after supper to Carleton and a few of -the others over at division headquarters, which had been moved upstairs -over the station, where the chiefs used to meet regularly each evening -for a pipe, with a round of pedro thrown in to liven things up a -bit--Big Cloud not being blessed with many attractions in the amusement -line. - -Carleton grinned. - -“Bad company,” he suggested. “Hard lot, that of yours over in the -roundhouse, Tommy. They’re spoiling his manners. Been a long time in -coming, but you know the old story of the water and the stone. What?” - -“What in blazes would _he_ do with more money?” inquired Spence, the -chief dispatcher, in unfeigned astonishment. - -Regan glared disdainfully. He had put precisely the same question to -Spitzer himself, but since then he had been brushing up his mathematics. - -“Do with it!” he choked. “Thirty dollars and eighty cents--_a year_. -Hell of a problem, ain’t it?” - -“Well, you needn’t run off your schedule,” said Spence, a little tartly. -“You’re the one that’s making most of the fuss over it.” - -“Tell you what, Tommy,” remarked Carleton, still grinning, “you want -to look out for Spitzer from now on. I guess his emancipation has -begun--nothing like a start. Before you know it he’ll be running -roughshod over the motive power department, including the master -mechanic.” - -“I give him the raise,” said Regan, more to himself than aloud. “‘Twas -coming to him, what? Four years, and the first time I ever heard a yip -out of him.” - -“You’ll hear more,” prophesied Carleton; “even if he doesn’t talk very -loud.” - -“Think so?” said Regan, puckering up his eyes. - -“I do,” said Carleton. - -And Regan did. - -Not at once, not for several weeks. But in the meantime a change came -over Spitzer. He swept and wiped and reported at five minutes of seven -every morning and kept himself just as much in the background, just as -much out of everybody’s way, just as unobtrusive as he had before, but -Spitzer was none the less changed. - -It began the day after he got his raise. It was an indefinite, elusive, -negative sort of a change, not the kind you could lay your hand on and -describe in so many words. Regan tried to, and gave it up. The nearest -he came to anything concrete was one day when he came around the -tail-end of a tender and, unexpectedly, upon Spitzer. Spitzer was -sweeping as usual, but Spitzer was also whistling--which was not usual. -Regan, it is true, couldn’t puzzle very much out of that, but then Regan -had his limitations. - -Mindful of Carleton’s words, Regan kept his eye in a mildly curious kind -of a way on the little faded, blueeyed drudge, and as he noticed the -first change without being able to define it, he now, after a week or -so, noticed a second, with the difference that this time the diagnosis -was painfully obvious--Spitzer’s return to Spitzer’s normal self. -Spitzer stopped whistling. - -Regan began to catch Spitzer’s eyes fixed on him with a hesitating, -irresolute, anxious gaze about every time he entered the roundhouse. -And though he didn’t quite grasp it, something of the truth came to him. -Spitzer was screwing up his courage to the sticking point preparatory to -another step onward in his belated march toward emancipation. - -It was a month to the day from the first interview when Spitzer tackled -the master mechanic again, and as before, out by the turntable in front -of the roundhouse, and, if anything, in a manner even more nervous and -ill at ease than on the former occasion. He stammered once or twice in -an effort to begin--and his effort was utter failure. - -Regan eyed him in profound distrust. Once in four years wasn’t so much, -and after all, even Spitzer, now that the shock was over, might be -expected to do that. But again in a month--and from Spitzer! Something -was wrong--perhaps Carleton was right. - -“Well,” he snapped, “you got your raise. Ain’t you satisfied?” - -Spitzer nodded dumbly. - -“Well, then, what’s the matter with you if you’re satisfied?” exploded -the master mechanic. - -“I want to get------” the last word trailed off into tremulous, -quavering incoherency. - -“You want to get what?” growled Regan. “Don’t sputter as though you’d -swallowed your teeth. What is it you want to get?” - -“Firing,” blurted Spitzer after a desperate struggle. - -Regan gasped for his breath. Spitzer! SPITZER--in a cab! He couldn’t -have heard straight. - -“Say it again,” whispered the master mechanic. - -“Firing,” repeated Spitzer, with more confidence now that the plunge was -taken. - -“Yes,” said Regan weakly to himself. “That’s it. I got it right--firing! -He wants to get _firing!_” - -“I--I can do it,” faltered Spitzer. “I got to.” - -“Eh? What’s that?” said Regan. “You got to? Say, you, Spitzer, what the -devil’s the matter with you anyway?” - -Spitzer wriggled like a worm on a hook, and his face went the color of a -semaphore arm--a deep red one. Spitzer was suffering acutely. - -“Well, well,” prodded Regan. “Release the air! Take the brakes off!” - -“I’m,” began Spitzer shamefacedly, “I’m------” He gulped down his Adam’s -apple hard, twice, and then it came away with a rush: “I’m going to get -married to Merla Swenson.” - -Regan’s jaw sagged like the broken limb of a tree, and his eyes fairly -popped out and hung down over the roll of his cheeks. Then gradually, -very gradually, he began to double up and unhandsome contortions -afflicted his facial muscles. Spitzer! Spitzer was enough! But Spitzer -_and_ Merla Swenson! Six-foot-heavy-boned-long-armed Swedish-maiden -Merla! Oh, contrariety, variety, perversity of life! - -“Haw!” he roared suddenly. “Haw, haw! Haw, haw, haw!” And again--only -louder. The turner and a helper or two poked their noses out of the -roundhouse doors to get a line on the disturbance. - -Can a stone float? Can a feather sink? Astonishing, bewildering, -dumfounding, impossible, oh, yes; but it was also very funny. It was the -funniest thing that Regan had ever heard in his life. - -“Haw, haw!” he screamed. “Ho, ho! Haw, haw!” - -His paunch shook like jelly, and he held both hands to his sides to ease -the pain. He straightened up preparatory to going off into another burst -of guffaws, and then, with his mouth already opened to begin, he stopped -as though he had been stunned. Spitzer was still standing before him, -and Spitzer’s head was turned away, but Regan caught it, caught the two -big tears that rolled slowly down the grimy cheeks. And in that moment -he realized what neither he nor any other man on the Hill Division had -ever realized before--that Spitzer, too, was _human_. - -Regan coughed, choked, and cleared his throat. Here was Spitzer in a new -light, but the Spitzer of years was not so readily to be consigned to -the background of oblivion. Spitzer in a cab was as much an anomaly as -ever, conjugal aspirations to the contrary. - -“Firing?” said he, with grave consideration that he meant, by contrast, -should serve as palliation for the sting of his mirth. “Firing? I’m -afraid not. You’re not fit for it. You’re not big enough.” - -Spitzer dashed his hands across his eyes. - -“I _can_ fire,” he announced with a surprising show of spirit, “an’ I -_got_ to. There’s smaller ones than me doing it.” - -“What do you mean by ‘got to’?” demanded the master mechanic. - -Spitzer shifted uneasily and kicked at the ground. - -“Merla an’ me’s been making up for quite a while,” he stammered: “but -she wouldn’t say nothing one way or the other till I got a raise.” - -“Well, you got it,” said Regan. - -Spitzer nodded miserably. - -“Yes, an’ now she says ‘tain’t enough to get married on, an’--an’ we’ll -have to wait till I get firing.” - -“Good Lord!” murmured Regan, and he mopped his brow in deep perplexity. -The destiny of mortals was in his hands--but so was the motive power -department of the Hill Division. He could no more see Spitzer in a cab -than he could see the time-honored camel passing through the eye of a -needle. Then inspiration came to him. - -“Look here, Spitzer,” said he, soothingly. “There ain’t any use talking -about firing, and I ain’t going to let you build up any false hopes. But -I’ll tell you what, you don’t need to feel glum about it. She loves you, -don’t she?” - -Spitzer’s lips moved. - -“H’m?” inquired Regan solicitously, bending forward. - -“Yes; she says she does,” repeated Spitzer in thin tones. - -“Yes; well then, when you know women, and as much about ‘em as I do, -you’ll know that nothing else counts--nothing but the love, I mean. It’s -their nature, and they’re all alike. That’s the way it is with all of -‘em”--Regan waved his hand expansively. - -“It’ll be all right. You’ll see. She won’t hold out on that line.” - -Some men profit much by little experience, others profit little by much -experience. Spitzer, possibly, had had little, very little, but the -dejected droop of his shoulders, as he started back for the roundhouse, -intimated that in the matter of knowledge as applied to the eternal -feminine he was perhaps, in so far as it lay between himself and the -master mechanic, the better qualified of the two to speak. And that, -certainly, when concretely applied, which is to say applied to Merla -Swenson. - -Regan couldn’t have kept the story back to save his life, and it didn’t -take long for the division to get it. They all got it--train crews -and engine crews on way freights, stray freights, locals, extras and -regulars, the staff, the shop hands, the track-walkers and the -section gangs down to the last car-tink. At first the division looked -incredulous, then it grinned, and then it howled, and its howl was the -one word “Spitzer!” with seventeen exclamation points after it to make -the tempo and rhythm hang out in a manner befitting and commensurate -with the occasion. - -It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good. Dutchy Damrosch did the -business of his life--he did more business than he had ever dreamed of -doing in his wildest flights of imagination, for Dutchy had the lunch -counter rights at Big Cloud. What’s that got to do with Spitzer and his -marital ambition? Well, a whole lot! Merla Swenson was second girl in -Dutchy’s establishment, and Merla was the “fee-ancy” of Spitzer--which -was a rotten bad pun of Spider Kelly’s, the conductor, and due more to -the brogue-like twist of his tongue than to any malice aforethought. - -To see any girl that was in love with Spitzer was worth the price of -coffee and sinkers any old time. The lunch counter took on the air of -a dime museum, and the visitors questioned Merla anxiously, a little -suspicious that after all there might be a nigger in the woodpile -somewhere in the shape of a “frame-up” with the hoax on themselves. - -Merla settled all doubts on that score. Unruffled, calmly, stoically, -dispassionately she answered the same question fifty times a day, and -each time in the same way. - -“Yah, I ban love Spitzer,” was her infallible reply, in a tone that made -the bare possibility that she could have done anything else seem the -very acme of absurdity. Merla’s inflexion struck deep at the root of -things inevitable. - -After that there was nothing to be said. A few, very few, and as the -days went by their numbers thinned with amazing rapidity, had the -temerity to snicker audibly. They only did it once, as with arms akimbo -and hands on hips Merla advanced to the edge of the counter with a look -in her steadfast, blue eyes, that was far from inviting, and inquired: -“Him ban goot mans, I tank?” - -It was put in the form of a question, it is true, but the “put” was of -such cold uncompromise that the result was always the same. The offender -hastily buried his nose in his coffee-cup, dug for a dime to square his -account--with Dutchy--and made for the platform. - -This was all very well, but unless Regan died and some one with a little -less--or a little more, depending on how you look at it--imagination -took his place, Spitzer’s chances of getting into a cab were as good as -ever, which is to say that they were about as good as the goodness of a -plugged nickel. And the trouble was that, as far as Spitzer could see, -the master mechanic wasn’t sprouting out with any visible signs of -premature decay. Furthermore, as he had suspicioned and now discovered, -Regan _wasn’t_ the last word on women; not, perhaps, that Merla put -firing before love, only she was uncommonly strong on firing. Spitzer -was unhappy. - -All things come to those who wait, they say. So they do, perhaps; but -the way of their coming is sometimes not to be understood or fathomed. -The story of a man who fell from the eighteenth story window of an -office building, and, incidentally, broke his neck has no place here -except in a general way. A friend who took a passing interest in the -event was curious enough to investigate the cause, and he traced it back -step by step, logically, surely, inevitably, beyond the possibility of -refutation, to the fact that the second hook from the top on the back -of the man’s wife’s dress--not the man’s dress, the dress of the man’s -wife--was missing on the morning of the day of his untimely decease. -The man--not the man’s friend--was an inventor. But no matter. It just -shows. Regan being still alive, the chances are better than a thousand -to one that Spitzer would have known a cold and forlorn old age, as -Robert Louis puts it, and Merla would never have had a second edition -of herself if it hadn’t been for a few measly, unripe crab-apples. What? -Yes, that’s it--crab-apples. That’s the way Spitzer got where he is -to-day--just crab-apples. Funny how things happen sometimes when you -come to think of it, isn’t it? Spitzer and the man who broke his neck -aren’t the only ones who’ve had their ups and downs that way, not by -several. There isn’t any moral to this except that here and there you’ll -find a man who isn’t as, modest about his own ability as he ought to be! - -Spitzer’s nocturnal habits, that were a matter of so much unconcern and -of which the railroad crowd at Big Cloud were so densely in ignorance, -have a part in this. The truth is that between the lunch-counter and the -station is the baggage and freight-shed, and behind the freight-shed it -is very dark; and also, not less pertinent, is the fact that Merla was -possessed of no other quarters than those shared by her sister-inarms -in Dutchy’s employ--which were neither propitious nor commodious. -Hence--but the connection is obvious. - -On Merla’s night off at eight o’clock, Spitzer sneaked down through the -fields and across the platform, weather permitting, and on those -nights Merla donned her bonnet “for a walk”--at the same hour. When the -station-clock struck ten and, coincidentally, Number One’s mellow chime -sounded down the gorge, Merla retraced her steps to the upstairs rear of -the lunch-counter, and Spitzer retraced his across the platform to the -fields in the direction of the town and his boarding-house; only, of -late, Spitzer had taken to lingering on the platform way up at the far -end where it was also very dark and equally as deserted. - -Here he would gaze wistfully at the big mogul with valves popping and -the steam drumming at her gauges, as she waited on the siding just in -front of him--‘Big Cloud being a divisional point where the engines -were changed--to back down onto Number One for the first stretch of the -mountain run--Burke’s run with 503, and big Jim MacAloon looking after -the shovel end of it. - -There wasn’t anything novel in the sight, but it didn’t seem to strike -Spitzer as monotonous although, when it was all over and he watched -the vanishing tail lights, he always sighed. It was just the same -performance each time. Ten minutes or so before Number One, westbound, -was due, MacAloon would run 503 out of the roundhouse, over the -turntable, up the line, and back onto the siding. Then Burke would -appear on the scene, light a torch, and poke around with a long-spouted -oil can. - -Spitzer would usually reach his position up the platform in time to see -the engineer’s final jab with the torch between the drivers or into the -link-motion before swinging himself through the gangway into the cab, as -the Limited with snapping trucks and screeching brake-shoes rolled into -the station; but one night it fell out a little differently. The station -clock had struck ten, Merla had hastened to her domicile, and Spitzer to -the far end of the platform as usual, but Number One was late. - -Suddenly Spitzer jumped and his heart seemed to shoot into his mouth. -There was a wild, piercing scream of agony. It came again. The blood -left Spitzer’s cheeks. He saw Burke fly around the end of the pilot, the -torch dancing in his hand, and make for the cab. Spitzer involuntarily -leaped from the platform to the track and ran in the same direction, -then the safety-valve popped with a terrific roar, drowning out all -other sounds. He clambered cautiously into the cab. On the floor -MacAloon was going through a performance that would have beggared the -efforts of a writhing python, and the while he groaned and yelled. - -As Spitzer watched, Burke, who was bending over MacAloon with an anxious -face, suddenly reached forward and picked up a little round object -that rolled from the pocket of the fireman’s jumper, then another and -another. Spitzer instinctively craned forward, and in so doing attracted -Burke’s notice for the first time. Burke’s look of anxiety gave way to -a grin and he held out the objects to Spitzer, just as if it wasn’t -Spitzer at all but an ordinary man--humor, like death, is a great -leveler, but no matter, let that go. Burke held them out to Spitzer, -Spitzer took them, and even Spitzer grinned. It didn’t need any doctor -to diagnose MacAloon’s complaint--and the complaint wasn’t poetic! -Cramps, old-fashioned, unadulterated cramps--just plain cramps and green -crab-apples! Some things lay a man out worse perhaps--but there aren’t -many. - -Burke’s grin didn’t last long, for at that moment came Number One’s -long, clear siren note, and back over the tender a streak of light shot -out in a wide circle from around a butte and then danced along the -rails and began to light up the platform, as the Limited thundered, five -minutes late, into the straight stretch. - -“Holy fishplates!” yelled Burke. “I’ve got to get a man to fire. -Spitzer, you run like hell to the roundhouse and----” - -Burke stopped. Spitzer stopped him. There are moments in everybody’s -life when they rise above themselves, above habit, above environment, -above everything, if even for only a brief instant. A chance like this -would never come again. If he could fire one trip maybe Regan would -change his mind. Spitzer grasped at it frantically, despairingly. - -“Burke, I _can_ fire,” he fairly screamed. “Give me a chance, Burke. -I’ll never get one if you don’t.” Burke gasped for a moment like a man -with his breath knocked out of him, then something like a dry chuckle -sounded in his throat. No one knows but Burke what decided him. It might -have been either of two things, or a combination of them both--Spitzer’s -pleading face, or the desire to take a rise out of Regan--Burke and -Regan not having been on the best of terms since the last general -elections. Be that as it may, Burke pointed at the squirming fireman. -“Take his feet,” he grunted. - -Together they lifted and dragged the stricken Mac-Aloon out of the cab -and to the ground. 1108, pulling Number One, had come to a stop abreast -of them by now, and Burke shouted at the engine crew. - -“Here!” he bawled. “Lend a hand!” - -And as both men stuck their heads out of the gangway, he and Spitzer -boosted the fireman up to them. - -“Got cramps,” explained Burke tersely. “You’ll be able to fix him up -in the roundhouse. Five minutes late, h’m? Well, hurry, you’re clear. -There’s your ‘go-ahead.’ Pull out and let me get hold.” - -Burke turned to Spitzer, as 1108 slipped away from the baggage-car and -moved up the track, and pointed to the gangway of his own engine. - -“Get in,” he said grimly. “You’ll get a chance to fire, and, take it -from me, you’ll never get a chance to do that or anything else again -this side of the happy hunting-grounds, my bucko, if you throw me down.” - -And while Regan quarreled amiably over a game of pedro upstairs in the -station with Carleton, 503, with Spitzer, touzled-haired, mild-eyed, -heart-beating-like-a-trip-hammer Spitzer, in the cab, backed down on the -Imperial Limited and coupled on for the mountain run. There was a quick -testing of the “air,” a hurried running up and down the platform, and -then Burke, leaning from the window with his arms stretched out inside -the cab and fingers on the throttle, opened a notch, and the platform -began to slide past them. - -Spitzer wrinkled his face and stared at the gauge needle--two hundred -and ten pounds, all the way, all the time--two hundred and ten pounds. -It was up to him. With a jerk of the chain, he swung the furnace door -wide and a shovelful of coal shot, neatly scattered, over the grate. - -There is art in all things; there is the quintessence of art in the -prosaic and laborious task of firing an engine. Spitzer was not without -art, for in a way he had had years of experience; but banking a fire in -the roundhouse, and nursing a roaring pit of flame to its highest degree -of efficiency in a swaying, lurching cab, are two different and distinct -operations that are in no way to be confounded. 503 began to lurch and -sway. Notch by notch Burke was opening her out, and the bark of her -exhaust was coming like the quick crackle of a gatling. Five minutes -late in the mountains on a time schedule already marked up to a dizzy -height that called for more chances than the passengers paid for -is--well, it’s five minutes, just _five minutes_, that’s all. Some men -would have left it for the Pacific Division crowd the next day on a -level track and a straight sweep--but not Burke. - -Spitzer’s initiation was in ample form and he got the full benefit of -all the rites and ceremonies with every detail of the ritual worked -in--and no favors shown. So far all was well, the rough country was -all in front of the pilot, and Spitzer was all business. His pulse was -beating in tune to only one thing--the dancing needle on the gauge. -Again he swung the door open, and the red flare lighted up the -heavens and played on features that Regan would never have known for -Spitzer’s--they were set, grim and determined, covered with little sweat -beads that glistened like diamonds. The singing sweep of the wind was in -his ears as he poised his shovel. There was a sickening slur. 503 shot -round a tangent--and the shovelful of coal shot like bullets all over -the cab, and, including Burke, hit about everything in sight but the -objective point aimed at. Simultaneously, Spitzer promptly performed -a gyration that resembled something like a back hand-spring and landed -well up on the tender, to roll back to the floor of the cab again with -an accompanying avalanche of coal. - -He picked himself up and glanced apprehensively at the engineer. There -was not a scowl, not even a grin on Burke’s face, just an encouraging -flirt of the hand--but the flirt was momentous. Wise and full of guile -was Burke, for with that little act Spitzer, biblically speaking, girded -up his loins and got his second wind. - -They were well into the foothills now, and the right of way was an -amazing wonder. Diving, twisting, curving, it circled and bored and -trestled its way, and buttes, canons, gorges and coulees roared past -like flights of fancy. - -The speed was terrific. To Spitzer it was all a wild, mad medley of -things he had never known before, of things that had neither beginning -nor end. The giddy slew as the big mountain racer hit the curves, the -crunching grind of the flanges as for an instant she lifted from her -wheel-base, the pitch, the roll, the staggering reel, the gasp for -breath, the beat of the trucks, the whir of the racing drivers, the rush -of the wind, the echoing thunder of the flying coaches behind--it was -all there, all separate, all welded into one, a creation, new, vernal, -life, the life of the rail, that beat at his eardrums and quickened the -pounding throb of his heart. - -At first, from time to time, Burke leaned over his levers to glance at -the pressure gauge, but after a bit he crouched a little further forward -in his seat and his eyes held on the track ahead where the beam of -the electric headlight flooded the glittering ribbons of steel. He was -getting what MacAloon or no other man had ever given him before--two -hundred and ten pounds _all_ the way. SPITZER was firing Number One, the -Imperial Limited, westbound, on the mountain run, _three_ minutes late! - -The sweat was rolling in streams from the little fellow now, and he -clung in the gangway for a moment’s breathing spell, leaning out, -staring ahead at a few shining lights in the distance. Came the hoarse -scream of the whistle, the clattering crash as they shattered the -yard switches, a blurred vision of dark outlines dotted with tiny -scintillating points, and station, yard, lights, switches and all were -behind him. - -Spitzer drew his sleeve across his forehead, and turned again to his -work as they thundered over a long steel trestle--Thief Creek. -Spitzer knew the road well enough at second hand, if not from personal -experience. Just ahead was The Pass--Sucker Pass--straight enough for -its quarter-mile stretch, but where the rock walls rose up on either -side so close as to almost scratch the paint off the rolling stock. -Eased for a moment in scant deference to switches and trestle just -passed, Spitzer felt the forward leap of the racer as Burke threw her -wide open again. He bent for his shovel--and then, quick as the winking -of an eye, sudden as doom, came a tearing, rending crash, a scream from -Burke, and the right-hand side of the cab seemed literally torn in two. - -A flying piece of woodwork that struck him across the eyes, a terrific -jolt as the engine lifted and fell back, sent Spitzer headlong to the -floor of the cab. Dazed, half mad with the pain, the blood streaming -from his forehead, he staggered to his feet. Burke lay coiled in an -inert heap just in front of him by the furnace door. A whizzing piece of -steel rose up, crunched, slithered, gashed a track of ruin for itself, -and was gone. It had missed Burke only by a hair’s-breadth--next time -there might not be even that limit of safety. With a cry, Spitzer leaped -forward and dragged the unconscious engineer across the cab. Again the -jolt, the slur, the stagger, the desperate wrench. It seemed like years, -like eternity to Spitzer. He was living a lifetime in the passing of -a second--it had been no more than that, no more than two or three at -most. - -There are some things worse, much worse, in railroading than a broken -crank-pin and a rod amuck, but not when it comes in The Pass, where -derailment at their racing speed spelt death, quick and sudden. There -was just one chance for the trailing string of coaches, just one for -every last soul aboard--Spitzer. But between Spitzer and the throttle -and the air-latch was a thing of steel that rose and fell, now swinging -a splintering, murderous arc through the shattered side of the cab, now -grinding into the ties land roadbed, threatening with every revolution -to pitch 503 and the train behind her headlong from the rails to crumple -like flimsy egg-shells against the narrow rocky walls that lined The -Pass. Just one chance for the train crew and passengers--_just one in -a thousand for Spitzer_. And little five-foot-five Spitzer, diffident, -retiring, self-effaced, unobtrusive Spitzer, with a dry, choking sob in -his throat, flung himself forward to stop the train. His hands clutched -desperately at the levers, there was a hiss, the vicious eventualities, -and that’s the way it was with about nine hundred and ninety-nine out -of every thousand colonists. The company, of course, did take _some_ -risk--they took a chance on the one-thousandth man. The company had -sporting blood. - - - - -V--SHANLEY’S LUCK - -If Shanley had only known what was going to happen, he could have saved -some of his money on that ticket. As it stands now, he has still got -transportation coming to him from Little Dance on the Hill Division to -Bubble Creek, B. C. That may be an asset, or it may not--Shanley never -asked for it. - -Third class, colonist, no stop over allowed, redhaired, freckle-faced, -an uptilt to the nose, a jaw as square as the side of a house, shoulders -like a bull’s, and a fist that would fell an ox--that was Shanley. That -was Shanley until the sprung rail that ditched the train at Little Dance -caused him the loss of two things--his erstwhile status in the general -passenger agent’s department, and a well-beloved and reeking brier. - -Both were lost forever--his status partly on account of the reasons -before mentioned, and partly because Shanley wasn’t particularly -interested in Bubble Creek; his brier because it became a part, an -integral part, of that memorable wreck, as Shanley, who was peacefully -smoking in the front-end compartment of the colonist coach when the -trouble happened, left the pipe behind while he catapulted through -the open door--it was summer and sizzling hot--and landed, a very -much dazed, bewildered, but not otherwise hurt Shanley, halfway up the -embankment on the off side of a scene of most amazing disorder. - -The potentialties that lie in a sprung rail are something to marvel at. -Up ahead, the engine had promptly turned turtle, and, as promptly giving -vent to its displeasure at the indignity heaped upon it, had incased -itself in an angry, hissing cloud of steam; behind, the baggage and mail -cars seemed to have vied with each other in affectionate regard for -the tender. Only the brass-polished, nickel-plated Pullmans at the -rear still held the rails; the rest was just a crazy, slewed-edge-ways, -up-canted, toppled-over string of cars, already beginning to smoke as -the flames licked into them. - -The shouts of those who had made their escape, the screams of those -still imprisoned within the wreckage, the sight of others crawling -through the doors and windows brought Shanley back to his senses. He -rose to his feet, blinked furiously, as was his habit on all untoward -occasions, and the next instant he was down the embankment and into the -game--to begin his career as a railroad man. That’s where he started--in -the wreck at Little Dance. - -In and out of the blazing pyre, after a woman or a child; the crash of -his ax through splintering woodwork; the scorching heat; prying away -some poor devil wedged down beneath the débris; tinkling glass as the -heat cracked the windows or he beat through a pane with his fist--it -was all hazy, all a dream to Shanley as, hours afterward, a grim, gaunt -figure with blackened, bleeding face, his clothes hanging in ribbons, he -rode into the Big Cloud yards on the derrick car. - -Some men would have hit up the claim agent for a stake; Shanley hit -up Carleton for a job. But for modesty’s sake, previous to presenting -himself before the superintendent’s desk, he borrowed from one of the -wrecking crew the only available article of wearing apparel at hand--a -very dirty and disreputable pair of overalls. Dirty and disreputable, -but--whole. - -“I want a job, Mr. Carleton,” said he bluntly, when he had gained -admittance to the super. - -“You do, eh?” replied Carleton, looking him up and down. “You do, eh? -You’re a pretty hard-looking nut, h’m?” - -Shanley blinked, but, being painfully aware that he undoubtedly did look -all if not more than that, and being, too, not quite sure what to make -of the super, he contented himself with the remark: - -“I ain’t a picture, I suppose.” - -“H’m!” said Carleton. “Been up at the wreck, I hear--what?” - -“Yes,” said Shanley shortly. No long story, no tale of what he’d done, -no anything--just “Yes,” and that was what caught Carleton. - -“What can you do?” demanded the super. - -“Anything. I’m not fussy,” replied Chanley. - -“H’m!” said Carleton. “You don’t look it.” And he favored Shanley with -another prolonged stare. - -Shanley, at first uncomfortable, shifted nervously from one foot to the -other; then, as the stare continued, he began to get irritated. - -“Look here,” he flung out suddenly. “I ain’t on exhibition. I come -for a job. I ain’t got any letters of recommendation from pastors of -churches in the East. I ain’t got anything. My name’s Shanley, an’ I -haven’t even got anything to prove _that_.” - -“You’ve got your nerve,” said Carleton, leaning back in his swivel -chair and tucking a thumb in the armhole of his vest. “Ever worked on a -railroad?” - -“No,” answered Shanley, a little less assertively, as he saw his chances -of a job vanishing into thin air, and already regretting his hasty -speech--a few odd nickels wasn’t a very big stake for a man starting -out in a new country, and that represented the sum total of Shanley’s -worldly wealth. “No, I never worked on a railroad.” - -“H’m,” continued Carleton. “Well, my friend, you can report to the -trainmaster in the morning and tell him I said to put you on breaking. -Get out!” - -It came so suddenly and unexpectedly that it took Shanley’s breath. -Carleton’s ways were not Shanley’s ways, or ways that Shanley by any -peradventure had been accustomed to. A moment before he wouldn’t have -exchanged one of his nickels for his chances of a job, therefore his -reply resolved itself into a sheepish grin; moreover--but of this -hereafter--Shanley back East was decidedly more in the habit of having -his applications refused with scant ceremony than he was to receiving -favorable consideration, which was another reason for his failure to -rise to the occasion with appropriate words of thanks. - -Incidentally, Shanley, like a select few of his fellow creatures, had -his failings; concretely, his particular strayings from the straight -and narrow way, not having been hidden under a bushel, were responsible, -with the advice and assistance of a distant relative or two--advice -being always cheap, and assistance, in this case, a marked-down -bargain--for his migration to the West, as far West as the funds in hand -would take him--Bubble Creek, B. C, the distant relatives saw to that. -They bought the ticket. - -Shanley, still smiling sheepishly and in obedience to the super’s -instruction to “get out,” was halfway to the door when Carleton halted -him. - -“Shanley!” - -“Yes, sir?” said Shanley, finding his voice and swinging around. - -“Got any money?” - -Shanley’s hand mechanically dove through the overalls and rummaged in -the pocket of his torn and ribboned trousers--the pocket had not been -spared--the nickels, every last one of them, were gone. The look on his -face evidently needed no interpretation. - -Carleton was holding out two bills--two tens. - -“Cleaned out, eh? Well, I wouldn’t blame any one if they asked you for -your board bill in advance. Here, I guess you’ll need this. You can pay -it back later on. There’s a fellow keeps a clothing store up the street -that it wouldn’t do you any harm to visit--h’m?” - -With gratitude in his heart and the best of resolutions exuding -from every pore--he was always long on resolutions--Shanley being -embarrassed, and therefore awkward, made a somewhat ungraceful exit from -the super’s presence. - -But neither gratitude nor resolutions, even of steelplate, -double-riveted variety, are of much avail against circumstances and -conditions over which one has absolutely, undeniably, and emphatically -no control. If Dinkelman’s clothing emporium had occupied a site between -the station and MacGuire’s Blazing Star saloon, instead of the said -Blazing Star saloon occupying that altogether inappropriate position -itself, and if Spider Kelly, the conductor of the wrecked train, had -not run into Shanley before he had fairly got ten yards from the super’s -office, things undoubtedly would have been very different. Shanley took -that view of it afterward, and certainly he was justified. It is on -record that he had no hand in the laying out of Big Cloud nor in the -control of its real estate, rentals, or leases. - -Railroad men are by no stretch of the imagination to be regarded as -hero worshipers, but if a man does a decent thing they are not averse -to telling him so. Shanley had done several very decent things at the -wreck. Spider Kelly invited him into the Blazing Star. - -Shanley demurred. “I’ve got to get some clothes,” he explained. - -“Get ‘em afterward,” said Kelly; “plenty of time. Come on; it’s just -supper-time, and there’ll be a lot of the boys in there. They’ll be glad -to meet you. If you’re hungry you’ll find the best free layout on the -division. There’s nothing small about MacGuire.” - -Shanley hesitated, and, proverbially, was lost. - -An intimate and particular description of the events of that night are -on no account to be written. They would not have shocked, surprised, or -astonished Shanley’s distant relatives--but everybody is not a distant -relative. Shanley remembered it in spots--only in spots. He fought -and whipped Spider Kelly, who was a much bigger man than himself, and -thereby cemented an undying friendship; he partook of the hospitality -showered upon him and returned it with a lavish hand--as long as -Carleton’s twenty lasted; he made speeches, many of them, touching -wrecks and the nature of wrecks and his own particular participation -therein--which was seemly, since at the end, about three o’clock in the -morning, he slid with some dignity under the table, and, with the fond -belief that he was once more clutching an ax and doing heroic and noble -service, wound his arms grimly, remorselessly, tenaciously, like an -octopus, around the table leg--and slept. - -MacGuire before bolting the front door studied the situation carefully, -and left him there--for the sake of the table. - -The sunlight next morning was not charitable to Shanley. Where yesterday -he had borne the marks of one wreck, he now bore the marks of two--his -own on top of the company’s. Up the street Dinkelman’s clothing emporium -flaunted a canvas sign announcing unusual bargains in men’s apparel. -This seemed to Shanley an unkindly act that could be expressed in -no better terms than “rubbing it in.” He gazed at the sign with an -aggrieved expression on his face, blinked furiously, and started, with a -step that lacked something of assurance, for the railroad yards and the -trainmaster’s office. - -He was by no means confident of the reception that awaited him. If there -is one characteristic over and above any other that is common to human -nature, it is the faculty, though that’s rather an imposing word, of -worrying like sin over something that _may_ happen--but never does. -Shanley might just as well have saved himself the mental worry anent the -trainmaster’s possible attitude. He did not report to the trainmaster -that morning, never saw that gentleman until long, very long afterward. -Instead, he reported to Carleton--at the latter’s urgent solicitation in -the shape of a grinning call-boy, who intercepted his march of progress -toward the station. - -“Hi, you, there, cherub face!” bawled the urchin politely. “The super -wants you--on the hop!” - -Shanley stopped short, and, resorting to his favorite habit, blinked. - -“Carleton. Get it? Carleton,” repeated the messenger, evidently by no -means sure that he was thoroughly understood; and then, for a parting -shot as he sailed gayly up the street: “Gee, but you’re pretty!” - -Carleton! Shanley had forgotten all about Carleton for the moment. -His hand instinctively went into his pocket--and then he groaned. He -remembered Carleton. But worst of all, he remembered Carleton’s twenty. - -There were two courses open to him. He could sneak out of town with -all possible modesty and dispatch, or he could face the music. Not that -Shanley debated the question--the occasion had never yet arisen when he -hadn’t faced the music--he simply experienced the temptation to “crawl,” - that was all. - -“It looks to me,” he ruminated ruefully, “as though I was up against it -for fair. Just my luck, just my blasted luck, always the same kind of -luck, that’s what. ‘Tain’t my fault neither, is it? I ain’t responsible -for that darned wreck--if ‘twasn’t for that I wouldn’t be here. An’ -Kelly, Spider he said his name was, if ‘twasn’t for him I wouldn’t be -here neither. What the blazes did _I_ have to do with it? I always have -to stand for the other cuss. That’s me every time, I guess. An’ that’s -logic.” - -It was. Neither was there any flaw in it as at first sight might appear, -for the last test of logic is its power of conviction. Shanley, from -being a man with some reasonable cause for qualms of conscience, became, -in his own mind, one deeply sinned against, one injured and crushed down -by the load of others he was forced to bear. - -He explained this to Carleton while the thought of his burning wrongs -was still at white heat, and before the super had a chance to get in a -word. He began as he opened the office door, continued as he crossed the -room, and finished as he stood before the super’s desk. - -The scowl that had settled on Carleton’s face, as he looked up at the -other’s entrance, gradually gave way to a hint of humor lurking around -the corners of his mouth, and he leaned back in his chair and listened -with an exaggerated air of profound attention. - -“Just so, just so,” said he, when Shanley finally came to a breathless -halt. “Now perhaps you will allow _me_ to say a word. It may not have -occurred to you that I sent for you in order that _I_ might do the -talking--h’m?” - -This really seemed to require no answer, so Shanley made none. - -“Yesterday,” went on Carleton, “you came to me for a job, and I gave you -one, didn’t I?” - -“Yes,” admitted Shanley, licking his lips. - -“Just so,” said Carleton mildly. “I hired you then. I fire you now. -Pretty quick work, what?” - -“You’re the doctor,” said Shanley evenly enough. He had, for all his -logic, expected no more nor less--he was too firm a believer in his -own particular and exclusive brand of luck. “You’re the doctor,” he -repeated. “There’s a matter of twenty bucks------ - -“I was coming to that,” interrupted Carleton; “but I’m glad _you_ -mentioned it. I’ll be honest enough to admit that I hardly expected you -would. A man who acts as you’ve acted doesn’t generally--h’m?” - -“I told you ‘twasn’t my fault,” said Shanley stubbornly. - -Carleton reached for his pipe, and struck a match, surveying Shanley the -while with a gaze that was half perplexed, half quizzical. - -“You’re a queer card,” he remarked at last. “Why don’t you cut out the -booze?” - -“‘Twasn’t my fault, I tell you,” persisted Shanley. “You’re a pretty -good hand with your fists, what?” said Carleton irrelevantly. “Kelly’s -no slouch himself.” - -Shanley blinked. It appeared that the super was as intimately posted -on the events of the preceding evening as he was himself. The remark -suggested an inspection of the fists in question. They were grimy and -dirty, and most of the knuckles were barked; closed, they resembled a -pair of miniature battering-rams. - -“Pretty good,” he admitted modestly. - -“H’m! About that twenty. You intend to pay it back, don’t you?” - -“I’m not a thief, whatever else I am,” snapped Shanley. “Of course, I’ll -pay it back. You needn’t worry.” - -“When?” insisted Carleton coolly. - -“When I get a job.” - -“I’ll give you one,” said Carleton--“Royal” Carle-ton the boys called -him, the squarest man that ever held down a division. “I’ll give you one -where your fists will be kept out of mischief, and where you can’t hit -the high joints quite as hard as you did last night. But I want you to -understand this, Shanley, and understand it good and plenty and once for -all, it’s your last chance. You made a fool of yourself last night, but -you acted like a man yesterday--that’s why you’re getting a new deal. -You’re going up to Glacier Canon with McCann on the construction work. -You won’t find it anyways luxurious, and maybe you’ll like McCann and -maybe you won’t--he’s been squealing for a white man to live with. You -can help him boss Italians at one seventy-five a day, and you can go up -on Twenty-nine this morning, that’ll take care of your transportation. -What do you say?” - -Shanley couldn’t say anything. He looked at the super and blinked; then -he looked at his fists speculatively--and blinked. - -Carleton was scribbling on a piece of paper. - -“All right, h’m?” he said, looking up and handing over the paper. -“There’s an order on Dinkelman, only get some one else to show you -the way this time, and take the other side of the street going up. -Understand?” - -“Mr. Carleton,” Shanley blurted out, “if ever I get full again, you----” - -“I will!” said Carleton grimly. “I’ll fire you so hard and fast you’ll -be out of breath for a month. Don’t make any mistake about that. No man -gets more than two chances with me. The next time you get drunk will -finish your railroad career for keeps, I promise you that.” - -“Yes,” said Shanley humbly; and then, after a moment’s nervous -hesitation: “About Kelly, Mr. Carleton. I don’t want to get him in bad -on this. You see, it was this way. He left early--that’s what started -the fight. I called him a--a--quitter--or something like that.” - -“H’m, yes; or something like that,” repeated Carleton dryly. “So -I believe. I’ve had a talk with Kelly. You needn’t let the -incomprehensible workings of that conscience of yours prick you any -on his account. Kelly knows when to stop. His record is O. K. in this -office. Kelly doesn’t get drunk. If he did, he’d be fired just as fast -as you will be if it ever happens again.” - -“If I’m never fired for anything but that,” exclaimed Shanley in a burst -of fervent emotion, “I’ve got a job for life. I’ll prove it to you, Mr. -Carleton. I’m going to make good. You see if I don’t.” - -“Very well,” said Carleton. “I hope you will. That’s all, Shanley. I’ll -let McCann know you’re coming.” - -Shanley’s second exit from the super’s presence was different from the -first. He walked out with a firm tread and squared shoulders. He was -rejuvenated and buoyant. He was on his mettle--quite another matter, -entirely another matter, and distinctly apart from the paltry -consideration of a mere job. He had told Carleton that he would make -good. Well, he would--and he did. Carleton himself said so, and Carleton -wasn’t in the habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a -man--not many. He did sometimes, but not often. - -Shanley did not take the other side of the street on the way to -Dinkelman’s--by no means. He deliberately passed as close to the Blazing -Star saloon as he could, passed with contemptuous disregard, passed -boastfully in the knowledge of his own strength. A sixteen-hundred class -engine with her four pairs of forty-six-inch drivers can pull countless -cars up a mountain grade steep enough to make one dizzy, but Shanley -would have backed himself to win against her in a tug of war over the -scant few inches that separated him from MacGuire’s dispensary as -he brushed by. None of MacGuire’s for him. Not at all. -Red-headed, freckle-faced, barked-knuckled, -bulwarked-and-armor-cased-against-temptation Shanley dealt that morning -with Mr. Dinkelman, purveyor of bargains in men’s apparel. - -The dealings were liberal--on the part of both men. On Shanley’s part -because he needed much; on Mr. Dinkelman’s part because it was Mr. -Dinkelman’s business, and his nature, to sell much--if he could--safely. -This was eminently safe. Carleton’s name in the mountains stood higher -than guaranteed, gilt-edged gold bonds any time. - -The business finally concluded, Shanley boarded Twenty-nine, local -freight, west, and in due time, well on in the afternoon, righteously -sober, straight as a string, cleaned, groomed, and resplendent in a -new suit, swung off from the caboose at Glacier Canon as the train -considerately slackened speed enough to give him a fighting chance for -life and limb. - -He landed safely, however, in the midst of a jabbering Italian labor -gang, who received his sudden advent with patience and some awe. A -short, squintfaced man greeted him with a grin. - -“Me name’s McCann,” said he of the squint face. “This is Glacier Canon, -fwhat yez see av ut. Them’s the Eyetalians. Yon’s fwhere I roost an’ -by the same token, fwhere yez’ll roost, too, from now on. Above is the -shack av the men. Are yez plased wid yer introduction? ‘Tis wan hell av -a hole ye’ve come to. Shanley’s the name, eh? A good wan, an’ I’m proud -to make the acquaintance.” - -Shanley blinked as he stretched out his hand and made friends with his -superior, and blinked again as he looked first one way and then another -in an effort to follow and absorb the other’s graphic description of the -surroundings. - -The road foreman’s summary was beyond dispute. Glacier Canon was as wild -a piece of track as the Hill Division boasted, which was going some. The -right of way hugged the bald gray rock of the mountains that rose up -at one side in a sheer sweep, and the trains crawled along for all the -world like huge flies at the base of a wall. On the other side was the -Glacier River with its treacherous sandy bed that had been the subject -of more reports and engineers’ gray hairs than all the rest of the -system put together. The construction camp lay just to the east of the -Canon, and at the foot of a long, stiff, two-mile, four-per-cent grade. -That was the reason the camp was there--that grade. - -Locking the stable door when the horse is gone is a procedure that -is very old. It did not originate with the directors of the -Transcontinental--they never claimed it did. But their fixed policy, if -properly presented before a court of arbitration, would have gone a -long way toward establishing a clear title to it. If they had built a -switchback at the foot of the grade in the first place, Extra Number -Eighty-three, when she lost control of herself near the bottom coming -down, would have demonstrated just as clearly the necessity for one -being there as she demonstrated most forcibly what would happen when -there wasn’t. All of which is by way of saying that rock or no rock, -expense or no expense, the door was now to be locked, and McCann and his -men were there to lock it. - -McCann explained this to Shanley as he walked him around, up the track -to the men’s shanties, over the work, and back again down the track to -inspect the interior of the dwelling they were to share in common--a -relic of deceased Extra Number Eighty-three in the shape of a truckless -box-car with dinted and bulging sides--dinted one side and bulged the -other, that is. - -“But,” said Shanley, “I dunno what a switchback is.” - -“Who expected it av ye?” inquired McCann. “An’ fwhat difference does ut -make? Carleton sint word ye were green. Ye’ve no need to know. So’s ye -can do as yez are told an’ make them geesers do as they are told, _an’_ -can play forty-foive at night--that’s the point, the main point wid -me, an’ it’s me yez av to get along wid----‘twill be all right. Since -Meegan, him that was helpin’ me, tuk sick a week back, I’ve been alone. -Begad, playin’ solytare is----” - -“I can play forty-five,” said Shanley. - -McCann’s face brightened. - -“The powers be praised!” he exclaimed. “I’ll enlighten ye, then, on -the matter av switchbacks, me son, so as ye’ll have an intilligent -conception av the work. A switchback is a bit av a spur track that -sticks out loike the quills av a porkypine at intervuls on a bad grade -such as the wan forninst ye. ‘Tis run off the main line, d’ye mind, an’ -up contrariwise to the dip av the grade. Whin a train comin’ down gets -beyond control an’ so expresses herself by means av her whistle, she’s -switched off an’ given a chance to run uphill by way av variety until -she stops. An’ the same holds true if she breaks loose goin’ up. Is ut -clear?” - -“It is,” said Shanley. “When do I begin work?” - -“In the mornin.’ ‘Tis near six now, an’ the bhoys’ll be quittin’ for the -night. Forty-foive is a grand game. We’ll play ut to-night to our better -acquaintance. I contind ‘tis the national game av the ould sod.” - -Whether McCann’s contention is borne out by fact, or by the even more -weighty consideration of public opinion, is of little importance. -Shanley played forty-five with McCann that night and for many nights -thereafter. He lost a figure or two off the pay check that was to come, -but he won the golden opinion of the little road boss, which ethically, -and in this case practically, was of far greater value. - -“He’s a bright jool av a lad,” wrote McCann across the foot of a weekly -report. - -And Carleton, seeing it, was much gratified, for Carleton wasn’t in the -habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a man--not many. -He did sometimes, but not often. Shanley was making good. Carleton was -much gratified. - -Of the three weeks that followed Shanley’s advent to Glacier Canon, this -story has little to do in a detailed way; but, as a whole, those three -weeks are pointed, eloquent, and important--very important. - -Italian laborers have many failings, but likewise they have many -virtues. They are simple, demonstrative, and their capacity for -adoration--of both men and things--is very great. - -From Jacko, the water boy, to Pietro Maraschino, the padrone, they -adored Shanley, and enthroned him as an idol in their hearts, for the -very simple reason that Shanley, not being a professional slave-driver -by trade, established new and heretofore undreamed-of relations with -them. Shanley was very green, very ignorant, very inexperienced--he -treated them like human beings. That was the long and short of it. -Shanley became popular beyond the popularity of any man, before or -since, who was ever called upon to handle the “foreign element” on the -Hill Division. - -And the work progressed. Day by day the cut bored deeper into the -stubborn mountain-side; day by day the Glacier River gurgled peacefully -along over its treacherous sandy bed, one of the prettiest scenic -effects on the system, so pretty that the company used it in the -magazines; day by day regulars and extras, freights and passengers, east -and west, snorted up and down the grade, the only visitations from the -outside world; night after night Shanley played forty-five with McCann -in the smoky, truckless box-car. - -Also the camp was dry, very dry, dryer than a sanatorium--that is, -than _some_ sanatoriums. Carle-ton had been quite right. There was no -opportunity for Shanley to hit the high joints quite as hard as he had -that night in Big Cloud--there was no opportunity for him to hit the -high joints _at all_. Shanley had not seen a bottle for three weeks. -Therefore Shanley felt virtuous, which was proper. - -Some events follow others as the natural, logical outcome and conclusion -of preceding ones; others, again, are apparently irrelevant, and the -connection is not to be explained either by logic, conclusion, -or otherwise. Rain, McCann’s departure for Big Cloud, and Pietro -Maraschino’s birthday are an example of this. - -When it settles down for a storm in the mountains, it is, if the -elements are really in earnest, torrential, and prolonged, and has -the effect of tying up construction work tighter than a supreme court -injunction could come anywhere near doing it. - -McCann had business in Big Cloud, whether personal or pertaining to the -company is of no consequence, and the day the storm set in--the morning -having demonstrated that its classification was not to be considered -as transient--he seized the opportunity to flag the afternoon freight -eastbound. This was natural and logical, and an opportunity not to be -neglected. - -That this day, however, should be the anniversary of the day the -padrone’s mother of blessed memory had given birth to Pietro Maraschino -in sunny Naples fifty-three years before is, though apparently -irrelevant, far from being so; and since its peculiar and coincident -happening cannot be laid at the door of either logical, natural, -scientific, or philosophical conclusions, and since it demands an -explanation of some sort, it must, perforce, be attributed to the -metaphysical--which is a name given to all things about which nobody -knows anything. - -“Yez are in charge,” said McCann grandiloquently, waving his hand to -Shanley as he swung into the caboose. “Yez are in charge av the work, me -son. See to ut. I trust ye.” - -As the work at the moment was entirely at a standstill and bid fair to -remain so until McCann’s return on the morrow, this was very good of -McCann. But all men like words of appreciation, most of them whether -they deserve them or not, so Shanley went back into the box-car out of -the rain to ponder over the tribute McCann had paid him, and to ponder, -too, over the new responsibility that had fallen to his lot. - -He did not ponder very long; indeed, the freight that was transporting -McCann could hardly have been out of sight over the summit of the grade, -when a knock at the door was followed by the entrance of the dripping -figure of the padrone. - -Shanley looked up anxiously. - -“Hello, Pietro,” he said nervously, for the weather wasn’t the kind that -would bring a man out for nothing, and he was keenly alive to that new -responsibility. “Hello, Pietro,” he repeated. “Anything wrong?” - -Pietro grinned amiably, shook his head, unbuttoned his coat, and held -out--a bottle. - -Shanley stared in amazement, and then began to blink furiously. - -“Here!” said he. “What’s this?” - -“Chianti,” said Pietro, grinning harder than ever. - -“Key-aunty.” Shanley screwed up his face. “What the devil is key-aunty?” - -“Ver’ good wine from Italia,” said the beaming padrone. - -“It is, is it? Well, it’s against the rules,” asserted Shanley with -conviction. “It’s against the rules. McCann’u’d skin you alive. He -would. Where’d you get it? What’s up, eh? It’s against the rules. I’m in -charge.” - -Pietro explained. It was his birthday. It was very bad weather. For the -rest of the afternoon there would be no work. They would celebrate the -birthday, Meester McCann had taken the train. As for the wine--Pietro -shrugged his shoulders--his people adored wine. Unless they were very -poor his people would have a little wine in their packs, perhaps. He was -not quite sure where they had got it, but it was very thoughtful of them -to remember his birthday. Each had presented him with a little wine. -This bottle was an expression of their very great good estime of Meester -Shanley. Perhaps, later, Meester Shanley would come himself to the -shack. - -“It’s against the rules,” blinked Shanley. “McCann ‘u’d skin you alive. -Maybe I’ll drop in by and by. You can leave the bottle.” - -Pietro bobbed, grinned delightedly, handed over the bottle, and backed -out into the storm. - -Shanley, still blinking, placed the bottle on the table, and gazed at it -thoughtfully for a few minutes--and his thoughts were of Carleton. - -“If ‘twere whisky,” said he, “I’d have no part of it, not a drop, not -even a smell. I would not. I would not touch it. But as it is----” - Shanley uncorked the bottle. - -Not at all. One does _not_ get drunk on a bottle of Chianti wine. A -single bottle of Chianti wine is very little. That is the trouble--it -is _very_ little. After three weeks of abstinence it is very little -indeed--so little that it is positively tantalizing. - -The afternoon waned rapidly--and so did the Chianti. Outside, the -storm instead of abating grew worse--the thunder racketing through the -mountains, the lightning cutting jagged streaks in the black sky, the -rain coming down in sheets that set the culverts and sluiceways running -full. It was settling down for a bad night in the mountains, which, in -the Rockies, is not a thing to be ignored. “’tis no wonder McCann found -it lonely,” muttered Shanley, as he squeezed the last drop from the -bottle. “‘Tis very lonely, indeed”--he held the bottle upside down to -make sure that it was thoroughly drained--“most uncommon lonely. It is -that. Maybe those Eyetalians ‘ll be thinkin’ I’m stuck up, perhaps--which -I am not. It’s a queer name the stuff has, though it’s against the -rules, an’ I can’t get my tongue around it, but I’ve tasted worse. For -the sake of courtesy I’ll look in on the birthday party.” - -He incased himself in a pair of McCann’s rubber boots, put on McCann’s -rubber coat, and started out. - -“An’ to think,” said he, as he sloshed and buffeted his way up the two -hundred yards of track to the construction shanties, “to think that -Pietro came out in cruel bad weather like this all for to present -his compliments an’ ask me over! ‘Twould be ungracious to refuse -the invitation; besides my presence will keep them in due bounds an’ -restraint. I’ve heard that Eyetalians, being foreigners, do not practice -restraint--but, being foreigners, ‘tis not to be held against them. I’m -in charge, an’ I’ll see to it.” - -They greeted him in the largest of the three bunk-houses. They greeted -him heartily, sincerely, uproariously, and with fervor. They were -unfeignedly glad to see him, and if he had not been by nature a -modest man he would have understood that his popularity was above the -popularity ever before accorded to a boss. Likewise, their hospitality -was without stint. If there was any shortage of stock--which is a matter -decidedly open to question--they denied themselves that Shanley might -not feel the pinch. Shanley was lifted from the mere plane of man--he -became a king. - -A little Chianti is a little; much Chianti is to be reckoned with and -on no account to be despised. Shanley not only became a king, he became -regally, imperially, royally, and majestically drunk. Also there came at -last an end to the Chianti, at which stage of the proceedings Shanley, -with extravagant dignity and appropriate words--an exhortation on -restraint--waddled to the door to take his departure. - -It was very dark outside, very dark, except when an intermittent flash -of lightning made momentary daylight. Pietro Maraschino offered Shanley -one of the many lanterns that, in honor of the festive occasion, they -had commandeered, without regard to color, from the tool boxes, and had -strung around the shack. Further, he offered to see Shanley on his way. - -The offer of assistance touched Shanley--it touched him wrong. -It implied a more or less acute condition of disability, which he -repudiated with a hurt expression on his face and forceful words on his -tongue. He refused it; and being aggrieved, refused also the lantern -Pietro held out to him. He chose one for himself instead--the one -nearest to his hand. That this was red made no difference. Blue, white, -red, green, or purple, it was all one to Shanley. His fuddled brain did -not differentiate. A light was a light, that was all there was to that. - -The short distance from the shanty door to the right of way Shanley -negotiated with finesse and aplomb, and then he started down the track. -This, however, was another matter. - -Railroad ties, at best, do not make the smoothest walking in the world, -and to accomplish the feat under some conditions is decidedly worthy of -note. Shanley’s performance beggars the English language--there is -no metaphor. For every ten feet he moved forward he covered twenty in -laterals, and, considering that the laterals were limited to the paltry -four, feet, eight and one-half inches that made the gauge of the -rails, the feat was incontestably more than worthy of mere note--it was -something to wonder at. He clung grimly to the lantern, with the result -that the gyrations of that little red light in the darkness would have -put to shame an expert’s exhibition with a luminous dumb-bell. The while -Shanley spoke earnestly to himself. - -“Queshun is am I drunk--thash’s the queshun. If I’m drunk--lose my job. -Thash what Carleton said--lose my job. If I’m not drunk--s’all right. -Wish I knew wesser I’m drunk or not.” - -He relapsed into silent communion and debate. This lasted for a very -long period, during which, marvelous to relate, he had not only reached -a point opposite his box-car domicile, but, being oblivious of that -fact, had kept on along the track. Progress, however, was becoming -more and more difficult. Shanley was assuming a position that might be -likened somewhat to the letter C, owing to the fact that the force of -gravity seemed to be exerting an undue influence on his head. Shanley -was coming to earth. - -As a result of his communion with himself he began to talk again, and -his words suggested that he had suspicions of the truth. - -“Jus’ my luck,” said he bitterly. “Jus’ my luck. Allus same kind of -luck. What’d I have to do wis Peto Mara--Mars--Marscheeno’s birthday? -Nothing. Nothing ‘tall. ‘Twasn’t my fault. Jus’ my luck. Jus’ my----” - -Shanley came to earth. Also his head came into contact with the -unyielding steel of the left-hand rail, and as a result he sprawled -inertly full across the right of way, not ten yards west of where the -Glacier River swings in to crowd the track close up against the mountain -base. - -Providence sometimes looks after those who are unable to look after -themselves. By the law of probabilities the lantern should have met -disaster quick and absolute; but, instead, when it fell from Shanley’s -hand, it landed right side up just outside the rail between two ties, -and, apart from a momentary and hesitant flicker incident to the jolt, -burned on serenely. And it was still burning when, five minutes -later, above the swish of leaping waters from the Glacier River now a -chattering, angry stream with swollen banks, above the moan of the wind -and the roll of the thunder through the mountains, above the pelting -splash of the steady rain, came the hoarse scream of Number One’s -whistle on the grade. - -Sanderson, in the cab, caught the red against him on the right of way -ahead, and whistled insistently for the track. This having no effect, he -grunted, latched in the throttle, and applied the “air.” The ray of the -headlight crept along between the rails, hovered over a black object -beside the lantern, passed on again and held, not on the glistening -rain-wet rails--_they_ had disappeared--but on a crumbling road-bed -and a dark blotch of waters, as with a final screech from the grinding -brake-shoes Number One came to a standstill. - -“Holy MacCheesar!” exclaimed Sanderson, as he swung from the cab. - -He made his way along past the drivers to where the pilot’s nose was -inquisitively poked against the lantern, picked up the lantern, and bent -over Shanley. - -“Holy MacCheesar!” he exclaimed again, straightening up after a moment’s -examination. “Holy MacCheesar!” - -“What’s wrong, Sandy?” snapped a voice behind him, the voice of Kelly, -Spider Kelly, the conductor, who had hurried forward to investigate the -unscheduled stop. - -“Search me,” replied Sanderson. “Looks like the Glacier was up to her -old tricks. There’s a washout ahead, and a bad one, I guess. But the -meaning of this here is one beyond me. The fellow was curled up on the -track just as you see him with the light burning alongside, that’s what -saved us, but he’s as drunk as a lord.” - -As Kelly bent over the prostrate form, others of the train crew -appeared on the scene. One glance he gave at Shanley’s -never-under-any-circumstances-to-be-for-gotten homely countenance, and -hastily ordered the men to go forward and investigate the washout ahead. -Then he turned to the engineer. - -“The man is not drunk, Sandy,” said he. - -“He is gloriously and magnificently drunk, Kelly,” replied the engineer. - -“What would he be doing here, then? He is not drunk.” - -“Sleeping it off. He is disgracefully drunk.” - -“Can ye not see the bash on his head where he must have stumbled in the -dark trying to save the train and struck against the rail? He is not -drunk.” - -“Can ye not smell?” retorted Sanderson. “He is dead drunk!” - -“I have fought with him and he licked me. He is a man and a friend -of mine”--Kelly shoved his lantern into Sanderson’s face. “_He is not -drunk_.” - -“He is _not_ drunk,” said Sanderson. “He is a hero. What will we do with -him?” - -“We’ll carry him, you and me, over to the construction shanty, it’s only -a few yards, and put him in his bunk. He works here, you know. McCann’s -in Big Cloud, for I saw him there. After that we’ll run back to the Bend -for orders and make our report.” - -“Hurry, then,” said the engineer. “Take his legs. What are you laughing -at?” - -“I was thinking of Carleton,” said Kelly. “Carleton? What’s Carleton got -to do with it?” - -“I’ll tell you later when we get to the Bend. Come on.” - -“H’m,” said Sanderson, as they staggered with their burden over to the -box-car shack. “I’ve an idea that bash on the head is more dirt than -hurt. He’s making a speech, ain’t he?” - -“Jus’ my luck,” mumbled the reviving Shanley dolefully. “Jus’ my luck. -Alius same kind of luck.” - -“Possibly,” said Kelly. “Set him down and slide back the door. -That’s right. In with him now. We haven’t got time to make him very -comfortable, but I guess he’ll do. I can fix him up better at the Bend -than I can here.” - -“At the Bend? What d’ye mean?” demanded Sanderson. - -“You’ll see,” replied Kelly, with a grin. “You’ll see.” - -And Sanderson saw. So did Carleton--in a way. Kelly’s report, when they -got to the Bend, was a work of art. He disposed of the nature and extent -of the washout in ten brief, well-chosen words, but the operator got -a cramp before Kelly was through covering Shanley with glory. The -passengers, packed in the little waiting-room clamoring for details, -yelled deliriously as he read the message aloud--and promptly took up -a collection, a very generous collection, because all collections are -generous at psychological moments--that is to say, if not delayed too -long to allow a recovery from hysteria. - -At Big Cloud, the dispatcher, because the washout was a serious matter -that not only threatened to tie up traffic, but was tying it up, sent a -hurry call to Carleton’s house that brought the super on the run to -the office. By this time the collection had been counted, and the total -wired in, as an additional detail--one hundred and forty dollars and -thirty-three cents. The odd change being a contribution from a Swede in -the colonist coach who could not speak English, and who paid because -a man in uniform, a brakeman acting as canvasser, made the request. A -Swede has a great respect for a uniform. - -“H’m,” said Carleton, when he had read it all. “I know a man when I see -one. Tell Shanley to report here. I guess we can find something better -for him to do than bossing laborers. What? Yes, send the letter up on -the construction train. One hundred and forty, thirty-three, h’m? Tell -him that, too. He’ll feel good when he sees it in the morning.” - -But Shanley did not feel good when he saw it in the morning, for he -was nursing a very bad headache and a stomach that had a tendency to -squeamishness. The letter was lying on the floor, where some one had -considerately chucked it in without disturbing him. His eyes fell on -it as he struggled out of his bunk. He picked it up, opened it, -read it--and blinked. His face set with a very blank and bewildered -expression. He read it again, and again once more. Then he went to the -door and looked out. - -A construction train was on the line a little below him, and a gang of -men, not his nor Pietro Maraschino’s men, were busily at work. As he -gazed, his face puckered. The problem that had so obsessed him on his -return journey from the birthday celebration the night before was a -problem no longer. - -“I _was_ drunk,” said he, with conviction. “I _must_ have been.” - -He went back to the letter and studied it again, scratching his head. - -“Something,” he muttered, “has happened. What it is, I dunno. I was -drunk, an’ I’m not fired. I was drunk, an’ I’m promoted. I was drunk, -an’ I’m paid well for it, very well. I was drunk--an’ I’ll keep my mouth -shut.” - -Which was exactly the advice Kelly took pains to give him half an hour -later, when Number One crawled down to the Canon and halted for a few -minutes opposite the dismantled box-car, while the construction train -put the last few touches to its work. - - - - -VI--THE BUILDER - -There are two sides to every story--which is a proverb so old that it -is in the running with Father Time himself. It is repeated here because -there must be _some_ truth in it--anything that can stand the wear and -tear of the ages, and the cynics, and the wise old philosophical owls -without getting any knock-out dints punched in its vital spots must have -some sort of merit fundamentally, what? Anyway, the company had their -side, and the men’s version differed--of course. Maybe each, in a way, -was more or less right, and, equally, in a way, more or less wrong. -Maybe, too, both sides lost their tempers and got their crown-sheets -burned out before the arbitration pow-wow had a chance to get the line -clear and give anybody rights, schedule or otherwise. However, be that -as it may, whoever was right or whoever was wrong, one or the other, or -both, it is the strike, not the ethics of it, that has to do with--but -just a moment, we’re over-running our holding orders. - -From the time the last rail was spiked home and bridging the Rockies was -a reality, not a dream--from then to the present day, there isn’t any -very much better way of describing the Hill Division than to call it -rough and ready. Coming right down to cases, the history of that piece -of track, the history of the men who gave the last that was in them to -make it, and the history of those who have operated it since isn’t far -from being a pretty typical and comprehensive example of the pulsing, -dominating, dogged, go-forward spirit of a continent whose strides and -progress are the marvel of the world; and, withal, it is an example so -compact and concrete that through it one may see and view the larger -picture in all its angles and in all its shades. Heroism and fame and -death and failure--it has known them all--but ever, and above all else, -it has known the indomitable patience, the indomitable perseverance, the -indomitable determination against which no times, nor conditions, nor -manners, nor customs, nor obstacles can stand--the spirit of the New -Race and the Great New Land, the essence and the germ of it. - -Building a road through the Rockies and tapping the Sierras to give -zest to the finish wasn’t an infant’s performance; and operating it, -single-track, on crazy-wild cuts and fills and tangents and curves and -tunnels and trestles with nature to battle and fight against, isn’t any -infant’s performance, either. The Hill Division was rough and ready. -It always was, and it is now--just naturally so. And Big Cloud, the -divisional point, snuggling amongst the buttes in the eastern foothills, -is even more so. It boasts about every nationality classified in certain -erudite editions of small books with big names, and, to top that, has an -extra anomaly or two left over and up its sleeve for good measure; -but, mostly, it is, or rather was--it has changed some with the -years--composed of Indians, bad Americans, a scattering of Chinese, and -an indescribable medley of humans from the four quarters of Europe, the -Cockney, the Polack, the Swede, the Russian and the Italian--laborers -on the construction gangs. Big Cloud was a little more than rough and -ready--it wasn’t exactly what you’d call a health resort for finnicky -nerves. - -So, take it by and large, the Hill Division, from one end to the other, -wasn’t the quietest or most peaceful locality on the map even before -the trouble came. After that--well, mention the Big Strike to any of the -old-timers and they’ll talk fast enough and hard enough and say enough -in a minute to set you wondering if the biographers hadn’t got mixed -on dates and if Dante hadn’t got his material for that little -hair-stiffener of his no further away than the Rockies, and no longer -back than a few years ago. But no matter---- - -The story opens on the strike--_not_ the ethics of it. There’s some -hard feeling yet--too much of it to take sides one way or the other. -But then, apart from that, this is not the story of a strike, it is -the story of men--a story that the boys tell at night in the darkened -roundhouses in the shadow of the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the -steam purrs softly at the gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a -catchy sob. They tell it, too, across the tracks at headquarters, or on -the road and in construction camps; but they tell it better, somehow, in -the roundhouse, though it is not an engineer’s tale--and Clarihue, the -night turner, tells it best of all. Set forth as it is here it takes no -rank with him,--but all are not so fortunate as to have listened while -Clarihue talked. - -Just one word more to make sure that the red isn’t against us anywhere -and we’ll get to Keating and Spirlaw--just a word to say that Carleton, -“Royal” Carle-ton, was superintendent then, and Regan was master -mechanic, Harvey was division engineer, Spence was chief dispatcher, and -Riley was trainmaster. Pretty good men that little group, pretty good -railroaders--there have never been better. Some of them are bigger now -in the world’s eyes, heads of systems instead of departments--and some -of them will never railroad any more. However------ - -If you haven’t forgotten Shanley you will recall the Glacier Canon, -and, most of all, you will recall the Glacier River with its treacherous -sandy bed that snuggled close to the right of way and forced the track -hard against the rocky walls of the mountain’s base. The havoc the -Glacier played with the operating department on the night of Shanley’s -memorable heroism was not the first time it had misbehaved itself, nor -was it the last--that was the trouble. It washed out the road-bed with -such consistent persistency, on so little provocation, and did it so -effectually as to stir at last to resentment even the torpid blood of -the directors down East. So they voted the sum, though it hurt, and -solaced themselves with the thought that after all it was economy--which -was true. - -There was only one thing to do against that overhospitable and -affectionate little stream, and that was to get away from it; but, -before proceeding to do so--in order to get elbow room to work so that -the flyers and the fast mails and the traffic generally wouldn’t be hung -up every time a Polack swung a pick--they pushed the track out over the -chattering river on a long, temporary, hybrid trestle of wood and steel. -That done, the rest was up to Spirlaw--up to Spirlaw and Keating. - -The plans called for the shaving down of the mountain-side, the -barbering, mostly, to be done with dynamite, for the beard of the -Rockies is not the down of a youth. So, when the trestle was finished, -Spirlaw with a gang of some thirty Polacks moved into construction camp, -promptly tore up the old track, and set themselves to the task in hand. -A little later, Keating joined them. - -Spirlaw was a road boss, and the roughest of his kind. Physically he was -a giant; and which of the three was the hardest, his face, his fist, -or his tongue, would afford the sporting element a most excellent -opportunity to indulge in a little book-making with the odds about even -all round. His hair was a coarse mop of tawny brown that straggled over -his eyes; and his eyes were all black, every bit of them--there didn’t -seem to be any pupil at all, which gave them a glint that was harder -than a cold chisel. Take him summed up, Spirlaw looked a pretty tough -proposition, and in some ways, most ways perhaps, he was--he never -denied it. - -“What the blue blinding blazes, d’ye think, h’m?” he would remark, -reaching into his hip pocket for his “chewing,” as he swept the other -arm comprehensively over the particular crowd of sweating foreigners -that happened to be under his particular jurisdiction at the time. “What -d’ye think! You can’t run cuts an’ fills with an outfit like this on -soft soap an’ candy sticks, can you? Well then--h’m?” - -That last “h’m” was more or less conclusive--very few cared to pursue -the argument any further. At a safe distance, the Big Fellows on the -division, as a salve to their consciences when humanitarian ideas were -in the ascendancy, would bombard Spirlaw with telegrams which were -forceful in tone and direful in threat--but that’s all it ever amounted -to. Spirlaw’s work report for a day on anything, from bridging a canon -to punching a hole in the bitter hard rock of the mountain-side, was a -report that no one else on the division had ever approached, let alone -duplicated--and figures count perhaps just a little bit more in the -operating department of a railroad than they do anywhere else in -the world. Spirlaw used the telegrams as spills to light a pipe as -hard-looking as himself, whose bowl was down at the heels on one side -from much scraping, and on such occasions it was more than ordinarily -unfortunate for the sour-visaged Polack who should chance to arouse his -ire. - -Some men possess the love of a fight and their natures are tempestuous -by virtue of their nationality, because some nationalities are addicted -that way. This may have been the case with Spirlaw--or it may not. -There’s no saying, for Spirlaw’s nationality was a question mark. He -never delivered himself on the subject, and, certainly, there was no -figuring it out from the derivation of his name--_that_ could have been -most anything, and could have come from most anywhere. - -To say that “opposites attract” isn’t any more original, any less -gray-bearded, than the words at the head of these pages. Generally, -that sort of thing is figured in the worn-out, stale, -familiarity-breeds-con-tempt realm of platitude, and at its unctuous -repetition one comes to turn up his nose; but, once in a while, life -has a habit of getting in a kink or a twist that gives you a jolt and -a different side-light, and then, somehow, a thing like that rings as -fresh and virile as though you had just heard it for the first time. As -far as any one ever knew, Keating was the only one that ever got inside -of Spirlaw’s shell, the only one that the road boss ever showed the -slightest symptoms of caring a hang about--and yet, on the surface, -between the two there was nothing in common. Where one was polished the -other was rough; where one was weak the other was strong. Keating was -small, thin, pale-faced, and he had a cough--a cough that had sent him -West in a hurry without waiting for the other year that would have given -him his engineer’s diploma from the college in the East. - -When the boy, he wasn’t much more than a boy, dropped off at Big Cloud, -and Carleton read the letter he brought from one of the big Eastern -operators, the super raised his eyebrows a little, looked him over and -sent him out to Spirlaw. Afterwards, he spoke to Regan about him. - -“I didn’t know what to do with him, Tommy; but I had to do something, -what? Any one with half an eye could tell that he had to be kept out -of doors. Thought he might be able to help Spirlaw out a little as -assistant, h’m? Guess he’ll pick up the work quick enough. He don’t look -strong.” - -“Mabbe it’s just as well,” grinned the master mechanic. “He won’t be -able to batter the gang any. One man doing that is enough--when it’s -Spirlaw.” - -Spirlaw heard about it before he saw Keating, and he swore fervently. - -“What the hell!” he growled. “Think I’m runnin’ a nursery or an outdoor -sanatorium? I guess I’ve got enough to do without lookin’ after sick -kids, I guess I have. Fat lot of help he’ll be--help my eye! I don’t -need no help.” - -But for all that, somehow, from the first minute when Keating got off -the local freight, that stopped for him at the camp, and shoved out his -hand to Spirlaw it was different--after that it was _all_ Keating as far -as the road boss was concerned. - -Queer the way things go. Keating looked about the last man on earth you -would expect to find rubbing elbows with an iron-fisted foreman whose -tongue was rougher than a barbed-wire fence; the last man to hold his -own with a slave-driven gang of ugly Polacks. He seemed too quiet, too -shy, too utterly unfit, physically, for that sort of thing. The blood -was all out of the boy--he got rid of it faster than he could make it. -But his training stood him in good stead, and, within his limitations, -he took hold like an old hand. That was what caught Spirlaw. He did what -he was told, and he did what he could--did a little more than he could -at times, which would lay him up for a bad two or three days of it. - -“Good man,” Spirlaw scribbled across the bottom of a report one day--a -day that was about equally divided between barking his knuckles on a -Polack’s head and feeding cracked ice to Keating in his bunk. Cracked -ice? No, it wasn’t on the regular camp bill of fare--but the company -supplied it for all that. Spirlaw, with supreme contempt for the -dispatchers and their schedules and their train sheets, held up Number -Twelve and the porter of the Pullman for a goodly share of the commodity -possessed by that colored gentleman. That’s what Spirlaw thought of -Keating. - -For the first few weeks after he struck the camp Keating didn’t have -very much to say about himself, or anything else for that matter; but -after he got a little nearer to Spirlaw and the mutual liking grew -stronger, he began to open up at nights when he and the road boss sat -outside the door of the construction shanty and watched the sun -lose itself behind the mighty peaks, creep again with a wondrous -golden-tinted glow between a rift in the range, and finally sink with -ensuing twilight out of sight. Keating could talk then. - -“Don’t see what you ever took up engineerin’ for,” remarked Spirlaw -one evening. “It’s about the roughest kind of a life I know of, an’ -you------” - -“I know, I know,” Keating smiled. “You think I’m not strong enough for -it. Why, another year out here in the West and I’ll be like a horse.” - -“Sure, you will,” agreed Spirlaw, hastily. “I didn’t mean just that.” - Then he sucked his briar hard. - -Spirlaw wasn’t much up on therapeutics, he knew more about blasting -rock, but down in his heart there wasn’t much doubt about another year -in the West for the boy, and another and another, _all of them_--only -they would be over the Great Divide that one only crosses once when it -is crossed forever. Six months, four, three,--just months, not years, -was what he read in Keating’s face. “What I meant,” he amended, “was -that you don’t have to. From what you’ve said, I figur’ your folks back -there would be willin’ to stake you in most any line you picked out, -h’m?” - -“No, I don’t have to,” Keating answered, and his face lighted up as he -leaned over and touched the road boss on the sleeve. “But, Spirlaw, -it’s the greatest thing in all the world. Don’t you see? A man does -something. _He builds_. I’m going to be a builder--a builder of -bridges and roads and things like that. I want to do something some -day--something that will be worth while. That’s why I’m going to be an -engineer; because, all over the world from the beginning, the engineers -have led the way and--and they’ve left something behind them. I think -that’s the biggest thing they can say of any man when he dies--that he -was a builder, that he left something behind him. I’d like to have them -say that about me. Well, after I put in another year out here--I’m -a heap better even now than when I came--I’m going back to finish my -course, and then--well, you understand what I want to do, don’t you?” - -There were lots of talks like that, evening after evening, and they all -of them ended in the same way--- - -Spirlaw would knock out his pipe against a stone or his boot heel, and -“figur’ he’d stroll up the camp a bit an’ make sure all was right for -the night.” - -A pretty hard man Spirlaw was, but under the rough and the brutal, the -horny, thick-shelled exterior was another self, a strange side of self -that he had never known until he had known Keating. It got into him -pretty deep and pretty hard, the boy and his ambitions; and the irony -of it, grim and bitter, deepened his pity and roused, too, a sense of -fierce, hot resentment against the fate that mocked in its pitiless -might so defenseless and puny a victim. To himself he came to call -Keating “The Builder,” and one day when Harvey came down on an -inspection trip, he told the division engineer about it--that’s how it -got around. - -Carleton, when he heard it, didn’t say anything--just crammed the dottle -in his pipe down with his forefinger and stared out at the switches in -the yards. They were used to seeing the surface of things plowed up and -the corners turned back in the mountains, there weren’t many days -went by when something that showed the raw didn’t happen in one way -or another, but it never brought callousness or indifference, only, -perhaps, a truer sense of values. - -They had been blasting in the Canon for a matter of two months when the -first signs of trouble began to show themselves, and the beginning was -when the shop hands at Big Cloud went out--the boiler-makers and -the blacksmiths, the painters, the carpenters and the fitters. The -construction camp, that is Spirlaw, didn’t worry very much about this -for the very simple reason that there didn’t appear to be any reason -why it, or he, should--that was Regan’s hunt. But when the train crews -followed suit and stray rumors of a fight or two at Big Cloud began to -come in, with the likelihood of more hard on the heels of the first, it -put a different complexion on things; for the rioting, what there had -been of it, lay, not at the door of the railroad boys, but with -the town’s loafers and hangers-on, these and the foreign -element--particularly the foreign element--the brothers and the cousins -of the Polacks who were swinging the picks and the shovels under the -iron hand of Spirlaw, their temporary lord and master--the Polacks, -gently ungentle, when amuck, as starved pumas. - -Then the Brotherhood said “quit,” and the engine crews followed the -trainmen. Things began to look black, and headquarters began to find it -pretty hard to move anything. The train schedule past the Canon was -cut better than in half, and the faces of the men in the cabs and the -cabooses were new faces to those in camp--the faces of the men the -company were bringing in on hurry calls from wherever they could get -them, from the plains East or the coast West. - -Every day brought reports of trouble from one end of the line to the -other, more rioting, more disorder at Big Cloud; and, in an effort to -nip as much of it in the bud as possible, Carleton issued orders to stop -all construction work--all except the work in Glacier Canon, for there -the temporary trestle lay uneasy on his mind. - -The day the stop orders went out elsewhere a letter went out to Spirlaw. -Spirlaw read it and his face set like a thunder cloud. He handed it to -Keating. - -Keating read it--and looked serious. - -“I guess things aren’t any too rosy down there,” he commented; then -slowly: “I’ve noticed our men seemed a bit sullen lately. They don’t -care anything much about the strike, it must be a sort of sympathetic -movement with the rest of their crowd that’s running wild at Big -Cloud--only I don’t just figure how they can know very much about what’s -going on. We don’t ourselves, for that matter.” - -Spirlaw smiled grimly. - -“I’ll tell you how,” he said. “I caught a Polack in the camp last night -that didn’t belong here--and I broke his head for the second time, see? -He used to work’ for me about a year ago--that’s when I broke it the -first time. He’s one of their influential citizens--name’s Kuryla. -Sneaked in here to stir up trouble--guess he’s sorry for it, I guess he -is.” - -“That’s the first I’ve heard of it,” said Keating, his eyes opening a -little wider in surprise. - -“You was asleep,” explained Spirlaw tersely. - -Keating stared curiously at the road boss for a minute, then he glanced -again at the super’s letter which he still held in his hand. - -“Carleton says he is depending on you to put this work through if it’s -a possible thing. You don’t really think we’ll have any serious trouble -here though, do you?” - -Spirlaw bit deeply into his plug before he answered. - -“Yes, son; I do,” he said at last, “And there’s a good many reasons -why we will, too. Once start ‘em goin’ an’ there’s no worse hellions on -earth than the breed we’re livin’ next door to. Furthermore they don’t -_love_ me--they’re just afraid of me as, by the holy razoo, I mean ‘em -to be. Let ‘em once get a smell of the upper hand an’ it would be all -day _an_’ good-by. Let ‘em get goin’ good at Big Cloud an’ they’ll get -goin’ good here--they’ll kind of figur’ then that there ain’t any law to -bother ‘em--an’, unless I miss my guess, Big Cloud’s in for the hottest -celebration in its history, which will be goin’ some for it’s had a few -before that weren’t tame by a damn sight.” - -“Well,” inquired Keating, “what do you intend to do?” - -“H’m-m,” drawled Spirlaw reflectively, and there was a speculative look -in his eyes as they roved over his assistant. “That’s what I’ve been -chewin’ over since I caught that skunk Kuryla last night. As far as I -can figur’ it the chance of trouble here depends on how far those cusses -go at Big Cloud. If I knew that, I’d know what to expect, h’m? I thought -I’d send you up to headquarters for a day. You could have a talk with -the super, tell him just where we stand here, an’ size things up there -generally. What do you say?” - -“Why, of course. All right, if you want me to,” agreed Keating readily. - -“That’s the boy,” said Spirlaw, heartily. “Number Twelve will be along -in half an hour. I’ll flag her, an’ you can go an’ get ready now. I’ll -give you a letter to take along to Carleton.” - -As Keating, with a nod of assent, turned briskly away, Spirlaw watched -him out of sight--and the hint of a smile played over the lips of the -road boss. He pulled a report sheet from his pocket, and on the back -of it scrawled laboriously a letter to the superintendent of the Hill -Division. It wasn’t a very long letter even with the P. S. included. His -smile hardened as he read it over. - -“Supt., Big Cloud,” it ran. “Dear Sir:--Replying to yours 8th inst., -please send a couple of good.45s, and _plenty of stuffing_. [‘Plenty of -stuffing’ was heavily underscored.) Yrs. Resp., H. Spirlaw. P.S. -_Keep the boy up there out of this_.” (The P. S. was even more heavily -underscored than the other.) - -Wise and learned in the ways of men--and Polacks--was Spirlaw. Spirlaw -was not dealing with the _possibility_ of trouble--it was simply a -question of how long it would be before it started. He folded the -letter, sealed it in one of the company’s manilas, and, as he watched -Number Twelve disappear around the bend steaming east for Big Cloud -with Keating aboard her and the epistle reposing in Keating’s pocket, he -stretched out his arms that were big as derrick booms and drew in a long -breath like a man from whose shoulders has dropped a heavy load. - -That day Spirlaw talked from his heart to the men, and they listened in -sullen, stupid silence, leaning on their picks and shovels. - -“You know me,” he snapped, and his eyes starting at the right of the -group rested for a bare second on each individual face as they swept -down the line. “You know _me_. You’ve been actin’ like sulky dogs -lately--don’t think I haven’t spotted it. You saw what happened to that -coyote friend of yours that sneaked in here last night. I meant it as a -lesson for the bunch of you as well as him. The yarns he was fillin’ you -full of are mostly lies, an’ if they ain’t it’s none of your business, -anyhow. It won’t pay you to look for trouble, I promise you that. You -can take it from me that I’ll bash the first man to powder that tries -it. Get that? Well then, wiggle them picks a bit an’ get busy!” - -“The man that hits first,” said Spirlaw to himself, as he walked away, -“is the man that usually comes out on top. I guess them there few kind -words of mine ‘ll give ‘em a little something to chew on till Carle-ton -sends that hardware down, I guess they will, h’m?” - -The camp was pretty quiet that night--quieter than usual. The cook-house -and the three bunk-houses, that lay a few hundred yards east of the -trestle, might have been occupied by dead men for all the sounds that -came from them. Occasionally, Spirlaw, sitting out as usual in front of -his own shanty, that was between the trestle and the gang’s quarters, -saw a Polack or two skulk from one of the bunk-houses to the other--and -he scowled savagely as he divided his glances between them and the sky. -It looked like a storm in the mountains, and a storm in the mountains -is never by any possibility to be desired--least of all was it to be -desired just then. The men at work was one thing; the men cooped up for -a day, or two days, of enforced idleness with the temper they were in -was another-- - -Spirlaw turned in that night with the low, ominous roll of distant -thunder for a lullaby. - -Once in the night he woke suddenly at the sound of a splitting crash, -and once, twice, and again, like a fierce, winking stream of flame, the -lightning filled the shack bright as day, while on the roof the rain -beat steadily like the tattoo of a corps of snare drums. Spirlaw smiled -grimly as the darkness shut down on him again. - -“Got the little builder out just about the right time, h’m?” he remarked -to himself; and, turning over in his bunk, went to sleep again--but even -in his sleep the grim smile lingered on his lips. - -The morning broke with the steady downpour unabated. Everything -ran water, and the rock cut was filled with it. Work was out of the -question. Spirlaw ate his breakfast, that the dripping camp cook brought -him, and then, putting on his rubber boots and coat, started over for -the track. Number Eleven was due at the Canon at seven-thirty, and she -would have the package of “hardware” he had asked Carleton for. - -But though seven-thirty came, Number Eleven did not--neither did any -other train, east or west. The hours passed from a long morning to drag -through a longer afternoon. Something was wrong somewhere--and badly -wrong at that. Spirlaw’s face was blacker than the storm. Twice, once in -the morning and once in the afternoon, he started down the track in the -direction of Keefer’s Siding, which was just what its name proclaimed -it to be--a siding, no more, no less, only there was an operator there. -Each time, however, he changed his mind after getting no further than a -few yards. The Polacks could be no less alive to the fact than -himself that something out of the ordinary was in the air, and second -considerations swung strongly to the advisability of sticking close to -the camp, so that his presence might have the effect of dampening the -ardor of any mischief that might be brewing. - -It was not until well on toward eight o’clock in the evening and the -last of the twilight that the hoarse screech of a whistle sounded down -the canon grade--a long blast and three short ones. It was belated -Number Eleven whistling for the camp--she wouldn’t stop, just slow down -to transact her business. Spirlaw, who was in his shanty at the time, -snatched up his hat, dashed out of the door, and headed for the bend of -the track. As he did so, out of the tail of his eye, he caught sight of -the Polacks clustered with out-poked heads from the open doors of the -bunk-houses. - -As he reached the line, Number Eleven came round the curve, and the door -of the express car swung back. The messenger dropped a package into his -hand that the road boss received with a grim smile, and a word into his -ear that caused Spirlaw’s jaw to drop--nor was that all that dropped, -for, from the rear end, as the train rolled by--dropped Keating. - -White-faced and shaky the boy looked--more so than usual. Spirlaw stared -as though he had seen an apparition, stared for a minute in silence -before he could lay tongue to words--then they came like the out-spout -of a volcano. - -“What the hell’s the meanin’ of this?” he roared. - -“Who in the double-blanked blazes let you out of Big Cloud, h’m? I’ll -have some----” - -“Let’s get in out of the wet,” broke in Keating, smiling through a spell -of coughing that racked him at that moment. “You can growl your head off -then, if you like”--and he started on a run for the shack. - -Once inside, Spirlaw rounded on the boy again, and he stopped only when -he was out of breath. - -“Didn’t Carleton tell you to stay where you was?” he finished bitterly. - -“Oh yes,” said Keating, “that’s about the first thing he _did_ say after -he had read your letter, when I gave it to him yesterday. Then I tumbled -to why you had sent me out of camp. You’re about as square as they make -them, Spirlaw. You needn’t blame Carle-ton, _he_ had about all he could -do without paying any attention to me or any one else. Had any wires or -news in here?” - -Spirlaw shook his head. - -“No; but I knew something was up, because Number Eleven is the first -train in or out to-day. The express messenger just said they’d cut loose -in Big Cloud and wrecked about everything in sight, but I guess he was -puttin’ it on a bit.” - -“He didn’t put on anything,” said Keating slowly. “My God, Spirlaw, it -was an awful night! The freight-house and the shops and the roundhouse, -what’s left of them, are ashes. They cut all the wires and then they -cut loose themselves--the Polacks and that crowd, you know. Yes, they -wrecked everything in sight, and there’s a dozen lives gone to pay for -it.” Keating stopped suddenly, and again began to cough. - -Spirlaw looked at the boy uneasily, and mechanically fumbled with the -cords of the package he had laid upon the table. By the time he had -removed the wrappers and disclosed two ugly, businesslike looking.45s -and a half-dozen boxes of cartridges, Keating’s paroxysm had passed. - -“I guess it was exciting enough for _me_, anyhow”--Keating tried hard to -make his laugh ring true. “I’m a little weak from it yet.” - -“If you weren’t sick,” Spirlaw burst out, “I’d make you sick for comin’ -back here. You know well enough we’ll get it next--you knew so well you -came back to help----” - -“I told Carleton he ought to send some help down here,” Keating -interrupted hastily; “and he just looked at me like a crazy man--he was -half mad anyhow with the ruin of things. ‘Help!’ he flung out at me. -‘Where’s it coming from? Let Spirlaw yank up his stakes and pull out if -things get looking bad!’” - -“Pull out!” shouted Spirlaw, in a sudden roar. “Pull out! _Me!_ Not for -all the cross-eyed, hamstrung Polacks on the system!” - -“I think you’d better,” said Keating quietly. “After what I saw last -night, I think you’d better. There was no holding them--they were like -savages, and the further they went the worse they got. They were backed -up by whisky and the worst element in town. I was in the station -with Carleton, Regan, Harvey, Riley and Spence and some of the other -dispatchers. It was a regular pitched battle, and in spite of their -revolvers the station would have gone with the rest if, along toward -morning, the striking trainmen and the Brotherhood hadn’t taken a hand -and helped us out. I don’t know that it’s over yet, that it won’t break -out again to-night; though I heard Carleton say there’d be a detachment -of the police in town by four o’clock. I wish you would pull out, -Spirlaw. You said yourself that all these fellows here needed to start -them sticking their claws into you was a little encouragement from the -other end. They’ve been afraid of you, but they hate you like poison. -Once started, they’ll be worse than the crowd at Big Cloud for hate is a -harder driver than whisky. Then besides, I really think you’d be of more -use in Big Cloud. You could do some good there no matter what the end -was, while here you’re alone and you stand to lose everything and gain -nothing. I wish you would pull out, Spirlaw, won’t you?” - -Spirlaw reached out his hand and laid it on Keating’s shoulder, as he -shook his head. - -“I’ve got a whole _lot_ to lose,” he answered, his hard face softening -a little. “A whole lot. I can’t say things the way you do, but I guess -you’ll understand. You got something that means a whole lot to you, that -you’d risk anything for--what you want to do and what you want to leave -behind you when it comes along time to cash in. Well, I guess most of us -have in one way or another, though mabbe it don’t rank anywheres up to -that. I reckon, too, a whole lot of us don’t never think to put it in -words, an’ a whole lot of us couldn’t if we tried to, but it’s there -with any man that’s any good. I’d rather go out for keeps than pull -out--I’d rather they’d plant me. D’ye think I’d want to live an’ have to -cross the street because I couldn’t look _even a Polack_ in the eyes--a -man would be better dead, what?” - -For a moment Keating did not answer, he seemed to be weighing the -possibility of still shaking the determination of the road boss before -accepting it as irrevocable: then, evidently coming to the conclusion -that it was useless to argue further, he pointed to the revolvers. - -“Then the sooner you load those the better,” he jerked out. - -Spirlaw looked at him curiously, questioningly. - -“Because,” went on Keating, answering the unspoken interrogation, “when -I dropped off the train I saw that fellow Kuryla--he was pointed out to -me in Big Cloud yesterday--and three or four more drop off on the other -side. I didn’t know they were on the train until then, of course, or I -would have had them put off. There isn’t much doubt about what they are -here for, is there?” - -“So that’s it, is it?” Spirlaw ripped out with an oath. “No, there ain’t -much doubt!” - -He snatched up a cartridge-box, slit the paper band with his thumb -nail, and, breaking the revolvers, began to cram the cartridges into the -cylinders. His face was twitching and the red that flushed it shaded to -a deep purple. Not another word came from him--just a deadly quiet. -He thrust the weapons into his pockets, strode to the door, opened it, -stepped over the threshold--and stopped. An instant he hung there in -indecision, then he came back, shut the door behind him, sat down on the -edge of his bunk, and looked at Keating grimly. - -“There’s been one train along, there’ll be another,” he snapped. “An’ -the first one that comes you’ll get aboard of. I hate to keep those -whinin’ coyotes waitin’, but----” - -“I’ll take no train,” Keating cut in coolly; “but I’ll take a revolver.” - -Spirlaw growled and shook his head. - -“Why didn’t you tell me about Kuryla at first?” he demanded abruptly. - -“You know why as well as I do,” smiled Keating. “I wanted to get you -away from here if I could. There wouldn’t have been any use trying at -all if I’d begun by telling you that. Wild horses wouldn’t have budged -you then. As for a train, what’s the use of talking about it, there -probably won’t be another one along under an hour. In the meantime, give -me one of the guns.” - -“Not m----” - -Spirlaw’s refusal died half uttered on his lips, as he sprang suddenly -to his feet; then he whipped out the revolvers and shoved one quickly -into Keating’s hand. - -Carried down with the sweep of the wind came the sound of many voices -raised in shouts and discordant song. It grew louder, swelled, and broke -into a high-pitched, defiant yell. - -“Whisky!” gritted Spirlaw between his teeth. - -“That devil Kuryla and the coyotes that came with him knew the best an’ -quickest way to start the ball rollin’. Well, son, I reckon we’re in for -it. The only thing I’m sorry about is that you’re here; but that can’t -be helped now. You were white clean through to come--Holy Mother, listen -to that!”--another yell broke louder, fiercer than before over the roar -of the storm. - -Spirlaw stepped to the door and peered out. It was already getting dark. -The rain still poured in sheets, and the wind howled down the gorge in -wild, furious, spasmodic gusts. Thin streaks of light strayed out from -the doors of the bunk-houses, and around the doors were gathered shadowy -groups. A moment more and the shadowy groups welded into a single dark -mass. Came a mad, exultant yell from a single throat. It was caught up, -flung back, echoed and reechoed by a score of voices--and the dark mass -began to move. - -“Guess you’d better put out that light, son,” said Spirlaw coolly. -“There’s no use makin’ targets of our----” - -Before he ended, before Keating had more than taken a step forward, a -lump of rock shivered the little window and crashed into the lamp--it -was out for keeps. A howl followed this exhibition of marksmanship, and, -following that, a volley of stones smashed against the side of the shack -thick and fast as hail--then the onrush of feet. - -Spirlaw’s revolver cut the black with a long, blinding flash, then -another, and another. Screams and shrieks answered him, but it did not -halt the Polacks. In a mob they rushed the door. Spirlaw sprang back, -trying to close it after him; instead, a dozen hands grasped and half -wrenched it from its hinges. - -“Lie down on the floor, Spirlaw, _quick!_”--it was Keating’s voice, -punctuated with a cough. The next instant his gun barked, playing -through the doorway like a gatling. - -From the floor the road boss joined in. The mob wavered, pitched swaying -this way and that, then broke and ran, struggling with each other to get -out of the line of fire. - -“Hurrah!” cried Keating. “I guess that will hold them.” - -“‘Tain’t begun,” was Spirlaw’s grim response. “Where’s them cartridges?” - -“On the table--got them?” - -“Yes,” said Spirlaw, after a minute’s groping. “Here, put a box in your -pocket.” - -“What are they up to now?” asked Keating as, in the silence that had -fallen, they reloaded and listened. - -“God knows,” growled Spirlaw; “but I guess we’ll find out quick enough.” - -As he spoke, from a little distance away, came the splintering crash of -woodwork--then silence again. - -“That’s the storehouse,” Spirlaw snarled. “They’re after the bars an’ -anything else they can lay their hands on. Guess they weren’t countin’ -on our havin’ anything more than our fists to fight with, guess they -weren’t.” - -Keating’s only reply was a cough. - -The minutes passed, two, three, five of them. Once outside sounded what -might have been the stealthy scuffle of feet or only a storm-sound so -construed by the imagination. Then, from the direction of the riverbed, -sudden, sharp, came a terrific roar. - -“My God!” yelled Spirlaw. “There’s the trestle gone--they’ve blown it -up! They’re sure to have laid a fuse here, too. Get out of here quick! -Fool that I was, I might have known it was the _dynamite_ they were -after.” - -Both men were scrambling for the door as he spoke. They reached it not -an instant too soon. The ground behind them lifted, heaved; the walls, -the roof of the shack rose, cracked like eggshells, and scattered in -flying pieces--and the mighty, deafening detonation of the explosion -echoed up and down the gorge, echoed again--and died away. - -The mob caught sight of them as they ran and, foiled for the moment, -sent up a yell of rage--then started in pursuit. - -“Make for the cut,” shouted Spirlaw. “We can hold them off there behind -the rocks.” - -Keating had no breath for words. Panting, sick, his head swimming, a -fleck of blood upon his lips, he struggled after the giant form of the -road boss; while, behind, coming ever closer, ringing in his ears, were -the wild cries of the maddened Polacks. The splash of water revived him -a little as they plunged along the old right of way where the river, -flooded by the storm, had again claimed its own. The worst of it was up -to his armpits. A grip on his shoulder and a pull from Spirlaw helped -him over. They gained the other side with a bare two yards separating -them from the mob behind, went on again--and then Spirlaw caught his -foot, tripped and pitched headlong, causing Keating, at his heels, to -stumble and fall over him. - -Like wild beasts the Polacks surged upon them. Keating tried to regain -his feet--but he got no further than his knees as a swinging blow from -a pick-handle caught him on his head. Half-stunned, he sank back and, as -consciousness left him, he heard Spirlaw’s great voice roar out like the -maddened bellow of a bull, saw the giant form rise with, it seemed, a -dozen Polacks clinging to neck and shoulders, legs and body, saw him -shake them off and the massive arms rise and fall--and all was a blur, -all darkness. - -The road boss lay stretched out a yard away from him when he opened his -eyes. He was very weak. He raised himself on his elbow. From the camp -down the line he could see the lights in the bunk-houses, hear drunken, -chorused shouts. He crept to Spirlaw, called him, shook him--the big -road boss never moved. The Polacks had evidently left both of them for -dead--and one, it seemed, was. He slid his hand inside the other’s vest -for the heart beat. So faint it was at first he could not feel it, then -he got it, and, realizing that Spirlaw was still alive he straightened -up and looked helplessly around--and, in a flash, like the knell of -doom, Spirlaw’s words came back to him: “_There’s the trestle gone!_” - -Sick the boy was with his clotting lungs, deathly sick, weak from -the blow on his head, dizzy, and his brain swam. _There’s the trestle -gone!_”--he coughed it out between blue lips. - -“_There’s the trestle gone!_” - -Keefer’s Siding was a mile away. Somehow he must reach it, must get -the word along the line that the _trestle was out_, get the word along -before the stalled traffic moved, before the first train east or west -crashed through to death, before more wreck and ruin was added to the -tale that had gone before. He bent to Spirlaw’s ear and three times -called him frantically: “Spirlaw! Spirlaw! _Spirlaw!_” There was no -response. He tried to lift him, tried to drag him--the great bulk was -far beyond his strength. And the minutes were flying by, each marking -the one perhaps when it would be too late, too late to warn any one that -the trestle was out. - -Just up past the rock cut, a bare twenty yards away where the leads to -the temporary track swung into the straight of the main line, was the -platform handcar they had used for carrying tools and the odds and ends -of supplies between the storehouse and the work--if he could only get -Spirlaw there! - -He called him again, shook him, breathing a prayer for help. The road -boss stirred, raised himself a little, and sank down again with a moan. - -“Spirlaw, _Spirlaw_, for God’s sake, man, try to get up! I’ll help you. -You must, do you hear, _you must!_”--he was dragging at the road boss’s -collar. - -Keating’s voice seemed to reach the other’s consciousness, for, weakly, -dazed, without sense, blindly, Spirlaw got upon his knees, then to -his feet, and, staggering, reeling like a drunken man, his arm around -Keating’s neck, his weight almost crushing to the ground the one sicker -than himself, the two stumbled, pitched, and, at the end, _crawled_ -those twenty yards. - -“The handcar, Spirlaw, the handcar!” gasped Keating. “Get on it. You -must! Try! Try!” - -Spirlaw straightened, lurched forward, and fell half across the car with -out-flung arms--unconscious again. - -The rest Keating managed somehow, enough so that the dangling legs freed -the ground by a few inches; then, with bursting lungs, far spent, he -unblocked the wheels, pushed the car down the little spur, swung the -switch, dragged himself aboard, and began to pump his way west toward -Keefer’s Siding. - -No man may tell the details of that mile, every inch of which was wrung -from blood that oozed from parted, quivering lips; no man may question -from Whom came the strength to the frail body, where strength was not; -the reprieve to the broken lungs, that long since should have done their -worst--only Keating knew that the years were ended forever, that with -every stroke of the pump-handle the time was shorter. The few minutes to -win through--that was the last stake! - -At the end he choked--fighting for his consciousness, as, like dancing -points, switch lights swam before him. He checked with the brake, reeled -from the car, fell, tried to rise and fell back again. Then, on his -hands and knees, he crept toward the station door. It had come at last. -The hemorrhage that he had fought back with all his strength was upon -him. He beat upon the door. It opened, a lantern was flashed upon him, -and he fell inside. - -“The trestle’s out at the Glacier--hold trains both -ways--Polacks--Spirlaw on--handcar--I------” - -That was all. Keating never spoke again. - -“I dunno as you’d call him a builder,” says Clarihue, the night turner, -when _he_ tells the story in the darkened roundhouse in the shadow of -the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the steam purrs softly at the -gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a catchy sob, “I dunno as -you would. It depends on the way you look at it. Accordin’ to him, he -was. He left something behind him, what?” - - - - -VII--THE GUARDIAN OF THE DEVIL’S SLIDE - -There is one bad piece of track on the Hill Division, particularly bad, -which is the same as saying that it is the worst piece of track, -bar none, on the American Continent. Not that the engineers were -to blame--they weren’t. It was Dame Nature in the shape of the -Rockies--Dame Nature and the directors. - -Sir Ivers Clayborn, gray-haired and grizzled, a man schooled in the -practical school of many lands and many years, who was chief consulting -engineer when the road was building, advised a double-looped tunnel -that, according to his sketch, looked something like the figure 8 canted -over sideways. The directors poised their glasses and examined the -sketch with interest until they caught sight of the penciled estimate in -the corner. That settled it. They did not even take the trouble to vote. -They asked for an alternative--and they got it. They got the Devil’s -Slide. - -First and last, it has euchred more money out of the treasury of the -Transcontinental than it would have taken to build things Sir Ivers’ way -to begin with; and it has taken some years, a good many of them, for -the directors to learn their lesson. The old board never did, for that -matter; but, thanks perhaps to younger blood, they’ve begun now to build -as they should have built in the first place. It isn’t finished yet, -that double-looped tunnel, it won’t be for years, but, no matter, it’s -begun, and some day a good many more than a few men will sleep the -easier because of it. - -From Carleton, the super, to the last section hand and track-walker, the -Devil’s Slide was a nightmare. The dispatchers, under their green-shaded -lamps, cursed it in the gray hours of dawn; the traffic department -cursed it spasmodically, but at such times so whole-heartedly and with -such genuine fervor and abandon that its occasional lapses into silence -were overlooked; the motive power department in the shape of Regan, the -master mechanic, cursed it all the time, and did it breathlessly. It had -only one friend--the passenger agent’s department. The passenger agent’s -department swore _by_ it--on account of the scenery. - -“Scenery!” gulped the dispatchers, and the white showed under their nail -tips as their fingers tightened on their keys. - -“Scenery!” howled the traffic department, and reached for the claim -file. - -“Scenery!”--Regan didn’t say it--he choked. Just choked, and spat the -exclamation point in a stream of black-strap. - -“Scenery!” murmured Mr. General Passenger Agent esthetically, waving a -soft and diamond bedecked hand from the platform of Carleton’s private -car. “Wonderful! Grand! Magnificent! We’ve got them all beaten into a -coma. No other road has anything like it anywhere in the world.” - -“They have not,” agreed Carleton, and the bitterness of his soul was in -his words. - -Everybody was right. - -The general passenger agent was right--the scenic grandeur was beyond -compare, and he made the most of it in booklets, in leaflets, in -pamphlets, and in a score of pages in a score of different magazines. - -The others were right--the Devil’s Slide was everything that the ethics -of engineering said it shouldn’t be. It was neither level nor straight. -In its marvelous two miles from the summit of the pass to the canon -below, its nearest approach to the ethical was three percent drop. There -wasn’t much of that--most of it was a straight five! It twisted, -it turned, it slid, it slithered, and it dove around projecting -mountain-sides at scandalous tangents and with indecent abruptness. - -Chick Coogan swore, with a grin, that he could see his own headlight -coming at him about half the time every trip he made up or down. That, -of course, is exaggerating a little--but not much! Coogan sized up the -Devil’s Slide pretty well when he said that, all things considered, -pretty well--there wasn’t much chance to mistake what he meant, or what -the Devil’s Slide was, or what he thought of it. Anyway, be that as it -may, Coogan’s description gave the division the only chance they ever -had to crack a smile when the Devil’s Slide was in question. - -They smiled then, those railroaders of the Rockies, but they’ll look at -you queerly now if you mention the two together--Coogan and the Devil’s -Slide. Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes. - -Any one on the Hill Division can tell you the story--they’ve reason to -know it, and they do--to the last man. If you’d rather get it first -hand in a roundhouse, or between trains from the operator at some -lone station that’s no more than a siding, or in the caboose of a way -freight--if you are a big enough man to ride there, and that means being -bigger than most men--or anywhere your choice or circumstance leads you -from the super’s office to a track-walker’s shanty, if you’d rather get -it that way, and you’ll get it better, far better, than you will here, -don’t try any jolly business to make the boys talk--just say a good word -for Coogan, Chick Coogan. That’s the “open sesame”--and the only one. - -There’s no use talking about the logical or the illogical, the rational -or the irrational, when it comes to Coo-gan’s story. Coogan’s story -is just Coogan’s story, that’s all there is to it. What one man does -another doesn’t. You can’t cancel the human equation because there’s -nothing to cancel it with; it’s there all the time swaying, compelling, -dominating every act in a man’s life. The higher branches of mathematics -go far, and to some men three dimensions are but elemental, but there is -one problem even they have never solved and never will solve--the human -equation. What Coogan did, you might not do--or you might. - -Coogan didn’t come to the Transcontinental a fullblown engineer from -some other road as a good many of the boys have, though that’s nothing -against them; Coogan was a product of the Hill Division pure and simple. -He began as a kid almost before the steel was spiked home, and certainly -before the right of way was shaken down enough to begin to look like -business. He started at the bottom and he went up. Call-boy, sweeper, -wiper, fireman--one after the other. Promotion came fast in the early -days, for, the Rockies once bridged, business came fast, too; and Coogan -had his engine at twenty-one, and at twenty-four he was pulling the -Imperial Limited. - -“Good goods,” said Regan. “That’s what he is. The best ever.” - -Nobody questioned that, not only because there was no one on the -division who could put anything over Coogan in a cab, but also because, -and perhaps even more pertinent a reason, every one liked Coogan--some -of them did more than that. - -Straight as a string, clean as a whistle was Coogan, six feet in his -stockings with a body that played up to every inch of his height, black -hair, jet black, black eyes that laughed with you, never _at_ you, a -smile and a cheery nod always--the kind of a man that makes you feel -every time you see them that the world isn’t such an eternal dismal -grind after all. That was Chick Coogan--all except his heart. Coogan -had a heart like a woman’s, and a hard luck story from a ‘bo stealing a -ride, a railroad man, or any one else for that matter, never failed to -make him poorer by a generous percentage of what happened to be in his -pocket at the time. Who wouldn’t like him! Queer how things happen. - -It was the day Coogan got married that Regan gave him 505 and the -Limited run as a sort of wedding present; and that night Big Cloud -turned itself completely inside out doing honor and justice to the -occasion. - -Big Cloud has had other celebrations, before and since, but none quite -so unanimous as that one. Restraint never did run an overwhelmingly -strong favorite with the town, but that night it was hung up higher than -the arms on the telegraph poles. Men that the community used to hide -behind and push forward as hostages of righteousness, when it was on its -good behavior and wanted to put on a front, cut loose and outshone the -best--or the worst, if you like that better---of the crowd that never -made any bones about being on the other side of the fence. They burned -red flares, very many of them, that Carleton neglected to imagine -had any connection with the storekeeper and the supply account; they -committed indiscretions, mostly of a liquid nature, that any one but the -trainmaster, who was temporarily blind in both eyes, could have seen; -and, as a result, the Hill Division the next day was an eminently -paralytic and feeble affair. This is a very general description of the -event, because sometimes it is not wise to particularize--this is a case -in point. - -Coogan’s send-off was a send-off no other man, be he king, prince, -president, sho-gun, or high mucky-muck of whatever degree, could -have got--except Coogan. Coogan got it because he was Coogan, just -Coogan--and the night was a night to wonder at. - -Regan summarized it the next evening over the usual game of pedro with -Carleton, upstairs over the station in the superb office. - -“Apart from Coogan and me,” said the master mechanic, in a voice that -was still suspiciously husky, “apart from Coogan and me and _mabbe_ the -minister--” the rest was a wave of his hand. Regan could wave his hand -with a wealth of eloquence that was astounding. . - -“Quite so,” agreed Carleton, with a grin. “Too bad to drag _them_ -into it, though. Both ‘peds’ to me, Tommy. It’s a good thing for the -discipline of the division that bigamy is against the law, what?” - -“They’ll be talking of it,” said Regan reminiscently, “when you and me -are on the scrap heap, Carleton.” - -“I guess that’s right,” admitted the super. “Play on, Tommy.” - -But it wasn’t. They only talked of Coogan’s wedding for about a -year--no, they don’t talk about it now. We’ll get to that presently. - -The Imperial Limited was the star run on the division--Regan gave Coogan -the thirty-third degree when he gave him that--that and 505, which was -the last word in machine design. And Coogan took them, took them and -the schedule rights that pertained thereto, which were a clear and a -clean-swept track, and day after day, up hill and down, Number One -or Number Two, as the case might be, pulled into division on the dot. -Coogan’s stock soared--if that were possible; but not Coogan. The -youngest engineer on the road and top of them all, would have been -excuse enough for him to show his oats and, within decent limits, no one -would have thought the worse of him for it--Coogan never turned a hair. -He was still the friend of the ‘bo and the man in trouble, still the -Coogan that had been a wiper in the roundhouse; and yet, perhaps, not -quite the same, for two new loves had come into his life--his love for -Annie Coogan, and his love, the love of the master craftsman, for 505. -In the little house at home he talked to Annie of the big mountain racer -and Annie, being an engineer’s daughter as well as an engineer’s wife, -listened with understanding and a smile, and in the smile was pride and -love; in the cab Coogan talked of Annie, always Annie, and one day he -told his fireman a secret that made big Jim Dahleen grin sheepishly and -stick out a grimy paw. - -Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes--and always, it seems, the cards -are stacked. - -The days and the weeks and the months went by, and then there came a -morning when a sober-, serious-faced group of men stood gathered in the -super’s office, as Number Two’s whistle, in from the Eastbound run, -sounded down the gorge. They looked at Regan. Slowly, the master -mechanic turned, went out of the room and down the stairs to the -platform, as 505 shot round the bend and rolled into the station. For -a moment Regan stood irresolute, then he started for the front-end. He -went no further than the colonist coach, that was coupled behind the -mail car. Here he stopped, made a step forward, changed his mind, -climbed over the colonist’s platform, dropped down on the other side of -the track, and began to walk toward the roundhouse--they changed engines -at Big Cloud and 505, already uncoupled, was scooting up for the spur to -back down for the’table. - -The soles of Regan’s boots seemed like plates of lead as he went -along, and he mopped his forehead nervously. There was a general air of -desertion about the roundhouse. The’table was set and ready for 505, -but there wasn’t a soul in sight. Regan nodded to himself in sympathetic -understanding. He crossed the turntable, walked around the half circle, -and entered the roundhouse through the engine doors by the far pit--the -one next to that which belonged to 505. Here, just inside, he waited, as -the big mogul came slowly down the track, took the’table with a slight -jolt, and stopped. He saw Coogan, big, brawny, swing out of the cab like -an athlete, and then he heard the engineer speak to his fireman. - -“Looks like a graveyard around here, Jim. Wonder where the boys are. I -won’t wait to swing the’table, they’ll be around in a minute, I guess. I -want to get up to the little woman.” - -“All right,” Dahleen answered. “Leave her to me, I’ll run her in. Good -luck to you, Chick.” - -Coogan was starting across the yards with a stride that was almost a -run. Regan opened his mouth to shout--and swallowed a lump in his throat -instead. Twice he made as though to follow the engineer, and twice -something stronger than himself held him back; and then, as though he -had been a thief, the master mechanic stole out from behind the doors, -went back across the tracks, climbed the stairs to Carleton’s room with -lagging steps, and entered. - -The rest were still there: Carleton in his swivel chair, Harvey, -the division engineer, Spence, the chief dispatcher, and Riley, the -trainmaster. Regan shook his head and dropped into a seat. - -“I couldn’t,” he said in a husky voice. “My God, I _couldn’t_” he -repeated, and swept out his arms. - -A bitter oath sprang from Carleton’s lips, lips that were not often -profane, and his teeth snapped through the amber of his briar. The -others just looked out of the window. - -MacVicar, a spare man, took the Limited out that night, and it was three -days before Coogan reported again. Maybe it was the fit of the black -store-clothes and perhaps the coat didn’t hang just right, but as he -entered the roundhouse he didn’t look as straight as he used to look and -there was a queer inward slope to his shoulders and he walked like a man -who didn’t see anything. The springy swing through the gangway was gone. -He climbed to the cab as an old man climbs--painfully. The boys hung -back and didn’t say anything, just swore under their breaths with full -hearts as men do. There wasn’t anything _to_ say--nothing that would do -any good. - -Coogan took 505 and the Limited out that night, took it out the night -after and the nights that followed, only he didn’t talk any more, and -the slope of the shoulders got a little more pronounced, a little more -noticeable, a little beyond the cut of any coat. And on the afternoons -of the lay-overs at Big Cloud, Coogan walked out behind the town to -where on the slope of the butte were two fresh mounds--one larger than -the other. That was all. - -Regan, short, paunchy, big-hearted Regan, tackled Jim Dahleen, Coogan’s -fireman. - -“What’s he say on the run, Jim, h’m?” - -“He ain’t talkative,” Dahleen answered shortly. - -“What the hell,” growled the master mechanic deep in his throat, -to conceal his emotion. “‘Tain’t doing him any good going up there -afternoons. God knows it’s natural enough, but ‘tain’t doing him any -good, not a mite--nor them either, as far as I can see, h’m? You got to -_make_ him talk, Jim. Wake him up.” - -“Why don’t _you_ talk to him?” demanded the fireman. - -“H’m, yes. So I will. I sure will,” Regan answered. - -And he meant to, meant to, honestly. But, somehow, Coogan’s eyes and -Coogan’s face said “no” to him as they did to every other man, and as -the days passed, almost a month of them, Regan shook his head, perplexed -and troubled, for he was fond of Coogan. - -Then, one night, it happened. - -Regan and Carleton were alone over their pedro at headquarters, except -for Spence, the dispatcher, in the next room. It was getting close on to -eleven-thirty. The Imperial Limited, West-bound, with Coogan in the cab, -had pulled out on time an hour and a half before. The game was lagging, -and, as usual, the conversation had got around to the engineer, -introduced, as it always was, by the master mechanic. - -“I sure don’t know what to do for the boy,” said he. “I’d like to do -something. Talking don’t amount to anything, does it, h’m?--even if you -_can_ talk. I can’t talk to him, what?” - -“A man’s got to work a thing like that out for himself, Tommy,” Carleton -answered, “and it takes time. That’s the only thing that will ever help -him--time. I know you’re pretty fond of Coogan, even more than the rest -of us and that’s saying a good deal, but you’re thinking too much about -it yourself.” - -Regan shook his head. - -“I can’t help it, Carleton. It’s got _me_. Time, and that sort of thing, -may be all right, but it ain’t very promising when a man broods the way -he does. I ain’t superstitious or anything like that, but I’ve a feeling -I can’t just explain that somehow something’s going to break. Kind of -premonition. Ever have anything like that? It gets on your mind and you -can’t shake it off. It’s on me to-night worse than it’s ever been.” - -“Nonsense,” Carleton laughed. “Premonitions are out of date, because -they’ve been traced back to their origin. Out here, I should say it -was a case of too much of Dutchy’s lunch-counter pie. You ought to diet -anyway, Tommy, you’re getting too fat. Hand over that fine-cut of yours, -I------” - -He stopped as a sharp cry came from the dispatcher’s room, followed -by an instant’s silence, then the crash of a chair sounded as, hastily -pushed back, it fell to the floor. Quick steps echoed across the room, -and the next moment Spence, with a white face and holding a sheet of -tissue in his hand, burst in upon them. - -Carleton sprang to his feet. - -“What’s the matter, Spence?” he demanded sharply. - -“Number One,” the dispatcher jerked out, and extended the sheet on which -he had scribbled the message as it came in off the sounder. - -Carleton snatched the paper, and Regan, leaping from his chair, looked -over his shoulder. - -“Number One, engine 505, jumped track east of switch-back number two in -Devil’s Slide. Report three known to be killed, others missing. Engineer -Coogan and fireman Dahleen both hurt,” they read. - -Carleton was ever the man of action, and his voice rang hard as chilled -steel. - -“Clear the line, Spence. Get your relief and wrecker out at once. Wire -Dreamer Butte for their wrecker as well, so they can work from both -ends. Now then, Tommy--my God, what’s the matter with you, are you -crazy?” - -Regan was leaning over the back of his chair, his face strained, his arm -outstretched, finger pointing to the wall. - -“I knew it,” he muttered hoarsely. “I knew it. That’s what it is.” - -Carleton’s eyes traveled from the master mechanic to the wall and back -again in amazed bewilderment, then he shook Regan by the shoulder. - -“That’s what, what is?” he questioned brusquely. “Are you mad, man?” - -“The date,” whispered Regan, still pointing to where a large single-day -calendar with big figures on it hung behind the super’s desk. “It’s the -twenty-eighth.” - -“I don’t know what you mean, Tommy,”--Carleton’s voice was quiet, -restrained. - -“Mean!” Regan burst out, with a hard laugh. “I don’t mean anything, do -I? ‘tain’t anything to do with it, it’s just coincidence, mabbe, and -mabbe it’s not. _It’s a year ago to-night Coogan was married._” - -For a moment Carleton did not speak; like Regan, he stared at the wall. - -“You think that----” - -“No, I don’t”--Regan caught him up roughly--“I don’t think anything at -all. I only know it’s queer, ghastly queer.” - -Carleton nodded his head slowly. Steps were coming up the stairs. -The voice of Flannagan, the wrecking boss, reached them, other voices -excited and loud joined in. He slapped the master mechanic on the back. - -“I don’t wonder it caught you, Tommy,” he said. “It’s almost creepy. But -there’s no time for that now. Come on.” - -Regan laughed, the same hard laugh, as he followed the chief into the -dispatcher’s room. - -“East of number two switch-back, eh?” he swore. “If there’s any choice -for hellishness anywhere on that cursed stretch of track, that’s it. My -God, it’s come, and it’s come good and hard--good and hard.” - -It had. It was a bad mess, a nasty mess--but, like everything else, it -might have been worse. Instead of plunging to the right and dropping -to the canon eighteen hundred feet below, 505 chose the inward side and -rammed her nose into the gray mass of rock that made the mountain wall. -The wreckers from Dreamer Butte and the wreckers from Big Cloud tell -of it to this day. For twenty-four hours they worked and then they -dropped--and fresh men took their places. There was no room to -work--just the narrow ledge of the right of way on a circular sweep with -the jutting cliff of Old Piebald Mountain sticking in between, hiding -one of the gangs from the other, and around which the big wrecking -cranes groped dangling arms and chains like fishers angling for a bite. -It was a mauled and tangled snarl, and the worst of it went over the -canon’s edge in pieces, as axes, sledges, wedges, bars and cranes -ripped and tore their way to the heart of it. And as they worked, -those hard-faced, grimy, sweating men of the wrecking crews, they -wondered--wondered that any one had come out of it alive. - -Back at headquarters in Big Cloud they wondered at it, too--and they -wondered also at the cause. Every one that by any possible chance -could throw any light upon it went on the carpet in the super’s office. -Everybody testified--everybody except Dahleen, the fireman, and Coogan, -the engineer; and they didn’t testify because they couldn’t. Coogan was -in the hospital with queer, inconsequent words upon his tongue and a -welt across his forehead that had laid bare the bone from eye to the -hair-line of his skull; and Dahleen was there also, not so bad, just -generally jellied up, but still too bad to talk. And the testimony was -of little use. - -The tender of switch-back number one reported that the Limited had -passed him at perhaps a little greater speed than usual--which was the -speed of a man’s walk, for trains crawl down the Devil’s Slide with fear -and caution--but not fast enough to cause him to think anything about -it. - -Hardy, the conductor, testified. Hardy said it was the “air;” that the -train began to slide faster and faster after the first switch-back was -passed and that her speed kept on increasing up to the moment that -the crash came. He figured that it couldn’t be anything else--just the -“air”--it wouldn’t work and the control of the train was lost. That was -all he knew. - -And while Regan swore and fumed, Carleton’s face set grim and hard--and -he waited for Dahleen. - -It was a week before the fireman faced Carleton across the super’s -desk, but when that time came Carle-ton opened on him straight from -the shoulder, not even a word of sympathy, not so much as “glad to see -you’re out again,” just straight to the point, hard and quick. - -“Dahleen,” he snapped, “I want to know what happened in the cab that -night, and I want a straight story. No other kind of talking will do you -any good.” - -Dahleen’s face, white with the pallor of his illness, flushed suddenly -red. - -“You’re jumping a man pretty hard, aren’t you, Mr. Carleton?” he said -resentfully. - -“Maybe I’ve reason to,” replied Carleton. “Well, I’m waiting for that -story.” - -“There is no story that I know of,” said Dahleen evenly. “After we -passed switch-back number one we lost control of the train--the ‘air’ -wouldn’t work.” - -“Do you expect me to believe that?” - -“You don’t seem to,” retorted Dahleen, with a set jaw. - -“What did you do to stop her?” - -“What I could,” said Dahleen, with terse finality. - -Carleton sprang to his feet, and his fist crashed down upon the desk. - -“You are lying!” he thundered. “That wreck and the lives that are lost -are at your door, and if I could prove it!”--he shook his fist at the -fireman. “As it is I can only fire you for violation of the rules. I -thought at first it was Coogan and that he’d gone off his head a bit, -and you are cur enough to let the blame go there if you could, to let me -and every other man think so!” - -Dahleen’s fists clenched, and he took a step forward. - -“That’s enough!” he cried hoarsely. “Enough from you or any other man!” - -Carleton rounded on him more furiously than before. - -“I’ve given you a chance to tell a straight story and you wouldn’t. -God knows what you did that night. I believe you were fighting drunk. I -believe that gash in Coogan’s head wasn’t from the wreck. If I knew I’d -fix you.” He wrenched open a drawer of his desk, whipped out a metal -whisky flask, and shook it before Dahleen’s eyes. “_When you were picked -up this was in the pocket of your jumper!_” - -The color fled from Dahleen’s face leaving it whiter than when he had -entered the room. He wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. All -the bluster, all the fight was gone. He stared mutely, a startled, -frightened look in his eyes, at the damning evidence in the super’s -hand. - -“Forgotten about it, had you?” Carleton flung out grimly. “Well, have -you anything to say?” - -Dahleen shook his head. - -“Ain’t anything to say, is there?”--his voice was low with just a hint -of the former defiance. “It’s mine, but you can’t _prove_ anything. You -can’t prove I drank it. D’ye think I’d be fool enough to do anything but -keep my mouth shut?” - -“No; I can’t _prove_ it”--Carleton’s voice was deadly cold. “You’re out! -I’ll give you twelve hours to get out of the mountains. The boys, for -Coogan’s sake alone if for no other, would tear you to pieces if they -knew the story. No one knows it yet but the man who found this in your -pocket and myself. I’m not going to tell you again what I think of -you--_get out!_” - -Dahleen, without a word, swung slowly on his heel and started for the -door. - -“Wait!” said Carleton suddenly. “Here’s a pass East for you. I don’t -want your blood on my hands, as I would have if Coogan’s friends, and -that’s every last soul out here, got hold of you. You’ve got twelve -hours--after that they’ll know--to set Coogan straight.” - -Dahleen hesitated, came back, took the slip of paper with a mirthless, -half-choked laugh, turned again, and the door closed behind him. - -Dahleen was out. - -Carleton kept his word--twelve hours--and then from the division rose a -cry like the cry of savage beasts; but Regan was like a madman. - -“Curse him!” he swore bitterly, breaking into a seething torrent of -oaths. “What did you let him go for, Carleton? You’d no business to. -You should have held him until Coogan could talk, and then we’d have had -him.” - -“Tommy”--Carleton laid his hand quietly on the master mechanic’s -shoulder--“we’re too young out in this country for much law. I don’t -think Coogan knows or ever will know again what happened in the cab -that night. The doctors don’t seem quite able to call the turn on him -themselves, so they’ve said to you and said to me. But whether he does -or not, it doesn’t make any difference as far as Dahleen goes. It would -have been murder to keep him here. And if Coogan ever can talk he’ll -never put a mate in bad no matter what the consequences to himself. -There’s nothing against Dahleen except that he had liquor in his -possession while on duty. That’s what I fired him for--that’s the only -story that’s gone out of this office. You and I and the rest are free to -put the construction on it that suits us best, and there it ends. If -I was wrong to let him go, I was wrong. I did what I thought was -right--that’s all I can ever do.” - -“Mabbe,” growled Regan, “mabbe; but, damn him, he _ought_ to be -murdered. I’d like to have had ‘em done it! It’s that smash on the head -put Coogan to the bad. You’re right about one thing, I guess, he’ll -never be the same Coogan again.” - -And in a way this was so; in another it wasn’t. It was not the wound -that was to blame, the doctors were positive about that; but Coogan, it -was pitifully evident, was not the same. Physically, at the end of a -month, he left the hospital apparently as well as he had ever been in -his life; but mentally, somewhere, a cog had slipped. His brain seemed -warped and weakened, simple as a child’s in its workings; his memory -fogged and dazed, full of indefinite, intangible snatches, vague, -indeterminate glimpses of his life before. One thing seemed to cling to -him, to predominate, to sway him--the Devil’s Slide. - -Regan and Carleton talked to him, trying to guide his thoughts and -stimulate his memory. - -“You remember you used to drive an engine, don’t you, Chick?” asked -Carleton. - -“Engine?” Coogan nodded. “Yes; in the Devil’s Slide.” - -“505,” said Regan quickly. “You know old 505.” - -Coogan shook his head. - -Carleton tried another tack. - -“You were in a bad accident, Coogan, one night. You were in the cab of -the engine when she went to smash. Do you remember that?” - -“The smash was on the Devil’s Slide,” said Coogan. - -“That’s it,” cried Carleton. “I knew you’d remember.” - -“They’re always there,” said Coogan simply, “always there. It is a bad -track. I’m a railroad man and I know. It’s not properly guarded. I’m -going to work there and take care of it.” - -“Work there?” said Regan, the tears almost in his eyes. “What kind of -work? What do you want to do, Chick?” - -“Just work there,” said Coogan. “Take care of the Devil’s Slide.” - -The super and the master mechanic looked at each other--and averted -their eyes. Then they took Coogan up to his boarding-house, where he had -moved after Annie and the little one died. - -“He’ll never put his finger on a throttle again,” said Regan with a -choke in his voice, as they came out. “The best man that ever pulled -a latch, the best man that ever drew a pay-check on the Hill Division. -It’s hell, Carleton, that’s what it is. I don’t think he really knew you -or me. He don’t seem to remember much of anything, though he’s natural -enough and able enough to take care of himself in all other ways. Just -kind of simple-like. It’s queer the way that Devil’s Slide has got him, -what? We can’t let him go out there.” - -“I wonder if he remembers Annie,” said Carleton. “I was afraid to ask -him. I didn’t know what effect it might have. No; we can’t let him go -out on the Devil’s Slide.” - -But the doctors said yes. They went further and said it was about the -only chance he had. The thing was on his mind. It was better to humor -him, and that, with the outdoor mountain life, in time might bring him -around again. - -And so, while Regan growled and swore, and Carleton knitted his brows in -perplexed protest, the doctors had their way--and Coogan, Chick Coogan, -went to the Devil’s Slide. Officially, he was on the pay-roll as a -section hand; but Millrae, the section boss, had his own orders. - -“Let Coogan alone. Let him do what he likes, only see that he doesn’t -come to any harm,” wired the super. - -And Coogan, when Millrae asked him what he wanted to do, answered -simply: “I’m going to take care of the Devil’s Slide.” - -“All right, Chick,” the section boss agreed cheerily. “It’s up to you. -Fire ahead.” - -At first no one understood, perhaps even at the end no one quite -understood--possibly Coogan least of all. He may have done some good--or -he may not. In time they came to call him the Guardian of the Devil’s -Slide--not slightingly, but as strong men talk, defiant of ridicule, -with a gruff ring of assertion in their tones that brooked no question. - -Up and down, down and up, two miles east, two miles west, Coogan -patroled the Devil’s Slide, and never a weakened rail, a sunken tie, a -loosened spike escaped him--he may have done some good, or he may not. - -He slept here and there in one of the switch-back tender’s shanties, -moved and governed by no other consideration than fatigue--day and night -were as things apart. He ate with them, too; and scrupulously he paid -his footing. Twenty-five cents for a meal, twenty-five cents for a bunk, -or a blanket on the floor. They took his money because he forced it upon -them, furiously angry at a hint of refusal; but mostly the coin would -be slipped back unnoticed into the pocket of Coogan’s coat--poor men and -rough they were, nothing of veneer, nothing of polish, grimy, overalled, -horny-fisted toilers, their hearts were big if their purses weren’t. - -At all hours, in the early dawn, at midday or late afternoon, the train -crews and the engine crews on passengers, specials and freights, passed -Coogan up and down, always walking with his head bent forward, his eyes -fastened on the right of way--passed with a cheery hail and the flirt of -a hand from cab, caboose, or the ornate tail of a garish Pullman. And -to the tourists he came to be more of an attraction than the scenic -grandeur of the Rockies themselves; they stared from the observation -car and listened, with a running fire of wondering comment, as the -brass-buttoned, swelled-with-importance, colored porters told the story, -until at last to have done the Rockies and have missed the Guardian -of the Devil’s Slide was to have done them not at all. It was natural -enough, anything out of the ordinary ministers to and arouses the -public’s curiosity. Not very nice perhaps, no--but natural. The railroad -men didn’t like it, and that was natural, too; but their feelings or -opinions, in the very nature of things, had little effect one way or the -other. - -Coogan grew neither better nor worse. The months passed, and he grew -neither better nor worse. Winter came, and, with the trestle that went -out in the big storm that year, Coogan went into Division for the last -time, went over the Great Divide, the same simple, broken-minded Coogan -that had begun his self-appointed task in the spring--he may have done -some good, or he may not. They found him after two or three days, and -sent him back to Big Cloud. - -“He’d have chosen that himself if he could have chosen,” said Carleton -soberly. “God knows what the end would have been. The years would have -been all alike, he’d never have got his mind back. It’s all for the -best, what?” - -Regan did not answer. Philosophy and the master mechanic’s heart did not -always measure things alike. - -The Brotherhood took charge of the arrangements, and Coogan’s funeral -was the biggest funeral Big Cloud ever had. Everybody wanted to march, -so they held the service late in the afternoon and closed down the shops -at half-past four: and the shop hands, from the boss fitter to the water -boy, turned out to the last man--and so did every one else in town. - -It was getting dark and already supper time when it was over, but -Carleton, who had left some unfinished work on his desk, went back -to his office instead of going home. He lighted the lamp, put on the -chimney, but the match was still burning between his fingers when the -door opened and a man, with his hat pulled far down over his face, -stepped in and closed it behind him. - -Carleton whirled around, the match dropped to the floor, and he leaned -forward over his desk, a hard look settling on his face. The man had -pushed back his hat. It was Dahleen, Coogan’s fireman, Jim Dahleen. - -For a moment neither man spoke. Bitter words rose to Carleton’s tongue, -but something in the other’s face checked and held them back. It was -Dahleen who spoke first. - -“I heard about Chick--that he’d gone out,” he said quietly. “I don’t -suppose it did him any good, but I kind of had to chip in on the -good-by--Chick and me used to be pretty thick. I saw you come down here -and I followed you. Don’t stare at me like that, you’d have done the -same. Have you got that flask yet?” - -“Yes,” Carleton answered mechanically, and as mechanically produced it -from the drawer of his desk. - -“Ever examine it particularly?” - -“Examine it?” - -“I guess that answers my question. I was afraid you might, and I wanted -to ask you for it that day, only I thought you’d think it mighty funny, -refuse, and well--well, get to looking it over on your own hook. Will -you give it here for a minute?” - -Carleton handed it over silently. - -Dahleen took it, pulled off the lower half that served as drinking cup, -laid his finger on the inside rim, and returned it to the super. - -Carleton moved nearer to the light--then his face paled. _It was -Coogan’s flask!_ The inscription, a little dulled, in fine engraving, -was still plain enough. “To Chick from Jim, on the occasion of his -wedding.” Carleton’s hand was trembling as he set it down. - -“My God!” he said hoarsely. “It was Coogan who was drunk that night--not -you.” - -“I figured that’s the way you’d read it, you or any other railroad man,” - said Dahleen. “It was him or me and one of us drunk, in the eyes of any -of the boys on the road, from the minute that flask showed up. There -was only one thing would have made you believe different, and I couldn’t -tell you--then. I’d have taken the same stand you did. But you’re -wrong.. Coogan wasn’t drunk that night--he never touched a drop. I -wouldn’t be telling you this now, if he had, would I?” - -“Sit down,” said Carleton. - -Dahleen took the chair beside the desk, and resting his feet on the -window-sill stared out at the lights twinkling below him. - -“Yes, I gave him the flask,” he said slowly, as though picking up the -thread of a story, “for a wedding present. The day he came back to his -run after the little woman and the baby died he had it in his pocket, -and he handed it to me. ‘_I’m afraid of it, Jimmy_,’ he said. That was -all, just that--only he _looked_ at me. Then he got down out of the cab -to oil round, me still holding it in my hand for the words kind of hit -me--they meant a whole lot. Well, before he came back, I lifted up my -seat and chucked it down in the box underneath. I don’t want to make -a long story of this. You know how he took to brooding. Sometimes he -wouldn’t say a word from one end of the run to the other. And once in a -while he seemed to act a little queer. I didn’t think much of it and -I didn’t say anything to anybody, figuring it would wear off. When we -pulled out of Big Cloud the night of the wreck I didn’t see anything out -of the ordinary about him, I’d kind of got used to him by then and if -there was any difference I didn’t notice it. He never said a word all -the way out until we hit the summit of the Devil’s Slide and started -down. I had the fire-box door open and was throwing coal when he says so -sudden as almost to make me drop my shovel: - -“‘Jimmy, do you know what night this is?’” - -“‘Sure,’ says I, never thinking, ‘it’s Thursday.’ - -“He laughed kind of softlike to himself. - -“‘It’s my wedding night, Jimmy,’ he says. ‘My wedding night, and we’re -going to celebrate.’ - -“The light from the fire-box was full on his face, and he had the -queerest look you ever saw on a man. He was white and his eyes were -staring and he was pushing his hand through his hair and rocking in his -seat. I was scart. I thought for a minute he was going to faint, then -I remembered that whisky and jumped for my side of the cab, opened the -seat and snatched it up. I went back to him with it in my hand. I don’t -think he ever saw it--I know he didn’t. He was laughing that soft laugh -again, kind of as though he was crooning, and he reached out his hand -and pushed me away. - -“‘We’re going to celebrate, Jimmy,’ says he again. ‘We’re going to -celebrate. It’s my wedding night.’ - -“I felt the speed quicken a bit, we were on the Slide then, you know, -and I saw his fingers tightening on the throttle. Then it got me, and -my heart went into my mouth--Chick was clean off his head. I slipped -the flask into my pocket, and tried to coax his hands away from the -throttle. - -“‘Let me take her a spell, Chick,’ says I, thinking my best chance was -to humor him. - -“He threw me off like I was a plaything. Then I tried to pull him away -and he smashed me one between the eyes and sent me to the floor. All the -time we was going faster and faster. I tackled him again, but I might as -well have been a baby, and then--then--well, that wound in his head came -from a long-handled union-wrench I grabbed out of the tool box. He went -down like a felled ox--but it was too late. Before I could reach a lever -we were in splinters.” - -Dahleen stopped. Carleton never stirred, he was leaning forward, his -elbows on his desk, his chin in his hands, his face strained, eyes -intently fastened on the other. - -Dahleen fumbled a second with his watch chain, twisting it around his -fingers, then he went on: - -“While I laid in the hospital I turned the thing over in my mind pretty -often, long before the doctors thought I knew my own name again, and I -figured that, if it was ever known, old Coogan was down and out for fair -even if when he got better his head turned out all right again, because -he wouldn’t be ever trusted in a cab under any circumstances, you -understand? If he didn’t come out straight why that ended it, of course; -but I had it in my mind that it was only what they call a temporary -aberration. I couldn’t queer him if that was all, could I? So I said to -myself, ‘Jimmy, all you know is that the “air” wouldn’t work.’ That’s -what I told you that day; and then you sprang that flask on me. You -were right, I _had_ forgotten it. Whisky in the cab on the night of an -accident is pretty near an open and shut game. It was him or me, and I -couldn’t tell you the story then without doing Coogan cold, but Coogan’s -gone now and it can’t hurt him. That’s all.” - -The tick of the clock on the wall, the click of the sounder from the -dispatcher’s room next door were the only sounds for a long minute, then -Carleton’s chair scraped and he stood up and put out his hand. - -“Dahleen,” he said huskily, “I’d give a good deal to be as white a man -as you are.” - -Dahleen shook his head. - -“Any one would have done it for Coogan,” he said. - - - - -VIII--THE BLOOD OF KINGS - -There never was, and there isn’t now, anything elusive about the Hill -Division, unless you get to talking about the mileage--when you strike -the mileage you strike deep water, and the way of it is this. Most -things that are big and vital and enduring develop with the years to -their own maturity, and with maturity comes perfection--as nearly as -anything is perfect. When the last rail that proclaimed man’s mastery of -the Rockies and the Sierras an accomplished fact was spiked to the ties -with much ceremony and more eclat, to say nothing of the somewhat -wobbly and uncertain blows with which the silk-hatted, -very-important-national-personage performed this crowning act, while the -rough-and-readys whose toil and sweat and grime and blood had bought the -miles the orators were eulogizing, being no longer of the elect, looked -on from a respectful distance--when all this was done the Hill Division, -even then, was no more than the rough draft of a masterpiece. - -In the years that followed came the pruning and the changes, the -smoothing and the toning down--tunnels bored through the mountain-sides -lessened the grades and lopped off winding miles around projecting -spurs; trestles with long embankment approaches added their quota to -this much-to-be-desired result; while in the foothills, instead of -circling around and around, to the right and the left and the left and -the right of an endless procession of buttes, the buttes themselves came -to be bisected with mathematical precision. All told, many miles, very -many miles, have been wiped out in this fashion--the elusive part of -it is that, measured in the dollars and cents paid by the tourists for -transportation and the shippers and consignees for freight hauls, the -line is just as long as ever it was! And it would appear that a good -deal of money had been spent with nothing to show for it; but then -against this is the fact that the directors down East were never rated -as imminent or near-imminent subjects for a lunacy commission. The -mileage is elusive--let it go at that. - -For the rest, the right of way from Big Cloud, the divisional point, -just East of the mighty blue-blurred, snow-capped range that towers -to the skyline North and South--from there to the rolling, undulating -country that reaches West from the base of the Sierras, the Hill -Division is, without question, the most marvelous piece of track ever -conceived by man, and it stands a perpetual and enduring monument to the -brains and the genius, ay, and the manhood, too, of those who built it. - -Such is the Hill Division. You who know the Rockies know it for the -grandeur of its scenery, know it for the glory of its conquest over -obstacles seemingly insurmountable; but there is another side that you -may not know, a side that the maps and plans and blueprints and the -railroad folders and the windows of the observation cars, big as they -are, do not show--and that side is the human side. It is full of tears -and laughter, full of sorrow and joy, of dangers and death and mistakes -and triumph--its history would fill many pages, but it is a history that -will never be written, for the generals and the rank and file of its -army have fought their battles without the blare of trumpets, have done -their work and their duty as they saw it, simply and with few words, -without thought of personal profit and, much less, of fame. They tell -their own stories amongst themselves, and they hold in honor those -entitled thereto--which is a meed beyond any recognition of governments -or kings or principalities, because it is the tribute of man to man, -without glamor and without pretense. If you are a man as they measure -men, they will tell you the stories, too; and, if you care to smoke, -they will offer you their black plugs with the heart-shaped tin tags -that their favorite manufacturer imbeds therein and, further, they will -hand you their clasp knives with which to slice it. If you are wise you -will understand that you are honored above most men, and you will be -becomingly humble and will listen. But if this, through circumstance and -misfortune, has never been your lot, then, here and there, inadequately -and meagerly, you may run across, in print, a stray breath from the Hill -Division--this is a case in print--the story of “King” Gilleen. - -Gilleen was a man you would never pass in a crowd without turning your -head to look at him a second time, not even in a big crowd, for nature -had dealt with Gilleen generously--or otherwise--whichever way it -pleases you best to consider it. He had red hair of a shade that might -be classified as brilliant, but which Regan, the master mechanic, -described in metaphor. Said Regan: “You could see that head a mile away -on the other side of a curve in a blizzard at night when he pokes it out -of the cab window. You’ll never get Gilleen on the carpet because his -headlight’s out, what?” Certainly, at any rate, Gilleen’s hair was -undeniably red. He had blue eyes, and a very small nose which, for -all that, was, next to his hair, the most prominent feature he -possessed--small noses with a slight up-cant to the tip _are_ -pronounced, mere size to the contrary. His face was freckled and so were -his hands; also, he was no small chunk of a man, not so very tall, but -the shoulders on him were something to envy if you were friendly with -him, or to respect if you were not. That was Gilleen, all except the -fact that he admitted with emphasis to the blood of some wild Irish -race of kings coursing through his veins. This last point was never -established--every one took Gilleen’s word for it, that is every one but -Regan, who was Irish himself and, more pertinent still, Gilleen’s direct -superior. On this point Regan, who was never averse to doing it, could -get a rise out of Gilleen quicker than the bite of a hungry trout. - -“By Christmas,” Gilleen would sputter on such occasions, “I’ll have -you know I’m no liar, an’ if ‘twere not for the missus an’ the six -kids”--here Gilleen would always stop to count, owing to a possible -arrival since the last clash, realizing that any slip would be -instantly and mercilessly turned against him by the grinning master -mechanic--“if’twere not for them, Regan, you listen to me, I’d bash your -face an’ then ram the measly job you give me down your throat, I would -that!” - -“Well,” Regan would return, “when you get to sitting on a dinky, gilded -throne, sunk to the crown-sheet in the bogs though it will be, I’d ask -no more nor as much from your hands as you get from mine--which is more -than your deserts. Who but me would do as much for you? You ought to -be back wiping. I’ve thought some seriously of it, h’m? Six, is it -now?--well, it’s a grand race!” - -Whereupon Gilleen would say hot words and say them fervently, while he -shook his fist at the master mechanic. - -“I’ll show you some day, Regan,” was his final word. “I’ll show you what -kind of a race it is, an’ don’t you forget it!” - -All of which is neither very interesting nor in any degree witty--it -simply shows where Gilleen’s nickname came from. Everybody on the -division called him “King”--not to his face, they do now, but they -didn’t then. Queer the way a little thing like that acts on a man -sometimes. Gilleen was well enough liked in a way, but no one ever -really took him seriously in anything. Associate a man with a joke and -henceforward and forever after, usually, the two are inseparable. He may -have aspirations, ambitions, what you will, but he is given no credit -for having them--with Gilleen it was that way. Just Gilleen, “King” - Gilleen--and a grin. - -The Lord only knows what possessed Gilleen to adhere with such -stout-hearted loyalty to his ancestors--you may put an interrogation -mark after that last word, if you like--it began with perhaps no more -than a boyish boast when his official connection with the system was no -further advanced than to the degree of holding down the job of assistant -boiler-washer in the roundhouse. The more they guyed him the more -stubbornly he stuck--it was a matter worth fighting for, and Gilleen -fought. He threw pounds, reach, and other advantages to the winds and -took on anybody and everybody. By the time he had moved up to firing -he had fought all who cared to fight, who were not a few; and when, -following that in the due course of promotion, he got his engine, he had -by blows, not argument, established his assertion outwardly at least. At -a safe distance the division, remembering broken noses and missing teeth -and no longer denying him his royal blood, gave him his way, smiled -tolerantly in self-solace and called him “nutty.” - -Regan, of course, still guyed--but Regan was master mechanic. Not that -he did it by virtue of the immunity his official position afforded him, -he never gave that a thought. He did it because he was Regan, and Regan -was built that way. He could no more forego the chance of a laugh or an -inward chuckle than he could forego the act of breathing--and live. A -joke was a joke, just fun with him, that was all. - -But with Gilleen it was different. Being unable to use his fists as was -his wont, and being possessed of no other safety-valve, the pressure -mounted steadily until it registered a point on his mental gauge that -spoke eloquently of trouble to come. - -And so matters stood when, following a rather dull summer, the fall -business opened with a rush and a roar. Things moved with a jump, and -the rails hummed under a constant stream of traffic east and west. -Here, at least, was no joke--a rush on the Hill Division, single-track, -through the mountains, never was. A month of it, and every one from -car-tink to superintendent began to show the effects of the strain. -It was double up everywhere, extra duty, extra tricks. The dispatchers -caught their share of it and their eyes grew red and heavy under the -lamps at night, and the heads of the day-men ached as they figured a -series of meeting points that had no beginning and no end; but, bad as -it was for the men on the keys, it was worse for some of those in the -cabs. Schedulers went to smash. Perishables and flyers were given the -best of it--the rights of the rest were the sidings. It was a case of -crawl along, sneak from one to the other, with layout after layout, -until the ordinary length of a day’s duty lapped over into fifteen-hour -stretches and sometimes to twenty-four. Sleep, what they could get of -it, the engine crews snatched bolt upright in their seats while they -waited for Number One’s headlight to shoot streaming out of the East, -or nodded until roused by the roar and thunder of a flying freight, cars -and cars of it crammed with first-class ratings, streaking East, as it -hurtled by with insolent disregard for every mortal thing on earth. - -Maybe Gilleen got a little more of it than any one else on the -throttles, maybe he did--or maybe he didn’t. Gilleen thought he did -anyhow, and naturally he put it down to Regan’s account. Regan was head -of the motive power department of the Hill Division--there was no one -else _to_ put it down to. It was Regan or imagination. Gilleen, not -being strong on imagination, did not debate the question--he let it go -at Regan. - -In from one run, shot out on another--that was Gilleen’s schedule. The -little woman in the little house uptown off Main street got to be mostly -a memory to Gilleen, and as for the six brick-headed scions of his -kingly race he came to wonder if they really existed at all. - -Things boomed and hummed on the Hill Division, and while everybody on -it snarled and swore and nagged at each other, as weary, worn-out, -dropping-with-fatigue men will do, the smiles broadened on the lips and -spread over the faces of the directors down East, as they rubbed their -palms beneficently, expectantly, scenting extra dividends and soaring -stock. - -It was noon one day when Gilleen, with a trailing string of slewing -freights behind him, pulled into the Big Cloud yards, uncoupled, backed -down the spur, crossed the’table, and ran into the roundhouse. As he -swung from the gangway, Regan came hurrying in through the engine doors -of Gilleen’s pit from the direction of headquarters, and walked up to -the engineer. - -“Gilleen,” said he briskly, “you’ll have to take out Special -Eighty-three. 1603’s ready with a full head on pit two.” - -“What’s that?” snapped Gilleen. “Take out a special _now?_ You know -damn well I’m just in from a run. I’m tired. You’ll rub it in once too -often, Regan.” - -“We’re all tired, aren’t we?” returned the master mechanic tartly. “Do -you think you’re the only one? As for rubbing it in, you’d better draw -your fire, my bucko. There’s no rubbing in being done except in your -eye! Anyhow, that’s enough talk. Special Eighty-three’s carded on rush -orders from down East, and she’s been in here an hour now.” - -“Well, why didn’t you let the crew that brought her in keep goin’ then?” - snarled Gilleen. It was a fool question and he knew it; but, as he had -said, he was tired, and his temper, never angelic, was now pretty well -on edge. - -Regan glared at him a moment angrily. Regan, too, was tired and -irritable, harassed beyond the limit that most men are harassed. The -demand upon the motive power department for men and engines had kept him -up more than one night trying to figure out a problem that was well-nigh -impossible. - -“Let ‘em go on!” he snorted. “You know well enough I haven’t anything -on the Prairie Division men. You know that--what d’ye say it for, h’m? -You’re the first man in--and you go out first.” - -“It strikes me I’m _generally_ the first man in these days,” retorted -Gilleen angrily; “an’ I’m sick of gettin’ the short end of it. I guess I -won’t go out this time.” - -It took a breathing spell before the master mechanic could explode -adequately. - -“You call yourself a railroad man!” he flung out furiously. “What are -you whining about? Every man’s got his shoulder to the wheel and pushing -without talk. We haven’t got any room here for quitters. I guess that -blood of yours you’re so pinhead-brained proud----” - -Regan did not finish. With a bellow of rage the red-haired engineer -went at the other like a charging bull, and the master mechanic promptly -measured his length on the roundhouse floor from a wallop on the head -that made him see stars. - -Regan scrambled to his feet. His heart was the heart of a fighter, even -if his build was not. Straight at Gilleen he flew, and the passes -and lunges and jabs he made--while the engineer played on the master -mechanic’s paunch like a kettle-drum and delivered a second wallop -on the head as a plaster for the first--are historic only for their -infinitesimal coefficient of effectiveness. It is unquestionably certain -that the master mechanic then and there would have proceeded to make up -for some of his lost sleep, at least, if Gilleen’s fireman and a wiper -or two hadn’t got in between the two men just when they did. - -Gilleen was boiling mad. - -“Well,” he bawled, “got anything more to say about quittin’ or that -other thing? I guess I won’t go out this time, what?” - -Regan was equally mad. And as he felt tenderly of his forehead, where -a lump was rapidly approximating the formation of a goose egg, he grew -madder still. - -“You won’t go out, won’t you?” he roared. “Well _I_ guess you will; -and, what’s more, you’ll go out _now_--and get your time! I fire you, -understand?” - -“You bet!’” said “King” Gilleen--and that’s all he said. He looked at -the master mechanic for a minute, but didn’t _say_ anything more--just -laughed and walked out of the roundhouse. - -Naturally enough, the story got up and down the division, and everybody -talked about it. With their rough and impartial justice they put both -men in the wrong, but mostly Gilleen for insubordination. The affront -Gilleen had suffered was not so big and momentous, a long way from being -the vital thing in their eyes that it was in his. Gilleen was just nutty -on that point, that was all there was to that. Regan’s judgment had -been bad and the moment he had seized for his thrust and fling was by no -manner of means a psychological one; but, for all that, Gilleen had no -business to strike the master mechanic. He had got what was coming to -him--that was the verdict. He was out and out for good. It was pretty -generally conceded that it would be a long while before he pulled a -throttle on the Hill Division again. - -What sympathy the engineer got, for he got some, wasn’t on his own -account. It was on account of his family--not the ancestral end of it, -however. Six kids and a wife do not leave much change out of a paycheck -even when it’s padded by overtime; six kids and a wife with no pay-check -is pretty stiff running. - -Gilleen was too hot under the collar to give a thought to that when he -marched out of the roundhouse that noon; but it wasn’t many hours, after -he had put in a few to make up for the sleep he hadn’t had during the -preceding weeks, that the problem was up to him for consideration with a -vote for adjournment for once ruled out as not in order. - -Mrs. Gilleen may or may not have shared her spouse’s opinions on the -subject of his illustrious descent--if she did she never put on any -“airs” about it. Washing and dressing and cooking was about all one -woman could manage for a household as big as hers. That’s what she -said anyway, whenever any one asked her about it. And one glance at the -red-headed brood that filled the front yard and swung on the front gate, -whose hinges creaked in loud and bitter protest, was enough to preclude -any dispute on that score. Just a little bit of a woman she was -physically; but bigger practically than the whole corps of leading -lights in social and domestic economy--which, come to think of it, is -damning Mrs. Gilleen with faint praise, whereas too much couldn’t be -said for her. However, let that go. Mrs. Gilleen _was_ practical, and -she had the matter up to the engineer almost before he had the sleep -washed out of his eyes. No nagging, no reproach, nothing of that -kind--Mrs. Gilleen wasn’t that sort of a woman. “King,” or not, Gilleen -might have been, Katie Gilleen was a _queen_, not in looks perhaps, but -a queen--that’s flat. A fine woman is the finest thing in the world, and -if that were said a little more often than it is maybe things generally -wouldn’t be any the worse for it--which is not a plank in the platform -of the Suffragettes, though it may sound like it. - -“Michael,” said she, “you rowed with Mr. Regan, and he fired you. Will -he take you back?” - -Gilleen lowered the towel to his chin to catch the dripping water -from his hair--he had just buried his head in the washbowl the minute -before--and looked at his wife. - -“I wouldn’t _ask_ him, Kate,” he said shortly. - -Mrs. Gilleen was proud, too--but for all that she sighed. - -“What will you do, then, Michael?” she asked. - -“I dunno yet, little woman. Some of the others will give me a job, I -guess. Mabbe I’ll try the train crews. I’ll hit ‘em up for something, -anyway.” - -“But there’s ever so much less money in that”--Mrs. Gilleen’s tones were -judicial, not plaintive. - -“I know it,” returned Gilleen; “but it’ll tide us over an’ keep the -steam up till we get a chance to pull out for somewheres where a man -can get an engine without a grinning fool of a master mechanic to -doublecross him with the worst of it every chance he gets.” - -“I hope it will all come out right,” said Mrs. Gilleen, a little -wistfully. - -“It will,” Gilleen assured her. “Don’t you worry. I’ll get after a job -right away as soon as I’ve had a bite.” - -It came easier even than Gilleen had figured it would--such as -it was--and it was about the last job Gilleen had thought of as a -possibility. Things have a peculiar way of working themselves out -sometimes, and, curiously enough, by means which, on the surface, are, -more often than not, apparently trivial and inconsequent. Certainly, -if Gilleen, on his way to the station that morning, had not run into -Gleason, the yard-master, why then--but he did. - -“Call-boys kind of scarce around your diggin’s since yesterday, ain’t -they, Gilleen?” was Gleason’s greeting. - -“Yes,” said Gilleen. “I’m out.” - -“See you’re headin’ for the station,” remarked Gleason tentatively. -“Goin’ down to patch it up?” - -“No!” answered Gilleen with a hard ring in his voice--the “no” was -emphatic. - -Gleason stared at the engineer for a minute, then took a bite from his -plug, and the motion of his head might have been a nod of understanding -or merely a wrench or two to free his teeth from the black-strap in -which they were imbedded. - -“No,” said Gilleen again; “I’m not. I’m goin’ down for another job.” - -“What kind of a job?” inquired Gleason. - -“Any kind from any one that will put me on--except Regan.” - -Gleason thought of his choked yards--the rush had in no way overlooked -him. Men, men that knew a draw-bar and a switch-handle from a hunk of -cheese, were as scarce in his department as they were in any of the -others. - -“Yards?” he queried--and blinked. - -“D’ye mean it?” demanded Gilleen, taking him up short. - -“Sure, I mean it.” - -“You’re on,” said Gilleen. “Night switchman,” amplified the yard-master. -“You can begin to-night.” - -“All right, I’ll be on deck,” agreed Gilleen; “an’ thanks, Gleason. I’m -much obliged to you.” - -“Humph!” grunted Gleason. “‘Tain’t much of a stake compared with an -engine, but it’s yours, an’ welcome.” - -It was quite true. Comparatively, it wasn’t much of a stake, and even -the first night of it was enough to throw the comparison into strong and -bitter relief. If anything would have put a finishing touch on Gilleen’s -feelings anent the master mechanic it was that first night on yard -switching, that and, of course, the nights that followed. It wasn’t -so much the work, though that was hard enough, and, being green, the -engineer made about twice as much for himself as there was any need -of, it was a not-to-be-denied tendency of his eyes to stray toward the -roundhouse every time a gleaming headlight showed on the turn-table. If -Gilleen had never known before how much he loved an engine he knew it -in those dark hours while he swung a lantern from the roofs of a freight -string, or hopped the foot-board of the switcher. Up and down the yards -from dusk till dawn, to the accompaniment of the wheezing, grunting, -coughing, foreshortened apology for a shunter, the clash of brake-beams, -the bump and rattle, staccato, diminuendo, as a line of box-cars -grumbled into motion, didn’t take on any roseate hues from the angle -Gilleen looked at it; nor did an occasional ten-wheeler, out or in, -sailing grandly past him with impudent airs help any, either. Gilleen’s -language became as freckled as his face and hands and as fiery as his -head. Even that grand old Irish race from which he sprang, that wild -and untamed breed of kingly sires paled into insignificance--Gilleen -was more occupied with Regan. What he thought he said, and said it aloud -without making any bones about it--said it through his teeth, with his -fists clenched. - -Perhaps it was just as well Gilleen was on nights, for, ordinarily, -the master mechanic had nothing to bring him around the yards, shops or -roundhouse after sundown--Regan’s evenings being spent with Carle-ton, -the super, a pipe and a game of pedro upstairs over the station in the -superintendent’s office next door to the dispatcher’s room--just as well -for both their sakes; for Regan’s physically; for Gilleen’s because, -little fond of his job as he was, there, were certain necessities that -even little Mrs. Gilleen with all her practicability and economy could -not supply without money. Anyway, the days went by and the two men did -not meet, though Gilleen’s orations got around to Regan’s ears fast -enough. The master mechanic only laughed when he heard them. - -“Gilleen,” said he, “is like the parrot that said ‘sic ‘em!’ and said it -once too often. He talks too much. If he’d kept his mouth shut I’d have -given him his run back, after a lay off to teach him manners. As it is, -if he likes switching let him keep at it. Mabbe by the time he’s tired -the throne of his ancestors ‘ll be ready for him, what?” - -All this was enough to spell ructions in the air, and, ordinarily, the -division to a man would have hung mildly expectant on the result of the -final showdown. But the Hill Division just then wasn’t hankering for -anything more to liven it up--it was getting all of that sort of thing -it wanted and a little besides. Attending strictly to business was about -all it could do, a trifle beyond what it could do, and everything else -was apart--the boom showed more signs of increasing than it did of being -on the wane. There wasn’t any let-up anywhere--things sizzled. - -It never rains but it pours, they say; and that’s one adage, at least, -that the railroad men of Big Cloud, and the town itself for that -matter, will swear by to this day. There are a few things that Big Cloud -remembers vividly and with astounding minuteness for detail, but the -night the shops went up tops them all. - -When it was all over they decided that a slumbering forge-fire in the -blacksmith shop was at the bottom of it--not that any one really knew, -or knows now, but they put it down to that because it sounded reasonable -and because there wasn’t anything else _to_ put it down to. However, -whether that was the cause or whether it wasn’t, on one point there was -no possible opening for an argument--and that was the effect and the -result. - -If you knew Big Cloud in the old days, you know where the shops were -and what they looked like; if you didn’t, it won’t take a minute to tell -you. You could see them from the station platform across the tracks far -up at the west end of the yards; and they looked more like a succession -of barns nailed on to each other than anything else, except for the -roofs which were low and flat--the buildings being all one-storied. What -with the quarters of the boiler-makers, the carpenters, the machinists -and the fitters, the old shops straggled out over a goodly length of -ground, and a grimy, ramshackle, dirty, blackened, Godforsaken looking -structure it was. To-day, thanks to that fire and the Big Strike when it -came along, there’s a modern affair of structural steel--and the rest is -but a memory. However---- - -Night in the mountains in the Fall comes early, and by nine o’clock on -the night the fire broke out it had shut down pitch dark. Nothing showed -in the yards but the twinkling switch lights, the waving lamps of the -men, and an occasional gleam from the shunter’s headlight when it shot -away from the end of a boxcar. Across the tracks the station lights -were like fireflies, and there was a glimmer or two showing from the -roundhouse. Apart from the fact that a pretty strong west wind was -brushing the yards, if you could count that as anything apart, there -was nothing out of the ordinary, everything was going on as usual, when, -suddenly without warning, a wicked fang of flame shot skyward, then -another higher than the first. It was answered by a yell from the -yardmen, caught up in the roundhouse, and then the switcher’s whistle -shrieked the alarm. A minute more, and everything with steam enough to -lift a valve joined in. Dark forms began to run in the direction of the -shops, and then the bell in the little English chapel uptown took a hand -in the clamor. The alarm was unanimous enough and general enough when it -came, there was never any doubt about that, but the fire must have got -a pretty stiff start before it broke through the windows to fling its -first challenge at the railroad men. - -Gilleen and the rest of the yard crew were on the run for the scene when -Gleason’s voice, bawling over the din, halted them. - -“Clean out three, four an’ five, an’ get ‘em down to the bottom of the -yards, an’ look lively!” he yelled. “Leave that string of gondolas on -six till the last. Jump now, boys! Eat ‘em up!” - -Oil-spattered floors and oil-smeared walls are a feeding ground for a -fire than which there is no better. The flame tongues leaped higher and -higher throwing a lurid glare down the yards, and throwing, too, as the -wind caught them up and whirled them in gusts, a driving rain of sparks -that threatened the long, dark lines of rolling stock, for the most -part choked to the doors with freight--freight enough to total a sum in -claim-checks that would blanch the cheeks of the most florid director on -the board of the Transcontinental. - -With Gleason in command, Gilleen and his mates went at their work heads -down. There wasn’t anything fancy or artistic about the way they banged -those cars to safety--there wasn’t time to be fussy. Behind them the -south end of the shops was already a blazing mass. The little switcher -took hold of first one string then another, shook it angrily for a -minute as her exhaust roared into a quick crackle of reports and the -drivers spun around like pin-wheels making the steel fly fire, then with -a cough and a grunt and a final push she would snap the cars away from -her, and the string would go sailing down the yard to bump and pound to -a stop, with an echoing crash, into whatever might be at the other end. -There was a car or two the next morning with front-ends and rear-ends -and both ends at once, that looked as though they had been in a cyclone; -and there was a claim-voucher or two put through for a consignment of -nursing bottles and a sewing machine--not that the two necessarily go -together, but no matter, they did then. Anyway, the record the yardmen -made that night is the record today, and in no more than ten minutes -there wasn’t a car within three hundred yards of the shops. - -But while the yard crew worked others were not idle. Regan and Carleton, -both of them, had caught the first flash from the windows of the super’s -room, and they were down the stairs, across the yards and into the -game from the start. Joined by the nightmen and the hostlers and the -wide-eyed call-boys they tackled the blaze. By the time they had dragged -and coupled the fifty-foot hose lengths, it took five lengths, along -the tracks from the roundhouse, the needle on the stationary’s gauge, -luckily not yet quite dead from the day’s work and whose fire-box -Clarihue, the turner, now crammed with oil-soaked packing, began to -climb, and they got an uncertain, weakly stream playing--uncertain, but -a stream. After that, things went with a rush--both ways--the fire and -the fight. - -From the gambling hells and the saloons, from the streets and their -homes came the population of Big Cloud, the Polacks, the Russians, the -railroad men, the good and the bad whites, the half-breeds--and the -local fire brigade. Two more streams they ran from the roundhouse and -that was the limit--the rest of the hose was liquid rubber somewhere -under the blaze. - -Regan, with a bitter, hard look on his face for the shops were Regan’s, -was everywhere at once, and what man could do he did; but, inch by inch, -the flames were getting the better of him. The yards were as bright -as day now, and the heat was driving the circle of fighters back, -stubbornly as they fought to hold their ground. It looked like a grand -slam for the fire with the four aces in one hand. Twice Regan had -been on the point of ordering the men to the roof, and twice he held -back--once he had even ordered a ladder planted, only to order it away -again. The building was only wood, and old, and the roof was none -too strong at best; but now, under and supported by the roof of the -fitting-shop, put in a month before in lieu of the old system of jacking -and blocking by hand, making the risk a hundredfold greater, were the -heavy steel girders and hydraulic traveling cranes that whipped the big -moguls like jack-straws from their wheels preparatory to stripping them -to their bare boiler-shells. Regan shook his head--it was asking a man -to take his life in his hands. For the moment he stood a little apart in -front of the crowd and just behind the nozzle end of one of the streams. -Again he measured the chances, and again he shook his head. - -“I can’t ask a man to do it,” he muttered; “but we ought to have a -stream up there, it’s----” - -“Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?”--the words came sharp and -quick from his elbow, stinging hot like the cut of a whip-lash. It was -“King” Gilleen, red-haired, blue-blooded, freckled-skinned Gilleen. - -The master mechanic whirled like a shot, and for a minute the two -men stared into each other’s eyes, stared as the leaping flames sent -flickering shadows across the grim, set features of them both, stared -at each other face to face for the first time since that noon in the -roundhouse days before. - -“Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?” said Gilleen again, and -his laugh rang hard and cold. “_You_ ain’t a quitter, are you? There’s -nothin’ wrong with _your_ blood, is there? If you’re not afraid--come -on!”--as he spoke he stepped forward, pushed the men from the -nozzle--and looked back at the master mechanic. - -Regan’s lips were like a thin, white line. - -Gilleen laughed out again, and it carried over the roar and the crackle -of the flames, the snapping timbers, the hiss and spit of the water, the -voices of the crowd. - -“Put up the ladder!”--it was Regan’s voice, deadly cold. “Lash a short -end around that nozzle, an’ stand by to pass it up”--he was at the -foot of the ladder almost before they got it in position, and the next -instant began to climb. - -Like a flash, Gilleen, surrendering the fire-hose temporarily, sprang -after him--and up. - -It wasn’t far--the shops were low, just one story high--and both men -were on the roof in a minute. Gilleen caught the coiled rope they slung -him from below, and together he and the master mechanic hauled up the -writhing, spluttering hose. - -A shower of sparks and a swirling cloud of smoke enveloped them as -they stood upright and began to advance. It cleared away leaving them -silhouetted against the leaping wall of flame a few yards in front of -them--and a cheer went up from the throats of the crowd below. - -Not a word passed between the two men. Foot by foot they moved forward, -laying the hose in a line behind them to lessen the weight and the -side-pull, that at first had called forth all their strength to direct -the play of the stream; foot by foot they went forward, closer and -closer, perilously close, to the blistering, scorching, seething -mass--for neither of them would be the first to hold back. - -High into the heavens streamed the great yellow-red forks of angry -flame, and over all, like a gigantic canopy, rolled dense volumes of -gray-black smoke. Came at the two men spurting, fiery tongues, stabbing -at them, robbing them of their breath, mocking at their puny might. - -Another step forward and Regan reeled back, one hand went to his -face--and the nozzle almost wrenched itself from the engineer’s grasp. - -“It’s a grand race!” laughed Gilleen, but the laugh was more of a -gasping cough, and the cough came from cracked and swollen lips. “It’s a -grand race, Regan; an’ the blood----” - -With a choking sob, Regan steadied himself and seized hold of the nozzle -again. - -They held where they were now--it was the fire, not they, that was -creeping forward, pitilessly, inevitably, licking greedily at the tarred -roof until it grew soft beneath their feet and the bubbles puffed up and -formed and broke. - -A cry of warning came from below, and with it came the ominous rending -groan of yielding timbers. It came again, the cry, and rang in Gilleen’s -ears almost without sense. He could scarcely see, his eyes were scorched -and blinded, his lungs were full of the stinging smoke, choking full. -Beside him Regan hung, dropping weak. “Get back, for God’s sake, get -back! “--it was Carleton’s voice. “Do you hear!” shouted the super -frantically. “Get back! The roof is sagging! Run for----” - -Like the roar of a giant blast, as a park of artillery belches forth in -deafening thunder, there came a terrific crash and, fearful in its echo, -a cry of horror rose from those below. Where there had been roof a foot -in front of the men was now--nothingness. - -Gilleen, with a shout, as he felt the edge crumple under him, flung -himself backward and as he leaped he snatched at Regan. His fingers -brushed the master mechanic’s sleeve, hooked, slipped--and he struck on -his back a full yard away. He reeled to his feet like a drunken man, and -dug at his eyes with his fists. Over the broken edge of the shattered -roof, hanging into the black below, was the dangling hose--but Regan -was gone. Weak, spent, exhausted, the master mechanic, unequal to the -exertion of Gilleen’s leap, had pitched downward, clutching desperately, -feebly, vainly, as he went. Regan was gone, and twenty feet, somewhere, -below--he lay. - -Gilleen staggered forward. It was the far end of the beams that had -given away and the six or seven yards of the roof that had fallen still -separated him from the heart of the blaze. The advancing flames lighted -up a scene of wreck and ruin below in the fitting-shop--girders and -steel Ts and cranes and tackles, splotches of roofing, shattered -timbers, lay aver the black looming shapes of the monster engine-shells -blocked on the pit. - -“Regan!” he called; and again: “Regan! _Regan!_” - -Above the roaring crackle of the fire, above the surging, pounding -noises that beat mercilessly at his eardrums, faint, so faint it seemed -like fancy, a low moan answered him. Once more it came and upon Gilleen -surged new-born strength and life. He began to drag at the hose with -all his might, dropping it foot by fool over the jagged edge of the roof -until it reached well down to the snarled and tangled wreckage below. -And then a mighty yell went up from a hundred throats--and again and -again: - -“Gilleen! King Gilleen! King! _King!_” - -There was no gibe now--just a bursting cheer from the full hearts of -men. “King!” they roared, and the shout swelled, but Gilleen never heard -them as they crowned him. King he was at last in the eyes of all men, -a king that knows no blood nor race nor throne nor retinue--Gilleen was -lowering himself down the hose. - -It was a question of minutes. The fire was sweeping in a mad wave across -the intervening space. The engineer’s feet touched something solid and -he let go his hold of the hose--and stumbled, lost his balance, and -pitched forward striking on his head with a blow that dazed and stunned -him. Mechanically he understood that what he had taken for flooring -was a workbench. He got to his feet again, the blood streaming from -his forehead, and shouted. This time there was no answer. Staggering, -falling, tripping, stumbling, he began to search frantically amid the -debris. The air was thick with the smothering smoke, hot, stifling, -drying up his lungs. He began to moan, crying the name of the master -mechanic over and over again, crying it as a man cries out in delirium. -Bits of oil-soaked waste and wads of packing, catching from the glowing -cinders, were blazing around his feet, the onrush of the flames swept -a blighting wave upon him that sent him reeling back, scorching, -blistering the naked skin of his face and hands. Again he fell. A great -sheet of fire leapt high behind him, held for an instant, and then the -dull red glow settled around him again--but in that instant, just a -little to the right, pinned under a scanling, half hidden by a snarled -knot of roof and girders, was the master mechanic’s form. - -On his knees, groping with his hands, Gilleen reached him, and began to -tear furiously, savagely, madly, at the timber that lay across Regan’s -chest. He moved it little by little, every inch tasking his weakening -muscles to the utmost. Blackness was before him, he could no longer see, -he could no longer breathe, hot, nauseating fumes strangled him and -sent the blood bursting from his nostrils. He tried to lift Regan’s -shoulders--and sank down beside the master mechanic instead. Feebly he -raised his head--there came the splintering crash of glass, a rushing -stream tore through a window, hissed against the boiler-shell above him, -and, glancing off, lashed a cold spray of water into his face. - -The window! Three yards to the window! He was up again, and pulling at -the dead weight of the master mechanic. Just three yards! He cried like -a child as he struggled, and the tears ran down his cheeks in streams. A -foot, two feet, three--_two more yards to go_. Axes were swinging now in -front of him, shouts reached him. Half the distance was covered--but he -had gone to his knees. Everything around was hot, it was all fire and -hell and madness. A yard and a half--only a yard and a half. Alone he -could make it easily enough and maybe Regan was dead anyhow, alone and -there was safety and life, alone--then he laughed. “It’s a grand race, -Regan, a grand race,” he sobbed hysterically, and his grip tightened on -the master mechanic, and he won another foot and another and another. -A black form wavered before him, he felt an arm reach out and grasp -him--then he tottered, swayed, and dropped inert, unconscious. - -They got him out, and they got Regan out, and they got the fire out by -the time there wasn’t much left to burn; and, after a week or two, both -men got out of the hospital. That’s about all there is to it, except -that Gilleen’s red head now decorates the swellest cab on the division, -and that he never fought for his title after that night--he never had -to; though, if you feel like questioning it, you can still get plenty of -fight, for all that--any of the boys will accommodate you any time. - -Regan isn’t an artist as a pugilist, but even so it is unwise to take -risks--unscientific men by lucky flukes have handed knockouts to their -betters. - -“If Gilleen says so that’s enough, whether it’s so or not, what?” Regan -will fling at you. “It’s pretty _good_ blood, ain’t it, no matter what -kind it is? Well then--h’m?” - - - - -IX--MARLEY - -There are some men they remember on the Hill Division--Marley is one of -them; and his story goes back to the days before the fire wiped out what -the strike had left of the old rambling shops at the western end of the -Big Cloud yards, back to the time when “Royal” Carleton was young in -the superintendency of the division, when Tommy Regan, squat, fat and -paunchy was master mechanic, and Harvey, was division engineer, and -Spence was chief dispatcher, when the Big Fellows, as they were called, -wrestled with the rough of it, shaking the steel down into a permanent -right of way, shackling the Rockies, welding the West and the East. - -Marley was not a “Big Fellow” in either sense of the word. - -Officially, when he started in, he wasn’t anything--that is, anything in -particular. Sort of general assistant, assistant section hand, assistant -boiler washer, assistant anything you like to everybody--Marley’s -duties, if nothing else, were multifarious. - -Physically, he was a queer card. He was built on plans that gave you the -impression Dame Nature had been doing a little something herself along -the lines of original research and experimentation--and wasn’t well -enough satisfied with the result to duplicate it! Anyway, as far as any -one ever knew, there wasn’t but one Marley produced. Maybe nature, -even, isn’t infallible; maybe she made a mistake, maybe she didn’t. -You couldn’t call him deformed--and yet you could! That’s Marley -exactly--when you get to describing him you get contradictory. It -must have been his neck. That lopped off two or three inches from his -stature--because he hadn’t any! But if that shortened him down to, -say, five feet five, which isn’t so short after all--there’s the -contradiction again, you see--the length of his arms at least was -something to marvel at, they made up for the neck. Regan used to say -Marley could stand on the floor of the roundhouse and clean out an -engine pit without leaning over. The master mechanic was more or less -gifted with imagination, but he wasn’t so far out, not more than a -couple of feet or so, at that. Marley’s hair, more than anything else -that comes handy by way of comparison, was like the stuff, in color and -texture, the fellows on the stage light and put in their mouths so as to -blow out smoke like a belching stack under forced draft--tow, they call -it. Eyes--no woman ever had any like them--big and round and wide, with -a peculiar violet tinge to them, and lids that had a trick of closing -down with a little hesitating flutter like a girl trying to flirt with -you. - -But what’s the use! Marley, piecemeal, would never look like the -short-stepping, springy-walked, foreshortened, arms-flopping Marley with -the greasy black peaked cap pulled over his forehead, the greasy jumper -tucked into greasier overalls who sold his hybrid services to the -Transcontinental for the munificent sum of a dollar ten a day. - -Marley’s arrival and introduction to Big Cloud was, like Marley himself, -decidedly out of the ordinary and by no manner of means commonplace. -Marley arrived “‘boing it” in a refrigerator car. - -They ice the cars at Big Cloud and, luckily for Marley, the particular -one he had, in some unexplained way, managed to appropriate required a -little something more than icing. They pulled him out in about as flabby -a condition as a sack of flour. He didn’t say anything for himself -mainly because he was pretty nearly past ever saying anything for -himself or anybody else. The boys who found him cursed fluently because -he wasn’t a pleasant sight, and then carried him up Main Street on the -door of a box-car with the hazy notion that MacGuire’s Blazing Star -Saloon was the most fitting Mecca available. - -Marley continued to play in luck. Mrs. Coogan, the mother of Chick -Coogan, that is, who went out in the Fall blizzard on the Devil’s Slide -some years before, spotted the procession as it passed her little shack, -halted it, made a hasty, but none the less comprehensive, examination, -amplified it by a few scathing remarks on discovering the proposed -destination, peremptorily ordered them into her bit of a cottage and -installed Marley therein. - -He was pretty far gone, pretty far--and he hung on the ragged edge for -weeks. Nobody knows what Mrs. Coogan did for him except Marley himself; -but it was generally conceded that she did more than she could afford -for anybody, let alone doing it for a stray hobo. - -Marley got well in time, of course, for, than old, motherly Mrs. Coogan -there was no better nurse, even if she had few comforts and dainties and -less money to buy them with; and then Marley got a job--or rather Mrs. -Coogan got one for him. - -There wasn’t anything Mrs. Coogan could have asked for and not got that -was within their power to give her--she was Chick’s mother, and with -Carleton or Regan or any of the rest of them that was enough. But Mrs. -Coogan never asked anything for herself--she had the Coogan pride. - -“The good Lord be praised,” she would say--Mrs. Coogan was sincerely -devout. “I’m able to worrk, so I am, an’ fwhy should I?” - -Why should she? They smiled at her as men smile when something touches -them under the vest, and they want to say the proper thing--and can’t. -They smiled--and gave her their washing. - -Mrs. Coogan tackled Regan on Marley’s behalf. - -The master mechanic scratched his head in perplexity, but his reply was -prompt and hearty enough. - -“Sure. Sure thing, Mrs. Coogan,” he said. “Send him down to me. I’ll -find him something to do.” - -To Marley he talked a little differently. - -“I ain’t quite sure I like the looks of you,” he flung out bluntly -enough, taking in the new man from head to toe. “There’s no job for you, -but I’ll give you a chance.” - -Marley’s eyes came down in a flutter. - -“Thanks, sir,” he mumbled nervously. - -Tommy Regan wasn’t used to being “sir” ed--the Hill Division did its -business with few handles and it wasn’t long on the amenities. - -“Humph!” he ejaculated with a snort, and a stream of black-strap laid -the dust on a good few inches of engine cinders. “You can hand any -thanks you’ve got coming over to Mother Coogan. And say”--the master -mechanic wriggled his fat forefinger under Marley’s nose--“thanks are -all right as far as they go, but I figure you owe her something over and -above that, what?” - -A faint flush came into Marley’s cheeks and he darted a quick look -at Regan. His eyes were on the ground and his hands had suddenly -disappeared in his pockets before he answered. - -“I’m going to board with her a spell,” he said in a slow way, as though -he was measuring every word before it was uttered. - -“Are, eh?” grunted Regan, but the grunt carried a grudging note of -approval. “Well, maybe that’ll help some. You can report at noon, -Marley, and make yourself generally handy around. I reckon you’ll find -enough to do.” - -“Thanks, sir,” said Marley again, as he turned away. - -Regan, leaning on the turntable push-bar in front of the roundhouse, -followed with his eyes as the other crossed the tracks in the direction -of the town, then he spat profoundly again. - -“Queerest looking specimen that ever blew into the mountains, and we’ve -had some before that were in a whole class by themselves at that,” - he remarked, screwing up his eyebrows. “Makes you think of a blasted -gorilla the way he’s laid out, what? Well, we’ll give him a try anyway,” - and, with a final glance in the direction of the retreating figure, the -master mechanic went into the roundhouse for his morning inspection of -the big moguls on the pits. - -It took the division and Big Cloud some time to size up the new man, and -then just about when they thought they had they found they hadn’t. - -Marley, if he was nothing else, was a contradictory specimen. - -Mrs. Coogan said it was like the good Lord was kind of paying her -special attention, kind of giving her another son--“so quiet an’ -accommodatin’ an’ handy to have around. A good bhoy was Marley--a foine -lad.” One hand would rest on her hip, and the other would smooth the -thin white hair over her ear with quick, nervous, little pats as she -talked, and the gray Irish eyes, a little dim now, would light up -happily. “Yes, ut’s more than I deserve; but I always knew the Lord wud -provide.’tain’t so easy to move the tubs around as it uster be. I guess -I knew it, but I wasn’t willin’ to admit it till I had somebody to do -it for me. Sivinty-wan I was last birthday.’tain’t old for a man, but a -woman--indade he’s a foine lad, an’ ‘tis myself that ses ut.” - -Down at headquarters Mrs. Coogan’s praise went a long way, and after -Carleton and Regan and the others in the office got accustomed to seeing -him around they came to accept him in a passive, indifferent sort of a -way. He was a curious case, if you like, but inoffensive--they let it go -at that. - -The men had their view-point. Marley didn’t talk much, didn’t draw out -the way a new hand was expected to in order to establish his footing -with the fraternity. Least of all did he make any overtures tending to -anything like an intimate relationship with any of his new associates. -Marley was never one of the group behind the storekeeper’s office that -had stolen out from the shops for a drag at their pipes and a breath of -air; never on the platform to exchange a word of banter with the crews -of the incoming trains; never amongst the wipers and hostlers in the -roundhouse who lounged in idle moments in the lee of a ten-wheeler with -an eye out across the yards against the possible intrusion of Regan or -some other embodiment of authority. He was civil enough and quick enough -to answer when he was spoken to, but his words were few--no more than a -simple negative or affirmative if he could help it. And when he himself -was in question there was not even that--Marley became dumb. - -All this did not help him any--he wasn’t what you’d call exactly -popular! So, if he had little to say for himself, the men had plenty, -and the general opinion was that he was a surly brute that by no -possible chance was any credit to the Hill Division and by no manner of -means an acquisition to Big Cloud. - -A few, very few, took a more charitable view, basing it on the shy, -slow flutter of Marley’s eyelids--they charged it up to an acute -sensitiveness of his grotesque and abnormal appearance. That isn’t the -way they put it, though. - -“Looks like hell, an’ he knows it,” said they judicially. “Let the -beggar alone.” - -It was good advice, whether their analysis was or wasn’t--Pete Boileau, -the baggage master, can vouch for that. As the time-worn saying has -it, it came like a bolt from the blue, and--but just a minute, we’re -overrunning our targets and that means trouble. - -Things had gone along, as far as Marley was concerned, without anything -very startling or out of the way happening for quite a spell, and Regan, -who had stood closer to Chick Coogan than any other man on the division -before the young engineer died, had begun to look on Marley with a -little more interest--as a sort of _deus ex machina_ for Mrs. Coogan. It -seemed to afford the big-hearted master mechanic a good deal of relief. -He got to talking about it to Carleton one morning about a month after -Marley’s advent to the Hill Division. - -“No, of course, I don’t know anything about him,” he said. “Nobody does, -I guess they don’t. But he minds his own business and does what he has -to do well enough, h’m? The old lady’s been getting a little feeble -lately--kind of wearing out, I guess she is. I was thinking Marley was -worth a little more than a dollar ten a day, what?” - -They were sitting in the super’s office, and Carle-ton’s glance, -straying out through the window from where he sat at his desk, fastened -on Marley’s clumsy, ungainly figure hopping across the yard tracks -from the roundhouse toward the station platform. He smiled a little and -looked back at Regan. - -“I guess so, Tommy--if it will do her any good. I wouldn’t bank on it, -though. He’s a queer card. Impresses you with the feeling that there’s -something you ought to know about him--and don’t. I’ve a notion, -somehow, I’ve seen him before.” - -“Have you?” said Regan. “That’s funny. I’ve thought I had myself once or -twice, but I guess it’s imagination more than anything else. Anyway, he -seems to remember what Mrs. Coogan did for him. I dunno what she’d do -even now without the board money, little as it is, to help out. There’s -no use borrowing trouble I suppose, but later on I dunno what on earth -she’ll do. She’s prouder than a sceptered queen--and she won’t be able -to wash much longer, nor take a boarder either, what?” - -Carleton sucked at his briar for a moment in silence. “We’ve all got -to face the possibility of the scrap heap some day, Tommy,” he said -soberly. “But it’s harder for a woman, I’ll admit--bitter hard. -Sometimes things don’t seem just right. If you want to give Marley a -small raise, go ahead.” - -The master mechanic nodded his head. - -“I think I will,” he announced. “He’s queer if you like, but that’s his -own business. Never a word out of him nor a bit of trouble since----” - -Regan’s words stopped as though they had been chopped off with a knife. -Both men, as though actuated by a single impulse, had leaped to their -feet. Behind them their chairs toppled unheeded with a crash to the -floor, and for an instant, as their eyes met each other’s, the color -faded in their cheeks. It had come and gone like a flash--a wild, hoarse -scream of rage, a brute scream, horrid, blood curdling, like the jungle -howl of some maddened beast plunged in a savage, blind, all-possessing -paroxysm of fury. - -Themselves again in a second, the master mechanic and superintendent -sprang to the window. - -On the platform, up at the far end, the great form of Pete Boileau -rocked and swayed like a drunken man, and clinging to him, his -legs twined around the other’s knees, his arms locked around the -baggage-master’s body just above the elbows--was Marley! - -Regan and Carleton gazed spellbound. There was something uncanny, -inhuman about the scene--like a rabid dog that had leaped, snarling, for -the throat hold. - -Suddenly, Marley’s legs with a quick, wriggling slide, released their -hold, his whole form appeared to shrink, grow smaller, he seemed to -crouch on his knees at the other’s feet, then his body jerked itself -erect to its full stature with a movement swift as a loosed bowstring, -his arms flew up carrying a great burden, and over his shoulders, over -his head, a sprawling form hurtled through the air. - -“Merciful God! He’s killed him!” gasped Carleton, dashing for the door. -“Come on, Tommy _Quick!_” - -Both men were down the stairs in a space of time that Regan, at -least, chunky and fat, has never duplicated before or since. Carleton, -hard-faced and tightlipped, led the way, with the picture beating into -his brain of Boileau’s senseless form on the ground and the other above -tearing like a beast at its prey. He wrenched the door of the station -open, sprang out on to the platform, stopped involuntarily, and then ran -forward again. - -The baggage-master’s form was on the ground lying in a curled-up, -huddled heap, and he was senseless all right--if he wasn’t something -more than that. But the rest of Carleton’s mental picture was wrong, -dead wrong. Right beside where the fight, if fight it could be called, -had taken place was a baggage truck, and over this, his head down, his -two great arms wound round his face, shoulders heaving in convulsive -sobs, Marley was crying like a broken-hearted child. - -Take him any way you like, look at him any way you like, Marley, -whatever else he was, was a contradictory specimen. - -Any other man with a skull a shade less tender than Boileau’s--it must -have been made of boiler plate--would never have drawn another pay -check. And even granting the boiler plate part of it, it was something -to wonder at. He had gone through the air like a rocket, and his head -had caught the full of it when he landed. How far? Carleton never said. -He measured it--twice. But he never gave out the figures of Boileau’s -aerial flight. Pete was a big man, six feet something, and heavy for his -height. The strength of four ordinary men concentrated in one pair of -arms might have done it perhaps; mathematically it wouldn’t figure out -any other way. Carleton never said. But what’s the use! The division did -some tall thinking over it--and Marley cried! - -They picked up Pete Boileau and carried him into the station, and the -contents of a fire bucket over his head opened his eyes. But it was a -good fifteen minutes before he could talk, and by that time when -they got over their scare and thought of Marley the baggage truck was -deserted. - -“What started it!” growled Boileau, repeating Carleton’s inquiry. “I’m -hanged if I know. I was jossing him a little--nothing to make anybody -sore. I was only funning anyhow, and laughing when I said it.” - -“Said what?” demanded Regan, cutting in. - -“Why, nothing much. He looked so queer hopping across the tracks like -a monkey on a stick that I just asked him why he didn’t cut out -railroading and hit up a museum for a job, and then before I knew it he -let out a screech and was on me like a blasted catamount.” - -“Serves you right,” said the master mechanic gruffly. “I guess you -won’t nag him again, I guess you won’t. And none of the other men won’t -neither if they’ve had any notion that way.” - -“He’s a wicked little devil,” snarled Boileau. “And the strength of -him”--the baggage-master shivered--“he ain’t human. He’ll kill somebody -yet, that’s what he’ll do!” - -Pete’s summing up was a popular one--the men promptly ticketed and -carded Marley as per Boileau’s bill of lading. There wasn’t any more -doubt about him, no discussions, no anything. They knew Marley at -last, and they liked him less than ever; but, also, they imbibed a very -wholesome respect for the welfare of their own skins. A man with arms -whose strength is the strength of derrick booms is to be approached with -some degree of caution. - -Marley himself said nothing. Carleton and Regan got him on the carpet -and tried to get his version of the story, but for all they got out of -him they might as well have saved their time. - -A pathetic enough looking figure, in a way, he was, as he stood in the -superb office the afternoon of the fight. The shoulders were drooping -giving the arms an even longer appearance than usual, no color in his -face, the violet eyes almost black, with a dead, hunted look in them. -Sorrow, remorse, dread--neither Regan nor Carleton knew. They couldn’t -understand him--then. Marley offered no explanation, volunteered -nothing. Boileau’s story was right--that was all. - -“You might have killed the man,” said Carleton sternly, at the end of an -unsatisfactory twenty minutes. - -“You can thank your Maker you haven’t his blood on your hands--it’s a -miracle you haven’t. Don’t you know your own strength? We can’t have -that sort of thing around here.” - -Marley’s face seemed to grow even whiter than before and he shivered a -little, though the afternoon was dripping wet with the heat and the -thermometer was sizzling well up in the nineties--he shivered but his -lips were hard shut and he didn’t say a word. - -Carleton, for once in his life when it came to handling men, didn’t seem -to be altogether sure of himself. An ordinary fight was one thing, and, -generally speaking, strictly the men’s own business; but everything -about Marley, from his arrival at Big Cloud to the sudden beastlike -ferocity he had displayed that morning, put a little different -complexion on the matter. A puzzled look settled on the super’s face as -he glanced from Marley to the master mechanic, while his fingers drummed -a tattoo on the edge of his desk. - -“You had some provocation, Marley,” he said slowly, “I don’t want you to -think I’m not taking that into consideration--but not enough to work -up any such deviltry as you exhibited. You’ll never get on with the men -here after this. They’ll make things pretty hard for you. I think you’d -better go--for your own sake.” - -There was dead silence in the super’s room for a half minute, then -Regan, who had been sitting with his chair tilted back and his feet -up on the window-sill, dropped the chair legs to the floor and swung -around. - -“I put Logan up firing yesterday,” said he. “There’s a night job wiping -in the roundhouse. What do you say about it, Carleton?” - -It was Marley who answered. - -“_Yes!_” he said fiercely. - -Carleton jabbed at the bowl of his pipe with his forefinger and his -eyebrows went up at Marley’s sudden animation. Marley’s eyes met his -with a single quick glance, and then the eyelids fluttered down covering -them. There was something in the look that caught the super, something -he couldn’t define. There was a plea, but there was something more--like -a pledge, almost, it seemed. - -“All right,” he said shortly; then, nodding at Mar-ley in dismissal: “I -hope you will remember what I’ve said. You may go.” - -Marley hesitated as though about to speak and changed his mind, -evidently, for he turned, walked straight to the door and out, then his -boots creaked down the stairs. - -“He’ll be away from the men there, all except a few,” said the master -mechanic, as though picking up the thread of a discussion. “And as for -them, I’ll see there’s no trouble. There’s Mrs. Coogan now that----” - -“Yes, Tommy”--Carleton smiled a little--“I didn’t put your interest all -down to love for Marley.” - -“What gets me,” muttered Regan screwing up his eyes, as his teeth met in -the plug he had dragged with some labor from his hip pocket, “what gets -me is the way he went to crying afterward. Like a kid, he was. It was -the blamedest thing I ever saw, what?” - -“I don’t think he’s responsible for himself when he gets like that,” - replied Carleton. “That’s exactly what I am afraid of. It comes over -him in a flash, making a very demon of him, and then the relaxation the -other way is just as uncontrollable. I don’t suppose he can help it, -he’s made that way. It wouldn’t make so much difference in an ordinary -man, but with strength like his”--Carleton blew a ring of smoke -ceilingwards--“you saw what he did to Boileau.” - -“I ain’t likely to forget it,” said Regan. “But if he’s left alone I -guess he’ll be all right. Any man that’s fool enough to do anything else -now will do it with his eyes open, and it’s his own funeral.” - -Those of the night crew in the roundhouse were evidently of the same -mind. They received him, it is true, with little evidence of cordiality, -but their aloofness was decidedly pronounced, and they looked askance at -the queer figure as it dodged in and out of the shadows cast by the big -mountain racers, or, at times, stood silently by one of the engine doors -under the dim light of an oil lamp staring out across the black of the -turntable to the twinkling switch lights in the yard. They didn’t like -him, but they had learned their lesson well; and, as the weeks slipped -away, they practised it--he was to be left alone. - -One thing they grudgingly admitted--Marley could work, and did. -Clarihue, the night turner, was man enough to give another his due any -time, no matter what his own personal feelings might be, and there was -some talk, after a bit, between him and the master mechanic about Marley -getting the next spare run firing. - -Clarihue even went so far as to hint at it as a possibility to Marley, -and for his pains got a surprise--he wasn’t used to seeing the chance of -promotion turned down. Marley had shaken his head and would have none -of it. He was satisfied where he was. That was all there was to that. -Clarihue drew back into his shell after that. Marley could wipe till his -hair was gray for all he cared. - -So Marley wiped; but at Mrs. Coogan’s cottage, as the summer waned, -there wasn’t as much washing done as there had been, and the company -doctor got to dropping in too frequently to put his visits down to the -old-time occasional friendly calls for an afternoon chat. And then, one -day in the early fall, the washing stopped altogether, and the doctor’s -face was puckered and serious as he left the cottage and headed down -Main Street to the station. He entered Carleton’s office and, after a -few words between them, the super sent for Regan. - -That evening Carleton’s private car was waiting on the siding when -Number Two, the Eastbound Limited, Chick Coogan’s old train, pulled in. - -As the little yard switcher importantly coughed the super’s car on -to the rear Pullman, Regan, in his Sunday best, a store suit of black -twill, with boiled shirt and stiff collar, came out of the station with -Mrs. Coogan on his arm. - -An incongruous pair they looked. The little old lady’s walk was in -painful contrast to the burly master mechanic’s stride--her short steps -had a painful, hesitating, uncertain waver to them. One hand gripped -tenaciously at Regan’s coat-sleeve, while the other held the faded, -old-fashioned shawl close about her thin, bent shoulders. She carried -her head drooped forward a little, hiding the face under the quaint poke -bonnet. - -A moment later Carleton, too, emerged from the station and joined them. - -The station hands and the loungers eyed the trio with curiosity, and -then stared in amazement as the two officials helped the old lady up -the steps of the private car--Mrs. Coogan was getting the best of it, -whatever it meant. - -The three disappeared inside, but presently Regan and Carleton came out -again, and the super dropped to the station platform. He held out his -hand to the master mechanic as Frank Knowles, the conductor, lifted his -finger to Burke in the cab. - -“Good-by, Tommy; and good luck,” he called, as the train began to move -out. “Don’t hurry, take all the time you need.” - -“All right,” Regan shouted back. “Good-by.” - -Carleton stood for a moment watching the tail lights grow dimmer until, -finally, they shot suddenly out of sight with the curve of the track, -then he turned to walk back along the platform--and stopped. - -Crouched back against the wall of the freight house, deep in the -shadows, was Marley. - -“Here you, Marley,” Carleton called. - -Marley, evidently believing himself to have been unobserved, started -violently, and then came slowly forward. - -“What are you hiding there for?” demanded the super. - -“I wanted to see Mrs. Coogan off,” Marley answered a little defiantly. - -The tone of the other’s voice did not please Carleton. - -“You’ve a queer way of doing it then,” he snapped shortly. - -Marley was twisting his hands, staring down the track. - -“I said good-by before I came down to work,”--he spoke as though talking -to himself. - -“Oh!” said Carleton, and looked at Marley sharply, “I suppose you know -what she went East for?” - -“Yes,” said Marley gruffly. That was all--just “yes.” And with that he -turned abruptly and started across the tracks for the roundhouse. - -Carleton, taken aback, watched him in angry amazement, then the scowl -that had settled on his face broke in a smile, and he shrugged his -shoulders. - -“Guess Tommy is right,” he muttered, as he went on toward the office. -“Marley’s all in a class by himself. We’ve never had anything like him -in the mountains before.” - -It was four days before Mrs. Coogan and the master mechanic came back. -Days during which Marley slipped into Dutchy’s lunch counter at deserted -moments for his meals, and, if that were possible, drew into himself -closer than ever. - -The boys were curious about Mrs. Coogan, naturally; curious enough even -to question Marley. He had one answer, only one. “She’s sick, I guess,” - he said. They got nothing more out of him than that. - -One thing Marley did, though, that Clarihue, while he thought nothing of -it at the time, remembered well enough afterwards. He asked the turner -to give him a sheet of railroad paper and a manila, and in his spare -moments the night before Mrs. Coogan came back he labored, bent over -the little desk where the engine crews signed on and off, scratching -painstakingly with a pen. Clarihue caught a glimpse of the sheet in -passing before Marley hastily covered it up--just a glimpse, not enough -to read a single word, just enough to marvel a little at the wiper’s -hand. Marley was a pretty good penman. - -Marley, of course, being on night duty slept daytimes, but the afternoon -Regan brought Mrs. Coogan back to the cottage he must have heard them -coming, for he was standing in the little sitting-room when they came -in. - -Mrs. Coogan kind of hesitated on the threshold, then she called out -quickly in a faltering way: - -“Marley, Marley, is that you?” - -Marley was twisting his hands nervously. His eyes shot a rapid glance -from the old lady to the master mechanic, and then the eyelids fluttered -down. - -“Sure,” he said, “it’s me.” - -She stumbled toward him and burst into tears, crying as though her heart -would break. - -“Marley, Marley,” she sobbed, “Don’t lave them do ut. Don’t lave them do -ut, there’s a good bhoy, Marley.” - -Marley never moved, just licked his lips with his tongue and his face -grew whiter. Queer, the way he acted? Well, perhaps. Never a move to -catch the frail, tottering figure, never a word to soothe the pitiful -grief. He stood like a man listening as a judge pronounces his doom. -Oh, yes, queer, if you like. Marley, whatever else he was, was a -contradictory specimen. - -It was Regan who caught the old lady in his arms, and led her gently -into her bedroom off the parlor. - -“You mustn’t give way like that, Mrs. Coogan,” he said kindly. “Just -lie down for a spell and you’ll feel better. I’ll ask Mrs. Dahleen, next -door, to come in.” - -It took the master mechanic several minutes to quiet her and persuade -her to do as he asked, but when he came out again Marley was still -standing, exactly as before, in the centre of the room. With a black -scowl on his face, Regan motioned the other outside, and, once on the -street, he laid the wiper low. Hard tongued was Regan when his temper -was aroused and he did not choose his words. - -“What d’ye mean by treating her like that, you scrapings from the junk -heap, you!” he exploded. “You know well enough what she went away for, -and if you’ve any brains in that ugly head of yours you know well enough -what she’s come back to, without any printed instructions to help you -out. What are you playing at, eh? What do you mean? You’re not fit to -associate with a dog! And she the woman that spent about her all to save -your miserable carcass, you. - -“You’d better stop!”--the words came like the warning hiss of a serpent -before it strikes. Marley’s face was livid, and his great gnarled hands -were creeping slowly upward above his waist line. - -With a startled oath, Regan leaped quickly back: and then, separated by -a yard, the men stood eying each other in silence. - -It was gone in a flash as it had come, for Marley, with a shudder, -dropped his hands limply to his sides, and the color crept slowly back -into his cheeks. - -“There is no chance for her?”--no trace of the passionate outburst of an -instant before remained. The question came low, hesitating--more like an -assertion combined with a wistful appeal for contradiction. - -It took Regan longer to recover himself, and it was a minute before he -answered. Then he shook his head. - -“She’ll be stone blind in a month,” he said gruffly. - -Marley’s eyes came up to the master mechanic’s--and dropped instantly -with their habitual little flutter. - -“Ain’t no doubt, no chance of a mistake?” he ventured. - -Again Regan shook his head. - -“Not a chance. The best man we could find East made the examination. -We’re arranging to get her into an institute--a home for the blind -somewhere.” - -“I thought you would”--Marley’s voice was monotonous. “That’s what she -was talking about, wasn’t it?” - -“Yes,” said Regan. - -Marley wagged his head with a judicial air. - -“That’ll kill her,” he remarked, as though stating a self-evident, but -commonplace, fact. “That’ll kill her.” - -“I’m afraid it will,” the master mechanic admitted gravely. “But there’s -nothing else to do. It’s impossible for her to stay here. She’s got to -have some one to look after her, and she has no money. God knows I wish -we could, but we can’t see any other way than put her in some place like -that.” - -“I thought you would if it turned out bad,” said Marley again, in dead -tones. “I figured it out that way when you were gone.” His hands were -traveling in an aimless fashion in and out of his pockets. Suddenly he -half pulled out an envelope, started, hastily shoved it back, and looked -at Regan. “I--I got a letter to post,” he muttered. - -“Well, supposing you have,” said Regan a little savagely--Regan wasn’t -interested in letters just then,--“supposing you have, you needn’t----” - -But Marley was well across the street. - -The master mechanic gasped angrily, choked--and went into Mrs. Dahleen’s -cottage on his errand. It was wasted breath to talk to Marley anyhow. - -It didn’t take long for the news to spread around Big Cloud, and for -three days they talked about Mrs. Coogan pretty constantly--after that -they talked about Marley. - -The Westbound Limited schedules Big Cloud for 2: 05 in the afternoon, -and on the third day after Mrs. Coogan’s return Marley came down the -street about half-past one, and crossed the tracks to the shops. Regan -was in the fitting-shop when Marley walked in. - -“I’d like to speak to you,” said Marley, going straight up to the master -mechanic. - -“Well?” grunted Regan, none too cordially. - -“I’d like you to come over to Mr. Carleton’s office with me.” - -There was something in Marley’s voice, feverish, impelling, something -in his face, that stopped the impatient question that sprang to Regan’s -lips. He looked at the ungainly, grotesque figure of the wiper for an -instant curiously, then without a word led the way out of the shops. - -They traversed the yard in silence, climbed the stairs in the station, -and entered the super’s room. Marley closed the door and stood with his -back against it. - -Carleton, at his desk, looked from one to the other in surprise. - -“Hello,” said he. “What’s up?” - -The master mechanic jerked his thumb at Marley, and appropriated a -chair. - -“He wanted me to come over. I don’t know what for.” - -Carleton turned inquiringly to the wiper. - -“What is it?” he demanded. - -Marley walked slowly across the room until he reached the super’s desk. -His face was drawn, and he wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. - -“It’s about Mrs. Coogan,” he said jerkily. “Five thousand would be -enough, wouldn’t it?” - -Carleton stared at the man as though he were mad, and Regan hitched his -chair suddenly forward. - -“Will you swear to give it to her if I get it for you?”--Marley’s hand, -clenched, was on the desk, and he leaned his body far forward toward the -super. There was no flutter of the eyelids now, and his eyes stared into -Carleton’s without a flicker. “_Swear it!_” he cried fiercely. - -Carleton drew back involuntarily. - -“Marley,” he said soothingly, “you’re not yourself, you----” - -“No, I’m not mad,” Marley broke in passionately. “I know what I’m -talking about. I know she’d die in one of them charity places. It’s up -to me. She treated me white--the only soul on God’s earth that ever did. -And maybe, maybe too, it’ll help square accounts. You’ll play fair and -swear she gets the money, won’t you?” - -“I don’t understand,” said Carleton slowly; “but I’ll swear to give her -anything you have to give.” Marley nodded quickly. - -“That’s all I want,” he said. “There ain’t much to understand.” He -fumbled in his pocket and brought out a newspaper clipping, a column -long, which he laid on the desk. “I guess you’ll get it all there.” - The heavy “set” of the heading leaped up at Carleton. “$5,000 -REWARD.” Below, halfway down the column, was the reproduction of a -photograph--Marley’s. - -Regan was up from his chair, bending over the super’s shoulder. - -“I thought I’d seen you somewhere before”--Carle-ton’s voice sounded -strained and hollow in his own ears. “It must have been the picture. I -remember now. You--you killed a man in Denver a year ago.” - -“It’s all there,” said Marley, licking his lips again. “I never saw him -before. I killed him like I almost killed Boileau this summer. I didn’t -know till afterward that he was rich, not until the family hung out that -reward.” - -Carleton did not speak. Regan reached viciously for his plug. Marley -stirred uneasily, and drew the back of his hand across his forehead. It -came away soggy wet. In the silence the chime of the Limited’s whistle -floated in through the open window, then, presently, the roar of the -train and the grinding shriek of the brake-shoes. - -“My God,” said Carleton in a whisper, “you want me to give you up and -get the reward--for her!” - -A queer smile flickered across Marley’s face. Heavy steps came running -up the stairs. There was a smart rap upon the door and a man stepped -quickly inside. For a second his eyes swept the little group. Then he -whirled like a flash, and the blue-black muzzle of a revolver held a -bead on Marley’s heart. - -“Ah, Shorty,” he cried grimly, “we’ve got you at last, eh? Put out your -hands!” - -Without protest, with the same queer smile on his face, Marley obeyed. -There was a little click of steel, and he dropped his locked wrists -before him. - -“You’re Mr. Carleton, aren’t you?”--the newcomer had swung to the desk. - -“Yes,” said Carleton numbly. - -“I’m Hepburn of the Denver police,” went on the officer. “We appreciate -this, Mr. Carleton. Shorty here has been badly wanted for a long time. -We got your letter yesterday.” - -Hepburn paused to reach into his pocket, and in the pause Carleton’s -eyes met Marley’s--and he understood. Marley had written the letter -himself and signed his, Carleton’s, name. And, too, it was clear enough -now, the telegram he had puzzled over the previous afternoon. It was -lying before him on his desk. - -His eyes dropped to it. “Will be on hand on arrival of Limited, (signed) -Denver.” - -“We can’t give you any receipt for him as you requested,” continued -Hepburn, drawing a paper out of his pocket; “but here’s an -acknowledgment that his capture is due to information furnished by you. -I guess that will answer the purpose. You won’t have any trouble getting -the reward.” He handed the paper to Carleton. - -The super took it mechanically, and started as it crackled in his -fingers. - -“Now,” said Hepburn briskly, “I don’t want to appear abrupt, but there’s -a local East at two-twenty. We’ll move along, Shorty. Good-by, Mr. -Carleton. Next time you’re in Denver look us up.” He took Marley’s arm -and moved toward the door. - -“Don’t--tell her, Mr. Carleton”--there was a catch in Marley’s voice, -and the words came low. - -Carleton did not answer. He was staring at the paper in his -hand--Marley’s price. - -Regan had turned his back, with a hasty movement of his fist to his -eyes. - -“Don’t tell her”--the plea came again from the doorway. - -Carleton tried to speak and his voice broke, then he cleared his throat. - -“She will never know, Marley,” he said huskily. - - - - -X--THE MAN! WHO DIDN’T COUNT - -He was a little gray-haired hostler, wiper, sweeper, assistant night -man in the roundhouse at Big Cloud, anything you like, and this is the -story he told me one night, leaning against the blackened jamb of one -of the big doors, wiping his hands occasionally upon a hunk of greasy -waste. - -They were a rough lot out in the mountains in the days when the Hill -Division was shaking her steel into something like a permanent right -of way--a pretty rough lot. The railroaders because they had to be; the -rest because they were just that way naturally. Miners and Indians made -up the citizenship mostly, and there’s no worse mixture. They’ve got the -redskins corralled on reserves now; but they hadn’t then, and it didn’t -take more than one bad word and one drop of bad whisky to set things in -lively motion. - -There’s a few highfaluting poems, and some other things, about the noble -red man that works you up so when you read them that you get to wishing -the Almighty had seen fit to let you be a red man, too. Well, that’s all -right in its way because, after you’ve rubbed elbows with some of the -real thing, you realize that the world owes the poets a living just as -much as it does anybody else, and that what they say has to sound good; -so you just come to keep the cautionary signals up by instinct, and let -it go at that. - -But, to give the poets their due, there’s one thing they never trip up -on, and that’s the Indian’s compound efficiency for smell. The Indian -can smell. When he sticks out his chest, faces southeast, and begins -to draw in the God-given mountain air, you’re free to bet that the -distilleries down Kentucky way are doing enough business to make regular -dividend checks a sure thing. That’s generally good whisky. Bad whisky, -in smell and otherwise, carries farther--and it’s only fifteen miles -from here to Coyote Bend! - -Coyote Bend wasn’t even a pin prick on the engineers’ blue prints when -they mapped out the right of way, and there wasn’t any such place when -the steel was all spiked down until the day some wandering prospector -staked out a bunch of claims--and the news spread. - -Gold in the Rockies? No; there’s never been much of it _found_, but -there’s an all-fired big superstition that the mother lode of the whole -country is tucked away here somewhere. That’s why, in two days, the -wilderness and a gurgling stream that trickled peacefully down through -a high-walled canon became Coyote Bend; and that’s why the local freight -began to make regular stops to dump off supplies alongside the track. -There was no station, of course, no agent, no nothing; the stuff was -just dumped, that’s all. The consignees picked out their goods if they -could read, or guessed at it if they couldn’t. - -Maybe I ought to have told you this before; anyway, I’ll stick it in -now. There are three men that figure in this story, though one of -them doesn’t count for much. He was a young chap named Charlie Lee. A -graduate of an Eastern college he was, and all he had to his name was -his diploma and the clothes he stood in when he hit the West. He struck -the super for a job, and he got it--braking on the local freight. Hell -for a man like him, eh? Well, it was, in more ways than one! Anyway, -from that day to this it was the best job he ever held down long enough -to draw a second month’s pay check. - -The other two were Matt Perley and Faro Clancy--“Breed” Clancy, they -called him behind his back. - -Perley was a very good sort, pretty straight, pretty clean, measuring -by the standards out here in those days; a little bit of a sawed-off, -blond-haired, blueeyed man, full of grit inside, and an out-and-out -railroad man--only a freight conductor, conductor on the local, but he -knew his business; he’d have gone up, ‘way up, in time. - -Clancy was a hellion, there’s no other name for him, and even that -doesn’t express it--no one word could. Indian one way, Irish the other. -He looked mostly Indian; the Irish came out in the brogue. Black, -swarthy, small eyes like needle points, coarse dry hair that straggled -down over his eyebrows, a hulking bony frame with the strength of a -wrecking crane--that’s Clancy, Breed Clancy. - -Oh, yes, he was slick, slick as they’re made--with his hands. Faro, -stud poker, dice, anything--it was his business; that, and running -booze joints. Mining camps and brand-new boom towns were Clancy’s meat -mostly--after Perley drove him out of Big Cloud. - -Don’t ask me. I don’t know what there was between them. That was before -my time. A woman probably--a woman’s generally blamed anyhow. Anyway, -one night Perley got the drop on Breed and marched him down the street -in front of his pistol and out of the town. After that, Clancy kept -away from Big Cloud. As I say, that part was before my time. I only -know there was bad blood between them; wicked bad blood on one side, as -you’ll see. Clancy disappeared from Big Cloud, and the two didn’t foul -each other again until Coyote Bend started. - -Breed Clancy hit the Bend with the first inrush of the miners, and -before any of them had time to much more than get a pick into the ground -he was busy knocking together a bit of a shack he called a hotel, and -was ordering the furnishings--liquid furnishings, you understand--from -Big Cloud. - -There were three barrels of it, the hardest kind of fire water that ever -went into the mountains waybilled to Clancy at Coyote Bend by the local, -on the first trip that Charlie Lee ever made with Matt Perley. I’m -getting back to Lee now, you see. - -Well, it was about noon when they whistled for the Bend that day, and -Lee, riding the brake wheels on the front end, could see about a dozen -“blankets” squatting alongside the right of way about where the train -would stop. Grouped behind these were a number of stragglers from the -camp, among whom was a big fellow in a red shirt you could see farther -than a semaphore arm. - -Now, I don’t say those Indians were attracted by the gold rush to Coyote -Bend. Coyote Bend, or any other place, old or new, stale or prosperous, -would get its share of the redskins. Where they came from or where they -went nobody knew. They’d drop in from nowhere, and, if they liked the -place, they’d grunt and settle down for a spell; if they didn’t like it, -they’d grunt, in benediction or otherwise, and leave. - -I’m not saying they smelled the whisky in that train. I’m not saying -they knew Clancy was importing fire water, and they were just there to -feast their eyes on the barrels and meditate on what was inside. I’m not -saying anything at all about that, or what followed. There’s only one -man that perhaps might have explained it---I say “perhaps” because he -never did; and also, because he knew Indian nature as well as any white -man in the West. That was Perley. - -Whether Perley even knew that Clancy was at the Bend or not, I don’t -know. I only know that he could have known it if he’d bothered to -read the waybills; and it was likewise on the cards that he might have -learned the day before, down at Big Cloud, that the whisky was going up -the following morning. I don’t know, and that’s straight. Sometimes I -think he did; sometimes I think he didn’t. I don’t know. - -Anyway, Lee slid to the ground as the train stopped, and went back to -the car that held the consignment for the Bend. As he fumbled with the -door, he got a whiff of raw spirit that nearly knocked him over. And -then, right behind him, rose a chorus of appreciative “ughs!” - -I told you an Indian could smell whisky, but I didn’t tell you why. It’s -his ruling passion. That’s straight. I’m not judging the Indian; the -taste was born in him. There are some white men just as bad. I’m not -judging them, either. Some drink for the same reason the Indian does, -some for others, and some--some men drink because they have to. - -What was I saying? Oh, yes, Lee getting that whiff. Well, before he got -the door unfastened, the man in the red shirt had pushed through the -Indians and come up beside him. - -“Me name’s Clancy,” said he. “Did yez bring up any stuff for me?” - -“There’s three barrels for somebody,” replied Lee, and slid open the -door--and the next minute he had jumped back with a yell, colliding with -Clancy. - -“Ugh!” ejaculated the apparition that confronted him. - -“He’s drunk! Majestically drunk! An’ on _my_ stuff!” roared Clancy; and -then, turning fiercely on Lee: “Fwhat did ye let him in there for, eh? -Fwhat did ye let him in for, ye mealy-faced little----” - -“Let him in nothing!” retorted Lee, getting back his grip on himself. -“Here, you, get out--and _quick!_” - -The Indian blinked gravely, but never moved. He sat cross-legged on -the floor, exactly in the middle of the car between the doors, swaying -slightly backward and forward. Beside him, up-ended and broached, was -one of Clancy’s kegs. The car reeked with the smell of it, for of the -half kegful that had gushed out what hadn’t gone into the Indian had -gone on to the floor. - -The half-breed was raving mad. I’ve a notion sometimes the man wasn’t -human at all. He had his hand on Lee’s throat when Perley came running -up from the rear end. - -“What’s the row?” he began, and then he stopped. He was a cool devil was -Perley, and he never turned a hair as he stepped between the two men. -“Ah, Clancy, it’s you, is it, you copper-faced renegade?”--no loud talk, -no bluster, he didn’t raise his voice; but his insult, the worst he -could have laid his tongue to, cut like the sting of a lash. - -Clancy swung around like a flash--and stared into the muzzle of -the conductor’s.45. His hands were clenching and unclenching as he -recognized Perley, and the cords in his neck swelled into knotty lumps. - -“Ut’s your worrk, this job, is ut?” he snarled. “Some day, Perley, I’ll -show you.” - -Queer, you say, he’d act like that--nothing to warrant it. Well, maybe. -I don’t know. I don’t know what was between them before; but I do know -the awful deviltry of Breed Clancy, and I know that Lee, leaning back -against the car, shivered at the look that passed between the two of -them. - -Perley cut the half-breed short off. “Once,” said he contemptuously, -still quiet, not a tone raised, and his voice the more deadly for it, -“once, perhaps you’ll remember, I warned you to keep out of my road. -Lee, how’d that Indian get in the car?” - -“I don’t know,” said Lee. - -“Well, then, throw him out,” said Perley shortly, snapping his watch -with his free hand. “We can’t stay here all day.” - -This little ruction between Perley and the half-breed has taken me -longer to tell it, I guess, than it did to happen. Anyway, it didn’t -cause the excitement you might think it would. The “blankets” were -too busy drinking in the smell of that whisky to let their hungry eyes -wander very far from anywhere but the open door of that car. And as for -the stragglers, by the time they’d caught on to the fact that there was -something on the boards besides that drunken Indian, Perley, with the -same cool contempt, had slipped his gun back in his pocket and was -boosting Lee into the car. - -The Indian offered no opposition as Lee tackled him. He couldn’t--he -was beyond all that--he was so full of dead-eye it was oozing out by the -pores. He just sat there, and Lee slid him to the door just as he was, -still sitting, and dropped him out. He struck the ground with a thud, -rebounded a foot, rolled over, grunted, and lay like a log. There was -a guffaw from the camp stragglers, and a deep and envious chorus of -“Ughs!” from the “blankets.” - -No, I’m not joking--it’s a long way from a joke, as you’ll see. They -_were_ envious. It acted like a red rag on a bull--the possibility of -attaining the condition, the state of heavenly bliss, that had been -reached by their red brother, do you understand? - -Clancy wasn’t laughing. He stood where Perley had left him, sullen and -with twitching face. I don’t know, I think it was Perley’s sheer nerve -that kept the halfbreed from drawing and shooting the conductor when -his back was turned. I don’t know--brute beast cowed by the human mind, -perhaps. No one ever knew Breed Clancy. He had his yellow streak at -times, and then again the blood that was in him made him worse than a -frenzied madman. Yes, I guess it was a case of “brute” all right, for -there was no cowing him when the frenzy was on him. - -Perley wasn’t laughing, either. He was opening and shutting his watch -impatiently. “Come on! Come on!” he cried at Lee. “Get those barrels -out. We’ve got to cross Number Two at the Creek. It’ll be the carpet for -ours if we hold her up.” - -Lee grabbed the broached cask and edged it toward the doorway. The -contents slopped and sloshed inside as he moved it, and occasionally a -little of the stuff would spill out through the bunghole. Then, somehow, -just as he got it to the door, his hold slipped, out it went, bounded on -the edge of the ties, and then went down the embankment right into the -hands of those squatting “blankets.” They didn’t squat long; I don’t -need to tell you that. They were on it in a mob, and they got the -taste--they’d had the smell--and the fill was to come presently. - -Clancy was cursing in streams; and no fouler-mouthed man than Clancy -ever lived. He tried once to get the Indians off the barrel, and the -stragglers backed him up half-heartedly. You might as well have tried -to move that mogul on the pit there behind you. He didn’t try but once, -then he fell back on cursing again, and Perley was the target for most -of it. - -Perley? He never answered him, but his face grew harder and harder--and -his gun was in his hand again. “Throw out those other two barrels!” he -snapped at Lee. - -“The redskins will get every last drop if I do,” objected Lee, -hesitating. - -“Owner’s risk. We’ve no station here. Throw ‘em out!” repeated Perley, -grimmer than before, only this time loud enough for Clancy to hear him. - -“Ye do,” roared the half-breed, “ye do, an’ I’ll worse than murdher ye -one of these----” - -“Throw ‘em out!” said Perley quietly, waving the go-ahead signal to the -engine crew. - -And out they went--down the embankment after the first. - -Lee jumped to the ground and banged the door shut, just as the drawbars -began to snap tight along the train and the local jolted into motion. -He waited beside Perley to swing the caboose as it came up. And while he -waited he watched and grinned. - -Funny? I don’t know; it depends on the way you look at it, depends on -what you call fun. Lee thought it was funny--then. The air was full of -curses, Indian yells, shouts, oaths; and there was one jumbled mess of -arms, and legs, and barrels. The Indians were after their _fill_, and -this time Clancy and the stragglers were in the game for keeps. - -Up ahead the engine crew hung grinning out of the gangway. Behind, the -other brakeman was occupying a reserved seat on the top of the caboose. -A quarter of a mile away over by the camp, men, attracted by the -shouting, were beginning to run toward the track. Inconsistent kind of -a mix-up, eh?--Indians, miners, whisky barrels, and railroaders. I -don’t know; call it funny if you like, though perhaps you can size it up -better when I’m through. - -By this time the caboose was up to where Perley and Lee were standing. -Perley motioned Lee aboard, and then swung on himself. - -Just as he did so, Clancy’s red shirt loomed up out of the mêlée, his -arm lifted, and over the clack of the car trucks pounding the steel came -the tinkle of breaking glass from the shattered pane in the door--the -bullet had passed between the heads of the two men on the platform, -missing them by a hair’s breadth. Another shot followed the first, -another and another, dangerously close; splintering the woodwork around -them; and then Perley fired. The half-breed spun round like a top, -clapped his hand to his face and pitched over. - -Then the curve of the track shut out the scene, but for five minutes -after they were out of sight they still got the whoops of the redskins, -the shouts and curses of the miners, and the crackle of guns like the -quick fire of a Gatling. You see it came to that before it was through, -and there was some blood spilled--a lot of it--and, not counting -Clancy’s, it wasn’t all “blanket” blood, either. - -Clancy? I’m coming to him. No, he wasn’t killed--if he had been I’d -never be telling you this story. - -It was two or three days before Lee and Perley got the details of what -happened. The redskins fought like fiends after the miners began to -fire on them and had killed one or two, and, though they were finally -subdued, the casualties, as I’ve said, weren’t all on their side by a -hanged sight. - -But I was talking about Clancy. Well, that bullet of Perley’s caught him -on the cheek bone, glanced in, plowed through his left eye, and landed -up somewhere against the cartilage of his nose--a bullet will make queer -tracks sometimes, worse than surveyors by a heap. They got him down to -Big Cloud to a doctor’s, and before he was half cured he disappeared. -They had a sort of makeshift hospital here in those days, and when I say -“disappeared” I mean they found his bed empty one morning, that was all. - -I told you I didn’t know whether Perley had any hand in putting that -Indian in the car, or the other redskins at the Bend. I don’t. I told -you I didn’t know what was between him and the half-breed before all -this happened. I don’t. Perley never said. But day after day as he and -Lee pounded up and down on the local through the mountains, he began to -grow silent and moody. - -Lee, young Lee then, was the only one that could get anywhere near the -inside of his vest. He took to Lee, and Lee liked him; but even Lee -had his limits when it came to confidences. There was lots Perley never -opened his lips about. No, I don’t know as it makes much difference now. - -Lee was the first of the two to hear that Faro Clancy was “loose.” - -“It looks to me like a bad business,” he said, after telling Perley the -news. - -Perley’s eyes just narrowed a little. “It looks more like a bad shot, a -rotten bad shot,” he answered evenly. - -“That, if you like,” returned Lee; “but there’ll be more to follow.” - -“One would think you _knew_ Clancy,” said Perley, cool as ever. - -Lee was anxious. Call it presentiment or what you like, from that moment -the thing was on his nerves. Perley had been pretty good to him; had -made things a heap easier for the young fellow, green and raw as he was, -in a hundred different ways. Things like that mean something. - -“Look here, Perley,” said he, “I’ve heard some talk, and I know there’s -something behind all this between you and that devil. I’m not asking for -confidences----” - -Perley cut him short, and caught him almost angrily by the shoulder. -“Don’t meddle!” he snapped. “Let it drop. _You_ don’t count in this, -whatever happens. Your being at the Bend that day was an accident. -What’s between me and Clancy concerns ourselves. You don’t count. Unless -you’re looking for another run besides the local, just remember that and -don’t meddle.” - -That was all. Lee never mentioned it to Perley again. Perley was right, -wasn’t he? I told you there were three men in this story, but that one -of them didn’t count. No, Lee didn’t count. Why should he? - -What did he have to do with it? Perley was right, I leave it to you. - -You’ve been over the division, and you know the Devil’s Slide just west -of the Gap from here. You know the grade--the worst in the mountains. -The trains crawl up at the pace a man could walk, because they can’t go -any faster; and they crawl down just as slowly, because they don’t dare -do anything else. - -I’ve seen the passengers get off the observation and walk--so have you. -Done it yourself probably? I thought so. Extra engine on the rear end to -push or hold back, and one in the middle if the train’s heavy, to keep -it from breaking apart--lessens the drawbar pull, you know. They’re -tunneling now to do away with that particular grade, but that’s nothing -to do with this story, nor, for that matter, with the night, some six -weeks after that business at the Bend, when the local, eastbound, was -climbing the Devil’s Slide. - -It was a dirty night outside the caboose. A storm had been racketing -through the mountains all afternoon, and by the time it got dark it was -a howling gale, raining hard enough to float the ties. - -Lee’s place was on the front end, going up that bit of track, but he -wasn’t well that night, and the other brakeman was doing his snatch. -Touch of mountain fever, or something, nothing serious; just enough -to make him shiver and boil alternately over the little stove in the -caboose, sitting with his back to the door. Up above him in the cupola, -holding down the swivel chair where he could watch the train--that is, -see his engine fling up the sparks, for that’s about all he could see, I -guess--was Perley. - -The car was swinging like a hammock with the heave and strain of the -big pusher coupled right behind it--it acts queer, that does. Every time -I’ve felt it I’ve always thought of a cat and a mouse. It’s like the -engine had the caboose by the scruff and was trying to shake the life -out of it. - -You’ve felt it a little if you’ve ever been in the rear Pullman going -up--the difference is that a caboose hasn’t any springs to speak of, you -understand? Racket enough to raise the dead. You couldn’t hear yourself -think. Not so much from the noise of the train or the storm, but from -the booming roar of the trailer’s exhaust--like she was trying to cough -her boiler tubes out every time the valves slid. - -Now, there’s just one more thing I want you to get. The engine crew of -a pusher naturally can’t see any track, road-bed, or anything of that -kind, and it isn’t their business to, either. All they watch is the -leader and the intermediate, if there is one. Their headlight plays -along over a few cars if it’s high enough, or loses itself on the top of -the door or the roof of the caboose if it isn’t, understand? - -Lee didn’t hear anything. He was sitting bent over with his head between -his hands, and it was the current of air from the opening door that made -him twist around and look up, thinking it had blown open. I don’t -know as you’d call him a coward; maybe yes, maybe no; anyway, he was a -white-faced, terrified man that next instant, as he started up from his -chair. He never got to his feet. Instead, he shut up like a jackknife, -and went down to the floor with a blow over the head from a revolver -butt that knocked him senseless. - -It all happened in a second, but in that second Lee got it with more -vividness than a thousand hours would have given him--the great, hulking -figure, the water trickling to the floor in little pools from the -dripping clothes, the sickly pallor of the face, the thin new skin of -the livid scar across the cheek, the sightless eye--Clancy. - -Lee couldn’t have lain unconscious more than twenty minutes, perhaps -it was only fifteen, for it takes about forty minutes to climb the -four miles of the Slide, you see. Call it twenty, that allows for what -happened before and what happened after. When he came to his senses the -light in the bracket lamp was out; blown out by the draft, for the door -was open. A stray beam or two from the pusher’s headlight filled the -caboose with an uncertain, wavering light--from the jolt and swing, you -know, though Lee thought at first it was his head. - -He tried to get up, but he couldn’t move. He was bound hand and foot, -laid out on the flat of his back--helpless. For a minute he was too -dazed to understand, then he remembered--Clancy. He stared up into the -cupola above him. The swivel chair was empty--Perley had gone. - -The car trucks were beating a steady _clack, clack-clack_, as they -pounded the fishplates; from behind came the full, deep-chested thunder -of the trailer’s exhaust; around, the hundred noises of the creaking, -groaning, swaying car; without, the patter of rain, the wail of the -wind. But over it all, low though it was, came a sound that sent a chill -to Lee’s heart. - -It was like a breathless moan, do you understand? That was the inhuman -part of it; it was breathless--there was no break--a sort of sobbing -monotone. It came from behind him. Lee shivered as he listened, and -then his heart began to pound as though it would burst. He was -afraid--_afraid_. Premonition, perhaps; I don’t know. He rolled himself -over on his side, and he saw---- - -How can I tell it! A figure was crouched against the side of the car in -a half-sitting posture, the face was red--red with the blood that -was flowing from the forehead. Lee shrieked aloud in terror. “Perley! -Perley!” Then he grew sick with the horror that was on him. Worse than -murder the half-breed had threatened--and he had kept his word. Perley -had been scalped! - -Lee’s cry must have reached the poor wretch’s consciousness, for he -staggered to his feet, sweeping his eyes clear with both hands. Lee, -sick to the depths of his soul, the sweat breaking out in great, cold -drops upon his forehead, fought like a maniac with his bonds. - -Perley never spoke, never paid any attention to Lee--he was past all -that--but his brain, at least, was still capable of coherent impression. -It must have been--to account for what he did. Right in front of him, as -he hung there tottering and swaying, was a broken bit of mirror tacked -up on the side of the car. He was staring into it. - -His moaning stopped. The shock of his own awful horror must have -revolted, shaken his very being. His hand groped weakly, subconsciously -perhaps, for his pocket--his revolver--the end. - -Again Lee shrieked as he struggled to free himself, and then, as Perley -fired, he burst out into a peal of wild, discordant laughter. His mind -was giving way. He began to gibber like a madman--that’s the way they -found him--with Perley’s body pitched full across his chest. - -Don’t ask me. I told you Perley was a little, undersized, sawed-off man. -I don’t know, do I? The halfbreed, physically, could have handled him -like a baby, once he caught him unawares. That’s all I know. - -They buried Perley down at Big Cloud; and they buried Clancy where the -posse dropped him, drilled full of holes. That’s the story. - -Lee? Charlie Lee? Why, he doesn’t count, does he? He had nothing to do -with it. Well, if you’re interested in him I’ll tell you. His college -diploma never did him any good. Once he got better and out of the -hospital, he took to drinking periodically--_hard_. Between times -straight as a string, you understand, for six weeks say, then off again. -That was fifteen years ago, and he’s done it ever since. The doctors -said that blow on the head unsettled him, skull splinter, or something -like that; but medicine’s not an exact science. The doctors were wrong. -The trouble was deeper than the skull--it was in his soul. Lee drank -to save himself from the madhouse--I told you, didn’t I, that some men -drink because they have to? - -Carleton, the super, and the men before Carleton, understood what the -doctors didn’t, so Lee’s working for the railroad yet. Not braking--he’s -not fit for that, but he keeps the job they gave him--and it’s kept for -him--when he gets back after his spells. I------there’s the foreman -shouting for me. Sorry, but I’ll have to go. “If you’re going out on -Number One she’s just coming down the gorge now. Good night, sir.” - -I lost him in the shadows of the big mogul on the pit behind me. Then I -turned and walked slowly out of the roundhouse, over the turntable, and -across the tracks to the station platform. Number One’s mellow chime -floated down from the gorge, then the flare of the electric headlight, -and the rumble of the train. And in quick, fierce tempo, the beating, -drumming trucks caught up the name I had heard the foreman shout, and -rang it over and over again in my ears: - -“Oh-you-Lee! Charlie-Lee! Lee! Charlie-Lee--Lee!” - - - - -XI--“WHERE’S HAGGERTY?” - -“The Hill Division was proud enough over it, of course, for Carleton was -its old chief; but, none the less, it read General Order Number 38 with -dismay and misgiving. - -“T. J. Hale,” the G. O. ran, “is hereby appointed Superintendent of -the Hill Division, with headquarters at Big Cloud, vice H. B. Carleton -promoted to General Manager of the System.” - -“Now who in the double-blanked, blankety-blanked blazes is Hale?” - demanded the roundhouse and the engine crews. - -“Carleton was all to the good, h’m?--what!” growled the dispatchers. - -The train crews swung their lanterns with a defiant air, and the -passenger conductors juggled their punches around their little fingers, -smiling a superior smile to themselves. Hale might be a good, man, -perhaps he was, but Carleton was--“Royal” Carleton. “I guess he’ll get -along all right with us, _but_ he don’t want to get fresh, that’s all. -Where’d he come from, h’m?” - -That question, at first, no one seemed able to answer. The general -impression was that the Transcontinental had got him from some Eastern -road. Certainly he was a new man, bran new, to the System. - -And then the renown of one Haggerty, who was braking on a passenger -local, became great, and, in consequence, the displeasure of the -Division increased. - -Said Haggerty: “When I was on the Penn five years back, this fellow Hale -was assistant super. I knew him well. You wanter look out for him, you -can take my little word for that. He’s a holy terror, an’ that’s a fact. -Got any chewin’?” - -Haggerty got his chewing, being an egregious liar; and Hale got a -damaged reputation for the same reason. - -But Haggerty got more than his chewing--and he had not long to wait. On -the day that the new super was expected, Haggerty, on passenger local -Number Seven, got into Big Cloud about noon, and, taking advantage -of the ten-minute wait for refreshments, straddled a stool at the -lunch-counter. Between bites, he fired questions at Spence the -dispatcher, who was bolting his mid-day meal. - -“Hale come yet?” he demanded. - -“Haven’t seen him,” replied Spence. - -“When d’ye expect him?” persisted Haggerty. - -“I don’t know,” Spence answered. - -“Oh, don’t be so blasted close!” snapped Haggerty. “You ain’t givin’ -away any weighty secret if you let out what time his special ‘ll be -along, I suppose.” - -“I haven’t heard of any special,” said Spence. “Say, Haggerty, they -tell me Hale’s an old friend of yours, h’m? No wonder you’re anxious. -I forgot about that. As soon as I get word about him, I’ll wire up the -line to you so’s you can jump your train, come back on a hand-car, and -be here on the platform to meet him.” - -“You go to blazes!” retorted Haggerty, and scowled across the counter -at an inoffensive looking little fellow who had taken the liberty of -smiling at the dispatcher’s words. - -At Haggerty’s look, the smile disappeared in a cup of coffee raised -hastily to the lips. “Huh!” snorted Haggerty, by way of driving home -to the other the audacity and temerity of his act, and likewise the -inadvisability of repeating it. Haggerty was galled. Once before that -morning he had been obliged to relegate this insignificant, squint, -eye-glassed individual, who had persisted in riding on the platform, to -a proper sense of submission. And the method employed had been no more -delicate a one than that of jerking the man bodily into the car by the -collar of his coat. “Huh!” he repeated, with rising inflexion. - -“No, Haggerty,” went on Spence pleasantly, “Don’t you worry. I won’t -fail you. When the super steps off the train, and the first words he -says is, ‘Where’s Haggerty?’ and you’re not here to respond in kind I -can plainly see there’ll be doings. Oh, no, don’t you fret, I’ll not -throw you down on anything like that----‘twouldn’t be wise for us, -that’s got to live with him, to rile him up at the outset! No, it -certainly wouldn’t, what?” - -“You go bite on a brake-shoe, you’re too sharp to be munchin’ -doughnuts,” snarled Haggerty. And, swinging himself from his seat, he -went back to his train. - -An hour later when he reached Elk River, the end of his run, he found a -telegram waiting for him from Spence. He sucked in his under lip as he -read it. - -“You sly joker,” wired the dispatcher, “why didn’t you tell us that your -friend came up with you on Number Seven?” - -Haggerty pushed his cap to the back of his head, and swore softly under -his breath. He began to go over in his mind the passengers that had been -aboard the train when they ran into Big Cloud. No one individual seemed -to stand out carded and waybilled as the new super. - -Then an idea struck Haggerty, and he climbed into the rear coach where -Berkely, his conductor, was making up his report sheets. - -“Say, Jim,” said Haggerty, “was there any passes into Big Cloud this -mornin’?” - -Berkely looked up suspiciously. “You mind your own business, an’ you’ll -get along better!” he snapped. - -“Oh, punk!” returned Haggerty. “My count’s the same as your’n, ain’t it? -What’s the matter with you, then? Honest, Jim, I wanter know. Was there -any passes?” - -“No, there wasn’t,” grunted Berkely, cooling down a little. - -“Well, then, you might have said so at first, instead of jumpin’ a -fellow for nothin’,” said Haggerty, and went out of the car to hang -meditatively over the handrail and spit reflectively at the ties. - -“Now wouldn’t that sting you?” he demanded of the universe in general. -“Wouldn’t that sting you? Who ever heard of a new super comin’ on the -job ridin’ a local on a _ticket!_ An’ me askin’ when he was goin’ to -turn up. Oh, yes, it sure would sting you! That funny boy Spence ‘ll pass -this along an’--oh, punk! I ain’t sure it wouldn’t have been better if -I’d kept my mouth shut about knowin’ Hale, but who’d ever thought he’d -come up on _my_ train! How was I to know, h’m?” And during all that -afternoon’s layup at Elk River, Haggerty pondered the matter. He -continued to ponder it as they pulled out for the return trip in the -evening, and he was still pondering it when they whistled for Big Cloud. - -There was no moon up that night, and it was pretty dark as they ran in. -Haggerty, with his lantern, was standing on the rear end. As the train -slowed itself to a halt, a man came tearing down the station platform at -a run. - -“Where’s Haggerty?” he called breathlessly. “Where’s----” - -“Here,” said Haggerty promptly, leaning out over the steps and showing -his light. “What d’ye want?” - -“Oh, all right,” said the man. “I’ll be back--” and he disappeared in -the shadow of the station. - -“He acts like he was nutty,” muttered Haggerty, and swung himself off -the steps. - -But, though Haggerty waited, the man did not come back, and he had not -come back when the train began to roll out of the station, and Haggerty -was again on the rear platform of the car. Then, just as his hand -reached out to open the door, he stopped and started suddenly as though -he had been stung. - -A voice came out of the darkness from the other side of the track over -by the roundhouse. “Where’s Haggerty?” it demanded anxiously. - -Then Haggerty tumbled, and his face went red with rage. He leaned far -out over the rail, and, forgetful that the pantomime was lost in the -darkness, shook his clinched fist in the direction from whence the voice -had come. - -“You go to he-ee-ll-lll!” he bawled, the exclamation shaken into -syllables by reason of the car wheels jolting over the siding switches -at that precise moment. And then, his senses being very acute, from -where the light shone in the dispatcher’s window he-thought he heard, -above the momentarily increasing rattle of the train, a laugh--a laugh -that produced anything but a quieting effect on his already outraged -sensibilities. - -Now Haggerty was not the nature of those who can pass lightly over a -joke at their own expense, especially if that joke be too prolonged and -carries with it a hint of underlying venom. Therefore, as the “one on -Haggerty” spread over the division, and scarcely an hour of the day -passed that the cry “Where’s Haggerty?” did not reach his ears, he -began to sulk and treasure up his injury. The division was rubbing it in -pretty hard. But the curious part of it all was that his bitterness -was not directed against himself who was the direct cause of his -discomfiture, nor against Spence who was the indirect cause, but against -Hale, who was no cause at all. - -Just once had Haggerty seen the superintendent. Hale was pointed out to -him on the platform at Big Cloud, and Haggerty had ducked hastily back -inside his train. Hale was the inoffensive little fellow he had treated -with such scant courtesy at the lunch-counter, the insignificant, -squint-eye-glassed individual he had hauled from the car platform by -the coat collar! When Haggerty’s mingled feelings of perturbation and -amazement permitted him any speech at all, it was rather incoherent. - -“_That_--the runt!” he gasped, and subsided into an empty seat. - -And in this inelegant, but pithy, summing up of the capacity and -dimensions of the new official the division was with him to the last -section hand. Him--a railroad man! The Hill Division remembered -“Royal” Carleton and was ashamed, and it rankled for the shame that it -considered had been put upon it. Out of it all, Haggerty was the only -thing of saving grace! So upon Haggerty they loosened, behind the -humor, some of their bitterness. Haggerty became the safety valve of the -division. - -A month had gone by and Hale had lived well up to what his appearance -had led them to expect. He might have been an automaton for all the -signs of life that emanated from his office. Just routine, the routine -business, routine, that was all. The disquiet and unrest that brooded -over the division became contempt--the kind of contempt that made the -car-tinks put on airs, and in their heart of hearts figure themselves -better railroad men than he who sat over them in supreme authority. - -Even Haggerty no longer ducked out of sight when circumstances required -that he should breathe the same air as his superior. Haggerty had -acquired a swagger; also, he now voiced his opinion, his cordially -poor opinion, of Mr. Hale without restraint and with no check upon his -tongue. - -And then Haggerty got a shock. It was imparted by Spence. - -“Got it from Hale’s clerk last night,” said the dispatcher. “He’s going -to run an inspection special over the division, and he’s picked out the -fag end of all things for the crew. He picked you first, Haggerty.” - -“Aw, forget it!” growled Haggerty, with a scowl. - -“I think there’s something behind it, though,” Spence went on, his voice -modulated confidentially. “Between you and me, Haggerty, the inspection -trip is a bluff.” - -Haggerty pricked up his ears. “How’s that?” he demanded. - -“Well,” said Spence serenely, backing to a safe distance, “I think he’s -hurt at the way you’ve cut him since he’s been here. He’s pining for -your company, and----” - -Haggerty sprang to his feet from the baggage truck on which he had been -seated, and shook his fist frantically at the fast retreating figure. He -was still gesticulating fiercely and muttering savagely to himself when -the window in the dispatcher’s room overhead opened softly, and Spence -stuck out his head. - -“Hey, there, Haggerty,” he called, “quit practising that deaf and dumb -alphabet. You haven’t got any time to waste. You want to run along and -get the missus to press out a pair of panties, and iron a boiled shirt -for you. You’ll get your orders in the morning.” - -“Come down for one minute,” choked Haggerty, his rage fanned to a white -heat by the knowledge of his own impotence, for Spence, as he well knew, -was safely entrenched behind locked doors. “Just one minute, an’ I’ll -make your face look like it had never been born. I will that!” - -“Haggerty,” said Spence in an injured tone, as the window closed, “you -are disgruntled.” - -But Haggerty was to be still more disgruntled, for the next morning, -true to Spence’s words, he found himself assigned to Inspection Special -Number Eighty-nine. Haggerty was not happy; but he boarded the forward -car, as they pulled out for the mountains with the mental resolution -that he would keep out of the super’s way. - -Resolutions, however, like many other things, are sometimes rudely -upset in the face of conditions that are not taken into account in the -reckoning. They had been running at a forty-mile clip, and were about -into the yard at Coyote Bend, when Haggerty nearly went to the floor as -the “air” came on with a sudden rush, and the train came jerking to a -halt like a bucking bronco. The whistle was going like mad for the block -ahead. Haggerty grabbed his red flag, dropped to the ground, and ran -back past the super’s car to take his distance. - -Up ahead, he could see the tail end of a freight disappearing around the -bend, crawling into safety on the siding. Nothing very interesting about -that, somebody would get Tokio for laying out the Special, he supposed. -Maybe the freight had had a breakdown, and was off schedule making the -Bend. Personally, Haggerty did not care. It made very little difference -to him. He picked up a handful of stones, and began to plug them at the -nearest telegraph pole. Suddenly he changed the direction of his shots, -and let fly with all his might at a gopher he had spotted squatting in -front of his hole. - -“Holy Mac!” he ejaculated in unbounded astonishment. “I believe I hit -the cuss!”--and he went back to see. - -Just as he got down the embankment, the Special began to whistle for -her flag, “one--two--three--four,” and Haggerty, scrambling to the track -again, began to run. But fast as he ran, he had only covered about half -the distance when the train began to move. It was, therefore, a very -breathless and panting Haggerty who just managed to grab the rail of the -rear car--the super’s car! - -There was nothing for it but to pass through and Haggerty, with his -acquired swagger, started. The super was alone in the rear compartment, -seated at a table, a mass of papers before him. Haggerty was -industriously rolling up his flag as he passed along. - -“Haggerty!” - -Haggerty stopped and swung around at the sound of his name. - -Hale reached his hand into a box of cigars that lay open on the table, -selected one carefully, lighted it, and leaned back in his chair. “I -would like to offer you one, Haggerty,” he said quietly, “but I am -afraid you would misunderstand.” - -Haggerty shifted a little before the super’s look. Somehow, there wasn’t -any squint at all; instead, behind the glasses, the gray eyes were -remarkably bright and clear, and their steadiness was discomposing--to -Haggerty. - -“It seems,” said Hale, a little smile playing around the corners of his -mouth, “that they don’t measure men by the same standard out West here -that they did when we were back on the Penn together, eh?” Haggerty -reddened. His only belief would have been in bluster; but, curiously -enough, there was something about this little man, he couldn’t tell just -what, that made bluster impossible. Therefore, Haggerty held his peace, -and his fingers played nervously with the flag, twirling it around and -around awkwardly. - -“Don’t make any mistake, Haggerty,” the super continued pleasantly. “I’m -not trying to rub it in. I want you to know that I’ve heard the story. -I want you to know that I didn’t nose it out. I heard it at the -lunch-counter that day after you went out, and before the men there knew -who I was. I want to start straight with you, Haggerty.” - -Haggerty was puzzled and flustered at this opening. “Well, sir,” he -blurted out, “of course you know it was all a lie. I only did it for a -josh.” - -“Yes, I understand,” Hale answered. “In itself it didn’t amount to -anything, but the consequences are a little more than you reckoned -on, aren’t they? It’s acted like a boomerang, and you’re pretty sore, -Haggerty, aren’t you?” - -The openness and friendly tones of the super took hold of Haggerty, and -he warmed toward the other. - -“Well, yes, sir, I suppose I am,” he admitted. - -Hale nodded. “Now, I want you to see the other side of it, Haggerty--my -side. No division of any railroad, or anything else for that matter, can -do itself justice unless everyone connected with it is pulling together -_for_ it. I want _every_ man out here with me, and first of all I -want you. There is nothing destroys respect so much as ridicule. The -division, much after the fashion that an epidemic of measles springs up -amongst children, took it into their heads to dislike the successor of -Mr. Carleton, no matter who he might be. Now, unfortunately, instead of -having checked the spread, the germs are being fostered because, back of -their fun with you, a description of contempt for me is constantly kept -alive. So I want you to cooperate with me, Haggerty, and show them that, -after all, whether I’m a holy terror or not, whether I’m a runt of a -giant, no matter what, I’m entitled to a fair deal out here in the West. -There, Haggerty, that’s a pretty long sermon for me. I’m not much at -preaching. Just turn what I’ve said over in your mind, that’s all. I -think I can safely offer you a cigar now. Will you have one?” - -Haggerty accepted the cigar with a flustered mumble of thanks, and as he -went forward to the other coach he chewed the end pensively. - -“Well, how’s the little fellow? Hope the ride ain’t makin’ him -car-sick,” sneered Slakely, the conductor. - -Haggerty strode up to the other, and shoved his fist savagely within an -inch of Slakely’s nose. - -“I’ll have you know, the super’s all right, you walleyed coyote, you! -I’m tellin’ you he’s a _man_. Do I hear any remarks to the contrary?” - -“Say,” gasped Slakely blankly, retreating down the aisle, “what’s the -matter with you, anyway?” - -“That’s what’s the matter!”--Haggerty’s explanation was more forcible -than explicit, though the meaning of his clenched fist which he shook -at the other was pointed enough in its inference. “That’s what’s the -matter, my bucko,” he repeated fiercely, “an’ don’t you forget it! -I’m givin’ it to you straight, an’ I’ll take none of your lip about it -neither! See?” - -Haggerty had raised the standard. Not, perhaps, as the super had -expected; but according to his own ideas, or rather to his fiery temper -which led him to act blindly on the spur of the moment as his impulse -directed. - -But it was not this method of Haggerty’s, if such a term could by any -stretch of the imagination be applied to Haggerty, that was to -bring about the desired result, and at the same time rid him of -his tormentors--tormentors who continued to sound the cry, “Where’s -Haggerty?” with undiminished frequency--tormentors who were much too -wary to allow themselves to be caught anywhere within striking distance, -for Haggerty’s forearm was a thing to wonder at. Instead, the end came -from another source as totally different as it was unexpected. It came -on the third day of the inspection trip, up in the Rockies at the new -bridge across the Stony River--and it was the new bridge that did it. - -They were to lay out there for the morning, and Haggerty started in to -employ the two or three hours of leisure this gave him by looking over -the work. It wasn’t much of a bridge as bridges go, for the Stony wasn’t -much of a river; but the approaches were enough to pull the heart out of -the stoutest bridge crew that ever toiled and sweated and slaved. Just -rock, solid, gray, massive; and so it was blast, blast, blast, hour -after hour all through the day, day after day. One span, resting on the -shore abutments, was to bridge the canon that yawned six hundred feet -below, where the Stony swirled and eddied, a foaming, angry, chattering, -little stream. - -On the eastern side, where Haggerty stood, the anchorage was pretty well -under way, but over across on the western shore they were still pitting -their blasting powder against the stubborn rock of the mountainside. -Haggerty crossed over on the old bridge to take a look at this. Just as -he reached the other side a stationary engine blew shrilly for a blast, -and the men began to run for cover. Haggerty pulled his watch and marked -the time--one minute and fifteen seconds. Then the blast thundered, -echoed, reechoed, and died away through the mountains. He joined the men -as they went back to their work. - -“Holy Mac!” he exclaimed to the foreman, as he peered over the edge of -the excavation and looked down some fifteen or twenty feet to the ledge -where the men were already busy again. “Holy Mac! You’ve got to look -sharp, eh?” - -“Oh, I dunno,” replied the foreman. “We give ‘em plenty of time. When -the whistle blows the men hump it. We don’t touch the button till the -last one is crawlin’ over the top of the bank. Then, with the time fuse, -there’s a minute, lots of time.” - -Haggerty looked on for awhile, then he turned away, sat down by one -of the shanties, and loaded his pipe. The pipe once alight, he settled -himself in a more comfortable position by sprawling on his back, his -hands under his head. From where he lay, he commanded a view of the -other side of the river as well as the work before him. He could see -Hale across there talking to one of the bridge engineers. He watched the -two men lazily, in drowsy contentment, until he lost sight of them as -they started to come over to his side, then his attention became riveted -again on his immediate surroundings. - -They were getting ready for another blast. Haggerty sat up. It was -rather exciting to see the men come scrambling out of the hole. The -whistle had just gone three toots. They were coming now, one head after -another popping up over the edge, then the shoulders, and finally the -men on their feet running like deers for shelter--not far, only a few -yards, for the excavation itself afforded protection, once clear of it. -Haggerty himself was not fifteen yards away. - -He counted the men as they came out. It was the eighteenth who, just as -his head and shoulders appeared, waved an arm and shouted: “All out. -Let ‘er go!” He saw the foreman bend over the battery and make the -connection that would spark the timefuse at the other end, and then a -groan of horror went up around him. Number Eighteen, with a cry and -a desperate effort to pull himself over the top, had slipped back and -disappeared from sight! - -Haggerty’s pipe dropped to the ground from between his teeth, his heart -seemed to stop its beats, a cold sweat broke out upon his face. He was -on his feet now, and the foreman’s words were ringing in his ears: “Then -there’s a minute, lots of time! _Then there’s a minute, lots of time!_” - -He began to run, and the seconds, as he ran, lengthened into years and -cycles. “My God!” he muttered in a catchy way. - -But fast as he ran, someone was faster than he. Five yards from the -edge of the excavation, a figure, small, short, speeding like the wind, -passed him. It was Hale--the super! - -Behind, the foreman’s voice bellowed hoarsely: “Come back! Come back! Ye -can’t get to the fuse! D’ye hear!” - -“Mabbe,” mumbled Haggerty between his teeth, “mabbe we can get the -_man_. Mary, Mother, help us!” - -Hale, flat on the ground, was making to swing himself over as Haggerty, -for the second time, caught him by the collar of his coat. “You ain’t -strong enough,” he grunted, yanking the super back. “You help me from -the top “--and over the edge he went himself. - -“Then there’s a minute, lots of time!”--the words came again unbidden. -How much, in God’s name how much, of that minute had gone, how much was -left? His teeth were set, his heart pounds so fierce and rapid that his -breath came hard and choked, as he lowered himself to a little ledge, -projecting out some seven or eight feet below the surface that had -caught and held the body of Number Eighteen. The man lay there groaning. -It was easy to see what had happened. A misplaced step in the climb, -then a loosened rock, his balance gone, and the stone had crashed down -upon his legs and ankles. - -There was a look of helpless terror in the eyes of the wounded man as -Haggerty reached and bent over him. “Get out,” the white lips quivered. -“You ain’t got time. I give the signal. The blast ‘ll be goin’ now.” - -“There’s a minute, lots of time,” said Haggerty in a sing-song, crazy -way. He was trying to fit the words to an air he had heard somewhere. -Queer he couldn’t remember it, the words were straight enough! Then he -laughed--foolishly--as he worked like a madman! - -He had raised the man in his arms and now, heaving with all his -strength, was gradually pushing him up, up. The strain became terrific. -Haggerty’s muscles cracked. One of his arms was almost useless to him -owing to the narrowness of the ledge that, to maintain even a precarious -footing as, little by little, he rose to an upright position, forced him -tight against the wall of rock and earth. Haggerty panted with cruel, -gasping sobs. “Then there’s a minute, lots of time!” The repetition of -the words came surging upon him with a shock of horror, lending him a -frenzied strength. A desperate twist, and he had made the halfturn that -brought his back to the cutting. His other arm was free now. A heave, -and he had swung Number Eighteen above his shoulders within reach of the -super’s outstretched hands. A second more, and, with Hale pulling above -and Haggerty lifting below, the man, with a cry of agony as his wounded -leg banged limply against the ground, was forced up over the bank. - -“Quick, Haggerty! For God’s sake, be quick yourself,” cried Hale. -“Hurry, man, _hurry!_” - -“There’s a minute”--Haggerty sprang for the top of the bank, clutched -it--“lots of--” The last word was blotted out as he dragged himself over -the edge, and heard Hale’s sharp command: “Lie flat!” From behind and -below him came the roar of the detonation, he felt the ground shake and -quiver beneath him, the echoes were rolling and reverberating like a -park of artillery--then Hale’s low, fervent: “Thank God!” - -It was Hale who got it first as the mob of men rushed forward, cheering, -laughing, gabbling hysterically. And it was at Hale’s uplifted hand that -the clamor died suddenly away, and in its stead came the super’s voice -in quiet tones: “Where’s Haggerty?” - -“Aw, gwan!” sputtered Haggerty sheepishly, trying to fight his way out -of the crowd that pressed upon him to haul and maul him, to thump his -back, to shake his hand. “Aw, gwan! I wanter get me pipe that I left -over by the shanty.” - - - - -XII--McQUEEN’S HOBBY - -There isn’t much use in talking about the logical or the illogical when -you come to couple up with a man’s hobby, because a hobby is a hobby and -that’s all there is to it--with nothing left to be said on the subject. -Most men have a hobby. McQueen’s was coal--just coal. - -McQueen talked coal with a persistence that was amazing. On all -occasions and under any pretext it was coal. Was he off schedule with a -regularity that entailed his presence on the carpet before the division -superintendent, it was coal. Did he break down between meeting-points -with the attendant result that the dispatchers fretted and fumed and -swore as they readjusted their schedules and rearranged their train -sheets, it was coal. Everlastingly and eternally coal. - -“What’s coal?” McQueen would demand oracularly. “It’s carbon and oxygen -and hydrogen with a dash of nitrogen, ain’t it? Well, then, what are you -talking about? Coal _ain’t_ just coal, some of it’s mostly slate. Two -hundred and ten pounds all the way, all the time, with the grate bars -cluttered with that, huh! What?” - -No purchasing agent that had ever hit the division had been quite able -to satisfy McQueen with the brand of the commodity that was supplied in -accordance with the requisition orders that he drew. And so, day in and -day out, big 802 puffed her way through the mountains, and McQueen, in -the cab, absorbed coal statistics, coal data, coal everything, with an -avidity, a thoroughness, and a masterliness of detail, that would have -put some noted geologists to shame and given the rest a run to hold -their rights on the marked-up schedule. - -Up at headquarters--when things were running smoothly and McQueen -was behaving himself with no scores chalked up against him on the -time-card--they treated his hobby as a joke. So that when his whistle -boomed out of the gorge to the westward, or shrilled across the cut -to the eastward, followed a moment afterward by the sight of the big, -flying mogul with her string of slewing dark-green coaches, the staff -on duty at Big Cloud would lean from the upper windows and watch the -Limited as she shattered the yard switches with a roar--watch as, with a -hiss of the air and the grinding of the brake shoes as they sparked the -tires, she would draw up, panting, at the platform, and the big engineer -would swing himself from the cab for an oil around. Then the badinage -flew thick and fast while McQueen swabbed his hands on a hunk of waste -and punctuated the remarks with squirts from his long-spouted can as he -filled the thirsty oil cups. - -So the big fellows laughed and joked, and the Brotherhood chaffed him -unmercifully. - -If anyone had asked McQueen what had started, let alone caused him to -exhaust the subject of coal with such painstaking and conscientious -insistence, he couldn’t for the life of him have answered. It had -started--just started, that’s all--and, fascinating him, had pursued -its insidious advance unchecked and unquestioned--that is, unquestioned -until one morning when Clarihue, the turner at the Big Cloud roundhouse, -kind of jerked him up a little on the proposition. - -“You’re against the red, you and your coal, Mac, all right, all right,” - Clarihue chuckled, as the engineer came in to sign on for the day’s run. - -McQueen was patting 802’s slide bars affectionately. “How’s that?” he -asked. - -“Oil!” - -“Oil?” repeated McQueen, puzzled. - -“Sure thing! No more coal--no more slate--no more cinders--you touch her -off, and there you are! You’ll have to cut out the coal and plug up on -oil, Mac.” - -“Oh!” said McQueen, enlightened. “Oil-burners, eh? I saw one of ‘em down -East. They’re evil smelling, inhuman, stinking brutes, that’s what they -are! don’t you let ‘em side track you like that, son. They may do down -there, but not in the hills. Not while you and me are pulling throttles, -and don’t you think so.” - -Clarihue grinned. - -“Well, mabbe,” said he. “But say, honest, Mac, what’s the sense of -gassing about coal the way you do? What’s to come out of it? What’s the -good of it? You just get the laugh from the boys, what?” - -McQueen’s answer was to scratch his head. To put the matter into the -concrete class of practicability was a phase of the subject that he had -not considered. He scratched his head when the turner had gone; and, -also, he scratched his head for several days thereafter. Then he caught -at a happy inspiration whereby to solve the riddle, and therein he -fell--but of that in a moment. - -Things were booming on the Hill Division. Traffic was doubled, trebled. -Everything on the train sheets was in sections. Promotions flew thick -and fast. Wipers were set to firing, and the firemen moved over to the -right-hand side of the cabs. Every wheel the division could beg, borrow -or steal was doing fancy time stunts smashing records. Everyone from -car-tink to superintendent, was on the jump. Even the directors, not to -be outdone in the general order of things, worked overtime rubbing fat -hands in gleeful anticipation of juicy, luscious dividends to be; only -_they_ neglected to figure in Noonan as an item on the balance sheets. - -Noonan? Where is the Brotherhood that does not number among its members -men with grievances, fancied or real? Noonan had a grievance,--no -particular grievance, just a grievance--and Noonan was a power in that -branch of the Brotherhood that held sway over the Hill Division. Noonan -always had a grievance; due, primarily, to the fact that he had a deep -and long-seated grudge against himself. It dated way back--he’d been -born that way. - -“Grievances!” he spluttered to a group of his admirers. “Grievances? -Why, we’re against the worst of it all the time. We’re not -track-walkers, are we? Well then, who runs the road? It’s us on the -throttles, what? Who’s to blame for our measly schedule of hours and -pay? We are, ‘cause we haven’t the sand to stand up for our rights. -That’s what, and don’t you forget it!” - -There was a chorus of assent. “Noonan’s right,” said one Devins, “only -it don’t look to me like now was what you might rightly call the time -to growl. Times are good, everything’s double-headed, and the paycar’s -running carload lots.” - -Noonan glared. “You’ve got the brains of a piston head, that’s what you -have,” he exploded. “It’s times like these we’d win hands down. Perhaps -you’d like to wait till there’s nothing doing, and they’re laying the -boys off and everybody, mostly, is running spare! What chance d’ye think -any demands would stand then?” - -Of a truth it was the accepted time and a most glorious opportunity. -In that, Noonan was right. Only one obstacle lay between him and the -accomplishment of his cherished ambition to make something of his -trouble-hunting proclivities and become a leader of men--in a strike. -That obstacle was McQueen. - -McQueen was a company man. Out and out a company man; though nothing -would have surprised McQueen more than to learn that he was looked up to -as a leader by the conservative element of the Brotherhood. True, he and -his coal was the joke of the division; but that was only a joke, and in -no wise to be held up against him. His influence, of whose existence he -was oblivious, was based on things apart from that. Big, kindly, -honest, incapable of deceit, simple, straight-forward, staunch in his -friendships, somewhat inclined to stubborness in his beliefs perhaps, -easily ruffled but as easily pacified, such was McQueen. Such was the -McQueen the officials honored, and such was the McQueen with whom the -boys would gladly and loyally have shared their pay checks to the last -cent. - -All this Noonan knew. Knew, too, that to gain his end he must first -win over McQueen. And to that object he began to devote himself. He -and McQueen shared the honors of the fast mail, and under ordinary -conditions communication between the two men was limited to a flirt -of the hand from the cab as one or other of them tore by the siding -designated as their meeting-point by the lords of the road, the -dispatchers. But now things were a bit different, everything was more -or less off schedule. And while the Limited, East and West, was nursed -along as near her running time as possible, and generally got the best -of it over everything else, there were, nevertheless, occasions when -both men were stalled together on time orders at the same point. - -Noonan tackled McQueen at the first opportunity. - -He picked his way cautiously as though not quite sure of his rights and -ready for a quick reverse. - -“Say, Mac,” he began, “what do you think of all this talk that’s -going ‘round?” - -“Talk?” said McQueen. “What talk?” - -“You don’t mean to say,” gasped Noonan, in well-simulated surprise, -“that you haven’t heard it? And the boys are slinging it pretty hot, at -that!” - -“I haven’t heard anything,” McQueen answered, slightly suspicious that -Noonan was about to spring one at his expense. “What you giving us?” - -“Straight,” confided Noonan earnestly. “It’s strike, Mac, that’s what.” - -“Strike!” ejaculated McQueen, bewildered. “What for?” - -“What for!” cried Noonan. “What for? That’s a sweet question to -ask. Well, pretty dashed near everything,”--he waved his hand -expansively--“hours, scale, and--and--” - -McQueen shook his head. “I’m not kicking,” he said. “I don’t see -anything to strike about. Looks to me as though you fellows were hunting -trouble. You’ll probably get it, what?” - -“You never see anything,” Noonan blurted out, irritation getting the -better of diplomacy. “Nothing but the blamed coal you’re forever yapping -about.” - -“What I know about coal,” returned McQueen with dignity, “you’ll never -know. It’s a subject that requires brains.” - -“Is that so!” Noonan jeered. “You tell it!” - -“It requires brains,” McQueen repeated stolidly. - -“It’s a shame that the only man on the division that has ‘em, don’t know -how to use ‘em, then,” Noonan prodded. “Who cares about your blazing -old coal and what it’s made of? Talk’s cheap. There’s no sense to it, -anyhow.” - -“Maybe there isn’t, and then again maybe there is. At any rate, there’s -a dollar a day for every man pulling a throttle,” McQueen announced -triumphantly. “I don’t know yet just how much for the firemen, I haven’t -figured it on their schedule.” - -Noonan pricked up his ears. “What’s that you say, Mac,” he demanded. - -Here was McQueen’s vindication. They’d laugh at his absurd, pointless -theories on coal, would they? Well then, he’d show them! And it wasn’t -any of their business, either, how many days he’d racked his brains, -puzzling out an adequate solution to the question Clarihue had flung at -him! He shook two impressive fat fingers at Noonan. - -“One dollar a day, every day, and the spare men proportionately, that’s -what! Do you get that, Noonan?” - -“Rats!” said Noonan. “You’d better go into the shops for repairs. You -need new stay-bolts on your dome cover!” - -“Never you mind my dome cover,” McQueen flung back, beginning to get -exasperated. “It may need a little tinkering, but it’s not ready for the -scrap-heap yet, the way some are I could mention--but won’t. It all -goes back to what I said. It’s a subject that requires brains--which you -haven’t got. There’s no use explaining anything to you because----” - -“You can’t,” Noonan interrupted craftily. “You’re only long on wind, -Mac.” - -“You listen to me, you rust-jointed disgrace to the throttle!” cried -McQueen, stung into retort. “You listen to me! What are you paid for? -Mileage, ain’t it? How do you get your mileage? Steam! What makes steam? -Coal! D’ye hear? Coal! Coal, and don’t you forget it. Well then, poor -coal means poor steam, and poor steam means poor mileage, don’t, it, -what?” - -Noonan burst into a loud and derisive guffaw. - -McQueen glared. “You’re a wild, uneducated, hee-hawing ass!” he choked. -“What do you know, anyway? Nothing! But _I_ know! A dollar a day I said, -and I say so now. I figured it out. It’s the difference between high -grade coal and the muck we burn. It’s the difference between the mileage -we make and the mileage we _could_ make in the same time. That totes up -one dollar a day. Supposing they wouldn’t let us have any more mileage -than they do now, well, we’d do it in better time, and the difference -would be ours, wouldn’t it? And time’s money. And _that_ totes up one -dollar a day just the same. It’s the same either way--time or mileage. -Take your choice!” - -“There, Johnny, that’s a good boy, run along and fetch me a bucket of -steam,” Noonan scoffed. - -With a snort of unutterable contempt, McQueen turned to swing himself -into his cab. - -“Hold on a minute, Mac,” Noonan cried, afraid that he had overstepped -himself. “Don’t get whiffy. I swear, I believe you’re right. Let’s see -how you figure it.” - -And McQueen, mollified, figured it. Figured it with the stub of a pencil -in greasy, scrawling characters on the back of a time order. As to the -process by which the conclusion was arrived at, that was something of -which Noonan was in profound and utter ignorance. Whether it was right -or wrong, he did not know. He never knew--and cared less! Certainly the -result was there. - -McQueen completed the last figure of his calculation with a flourish. -“There!” he cried exultingly. “How about it now, eh?” - -Noonan took the paper, wrinkled his brows, pursed his lips, and stared -at it with the air of a connoisseur of calculus. “H’m,” said he slowly, -“are you dead sure it’s right, Mac?” - -“Right!” McQueen fairly yelled, touched in another tender spot. “Right! -Confound you, it’s there in black and white, ain’t it? Figures don’t -lie, do they? Well, what in thunder’s wrong with you, then?” - -“I wanted to be sure, Mac, that’s all. Holy fishplates, I knew it was -bad, rotten bad, but I didn’t think they were handing it to us like -this.” - -“You bet it’s bad. It’s the worst ever. There’s more kinds of coal than -there are spikes in the right of way from here to Big Cloud and back -again, but the coal we get is the last on the list. Bad! It’s what I’ve -always said, ain’t it?” - -“It’s fierce!” continued Noonan with rising emphasis. “And when the boys -hear this, it’ll be the last straw. They’ll fix ‘em!” - -“Fix who?” inquired McQueen, blankly. - -“Why, ain’t I telling you! The company.” - -“I--I was talking about the coal,” said McQueen a little uneasily. - -“Sure you were,” Noonan agreed heartily. “Sure you were, and how the -company is robbing every engineer on the division of a dollar a day, to -say nothing of the firemen and the train crews. It’s enough to make a -man mad. Well, I should say yes!” - -“I--I didn’t say the company was robbing us,” protested McQueen. - -“What’s that!” cried Noonan sharply; then in apparent disgust: “So your -crazy old figures are just gas-bag filling like the rest of your coal -talk, eh? They _did_ look pretty scaly, and that’s a fact. I had my -suspicions. That’s why I asked you if you were sure they were right. But -I might have known they weren’t without asking.” - -“Oh, you might, might you?” exploded McQueen, goaded once more into -angry outburst. “You and your suspicions! Who are you! I tell you they -are right, and that’s the end of it!” - -“Well, if they’re right, why don’t you stand by them, then? We’re being -robbed every day we work, ain’t we?” - -“Ye-e-es, I suppose we are,” McQueen admitted reluctantly; “but I didn’t -figure it out for the purpose of----” - -“Mac,” Noonan interrupted unctuously, “‘tain’t for you nor me to say the -purpose it’s to be put to. There’s others besides us. But I do say, Mac, -you’re almighty smart.” - -McQueen shook his head. “I’m a company man,” he said dubiously. - -“Company man! Of course you are. We’re all company men. But right’s -right and wrong’s wrong before anything else. Well, ta ta, Mac, see you -again. I’m off. There’s Hake with the tissue. I’ll tell the boys where -you stand.” - -It was a somewhat dazed McQueen that in turn pulled himself up into his -own cab. He stood in the gangway and squinted meditatively at the coal -heaped high on the tender. To his conscientious self-communion, his -triumphant vindication had somewhat the appearance of a boomerang. -“I don’t know,” he reflected. “It is damn poor coal, and--and figures -_don’t_ lie. We--we’ve been getting the worst of it, and--and a man -_should_ stand up for his rights.” And while McQueen, busy with new and -momentous problems, was steaming west into the Rockies, Noonan, with his -tongue in his cheek, was cutting along for Big Cloud with a wide-flung -throttle. - -That night, at Big Cloud, Noonan’s cronies got the story. That is, they -got what Noonan saw fit to tell them. And the burden of his tale was -that McQueen was with the Brotherhood and against the company. That was -sufficient. They looked with appreciative admiration at the man who had -done the trick, and then they flew to obey his orders. - -By morning, every engineer on the division had the news. On way -freights, on stray freights, on regulars, specials, and sections, they -got it--every last one of them. And McQueen coming east again on Number -Two got it, and marvelled a little at his new importance, never seeing -Noonan’s hand in the marked deference paid to him. - -First and last it was a bad business. Bad for the company, bad for the -hot heads led by Noonan, bad for the others, and bad for McQueen. -It caught the company none too well prepared, and Carleton, for this -happened in the days of his superintendency, was hard put to it to move -anything. There was pretty bitter feeling; and before it was over there -was blood spilled. But the roughs at Big Cloud, who didn’t know the -pilot from a horn-block, were responsible for the most of that, though, -in their own way, too, they ended it. - -It came to a show-down the night they carried young Carl Davis home from -the yard on a door they had wrenched from a box-car. Davis was braking -in the yard then, and he was a nephew of McQueen’s. He had lived with -the engineer ever since, as a little chap of ten, he had come out to the -West. Childless themselves, McQueen and his wife thought as much of the -lad as though he had been their own. - -McQueen in his grief didn’t get the rights of it. Only in a confused -sort of a way he understood the roughs had winged the boy with a -cowardly shot, meaning perhaps to do no more than shoot out his lamp as -he swung by on the top of a car. And while his wife with tender hands -busied herself in rendering such assistance to the surgeon as she could, -McQueen sat in a chair and stared, dry-eyed and bitter of heart, at the -white face on the bed. - -Also McQueen was getting sense. Certainly, he had never intended to -strike. Now, the shock of Carl’s hurt had sobered his judgment and he -saw things as he should have seen them, saw them as he cursed himself -for not having seen them before he had allowed his senseless egotism to -carry him off his feet. As the thoughts came crowding through his brain, -his cheeks burned dull red at his own shame. But through it all he -blamed only himself, with never an inkling that he had been used as a -cat’s-paw by the crafty Noonan--that was to come afterward. - -McQueen waited only to wring a half-grudging assurance from the doctor -that the boy would pull through, then he took his hat and left the -house. It was getting on toward eleven o’clock when he walked into the -hall across from the station where the boys had their headquarters, and -had been in the habit of congregating each night ever since the strike -began. Usually noisy in a good-natured, devil-may-care way, there was a -subdued and serious quiet pervading the room as McQueen stepped in. The -shooting in the yard was something they had not counted on and, like -McQueen, it was acting on them as a tonic. All except Noonan who, -evidently bolstered up with a few drinks, was more noisy, hilarious and -quarrelsome than ever. - -McQueen answered the questions they crowded at him as to the boy’s -condition soberly, and going over to Noonan took him by the arm and led -him into a corner. - -“The game ain’t worth it,” he said shortly. “I’ve had my lesson to-night -and I’m through!” - -“What for?” demanded Noonan aggressively. “We didn’t have anything to do -with it. We’re not responsible, are we?” - -“We are,” said McQueen sturdily. “Morally responsible.” - -“Morally responsible!” Noonan mocked with a sneer. “Oh, mamma, listen -to him! Streak of yellow, that’s you, McQueen.” Then fiercely: “You play -the scab and I’ll bash your head to jelly.” - -“You’re drunk,” retorted McQueen contemptuously. - -“Drunk, eh? I’m not so drunk but that I know who’s running this strike. -It’s me, and don’t you forget it! And what I says goes, d’ye hear?” - -“I’m asking you to call it off. Blood on our heads I won’t stand for. -Our grievances don’t warrant what’s likely to happen here if things go -on. You owe it to the men who followed you into the strike, Noonan.” - -“Oh, I do, do I? Followed _me_ into the strike, eh? How about the men -that followed _you?_” - -“That followed me?” repeated McQueen in amazement. - -“Sure, that followed you! You didn’t think I took any stock in your -batty coal talk, did you? You must think I’m green! All I wanted was -_you_--you bit fast and easy enough--the rest of the softies came along -then like a pack of sheep. What d’ye think now about _me_ owing it all -to the men, Mr. Morally Responsible, eh?” - -It took McQueen a minute to get the whole of it--the bitter whole of it. -Then the blood rushed to his face in a crimson flood. He reached out and -grasping Noonan by neck and shoulders shook him as a terrier shakes a -rat. “You cur!” he cried hoarsely, and flung the other suddenly away -against the wall. - -The men at the sound of the scuffle came running over. - -“He’s a scab! Kill him!” shrieked Noonan. - -McQueen turned to face the men. “If beating this strike’s a scab, I’m a -scab,” he said quietly. “I’m out to beat it right now! I’ve been a fool -and I’m ready to admit it. But I didn’t know until to-night that I’d -been bait for a whining thing like that!” pointing at Noonan. “He says -some of you men came in on the strike because I did. If that’s so, then -get out of it because I do. Get out of it before there’s more on our -hands than we’ll be able to answer for when we go into Division for -the last time. That’s all I’ve got to say. I’m going over now to ask -Carle-ton to put me on again, if it’s nothing better than pulling a way -freight. And--and I hope you’ll come with me.” - -As the flood follows the fracture in the dam, so the breaking of the -tension filled the room with pandemonium. Cheers, yells, hisses, curses, -shouts--the Brotherhood was divided against itself. But ten minutes -later, the majority of them were clustered behind McQueen in the super’s -office. - -Carleton and his staff were sleeping at headquarters those days, -and they gathered in a group around the green-shaded lamp on the -dispatcher’s table to face the delegation. - -“Mr. Carleton,” McQueen began, “we----” - -That was all. He never got any further. From the platform outside came -hoots and cat-calls, and above the chorus Noonan’s voice: - -“Soak the scab! Kill him! If he’s so fond of it, let him have it! -_Now!_” - -The window pane was shivered with a crash, and McQueen, struck full in -the head by a huge hunk of coal, sank without so much as a moan to the -floor. - -They cured him of brain fever in the course of time all right, but they -never cured him of coal. Up and down from one end of the division to the -other, when he got around again, he talked coal harder than ever--it was -his business. McQueen was doing the buying for the road. - -“There wasn’t anything wrong with what I said about coal,” he asserts -with a smile, when the boys put it up to him. “Not for a minute! Good -coal makes better steam, better everything, and pays the company. They -saw that all right. That’s why I’m buying it, see? As for figuring it -into the schedule, the sum was too hard and they couldn’t do it. Me? -Oh, I can’t, either, I lost the paper I did it for Noonan on. I ain’t so -good on figures as I was, what?” - - - - -XIII--THE REBATE - - -He was known as Dutchy, but his name was Damrosch. - -This is Dutchy’s story when Dutchy and the Transcontinental were in -the making; and before, as has been recorded elsewhere, he came to Big -Cloud. He started railroading as cook’s helper on a construction gang -that was laying track across the prairie. As the mileage grew, so -Dutchy grew. At first lank and lean, he took on, little by little, the -appearance of being comfortably nourished, until, by the time they hit -the Rockies, Dutchy’s gait had become a waddle and his innocent blue -eyes were almost hidden by the great rolls of fat that puffed out his -face like a toy balloon. Then Dutchy, slow of body and likewise of -brain, and yearning for a quiet and peaceful existence, secured the -lunch-counter rights for Dry Notch. - -Now, Dry Notch, half-way across the prairie, consisted of a water-tank, -a small roundhouse, a smaller station and a diminutive general store. -But because of its geographical position, it was headquarters for the -Mid-Plains Division. - -Here, T. V. Brett was superintendent; Thornley was his chief clerk; -and MacDonald was dispatcher. And these, with the railroad hands and -train-crews comprised the population of Dry Notch, unless there might be -added a few ranchers somewhere in the neighborhood. - -The staff bunked in a room over the station, and the men had their -quarters in the roundhouse, but one and all they ate at Dutchy’s -counter. Sinkers and coffee, apple pie and sandwiches they stood as a -steady diet for a month after he had appeared upon the scene, and then a -delegation waited upon him and demanded dishes more substantial. - -“You can make meat pies and chicken stew and all that sort of thing, -can’t you?” they demanded. “Sure!” said Dutchy. “But dot iss oxpensive.” - Money was no object, they assured him, and thereupon proceeded to fix -a schedule of prices--fifteen cents for a meat pie; twenty cents for -a chicken stew--with two slices of bread and butter thrown in for good -measure. - -“Veil,” said Dutchy, “so iss it.” - -And a few nights later, true to his promise, they got their chicken -stew--canned chicken stew. - -The huge pot, full to the brim, had been emptied, and Dutchy, his -face beaming with smiles, had bustled into the back room for a further -supply, when MacDonald’s voice rose plaintively: - -“It’s--it’s _chicken_, isn’t it?” - -The crowd looked inquiringly at the dispatcher. - -“Because,” went on MacDonald softly, “I--never heard of any chickens, in -Dry Notch.” - -And then, amid the laughter that ensued, Thornley rose dramatically from -his seat, and, picking up a bone from his plate, waved it aloft. - -“Gentlemen, this is no time for mirth!” he cried. “We are the victims -of a swindle. We are in the clutch of an octopus--that is to say, a food -trust, composed of Dutchy and the dining-car conductors of Numbers One -and Two. It is my painful duty to assert that I recognize this bone as -the identical bone on which I fed two nights ago coming up the line on -Number One.” - -Dutchy entered, staggering under the load of the replenished pot, when -Thornley solemnly demanded a rebate on the spot. - -“Vat iss it?” said Dutchy, halting and peering anxiously into the -pot; then, evidently reassured that no essential ingredient had been -forgotten, he looked up at the ring of faces that were regarding him -with grave inquiry. “Vat iss a repate?” he demanded. “It something iss -mit der bread und butter for twenty cents to go, yess?” - -The crowd roared, and up and down the division train-crews, -engine-crews, and section-gangs got the joke and passed it on until the -lunch-counter became known to every man on the system as “The Rebate.” - -They did not explain the joke to Dutchy, and for days he endured the -chaff stolidly, though with much bewilderment, until, one afternoon, -MacDonald patiently and ploddingly acquainted him with the unhallowed -baseness of one Thornley--helping himself, by way of compensation, to -the heap of doughnuts under the glass cover. - -Dutchy listened, his cheeks getting redder and redder as MacDonald, -exaggerating some hundredfold, suavely rubbed it in. - -“Dot Thornley iss--iss a pig!” shouted Dutchy suddenly, as the light -burst in upon him. - -MacDonald nodded assent, his mouth too full of doughnut to speak. - -“Und I a fool iss, yess?” continued the proprietor, pounding a fat fist -on the counter. - -Again MacDonald nodded, smiling sweetly--and reached for another -doughnut. - -But this time Dutchy’s fingers were firmly clasped around the cover, -and he peered suspiciously through the glass at the number of doughnuts -remaining, then glared at the dispatcher. - -“You--you git out from here!” he said slowly, but with rising emphasis. - -And MacDonald, chuckling, went. - -It was not until after supper that same evening, when Number One pulled -in, that Dutchy made any move toward retribution--then Dutchy cut loose. -It was Taggart who got it--little Shorty Taggart, the driver of Number -One, who was red-haired and an inveterate joker, and likewise a great -crony of Thornley’s. - -The first intimation MacDonald had that anything was up was an enraged -howl that, rising above the tumult of the station, reached him where he -sat in the dispatcher’s office. There was no mistaking the voice--it -was Dutchy’s. MacDonald stuck his head hastily out of the window, while -Thornley, who was in the room, leaned over his shoulder. - -Dutchy was bellowing like a mad bull. “Say it! Shusht say it. Oh! py -golly!” - -Here followed a volcanic eruption of guttural German with one or two -words common to all languages intermingled. - -Then, flying through the doorway of the lunchroom, dashing down -the platform, scattering loungers, passengers, and car-tinks in all -directions, in a mad rush for the engine end of the train, tore a short -figure in tight-fitting, bandy-legged overalls, whose flaming red hair -presented a shining mark for the plate that whizzed past his ear and -smashed into a hundred pieces against a baggage-truck. - -And Dutchy, blowing hard, his sleeves rolled up over the fat of his -arms, waddled to the center of the platform and shook a frantic fist -after the retreating engineer. - -“Ta fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he screamed, and, puffing his -cheeks in and out like a whezzy injector, he turned, reentered the -restaurant, and the door closed behind him with a resounding bang. - -MacDonald drew in his head, and the tears were running down his cheeks -as he held his sides. - -Thornley groped for a chair. - -“Guess Taggart was asking for a rebate,” he gasped. “It was worth pay to -see him run.” - -“You bet!” said MacDonald eloquently, when he could get his breath. - -The door opened, and Brett, the super, came in. - -“D’ye see Taggart and Dutchy, Brett?” cried Thornley. - -“Yes,” said Brett, laughing. Then, more seriously: “Look here, you’d -better patch it up with Dutchy. There’s no use rubbing it in too hard. -MacDonald, tell Blaney to put my car on Number Two when she comes in. -I’m going east to-night.” - -The patching, however, was quite a different matter than talking about -it. - -The next morning the lunch-room door was ominously closed--and the staff -went breakfastless. By listening at the keyhole, and from an occasional -glimpse through the window, they knew that Dutchy was inside. - -But to pleadings, threats, and door-kickings the occupant was, to all -intents and purposes, oblivious. Things began to look serious for the -staff and station hands who were wont to depend on Dutchy for their -grub-stakes. - -Thornley whistled softly and pulled at his pipe, his feet on the -dispatcher’s desk. - -“He’ll _have_ to open up when Number Ninety-Seven pulls in,” Thornley -was saying, more by way of reassuring himself than of presenting any -new view of the case to MacDonald. “The company won’t stand for any -inconvenience to the passengers--that is” he hastened to amend, “not -of this kind. What? They’ve got a sort of lien on that joint, and if he -waits for them to get after him he’ll get into trouble. Wish Brett -were back--he’d make him open up quick, I guess. What’s the matter with -Number Ninety-Seven, anyhow? Thought you said she was on time?” - -“So she is,” said MacDonald, grinning. “Hear her?” - -From the eastward came the hoarse shriek from the whistle of a -five-hundred class. - -“Guess I’ll go down,” said Thornley. “Coming?” - -MacDonald nodded and got up from his chair. The two men reached the -platform in time to acknowledge a flirt of the hand from Sanders in the -cab as the big machine, wheel-tires sparking from the tight-set brakes, -rolled slowly past them, coming to a halt farther on. - -Simultaneously the door of the lunch-room swung wide open, and on the -threshold, completely filling the opening with his bulk, stood Dutchy. -In his left hand he held his bell, which he began to ring clamorously; -in his right hand, almost but not quite concealed behind his apron, -was no less a weapon than a substantial-looking rolling-pin. A crowd of -passengers began to surge toward the restaurant, and among them mingled -the hungry railroad men of Dry Notch. - -“Come on!” shouted Thornley exultantly. “I knew he’d have to open up. -Here’s where we feed--h’m?” - -“Vait!” cried Dutchy imperiously, as the head of the column reached -him. “You, yess; you, no. Vat iss it?” He was sorting the sheep from -the goats, allowing the passengers to enter, pushing the railroaders -ruthlessly to one side. - -“You, yess; you, no. You, yess; you--oh! py golly!” - -He had caught sight of Thornley, and, swinging suddenly, struck out -viciously in that direction with the rolling-pin. Being obliged, -however, to maintain his position in the doorway, the strategic key to -the situation, the jab fell short by two or three inches, barely missing -Thornley’s nose. - -Thornley fell back instinctively. - -“Look here, you old ass!” he yelled angrily, “we’ve had about enough of -this. It’s past a joke. The company’s got a lien on that joint of yours, -and we’ll close it up so tight you’ll never open it again--d’ye hear?” - -Dutchy stopped short in the monotonous, “You, yess; you, no,” on which -he had recommenced, and his paunch began to shake. - -“Yah!” he cried. “Dot iss a joke. Oh, py golly, _lean!_ Dot iss ven you -ge-starving get, yah? Ho, ho! Ha, ha!” - -In Dutch’s burst of merriment first one and then another joined, until -even Thornley, his good nature getting the better of him, roared with -the rest at his own expense. - -But if this apparent return to good humor on Dutchy’s part inspired -any hope in the minds of the railroad men that he had relented and -that former friendly relations were to be resumed, they were doomed to -disappointment, for Dutchy stolidly continued to allow the passengers to -go in and as stolidly barred the entrance to the others. - -Then they gave it up, and bought out the slender stock of canned goods -and biscuits from the shelves of the general store. - -They messed in the baggage-room and they swallowed their scanty portions -to the tune of “Die Wacht am Rhein,” bellowed out by a strong and -sonorous voice, through the partition, on the other side of which, laid -out in tempting confusion, as they were painfully aware, was plenty. - -What they had, however, did little more than whet their appetites, and -by three o’clock some of the men were talking of carrying the position -by storm, helping themselves, and doing a few fancy stunts with Dutchy. - -“We can’t have any row,” said Thornley, pulling at his mustache and -staring at MacDonald. “What had we better do? The boys’ll be pulling the -old shack down around his ears. He’ll fight like blazes, and some one’ll -get hurt. And then the company’ll want to know what’s what. Say, the old -geeser has got us where he wants us, sure--eh, what?” - -MacDonald nodded. - -“I’ll tell you what it is,” Thornley went on impressively, “there’s some -one besides Dutchy in this. They’ve been giving him a steer, and _I_‘d -give a few to know who it is. It’s mighty queer Dutchy would wake up -so suddenly to the fact that he was a joke. Then, there isn’t enough to -that rebate josh to make him so sore. Some one’s been stringing him good -and plenty. What had we better do?” - -“I don’t know,” MacDonald answered. “Let’s go and see if we can’t talk -him over.” - -At the sight of Thornley and the dispatcher heading for the lunch-room, -the trainmen and station-hands fell in behind them. - -MacDonald halted a few paces from the door. - -“You boys, stay here,” he directed. “Let me see what I can do.” - -Thornley and the men halted obediently, while MacDonald went on and -knocked at the door. There was no response. - -“Dut--Mr. Damrosch!” he called. “It’s MacDonald. I want to talk to you.” - -This time his knock was answered, and so suddenly as to cause him to -jump back in surprise. - -“Veil, vat iss it?” demanded Dutchy, scowling belligerently. - -“We’re--we’re--” stammered MacDonald, his confidence a little shaken at -the proprietor’s attitude. Then, desperately: “Oh, I say, confound it -all, Dutchy, we’re hungry.” - -“So!” Dutchy’s exclamation was a world of innocent astonishment and -kindly interest. - -“Yes,” went on MacDonald, diplomatically. “You bet we are. It’s been -a good joke, but you’ve had the best end of it. Let’s call it quits, -there’s a good fellow, and--and give us all a handout.” - -Dutchy listened attentively to the appeal. - -“I, a fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he queried softly. - -“You most decidedly are not,” MacDonald assured him. - -“You vill for repates no longer ask, yet?” persisted Mr. Damrosch. - -“Not on your life!” replied the dispatcher earnestly, beginning to see -daylight. “That’s all off. We’ll apologize, too, if you like. I promise -you, we are quite willing to apologize.” - -“Veil, den,” announced Mr. Damrosch, “ve vill aggravate”--and he slammed -the door in MacDonald’s face. - -“Oh, hold on, Dutchy!” cried MacDonald piteously, for he was very -hungry. “What did you say?” - -“Vat I said iss dot ve vill aggravate!” shouted Dutchy from the other -side of the door. “Dot iss English, don’d it? Aggravate!” - -“He means arbitrate,” prompted Thornley from the platform. - -“Oh, all right!” said MacDonald. “We’ll agree to that, Dutchy. Come -on----open up!” - -“I vill not mit you aggra--arra--_do it_--hang dot vord!” Dutchy -asserted decisively, but again opening the door. “But mit Mister Brett I -vill do it.” - -“But Mr. Brett isn’t here, you know that,” retorted MacDonald, beginning -to get exasperated. “And, what’s more, he won’t be back until the day -after tomorrow. I guess you know that, too, don’t you?” - -Dutchy smiled a patient, chiding smile. “Dot iss too bad,” he remarked -regretfully. “But dot Thornley a pig iss, und you--oh, py golly! you--I -could not you pelief. Ve vill vait for Mister Brett.” - -He was closing the door again, when MacDonald put his foot against the -jamb and, leaning toward Dutchy, said quickly, in an undertone: - -“Look here, Dutchy, you’re going too far. If I couldn’t see any farther -than you, I’d wear glasses. Now’s the time to make your deal. I’ll help -you--see? You can get anything out of the boys now, but you push them -too far and they’ll pull the whole outfit down over your ears. You say -what you want, and I’ll get it for you.” - -Dutchy looked meditatively into MacDonald’s face, and shook his head -with a sad smile of wisdom. - -“I could not you pelief,” he repeated. - -“You don’t have to. You don’t have to believe anybody. Whatever you want -us to do we’ll do before you let us in to eat. You can’t lose. What do -you say?” - -Mr. Damrosch scratched his head pensively, without taking his eyes off -the dispatcher. After a minute he tapped MacDonald on the shoulder. - -“Veil,” he announced, “I vill tell you. Listen.” - -MacDonald listened--incredulously. Then he whistled a low, -long-drawn-out note of consternation. - -“Well, you’ve got a nerve!” he gasped. “What do you think, eh? The -boys’ll never--” He stopped suddenly, a smile came over his face, and he -chuckled softly to himself. “Dutchy, you’re great! It’ll be meat for -the boys to make Thornley stand for it. That’s what you want to do--make -Thornley stand for it. Will the boys make him? Oh, will they! Give them -the chance. That’s the way to handle it. I told you I’d help you. -Now, make your _spiel_” MacDonald turned to the group on the platform. -“Dutchy’ll arbitrate!” he cried. - -At this the men began to push forward, but Dutchy stopped them. “Vait as -you iss! Ven der--der--hang dot word--iss, den iss it. Vait!” - -They waited, and Dutchy began to count on his fingers. “Dere iss sixteen -dot breakfasted didn’d,” he began. “Dot--iss--iss--” - -“Average ‘em up at a quarter apiece,” prompted MacDonald in a whisper. -“That makes four dollars.” - -“Iss four dollars--yess,” went on Dutchy. “Veil, I vant dot. Dere iss -der crews dot in-came und out-vent und didn’d eat ven der door vas -closed. Dot iss two dollars--yess? Veil, I vant dot.” - -The men came to, and a roar of derision rent the air, in the face of -which even Dutchy was a little shaken. - -“Stand pat,” encouraged MacDonald. “You’ve got them coming and going.” - -Dutchy held up his hand for silence. “Dere iss der sixteen over again -yet dot dinnered didn’d. Dot iss four dollars--yess? Veil, I vant dot. -Dot iss four und two and four. Dot iss ten dollars--don’d it? Veil, I -vant dot, und den you come in--yess, one py one--for a quarter py each.” - -Then, amid the storm of abuse and jeers that greeted Dutchy’s ultimatum, -MacDonald, with a final injunction to the proprietor to stand by his -guns, turned and joined Thornley and the men. - -“Veil, py golly!” screamed Dutchy above the din. “Vat iss it? Who -was der commencer of dot joke dot iss ten dollars to pay? It iss dot -Thornley!” - -“Why, you wretched old thief,” yelled Thornley, “Do you think we’re -going to pay you for grub we didn’t get, because you wouldn’t let us -have it, and then pay you for it again when you do dole it out? We’ll -see you further, first.” - -“It vas agreed in front of der--hang dot word!--py der--” - -“Agreed nothing!” snorted Thornley. - -“Dot you vill for repates no longer ask, yet, don’d it? Veil, der price -ten dollars iss. Dere iss no repate. Oh, py golly, Mister Thornley, dot -vas an oxpensive joke--yess? Dot vas your joke, und I shusht thought me -dot I hope you will pay dot yourself.” - -Thornley paid. With no good grace, but because, as MacDonald had said -they would, the men made him. Disgruntled and angry, he led the file -into the restaurant, placing ten dollars and twenty-five cents in -Dutchy’s hand before he crossed the threshold. - -Behind him followed MacDonald and the grinning line of men, each -contributing their quarters--in advance--for the first square meal they -had had that day. - -“Eat vat you like,” said Dutchy magnanimously. - -Thornley glared. “Eat vat you like! Eat vat you like!” he mimicked -savagely. “I like your colossal generosity at my expense!” - -For a long time there was no other noise save the rattle of dishes and -the busy clatter of knives, forks, and spoons. Then Thornley beckoned to -Dutchy. - -“Veil, vat iss it?” inquired the proprietor from behind the counter. - -“Who put you on to this?” demanded Thornley. “I’ve had to stand for it, -and I’d like to know. I would that!” - -MacDonald, sitting beside Thornley, noticed, with some misgivings, a -peculiar expression sweep over Dutchy’s face, but to his relief the -proprietor’s only reply was a grunt, as he answered a call for more -coffee. - -“By the hokey, I’ll bet it was that red-haired Taggart!” exclaimed -Thornley suddenly, turning to the dispatcher. - -MacDonald buried his face in his cup, ostensibly to drain the last drop, -then he set it down quickly and jerked his watch from his pocket. - -“Holy Moses!” he ejaculated, and fled from the room. - -An hour later, as Thornley was again sitting with his feet on -MacDonald’s desk, Dutchy stuck his head into the room and beckoned to -the dispatcher. MacDonald walked across the floor and joined him. Dutchy -pulled him out of the room and closed the door. - -“Dere iss one thing dot I forgotted did,” announced Mr. Damrosch. - -“What’s that?” inquired MacDonald. - -“Dere iss five doughnuts dot iss paid for not.” - -“Oh!” said MacDonald. - -“Dot vas der time you told dot it vas Thornley--yess? Dot vas von dollar -py each. Veil, I vant dot--yess?” - -“Really!” laughed MacDonald. “Well, I guess _not!_” - -“Dot--vas--der--time”--Dutchy was raising his voice, each word growing -louder and more distinct than the preceding one. Thornley’s chair inside -creaked ominously. MacDonald glanced furtively toward the door, and his -face grew red--“you--told--dot----” - -With a hasty movement, MacDonald clapped one hand over Dutchy’s mouth, -and with the other thrust a five-dollar bill into his fingers. - -“Get out!” he choked, and shoved Dutchy violently toward the stairs. - -At the bottom, Dutchy halted, turned and looked up with a grin. - -“Py golly,” said he, “I shusht thought me dot I like jokes pretty good, -and I hope dot----” - -“Oh, shut up!” said MacDonald. - - - - -XIV--SPECKLES - -This happened at a period in the history of the Hill Division when -trade was very bad, and the directors, scowling over the company’s -annual report, threw up their hands in holy horror; while from the -sacred precincts of the board-room there emanated the agonized cry: - -“Economy!” - -The general manager took up the slogan and dinned it into the ears of -the division superintendents. - -“Operating expenses are too high,” he wrote. “They must be cut down.” - And the superintendents of divisions, painfully alive to the fact that -the G. M. was not dictating for the mere pleasure of it, intimated in -unmistakable language to the heads of departments under them that the -next quarterly reports were expected to show a marked improvement. - -John Healy had charge of the roundhouse at Big Cloud, in those days, and -the morning after the lightning struck the system he came fuming back -across the yards from his interview with the superintendent, stuttering -angrily to himself. As he stamped into the running-shed his humor -a shade worse than usual the first object that caught his eye was -Speckles, squatted on the lee side of 483, dangling his legs in the pit. - -That is, it would have been the lee side if Healy had come in the other -door. - -“Cut down operatin’ expinses, is ut?” Healy muttered. “Begorra, I’ll -begin right now!” - -And he fired Speckles on the spot. - -Now, Speckles--whose name, by the way, was Dolivar Washington -Babson--had been fired on several occasions before, and if he swallowed -a little more tobacco-juice than was good for his physical comfort it -was rather as a gulp of startled surprise at Healy’s appearance than -because of any poignant regret at the misfortune that had overtaken him. -Nevertheless, he felt it incumbent on himself to expostulate. - -“Git out an’ stay out!” said Healy, refusing to argue. - -And Speckles got out. - -For a day he kept away from the roundhouse, the length of time past -experience had taught him was required to cool the turner’s anger; -then he sauntered down again and came face to face with Healy on the -turntable. - -“I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” he began, -broaching the subject timidly. - -“Phwat?” demanded Healy. - -“I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” Speckles -repeated monotonously. - -“Oh, I heard you--I heard you,” said Healy, a little inconsistently. “On -ag’in, is ut? Ut’ll be a long toime, me son, mark that!” - -This being quite different from Healy’s accustomed, “Well, git back to -yer job,” it began to filter vaguely through Speckles’ brain that his -name was no longer to adorn the company’s pay-sheets. - -“Am I fired for good, Mr. Healy?” he faltered. - -“You are!” said Healy. “Just that!” Then, relenting a little as -Speckles’ face fell: “If’twere not fer the big-bugs down yonder “--he -jerked his thumb in the general direction of the East--“I might--moind, -I don’t say I would, but I might--put you on ag’in. As ut is, we’ve -instructions to cut down the operatin’ expinses, an’ there’s an ind on -ut!” - -Speckles stood for a moment in dismay as Healy went back into the -roundhouse; then he turned disconsolately away, crossed the tracks to -the platform of the station, and, seeking out a secluded corner of the -freight-house, sat down upon a packing-case to think it out. - -To Speckles it was no mere matter of cutting down expenses. It was a -blasted career! - -Whatever Speckles’ faults, and he was only a lad, he had one redeeming -quality, before which, in the eyes of the business he had elected to -follow, his strayings from the straight and narrow path dwindled into -insignificance--railroading was born in him. - -At ten he had started in as caller for the night-crews, and, during the -five years the company had had the benefit of his valuable services in -that capacity, there was not a man on the division but sooner or later -came to know long-armed, bony, freckled-faced, red-haired Speckles--came -to know the little rascal, and like him, too. - -Then Speckles had been promoted to the post of sweeper in the -roundhouse, and occasionally, under Healy’s critical inspection, to -washing out boiler-tubes. Fresh fuel thereby added to the fire of his -ambition, he began to figure how long it would be before he got to -wiping, then to firing, and after that--even Speckles’ boundless -optimism did not have the temerity to specify any particular date--the -time when he would attain his goal and get his engine. - -Now, instead, at the age of sixteen, he found himself seated on a -cracker-box, his dreams for the future rudely shattered--thanks to -Healy, old Sour Face Healy! - -So Speckles sighed, and as he sighed the shop whistle blew. It was -noon, and the men began to pour out of the big gates. Then Speckles, -remembering that the schools were also “letting out,” hurried down the -platform and up the main street. He would confide in Madge. Madge would -understand. - -Madge Bolton was the daughter of the ticket agent at the station, and -between Mr. Bolton and Speckles there existed a standing feud, the -_casus belli_ being fifteen-year-old, blue-eyed Madge. Speckles kicked -his heels on the corner until she appeared; then he turned and fell into -step beside her, reaching a little awkwardly for her strap of books. - -“Hallo, Dol!” was Madge’s greeting. She was the only person in Big Cloud -who did not call him Speckles. - -“Hallo, Madge!” he returned. - -Madge glanced at his face and hands. “Haven’t you been to work?” she -asked. - -“Nope.” - -“Why, Dol?” - -“Fired,” said Speckles laconically. - -“Oh, Dol, again!” she cried reproachfully. “What for?” - -“‘Tain’t only the third time, and ‘twasn’t for nothin’,” said Speckles, a -bit sullenly. “I was only restin’.” - -“Dolivar Babson,” she accused, “you were loafing. Oh, Dol, you’ll never -get to firing, and--and--” She hesitated and stopped, her cheeks a -little red with the hint of boy-and-girl castle-building that would have -increased her father’s ire against the luckless Speckles had he seen it. - -Speckles, somewhat shamefaced, and having no excuse to offer, trudged on -in silence. - -“Did you ask Mr. Healy to take you back?” she inquired, after a moment. - -“He won’t,” said Speckles. - -“What are you going to do, Dol?” - -“I dunno.” - -“Well,” said Madge, hopefully, “perhaps you could get a job in one of -the stores. I’ll ask Mr. Timmons, the grocer, if you like. I know him -pretty well.” - -Speckles came to an abrupt and sudden halt, cast in Madge’s face one -look that carried with it a world of unutterable reproach, handed over -her books in silence--and fled. - -He, a railroad man, go into a _store!_ And this from Madge! Madge, who, -of all others--it was too much! Speckles ate his dinner, dispirited and -crushed. Everything and everybody was against him. - -His mother’s curt inquiry as to when he was going back to work did not -in any way tend to mitigate his troubles--rather, on the contrary, to -accentuate them. - -“Old Sour Face won’t put me back,” he jerked out, in response to his -mother’s repeated question. - -“No wonder he won’t,” said his mother sharply, “if you’re as -disrespectful as that. I’m ashamed of you, and you ought to be ashamed -of yourself.” - -Speckles was too much depressed to offer any defense. He finished his -meal in silence, gulped down his cup of tea in two swallows, took his -hat, and started out. - -Unconsciously he directed his steps toward the yards, and, some five -minutes later, arrived at the station. Here, about half-way down the -platform, he spotted Mat Bolton in the open doorway of the ticket -office. - -As he approached, the nonchalant air with which the other leaned with -folded arms against the jamb of the door aroused Speckles’ suspicions. -To reach the seat of his meditations--the cracker-box in the freight -shed which had now become his objective point--he would be obliged to -pass Mr. Bolton. He therefore began to incline his course toward the -edge of the platform nearest the rails, so that, when he came opposite -the office door, some fifteen feet were between him and his arch enemy. - -Mr. Bolton awoke from his lethargy with surprising suddenness. - -“You young rascal,” he shouted, “what you been doing to my girl? I’ll -teach you to make girls cry, you little speckled-face runt, you!” - -He made a dash for Speckles, but by the time he had recovered his -balance and saved himself from toppling over the edge of the platform -to the tracks, Speckles had reached the safe retreat of the freight-shed -door. And as the irate parent, after shaking his fist impotently, walked -back and disappeared within his domain, Speckles indulged in a series -of pantomimes in which his fingers and his nose played an intimate and -comprehensive part. - -Perched once more on the cracker-box, Speckles again resolved himself -into a committee on ways and means. His little skirmish with Madge’s -father had exhilarated him to such an extent that his heavy and -oppressing sense of despondency had vanished, and in its place came a -renewed determination to resume, somehow or other, the railroad career -that Healy had so emphatically interrupted. - -He turned over in his mind the feasibility of applying to Regan, the -master mechanic, for a job in the shops, but dismissed the idea almost -immediately on the ground that shop men were not, strictly speaking, -railroaders. - -He might start in switching and braking, and work up to conductor. That, -at least, was railroading--not to be compared with engine-driving, not -by long odds, but still it was railroading. His face brightened. He -would interview Farley, the trainmaster. - -Farley was in his office. Speckles had not very far to go, only a few -steps down the platform. All the offices--and Big Cloud was division -headquarters--were under the same roof. - -At Speckles’ request, Farley swung around in his swivel-chair with a -quizzical expression on his face. Then he grinned. - -“Want to go on with the train-crews, eh? What do you think, kid, that -I’m running a kindergarten outfit, even if some of ‘em do act like it? -How old are you?” - -“Sixteen,” said Speckles, with a sinking heart. - -“Sixteen, eh? Well, come back in a couple of years, and----” - -But, for the second time that day, Speckles fled. He was in no mood to -stand much chaffing, and Farley, as he well knew, had a leaning that -way. Speckles halted outside the door, undecided what move to make next, -when the clicking of the instruments in the dispatcher’s room overhead -came to his ears like an inspiration. - -Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Spence, who had been on the -night trick most of the years that Speckles was caller, was now chief -dispatcher. If he had any friend anywhere, it was Spence, the man at -whose elbow he had sat through those long, dark hours of the night that -beget confidences, and into whose ears he had so often poured the tales -of his cherished aims and ambitions. - -Speckles covered the stairs three steps at a time, in his new-found -exuberance. Spence looked up from his key and listened as Speckles told -his story. - -“So you’re Healy’s contribution to economy, eh?” he said when Speckles -had finished. “And he won’t take you back?” - -“No,” said Speckles. - -“Well, that’s pretty rough. But I don’t see how I can help you any, -Speckles. I haven’t any rights over Healy, you know.” - -Speckles hesitated a moment and fidgeted nervously from one foot to the -other. “I know you ain’t,” he began, “but I thought maybe you’d put me -on here.” - -“W-what!” ejaculated Spence. Then, smothering a laugh at the sight -of Speckles’ woebegone countenance, he demanded gravely “You mean -dispatching?” - -Speckles nodded. - -“No, no, Speckles, that would never do. You go back and see Healy. I’ll -do what I can for you with him.” - -“‘Twon’t do no good,” said Speckles hopelessly. “I’ve asked him twice -already.” - -“Well, ask him again. Look here, Speckles, it’s up to you to square -yourself with Healy, somehow or other. If you want your job very badly, -you ought to be sharp enough to find a way of getting it. Go on, now.” - -So Speckles descended the stairs to the platform and irresolutely began -to cross the tracks in the direction of the running-shed. He reached the -roundhouse and skirmished cautiously along its front. No Healy was in -sight, so he dived in between two engines and made his way to the rear -of the shed. Here, by peering around the end of a tender, he could see -Healy’s cubby-hole--Healy called it an office--a bit of space about four -by six partitioned off from the back wall in the corner, with a greasy -book the engine-crews signed, and two or three others, equally greasy, -in which Healy kept tabs on things in general. - -In spite of his trepidation, Speckles grinned. Healy was there, bending -over a very flimsy, spindle-legged table that he had wheedled out of the -claim-agent some months before. His brows were puckered into a ferocious -scowl, and he growled and muttered to himself, now laboring furiously -with a stubby pencil on the sheets of paper in front of him, now pausing -to bite that unoffending article almost in two in his desperation. - -Healy was working on his invention. All the division knew about Healy’s -ideas on Westinghouse and “air,” and that these ideas, when perfected, -were to be patented. As to what the consensus of opinion of their value -was is neither here nor there, except that in Healy’s presence, when -referred to at all, the subject was treated with dignity and respect, -for Healy’s physical powers were beyond the ordinary, and dearest to -Healy’s heart and most sacred in his eyes was this creation of his -brain, or, to be more accurate, fancy. - -Speckles sidled up to the cubby-hole, and, without any peroration, took -the plunge. - -“I came to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,”--he spoke rapidly, as -though he feared his courage might ooze out before he could finish. - -Healy wheeled round with a grunt. - -“Oh, ut’s you, is ut?” he demanded grimly. - -Speckles, ready to run at the first sign of violence, acknowledged the -impeachment by nodding his head affirmatively, and smiled sheepishly -while Healy scrutinized him with a long stare from head to foot. - -“Well,” said Healy, “you wait a minute an’ I’ll give you me answer.” - -Speckles’ heart bounded in joyous hope. Healy very deliberately gathered -up his papers, folded them carefully, and opening the cupboard where his -coat hung--it was a hot day, and Healy was in his shirtsleeves--tucked -them into the inside pocket. Then, like a flash, he turned and reached -for the first thing in sight. It was a broom. - -But, quick as he was, Speckles was quicker, and he led Healy by the -length of the pit as he dodged around the tail end of a tender and -darted out of the running-shed across the tracks to the freight-house. - -Healy followed no farther than the turntable. There he halted, and -Speckles, from his retreat, saw him shake his fist and listened to the -threat that thundered across the yards: - -“Show yer face around here ag’in, you young rascal, an’ I’ll bate the -loife out av you, so I will!” - -Speckles betook himself to the cracker-box, and from his lips there -flowed a fluent and unrestrained expression of his opinion on things in -general, but more particularly of Healy, and more particularly still of -Healy’s invention. Then, his indignation subsiding, it was followed by -a fit of the blues; so that when, at the expiration of half an hour, -Healy, still in his shirt-sleeves, came out of the roundhouse and walked -up the tracks in the direction of the shops, Speckles, through the -freight-house door, remarked the incident in complete apathy and as one -in which he had no interest whatever. - -Ten minutes later, however, his apathy vanished and he sprang to his -feet at the sound of the excited shouts of the men in the running-shed. -Some were hastily swinging the big engine doors wide open, others -were setting the table in position, while one started on a run in the -direction Healy had taken. - -Another minute and the shop whistle had boomed out its warning, and as -Healy, with the man who had gone after him, came tearing down the track -like mad, Speckles saw the smoke beginning to curl up over the roof at -the back. The running-shed was afire. - -With a whoop, Speckles traversed the platform, leaped to the rails, and -was hard on Healy’s heels by the time the turntable was crossed. Healy -paused but an instant. The thing to do was to get the engines out, and -Healy was the man to do it. - -“Get tackle rigged on 463,” he ordered. “She’s cold, an’ we’ll have to -haul her out. Set the table fer 518; I’ll take her.” - -Then he started on the jump for the cubby-hole and his precious papers. - -Now, the tackle that Healy had referred to was stored in the rear of the -roundhouse in the same general direction as the cubby-hole, and as the -order had been given to no one in particular, Speckles, shouting “I’ll -get it,” started after Healy. - -Some grease and waste had caught and was rolling up a nasty smoke. -Through it, even while he tugged manfully at the heavy tackle, Speckles -saw Healy run into his office, snatch his coat, rush out again, and dash -for the cab of 518, throwing the coat up on the tender. As he did so, -something fell from the pocket. - -Speckles dropped the tackle and pounced upon it. It was the bundle of -papers he had seen Healy put in his coat-pocket a little while before. - -It was Healy’s invention! - -Speckles’ first impulse was to shout to Healy, but just then 518 glided -out of the shed, and the men in front of 463 were yelling in chorus for -the tackle, so Speckles put his tongue in his cheek and the papers in -his pocket. - -It wasn’t much of a blaze, but it looked bad while it lasted. Even after -the shop-hands had got their hose-lengths connected and a stream playing -on the fire, and the engines were all in safety in the yard, the smoke -continued to roll out in clouds, with here and there a vicious tongue of -flame. - -Then Healy, his duty done, bethought him of his coat on the tender of -518. And Speckles, as he heard Healy’s gasp of dismay on discovering -that his papers were gone, had an inspiration. - -“Me papers! Me papers!” wailed Healy. “Fer the love av Mike, I must av -dropped thim on the flure!” - -“I’ll get them for you, Mr. Healy,” said Speckles, quick as a shot. - -“You’ll not!” said Healy. “I’ll have no wan risk his life fer thim, bad -as I want thim. Hey, come back, you runt!” - -But Speckles was gone. Headed straight for the big, yawning doors that -vomited their smoke and flames? Oh, no, not Speckles! Hardly! Speckles -would make his attempt from the rear! And around the end of the shed and -in behind he raced. - -Some of the men were fighting the fire from that side, but they were -too busy to pay any attention to Speckles. A dab of soot and dirt on his -face which he obtained by rubbing his fingers along the blackened wall, -an artistic smudge of generous proportions on the outside of the papers, -which he took from his pocket, and Speckles’ make-up was complete and -convincing. - -Now, Speckles had an eye for the dramatic and an appreciation of its -value. He peered in through one of the windows. It was not nearly as bad -inside as it had been, and he decided there would be no risk and very -little discomfort in carrying out the plan that had popped into his -head. - -So he climbed in through a window and dropped down to the floor on the -other side. The next minute he had dashed through the running-shed, -and emerged from a whirl of black smoke into the open in front of the -turntable, the papers waved aloft in his fist. - -It was effective--decidedly effective! A cheer went up, and the men -crowded around, while Healy rushed forward and began to pump Speckles’ -arm up and down like an engine-piston. - -“Ut’s a hero you are, me bright jool av a lad!” he cried in his delight. -“‘Tis mesilf, John Healy, that ses ut, an’ the bhoys are me witness. -Come back to yer job in the mornin’ an’, by my sowl, Speckles, I’ll -niver fire you ag’in, niver! An’ ut’s more I’ll do--I’ll promote you. -Ut’s a wiper you are from now on, me son, an’ to blazes wid cuttin’ down -operatin’ expinses! Where did you foind the papers?” - -“On the floor,” said Speckles--and he told the truth. - - - - -XV--MUNFORD - -Munford came to the work before the gangs were deep enough into the -hills to lose daily, or rather nightly, touch with Big Cloud. And the -way of his coming was this: The town, springing up in a night, had its -beginning in the wooden shanty the engineers built as headquarters -for the Hill Division that was to be. Then, with mushroom growth, came -shacks innumerable; and these shacks, for the most part, were gambling -hells and dives and saloons, and the population was Indian, Chinese and -bad American. To these places of lurid entertainment flocked the toilers -at night, loading down the construction empties as they backed their -way to the spurs and sidings that soon spread out like a cobweb around -headquarters. - -Naturally, rows were of pretty frequent occurrence between the company’s -men and the leeches who bleed them with crooked games and stacked decks -over the roulette, faro and stud-poker tables. But of them all in the -delectable pursuit of separating the men and their pay-checks, Pete -McGonigle’s “Golden Luck” saloon was in the van, both as to size and -crookedness. And that high station of eminence it maintained until the -night a stranger wrecked it by no more delicate a method than that of -kicking over the roulette table, sending it and the attendant, who was -presiding over the little whirling ball in Pete’s interest, crashing to -the floor. That stranger was Munford. And that was how Munford came to -join the army of the Rockies. - -A number of the company men were present and they sided in with -Munford. Before this amalgamation, Pete and his hangers-on went down to -ignominious defeat, and the “Golden Luck,” to utter demolishment and -ruin. News of the fracas spread rapidly to the other “joints.” The -dive-keepers joined forces, the company men did likewise, and that night -became the wildest in the history of Big Cloud. - -Munford took command of his new-found friends from the start. In the -street fight that followed he did wondrous things--and did them with -zest, delight and effectiveness. With his great bulk he towered above -his companions, and the sweep of his long arms as they rose and fell, -the play of his massive shoulders as he lunged forward to give impetus -to his blows, was a marvelous sight to see. But the details of that -fight have no place here. Its result, however, was that Munford, -previously unknown and unheard of, became thereafter, a marked man in -Big Cloud. - -When the fight was over the company men, elated with victory though -somewhat the worse for wear, retired to the yard to wait for the -construction trains to take them up to their work. And while they waited -they spent the time gazing in admiration at Munford who sat on the edge -of a flat-car, his legs dangling over, blowing softly on his knuckles, a -smile of divine contentment on his face. - -What was Munford going to do? demanded McGuire and the cronies of his -particular gang who had had the honor of being present at Pete’s when -the evening’s proceedings were instituted, and who therefore felt they -had a prior claim to the hero’s consideration over and above that of -the men from other sections of the work who had taken part in the fight. -Munford did not know. Would he go up the line with them and take a job -with their gang if they promised to get him one? Munford would. So he -kept his seat when the construction train pulled out just as the dawn -was breaking, and twenty miles up the road at Twin Bear Creek they -tumbled him off and introduced him to Alan Burton, foreman of Bridge -Gang No. 3. - -At the sight of his battered and jaded crew, who in no wise appeared -fit for the day’s work before them, Burton swore savagely and with great -bitterness of tongue bade them get to their work. Then he turned in his -ill-humor to Munford, who was still standing beside him. - -“Who the devil are you? What you doin’ here? Where d’ye come from?” - -The questions came quick and sharp like a volley of small arms. - -Munford eyed the wiry little chunk of a man, scarcely up to his own -shoulders, in silence, taking him in from head to foot. - -“Well,” snapped Burton, “speak up!” - -“Munford’s my name,” said Munford, coolly. “I’m here for a job. Where I -come from ain’t none of your blamed business, is it?” - -“Ain’t it?” said Burton. “Well, then, you can walk back there, my -bucko!” and he turned on his heel and followed the men to their work. - -Munford sat down on the doorsill of the camp shanty and with a laugh -pulled out his pipe and began to smoke. He was still sitting there a -half-hour later when the foreman came back. - -“If you’ve got far to go,” grinned Burton, “you’d better get started.” - -“No hurry,” replied Munford, imperturbably. - -“You’re a queer card,” said Burton, after a moment. “What’s this about -the trouble down at Big Cloud last night the boys are so full of they -can’t do anything besides talk?” - -Munford chuckled quietly. “Nothin’ much,” said he. - -“Nothing much, eh? They say you put the ‘Golden Luck’ and Pete McGonigle -to the bad, and then cleaned out every dive in town. You’re quite a -reformer, ain’t you? I’ll tell you this, though, it won’t be healthy for -you around these parts from now on.” - -“Oh, I don’t know,” said Munford. “Say, how about that job?” - -Burton laughed. “You’ve got a sweet nerve to ask for a job, and you -responsible for a gang that won’t be able to do a day’s work among the -lot of them between now and night. Did up McGonigle’s, eh? Well, I don’t -know, I reckon in the long run that’ll be worth more to the company than -the day’s work. All right, sport, you can go to work--until Pete and -his crowd scare you out, which I predict won’t be long. And while you’re -here, if you get itchy for trouble don’t look for it among the men, come -to _me._” - -“Well, I’ll--” gasped Munford. “Why, I could twist you like--” Then he -laughed in pure delight at Burton’s spunk “Oh, sure! _Sure_, I will.” - -It took Munford no longer than a day to get the hang of the work. He was -already more than a demigod in the eyes of Bridge Gang No. 3, and that -counted for much. They were eager and ready to show him what they knew -themselves, whereas the ignorance and rawness of any other newcomer -would have been turned to good account in the shape of gibes and jests -at his expense. In two days, from a natural adaptability coupled with -his great strength, that was the strength of two men, Munford had fitted -into place with the same nicety that one part of a well designed machine -fits into another. - -To the crews of the construction trains bringing up the bridge material -he was pointed out with pride by his mates--though, indeed, that action -was superfluous--as “the boy who did the trick at Pete’s.” And from -these in turn Munford learned that down at Big Cloud, Pete and others of -his ilk had sworn that, sooner or later, they would fix him for it. At -this he only laughed and, doubling his great arm bared to the shoulders, -intimated that there could be no greater pleasure in life for him than -to have them try it. And that night sitting outside the camp after -supper, McGuire, as spokesman, alluding to the threat, proposed that -under Munford’s leadership they should make another raid on Big Cloud. - -Burton, passing by, caught the gist of the conversation. “I want to see -you a minute, Munford,” he called, shortly. - -Munford got up and followed to the foreman’s little shanty that stood a -few yards away from the main camp. Once inside, Burton shoved him into a -chair and shook his fist under Munford’s nose. - -“Didn’t I tell you yesterday morning,” he spluttered angrily, “that if -you were looking for trouble to come to me and leave the gang alone? And -here you’re at it again, what? Go down to Big Cloud and raise hell, -eh? You great, big overgrown calf!” Munford blinked at the foreman, -speechless. It was a long time since he had taken words like these from -any man, much less a little spitfire like Burton. - -“Trouble!” continued the irate Burton, hardly pausing for breath. “You -live on it, don’t you? Eat it, eh? Well, you’ll get a fill of it before -long that’ll give you the damnest indigestion you ever heard of. I -promise you that! But you keep your hands off my crew! Now you listen to -what I’m saying!” - -“Aw, go hang!” said Munford, contemptuously. “I can’t help it, can I, -if they want to go down to Big Cloud? If you’re so blamed anxious about -them, it’s a wonder you don’t go around every night and tuck ‘em into -their bunks!” - -For a moment Burton looked as though he were going to jump into Munford -and mix it then and there; but instead, with a short laugh, he turned -and walked to the other side of the room, sat down on the edge of his -bunk and pulled out his pipe. He cut some tobacco from his plug, rolled -it between his palms, packed his pipe slowly and lighted it. It was -five minutes before he broke the silence; Munford was beginning to feel -uncomfortable. - -“I don’t suppose throwing a few timbers across Twin Bear Creek means -much of anything to you, Munford, eh?” he asked quietly. - -“Not so much,” replied Munford carelessly, a little puzzled at the -question. - -“No? Well, it means a lot to me, a whole lot! Until that trestle is up, -we can’t shove material over to the other side, ties and rails and heavy -stuff. Progress on the Hill Division depends just at this minute on -Bridge Gang No. 3, and concretely on me. I don’t propose to have it -interfered with by the men going down to Big Cloud and getting their -heads broke, understand?” - -“Oh, I guess we can take care of _our_ heads, if that’s all that bothers -you,” drawled Munford. “And I furthermore guess your bloomin’ little -bridge you seem so stuck on won’t take any hurt by lettin’ the boys -have their fling. Anyway, whether it will or not, what’s the use of -you shootin’ off all your talk? You can’t stop ‘em! If they want to go, -they’ll go. And say, Burton”--an inspiration coming to Munford--“come on -down with us. I’ll promise you the time of your life.” - -“I ought to have put it up to you differently, I guess, and saved my -breath,” said Burton in disgust. “You’re just a hulk of bone and muscle -and your head’s wood. You can lift a timber and swing a pick or axe -because you’ve got the strength. But that’s all you know, or all you’re -good for!” - -The cool contempt in Burton’s voice stung Mun-ford more than the words -themselves. - -“Is that so!” he snarled, resorting to his favorite habit of blowing on -his knuckles. “I’d show you fast enough what I’m good for, you runt, if -you was a little bigger!” - -“Maybe you’ll find I’m big enough one of these days,” said Burton, -sharply. “Now I’ll put it to you straight so that you’ll understand. -I’ll show you whether I can stop the gang going to Big Cloud or not. No -man rides on the construction trains after to-day without a pass signed -by me. That’s orders! If the men don’t like it, you can tell them it’s -your fault. The next row in Big Cloud wouldn’t stop at fists. And as for -you, you wouldn’t come out of it alive.” - -“You needn’t worry about me,” sneered Munford. “I’m----” - -“You’re a fool! The thickest-headed, trouble-hunting fool it’s ever been -my cursed luck to run against!” exclaimed Burton angrily. - -Munford brushed his great shock of hair out of his eyes with a nervous -sweep of his hand. “I ain’t ever before taken the back talk from any man -that I’ve taken from you--without hurtin’ him,” he said thickly, rising -from his chair. “And I’m goin’ to get out of here before I hurt _you!_” - He walked quickly across the shanty and swung around in the doorway. “By -God, I wish you was bigger!” he flung out. - -Munford walked back to the men’s camp and listened to their conversation -awhile in sullen silence. They were still on the same topic and were -waxing more enthusiastic each minute. - -“Aw, dry up!” said Munford, cutting in at last. “It’ll be a long time -before any of you see Big Cloud again.” - -“Who says so?” demanded McGuire, aggressively. - -Munford jerked his thumb in the direction of the foreman’s shanty. -“Him,” he said laconically. - -“How’s he goin’ to stop it? What for? What’s the matter with him, -anyway? It’s none of his business!” the men were talking in chorus. - -“He’s fussy about gettin’ his dinky little bridge through,” sneered -Munford. “He says he ain’t goin’ to have broken heads interferin’ -with it, either. From now on you’ve got to get a pass to ride on the -construction train. Likewise, he said if you didn’t like it I was to -tell you”--here Munford paused to glance around the circle--“that it’s -my fault and I’m the cause of all the trouble.” - -“What did you tell him?” demanded the crew. - -“I told him to go hang. What else would I tell him?” - -“Bully for you!” shouted McGuire, slapping his leg in delight. “Did he -fire you?” - -This was something Munford had not thought of. - -“Fire me?” he repeated. Then slowly, pondering the idea: “No, he didn’t. -It’s funny he didn’t, though; I gave him back talk ‘enough.” - -“Aw,” said McGuire, with a sneer, “that’s easy. He’d have fired you -quick enough if he dared.” - -“Why,” said Munford innocently. “I wouldn’t have touched him if he had. -He’s too small to touch--I told him that, too.” - -“‘Tain’t that,” McGuire returned. “He ain’t afraid of any man, big or -little. I’ll give him credit for that. It’s his bridge, and that means -his job, that he’s afraid of.” - -“What’s my gettin’ fired got to do with the bridge?” demanded Munford, -in amazement. - -“Aw, go on; you know what I mean. If Burton has trouble with us the -bridge work stops, don’t it? And the company’ll be askin’ Burton the -reason why, won’t they? Well, Burton knows there’s some things we won’t -stand for, and firin’ you after we brought you up here is one of them. -And that’s right, too, eh, mates?” - -There was emphatic assent from the men. - -Munford, a little flustered at this wholesale exhibition of homage, -fidgeted nervously. “Much obliged,” said he, clumsily. “Don’t put -yourselves out on my account. I----” - -“That’s all right,” broke in McGuire. “Burton won’t try it; he knows -better. As for gettin’ a pass to get out of camp, I dunno about _that_.” - He got up, stretched himself and yawned. “The way I look at it, it’s -more up to Munford here than it is to Burton. I’m goin’ to turn in, but -I’ll say first that the night Munford says Big Cloud, then Big Cloud it -is for Bridge Gang No. 3. That’s the way we talked it before we knew -about Burton mixin’ in, and I reckon it stands just the same now.” - -And the camp retired to their bunks and to sleep, voicing McGuire’s -sentiments and swearing a unanimous and enthusiastic allegiance to -Munford; all but Munford himself who did not sleep but lay awake tossing -restlessly though, withal, in a very self-satisfied frame of mind. - -This outburst of popularity pleased Munford exceedingly. The more -so that it was directly traceable to his great strength and physical -courage of which he was inordinately vain. He began to regard Burton -with contempt. Burton was a man whose backbone wobbled when it came to a -showdown! As Munford turned the situation over in his mind his contempt -grew stronger until he came to decide that he despised the little -foreman heartily. Would he, he demanded of himself with a snort, have -fired a man that had talked to him as he had talked to Burton, had -he been in Burton’s place? He would! And the gang, bridge, job and -everything else could go to blazes! Munford sat up to emphasize his -feelings on this point with a crash of his fist on the side of the bunk. -He thrilled with the fierce joy of enacting just such a rôle as his -imagination depicted, despising Burton accordingly for lacking in what -were, to him, the essentials of a man. He decided, as he fell asleep, to -make the foreman’s life a burden to him--and he did. - -No flagrant violation or disobedience of orders was there, instead the -inauguration of a petty little system of nagging that embraced every -indignity Munford could think of. And the range of his attack was from -profound and exaggerated attention and politeness to the utter and -complete ignoring of the very existence of such a person as Alan Burton, -foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3. While the gang, taking their cue from -Munford, would shift from one extreme to the other with a precision and -significance that cut deeper into a man of Burton’s high-strung, nervous -temperament than any other form of torture they could have devised. - -Three times during three days Burton, who was afraid of no man or -aggregation of men, took the bull by the horns and struck Munford a -violent blow in an effort to bring matters to a head. On the first -occasion the gang watched the action with a gasp of mixed pity and -admiration--looking for Burton’s instant annihilation. But Munford, with -a bit of a laugh, only reached out and grasping Burton’s neck held him -wriggling, helplessly, impotently, at arm’s length. “You got to grow, -boy; just keep quiet now, I ain’t going to hurt you,” he taunted. And -the gang promptly lost their faint appreciation of Burton’s nerve in -their relish of the ridiculous figure cut by the white-faced, raging -foreman. - -It was dirty work, and deep down in his heart Munford knew it. But his -better nature no sooner manifested itself by sundry pricks of conscience -than it was smothered beneath the new sense of authority and command -that was now his for the first time in his experience; and which, -catering as it did to his peacock vanity, was paramount to all things -else. The work lagged sadly and fell behind. The daily reports Burton -signed and sent down to headquarters became worse and worse. - -Each day, too, the feud between the dives at Big Cloud and Bridge Gang -No. 3, fanned by the crews of the construction trains, who taunted -McGuire and the men with cowardice, grew stronger. For the trainmen, -having no idea of disregarding Burton’s orders and allowing the bridge -men to ride down on the empties, rubbed it in until the gang writhed -under their gibes. - -Munford did not come in for much of this personally. The trainmen, none -of them, seemed to display any particular hankering for discussing the -question in his presence; but he got it second-hand from McGuire and -the gang. The outcome of it all was a decision one night after supper -to board the construction train the following evening, Burton, the train -crew and the company to the contrary, and go down to Big Cloud if they -had to run the train themselves. Munford concurred in the decision by -blowing very gently on his knuckles. It looked bad for the peace and -quiet of Big Cloud; and it looked bad for Burton’s standing with the -company. - -Munford, as commander-in-chief, and McGuire, as chief of staff, withdrew -from the circle and strolled off by themselves to perfect their plans -for the next day’s campaign, taking the trail in the direction of Big -Cloud--a trail still called, but now a passable road due to the traffic -incident to the building of the Hill Division, whose right of way it -paralleled from Big Cloud to the ford at Twin Bear Creek. At the end of -a quarter of a mile the two men sat down on a felled tree by the side -of the trail to talk. Some ten minutes had passed when McGuire, in the -midst of a graphic description of what they would do to Pete McGonigle -and the rest, suddenly stopped and gripped Munford tightly by the -shoulder. - -“Keep mum,” he cautioned. “There’s someone comin’!” - -In the bright moonlight they could make out the figure of a man about a -hundred yards down the road coming toward them from the camp. - -“He walks like Burton,” whispered McGuire. “What the devil is he -followin’ us for? Get back into the trees and let him pass.” - -They moved noiselessly a little deeper into the wood that fringed the -road, and lying flat, watched the man who was approaching. - -“It’s Burton,” McGuire announced at last. - -Munford grunted assent. - -“He’s been followin’ us all right, and now he’s goin’ to wait for us to -come back,” continued McGuire, as Burton halted within a few yards of -them and sat down to smoke. “Well, we’ll give him a run for his money. -He can wait a while, I’m thinkin’.” - -Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed. McGuire began to tire of his -self-selected game of hide and seek, “Come on,” said he, “let’s go out -and see what he wants.” - -“Wait,” Munford answered. “There’s someone comin’ from Big Cloud way. -It’s not us Burton’s after. Listen!” - -There was the faint beat of horse’s hoofs gradually drawing nearer. Then -presently rider and horse loomed out of the shadows and Burton, getting -up, stepped out into the middle of the road. - -The horseman drew up beside him. “That you, Burton?” he called softly. - -“Yes,” said Burton, shortly. - -“You got Pete’s letter, then,” the man went on, dismounting from his -horse. “I suppose it’s all right to talk here. No one around, eh?” - -“As well here as anywhere. Only cut it short.” - -“Oh, there ain’t any hurry,” returned the man, with a laugh. “Wait till -I tie my horse, then we can sit down and chew it over comfortable.” - -“Now,” he went on, that task performed, “what I came to see you about -was this fellow Munford.” - -“Well,” demanded Burton, “what about him?” - -“It looks to us down to Big Cloud, from the way the fellows on the -construction trains are talkin’, you ain’t got any cause to love him, -eh? So Pete figured you and him could deal. You want to get rid of him, -don’t you?” - -“I wish to God I’d never seen his face!” exclaimed Burton, with great -bitterness. - -“Sure! That’s the idea. You don’t want him; we do want him--bad! There’s -nothin’ against the rest of the men; we’ll forget all about that. It’s -just Munford we’re after.” - -“Why don’t you get him, then?” said Burton curtly. - -“We’re goin’ to,” the man replied, with a nasty laugh. “We’re goin’ to, -all right. It’s a fair deal. You’re on, eh? Pete said you’d jump at the -chance to sit in. We want you to fire him.” - -“That all I’m to do?” asked Burton, quietly. - -“Sure, that’s all there is to it--except this.” - -Munford’s hand closed on his companion’s arm in a tight, spasmodic grip -as Pete’s emissary produced a wad of bills and began to peel off the -outer ones. - -“Three hundred plunks,” said the man, extending the money he had -abstracted from the roll to Burton. “Pretty good for just firin’ a man -we’ve been lookin’ for you to fire for the last week, anyway. Besides, -there’s been some talk down at headquarters about you not bein’ able to -handle your men, and about them gettin’ someone that can. Pete says not -to bother about that, he’ll fix it for you. Here, take the money.” - -“Suppose I fired him,” said Burton, slowly, “where’d he go?” - -“What do you care where he goes, so long as you get rid of him?” - -“He couldn’t go West,” went on Burton, paying no attention to the -other’s remark; “so he’d have to go East--that’s Big Cloud--and -_murder!_” He turned fiercely, savagely on the man. “You dirty, -low-lived hound!” he flashed. “You offer me three hundred dollars to -murder a man, do you? You wonder why I’ve stood for what I did, do you, -you scrimp! Fire him, eh, to get a cowardly knife or shot in his back! -You think I didn’t know what would happen if I let him out, eh? Get -out of here, you cur! And get out now--while you _can!_” Burton’s voice -rasped, hoarse with passion. He turned abruptly away and strode quickly -in the direction of the camp. - -“Hold on, wait a minute, Burton,” cried the other, following him. “Don’t -get batty.” - -Unconsciously Munford had tightened his grip on McGuire’s arm until the -latter whimpered with the pain, and now Munford lifted him bodily to his -feet making cautiously for the spot where the horse was standing. The -two figures were still discernible, and Burton’s angry voice continued -to reach the listeners, though the words were now indistinguishable. - -Munford’s face in the moonlight was colorless, the muscles around his -mouth twitched convulsively. “D’ye hear what they said? D’ye hear what -they said? _My God!_ d’ye hear it all?” he was mumbling incoherently in -McGuire’s ear, his eyes strained up the road. - -“Yes, I heard it. Let go of my arm, you’re breakin’ it!” - -“He’s comin’ back,” said Munford, hoarsely. - -Burton had disappeared around a turn in the road and the man, after -hesitating a moment, began to retrace his steps to his horse, muttering -fiercely to himself as he came along. As he reached for the bridle, -Munford leaped out and grasped him by the throat, choking back the man’s -cry of terror. - -“You make a noise,” snarled Munford, “and I’ll finish you! Oh, it’s you, -eh? Look here, Mac, it’s the cuss that ran the roulette wheel that -night at Pete’s. So my price is three hundred, eh? Well, hand it out. -_Quick!_” - -Slowly the fellow put his hand in his pocket and for the second time -that night pulled out his roll. - -Munford’s anger seemed to have vanished. He laughed softly as he took -the money. - -“What are you going to do with me?” whined the gambler. - -Munford made no answer. In the imperfect light, he was laboriously -counting the bills. McGuire watched the operation, at the same time -keeping an eye on their prisoner. - -“Two sixty--eighty--three hundred,” said Munford at last, cramming that -amount into his pocket and handing back by far the larger part of the -roll to the man. “What am I goin’ to do with you? Nothin’! You get on -that horse and ride back to Pete. I want him to know this. Tell him all -about it. Tell him Munford told you to tell him. That’s worth more than -breakin’ your neck--and that’s all that saves you from gettin’ it broke, -savvy? You tell him _I’ve_ got the three hundred, and I’ll give him -his chance at me for it one of these days.. And when I do--My God, _you -ride_ before I begin with you!” - -The fellow glanced fearfully from Munford to McGuire and back again -to Munford to assure himself that he was free to go. Then he clambered -frantically into the saddle and lashing his beast in a frenzy of terror -disappeared down the trail. - -Munford, with swift revulsion of mood, threw himself down on the grass, -burying his face in his hands. Not a word from McGuire; he walked -awkwardly up and down, whistling under his breath. After a minute -Munford looked up. - -“I got to square this with Burton,” he said brokenly. - -McGuire nodded. - -“He’s a better man than you and me and the whole gang put -together”--Munford’s tones were fiercely assertive. - -“He is that,” assented McGuire, with conviction. - -There was silence for a moment between them; then McGuire spoke: “Why -didn’t you take it all?” he asked. - -“Take it all!” flared Munford. “I’m no thief, am I? Well, then, what’s -the matter with you? That’s my price, ain’t it? Three hundred. That’s -what Pete offered for a chance to get his paws on me. Well, _I’ll_ give -him his chance, you heard me promise, didn’t you? That’s right, eh? -That’s Pete’s proposition, and the money’s mine, ain’t it?” - -“It is,” said McGuire. - -“It is, and it ain’t,” said Munford. “Burton _could_ have had it if -he’d sold me out, couldn’t he? Well, then, I’m goin’ to see he gets it -anyway.” - -“He wouldn’t take it, not by any means, he wouldn’t,” objected McGuire. - -“Not outright, he wouldn’t,” agreed Munford. “I know that well enough. -We got to fix it so he won’t know where it come from, and so it will -square me with him, and you fellows, too.” - -“How you goin’ to do that?” demanded McGuire. “I dunno,” said Munford. -“We’ll talk it over with the boys. Come on back to camp.” - -The next day and the day after, the gang worked like Trojans, and the -lack of any sneer or incivility on their part, coupled with a subdued, -expectant excitement that the men tried fruitlessly to hide, made Burton -more anxious and ill at ease than during the days that had gone before. -It looked like the lull before the storm; and he wondered bitterly what -culminating piece of deviltry they were hatching. - -To the taunts of the train crews the gang grinned and said nothing. - -On the second day a package, addressed to Munford, came up from the -East, and at noon hour the men handed it around from one to another in -awestruck wonder at the magnificence of the solid gold repeater that -chimed the quarters, halves and hours, and split the seconds into -fractions. It was indeed a beauty. Maybe the chain was a little massive, -but the men opined that it was therefore strong. They pried open the -case to read the inscription over whose wording they had wrestled most -of a night. - -“Nifty, ain’t it?” cried McGuire, admiringly; and he read it aloud: -“‘This is to certify that Alan Burton is as square as they make them, -and Munford and the gang are sorry. So help us!’” They delivered it -solemnly to Munford, who was to make the presentation, and started in a -body for Burton’s shanty. Burton met them at the door, his face hard and -set. - -“So it’s a showdown at last, eh, boys?” he laughed grimly. “Well, what -is it?” - -The men shoved Munford bodily forward and he stood balancing himself -sheepishly, first on one foot and then on the other, as he faced Burton. -He cleared his throat painfully once or twice, then he found his -voice. From a point of oratory or rhetoric it was perhaps the lamest -presentation speech on record, for Munford suddenly thrust the watch and -chain into the astounded Burton’s hands. - -“Here, take it,” he sputtered. “It’s all written out on the inside.” And -breaking through the men, he turned and fled incontinently. - - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's On The Iron At Big Cloud, by Frank L. 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Packard</title> - <meta content="pg2html (binary v0.17)" /> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> - - body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} - P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .50em; margin-bottom: .50em; } - H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } - hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} - .foot { margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%; text-align: justify; font-size: 80%; font-style: italic;} - blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} - .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} - .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} - .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} - .xx-small {font-size: 60%;} - .x-small {font-size: 75%;} - .small {font-size: 85%;} - .large {font-size: 115%;} - .x-large {font-size: 130%;} - .indent5 { margin-left: 5%;} - .indent10 { margin-left: 10%;} - .indent15 { margin-left: 15%;} - .indent20 { margin-left: 20%;} - .indent30 { margin-left: 30%;} - .indent40 { margin-left: 40%;} - div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } - div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } - .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} - .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} - .pagenum {position: absolute; right: 1%; font-size: 0.6em; - font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; - text-align: right; background-color: #FFFACD; - border: 1px solid; padding: 0.3em;text-indent: 0em;} - .side { float: left; font-size: 75%; width: 15%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: left; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - .head { float: left; font-size: 90%; width: 98%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - p.pfirst, p.noindent {text-indent: 0} - span.dropcap { float: left; margin: 0 0.1em 0 0; line-height: 0.8 } - pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} - -</style> - </head> - <body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of On The Iron At Big Cloud, by Frank L. Packard - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: On The Iron At Big Cloud - -Author: Frank L. Packard - -Release Date: February 23, 2017 [EBook #54111] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - -</pre> - - <div style="height: 8em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h1> - ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD - </h1> - <h2> - By Frank L. Packard - </h2> - <h4> - McClelland & Goodchild Limited - </h4> - <h4> - Prospect Press, Printers New York, U.S.A. - </h4> - <h3> - 1911 - </h3> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0001.jpg" alt="0001 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0001.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0007.jpg" alt="0007 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0007.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <h3> - TO - </h3> - <h3> - MY FATHER - </h3> - <h3> - <i>LUCIUS HENRY PACKARD</i> - </h3> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - <b>CONTENTS</b> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD</b> </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> I—RAFFERTY’S RULE </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> II—THE LITTLE SUPER </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> III—“IF A MAN DIE” </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> IV—SPITZER </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> V—SHANLEY’S LUCK </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> VI—THE BUILDER </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VII—THE GUARDIAN OF THE DEVIL’S SLIDE </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> VIII—THE BLOOD OF KINGS </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> IX—MARLEY </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> X—THE MAN! WHO DIDN’T COUNT </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> XI—“WHERE’S HAGGERTY?” </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> XII—McQUEEN’S HOBBY </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> XIII—THE REBATE </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> XIV—SPECKLES </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> XV—MUNFORD </a> - </p> - - <p> - <br /><br /> <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD - </h2> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - I—RAFFERTY’S RULE - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he General Manager - of the Transcontinental System glared at the young man who stood facing - him across the office desk. “Why, you wouldn’t last three months!” he - snapped. - </p> - <p> - “I’d like to try, uncle.” - </p> - <p> - “Humph!” - </p> - <p> - “I’m qualified for the position,” young Holman went on. “I’ve done my - stint with the construction gangs and I’ve spent four years in the Eastern - shops. You promised me that if I’d stick I’d have my chance.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, if I did, I didn’t promise to put you in the way of making a fool - of yourself and a laughing-stock of me, did I? You may be qualified - technically, I don’t say you’re not. In fact, I’ve been rather pleased - with you; that’s one reason why you’re not going out there to tackle - something you can’t handle. If men like Rawson and Williams can’t hold - down the job, what do you expect to do?” - </p> - <p> - “No worse than they, at least,” Holman answered, quietly. “Look here, - uncle, that’s just the point. There aren’t any of the men want the - position, so I’m not jumping anybody to take it. I’ll not make any - laughing-stock of you, either. I’m not going out as the Old Man’s nephew; - just plain Dick Holman. If I don’t make good you can wash your hands of my - railroad career.” - </p> - <p> - “Young man,” said the General Manager, severely, “don’t make rash - statements.” - </p> - <p> - He pushed the papers on his desk irritably to one side. Then he frowned. - Two years ago, when the road had dug, blasted, burrowed, and trestled its - right of way through the mountains, they had built the repair shops for - the maintenance of the rolling stock, and from the moment the first brass - time-check had been issued the locomotive-foremanship of the Hill Division - was no subject to be introduced with temerity anywhere within the - precincts of the executive offices. One man after another had gone out - there, and one after another they had resigned. “Hard lot to handle,” - Carleton, the division superintendent, had replied to the numerous - requests for explanation that had been fired at him. And now Dick wanted - to go. The general manager’s fingers beat a tattoo on the desk and his - frown deepened into a scowl. “You’re a young fool,” he grunted at last. - </p> - <p> - And Holman knew that he had gained his point “That’s very good of you, - uncle,” he cried. “I knew you’d see it my way. When may I start?” - </p> - <p> - “I guess you’ll get there soon enough,” his uncle answered grimly. He rose - from his chair and accompanied Holman to the door. “Well, go if you want - to, but remember this, young man, you’re going on your own terms. When you - resign from <i>that</i> position, you resign from the road, understand!” - </p> - <p> - “All right, uncle,” Holman laughed in reply. “It’s a bargain.” - </p> - <p> - Three days later, as Number One pulled into Big Cloud, Holman swung - himself to the platform. Up past the mail and baggage cars, the steam - drumming at her safety, a big ten-wheeler was backing down to couple on - for the run through the Rockies. There was the pride of proprietorship in - his glance as his eyes swept the great mogul critically, for in his pocket - was his official appointment as Locomotive Foreman of the Hill Division, - vice Williams, resigned. - </p> - <p> - It was not until the last of the Pullmans had rolled smoothly past him - that he turned to take stock in his surroundings. The first impression was - not prepossessing. Before him, just across the yard filled with strings of - freight cars, were the low, rambling, smoke-begrimed shops and running - shed, while beyond these again the town straggled out monotonously. - </p> - <p> - To the westward, through the mountains, were the curves and grades that - wrenched and racked and tore the equipment he would hereafter be - accountable for. To the eastward—but “eastward” was only two hundred - yards away, for there his eye caught the “Yard Limit” post, that likewise - marked the end of the division. - </p> - <p> - If after this cursory survey there still lingered any illusions of the - picturesque in Holman’s mind, they were rudely dispelled by the interior - of the barn-like structure at the side of the platform that did duty for - station, division headquarters, general storeroom, and anything else that - might seek the shelter of its protecting roof. The walls were adorned with - such works of art as are afforded by the Sunday supplements, interspersed - here and there with an occasional blue-print and time schedule. The - furnishings bore unmistakable evidence of having seen service with the - construction staff when the road was in the making. At the right of the - door, as Holman entered, the despatcher was poring over the train sheet. - </p> - <p> - “Sure,” said he in answer to Holman’s inquiry, “that’s the super over - there.” - </p> - <p> - Holman crossed the room and proffered his credentials. - </p> - <p> - “Glad you’ve come,” was Carleton’s greeting, as he rose and extended his - hand. “We’ve been expecting you. Williams went East this morning on Number - Two. Sit down. That’s your desk there.” - </p> - <p> - Holman glanced at the battered table toward which the other pointed, then - back again to the four days’ growth on the super’s face. - </p> - <p> - Carleton grinned. “Fixings aren’t up to what you boiled-shirt fellows down - East are used to. Out here on the firing line most anything goes. I’ve - been requisitioning office fixtures for months. Ain’t seen any way-bill of - them yet, Davis, have you?” he called across to the despatcher. - </p> - <p> - Davis got up with a laugh and joined the other two. “No,” said he, shaking - hands with Holman, “not yet.” - </p> - <p> - “And not likely to, either,” continued the super. “It’s rough and ready - out here, Holman. The staff quarters up there,” he jerked his thumb toward - the ceiling, “are all-fired crude, and the Chinese cook is a gilt-edge - thief and most persuasive liar; but we’ve got the finest division of the - best railroad in the world, and we’re pushing stuff through the mountains - on a schedule that makes Southern competition sick. We’re young here yet. - Some day, when the roadbed’s shaken down to stay, we’ll build the extras.” - </p> - <p> - The enthusiasm and bluff heartiness of the super was contagious. Holman - put out his hand impulsively. “We’ve heard a lot of you fellows down - East,” he said, “and I’m glad I’ve got a chance to chip in.” His eyes - swept around the room and came back to meet the super’s smilingly. “Even - if accommodations <i>are</i> below ‘Tourist Class,’” he added. - </p> - <p> - So Holman came to the division and joined the staff. Spence, chief - dispatcher, had shaken his head. “Twenty-eight and locomotive foreman of - <i>this</i> division with the roughest, toughest bunch on the system’s - pay-roll to handle! Hanged if he isn’t a decent sort, though, even if he - will shave and wear collars. Imagine Williams with creased trousers! And - say, his wardrobe—he’s actually got a dress suit with him! Wouldn’t - that ground the wires! Who is he, Carleton? Got a pull with the Old Man?” - </p> - <p> - “Didn’t inquire,” returned Carleton bluntly. “Let him try out.” - </p> - <p> - If the super waited before passing judgment on the latest addition to the - staff of the Hill Division, the shop hands did likewise—but for - another reason. They waited for Rafferty. Rafferty was boss. Who - Rafferty’s boss was, was his affair, and it did not concern them. What - Rafferty said—went. It was two weeks before he delivered his - verdict. - </p> - <p> - “A damned pink-faced dude!” he announced and terminated his remark with a - stream of black-strap juice by way of an exclamation mark. - </p> - <p> - The fiat had gone forth! - </p> - <p> - Down in the pits, stripping the engines of their motion gear, the fitters - passed resolutions of confidence in Rafferty’s judgment, and among the - lathes and planers the machinists did likewise. The concurrence of the - forge gang was expressed by a vicious wielding of the big sledges that - sent showers of sparks flying from the spluttering metal whenever Holman - was sighted coming down the shop on a tour of inspection—a - significant intimation to him to keep his distance. And that the sentiment - of the shops might not be lacking in unanimity, the boilermakers, should - Holman have the temerity to pause for an instant before a shell on which - they were at work, would send up a din from their clattering hammers - intolerable to any but the men themselves whose ears were plugged with - cotton waste. - </p> - <p> - As for Holman, he might have been entirely unconscious of the hostility - and ill-will of his subordinates for all the evidence he gave of being - aware of it. He was busy mastering the routine and details of his new - position. For a month he said nothing; then one morning over at - headquarters he turned to Carle-ton, who was reading the train mail that - had just come in. - </p> - <p> - “Why did Williams resign?” he asked quietly. - </p> - <p> - “Eh?” said Carleton, startled out of his calm by reason of the suddenness - of the question. - </p> - <p> - “Why did Williams resign?” Holman repeated. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t know. Tired of the life out here, I guess,” Carleton evaded. - </p> - <p> - “Was it Rafferty?” - </p> - <p> - Carleton turned sharply to scrutinize the other’s countenance. Holman was - gazing out of the window. - </p> - <p> - “It was Rafferty,” Carleton admitted after a moment. - </p> - <p> - Holman’s gaze never shifted from the window. “Why wasn’t Rafferty fired?” - he asked in the same quiet tones, but this time there was just the - faintest tinge of accusation in his voice. - </p> - <p> - Carleton’s face flushed. An instant’s hesitation, then he answered - bluntly: “He weighed more, that’s why!” - </p> - <p> - “Oh!” said Holman significantly. “Then why didn’t you recommend Rafferty - for the position long ago and save all the trouble?” - </p> - <p> - “I would have if he could do anything more than sign his name.” - </p> - <p> - Holman turned angrily to face the super. “So,” he cried, “when a fellow - comes out here he has to play a lone hand, eh? A show-down with Rafferty, - shop hands, and the whole division drawing cards against him. You, - Carleton, I didn’t put you down as a man with a pet.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton got up and put his hand on Holman’s shoulder. “Don’t do it, - either,” he said quietly. “Don’t run off your schedule that way, son. It - has always been man to man, and I wasn’t appealed to. So far it has been - all Rafferty. It’s easier to get a new foreman than a new shop crew, so I - haven’t interfered.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t understand,” said Holman blankly. - </p> - <p> - The super laughed shortly. “Rafferty has the men where he wants them. If - he got on his ear he could tie us up so quick we wouldn’t know what - happened. A nice thing for me to admit, isn’t it? But it’s so. I suppose I - should have nipped the whole business in the bud, but I kept on hoping - that each new man would beat Rafferty at his own game. Has he got you - going, too?” - </p> - <p> - Holman gathered up the repair reports from his desk and started for the - door. “Game’s young yet,” he flung over his shoulder as he went out. - </p> - <p> - From the office Holman walked up the yard to the spur tracks at the end of - the shops where three or four engines were waiting their turn for an empty - pit. He glanced at their numbers, comparing them with the papers he held - in his hand, then turned and walked back, pausing on the way to inspect an - engine, bright and clean as fresh paint and gold leaf would make her, that - had been hauled out of the shops that morning. He passed in through the - upper doors to the fitting-shop. Already another engine had been shunted - in to replace the one that had gone out. Her guard-plates, links, - cross-heads, main and connecting rods were lying on the floor beside her, - and the labor gang were jacking and blocking her up preparatory to running - the wheels out from underneath her. - </p> - <p> - There was a trace of heightened color in Holman’s face as he turned to - look for Rafferty. - </p> - <p> - The boss fitter was in his usual place. Down the shop, hands dug deep in - his trousers pockets, legs spread wide apart, he swung slowly round and - round on the little iron turntable that intersected the handcar tracks - where they branched out in all directions through the shops. As Holman - approached he stopped the motion indolently by allowing the toe of his - boot to trail along the floor around the table. - </p> - <p> - Holman’s manner was quiet and his voice was soft, almost deferential, as - he spoke: “I see you have 483 finished, Mr. Rafferty.” - </p> - <p> - Rafferty looked down from his superior two inches and said: “Yis.” - </p> - <p> - “And,” continued Holman, “you’ve run in 840 in her place?’ - </p> - <p> - “Yis,” said Rafferty again, this time even more indifferently than before. - </p> - <p> - “Well, now, really, Mr. Rafferty, I’d like to know why you did it? You - know I told you yesterday to be particular to take 522 next.” Holman’s - tones were more nearly those of apology than of expostulation. - </p> - <p> - For answer Rafferty gave a little shove with his foot and the turntable - began to revolve slowly. During the circuit Rafferty coolly gave some - directions to the men nearest him, and then as he once more came round - facing Holman he stopped. “Fwhat was ut you was sayin’, Mr. Holman?” he - drawled. - </p> - <p> - “This is the biggest division on the system, isn’t it?” Holman asked - inconsequently. - </p> - <p> - “Eh?” demanded Rafferty. - </p> - <p> - “Longest division—most mileage—covers quite a stretch of - country,” Holman amplified. - </p> - <p> - “Oh!” returned the other with a grin. “Well, you’ll be thinkin’ so if you - ever sthay long enough to git acquainted wid ut.” - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps that’s the reason I am beginning to feel cramped—I’ve only - been here a month, you know,” Holman smiled. - </p> - <p> - “Fwhat d’ye mean?” - </p> - <p> - “Why, curiously, it doesn’t seem big enough or wide enough or long enough - for even <i>two</i> men.” - </p> - <p> - Holman purred his words in soft, mild accents, and Rafferty, - understanding, sneered in quick retort: “Was you thinkin’ av lavin’, Mr. - Holman?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Holman, slowly, “I don’t know that I was. I thought perhaps the - matter might be adjusted, and I’d like to ask your advice. Now, if you - were locomotive foreman and you found that the foreman of this shop, in a - dirty, low, underhanded fashion was discrediting you with the men, and - furthermore flatly disobeyed your orders, what would you do, Mr. - Rafferty?” - </p> - <p> - By the time Holman had completed his arraignment, Rafferty was mad—fighting - mad. “I’ll tell you fwhat I’d do,” he yelled, shaking a great horny fist - under Holman’s nose. “I’d plug him good an’ hard, that’s fwhat I’d do! - See!” - </p> - <p> - “Rather drastic,” Holman commented after a pause, during which Rafferty - drew back and with hands on hips stood scowling belligerently. “But - desperate cases sometimes require desperate remedies, and I don’t know—but—that—” - his fist shot out and caught Rafferty fairly on the point of the jaw—“you’re - right!” - </p> - <p> - Rafferty, staggering back from the impact of the blow, set the table - whirling. His feet went out from under him and he fell sprawling to the - floor. As he picked himself up, Holman sprang toward him and swinging - twice landed two vicious smashes on Rafferty’s face. Then, except for a - confused recollection of a rush of men, that was all Holman remembered - until he opened his eyes to find himself in his bunk at headquarters with - Carleton bending over him. - </p> - <p> - “You’re a sight,” Carleton commented grimly. “What was the muss about?” - </p> - <p> - Holman explained. “I took Rafferty’s advice and plugged him, you see, and - after that———” - </p> - <p> - “After that if it hadn’t been for old Joe, the turner, running over here - to tell us, they’d have killed you. Don’t you know any better than to - stack up against Rafferty like that, let alone the whole gang? Did you - expect to do them all up?” - </p> - <p> - “No, not exactly. I expected there’d be something coming to me, but I had - to do it. I’ll admit, Carleton, I was in a blue funk, but I just <i>had</i> - to. Moral effect, you know.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Carleton savagely, “the moral effect is great! It will be as - much as your life is worth to put your head inside those shops again. You - don’t know the men you’re dealing with out here.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re wrong, dead wrong, Carleton, I do. You said it was man to man, - didn’t you? Well, then, either I’m running the shops or Rafferty is. - Rafferty has the men with him because he’s a bully and they’re afraid of - him. It was mere force of habit made them pile on to me. You wait until - they’re cooled off a bit and see.” - </p> - <p> - But Carleton shook his head. “You’re a bloomin’ fool,” he summed up - judicially, “but here, shake! You’ve got your grit with you, if you did - leave your sense behind.” - </p> - <p> - For the rest of the morning Holman nursed his injuries, but at one o’clock - he was at his desk again. Five minutes afterward Rafferty came in. He was - not a pretty sight with his cut lip and battered eye as he limped past - both Spence and Holman. With a vindictive glare at the latter he marched - straight across the room to where Carleton sat. He leaned both hands on - the super’s desk. - </p> - <p> - “Ut’ll be just a show-down, Mr. Carleton, that’s all there is to ut. Me or - him, which?” he announced. - </p> - <p> - Carleton tilted his chair back, put his feet up on the desk and his thumbs - in the armholes of his vest. “State your case; Rafferty,” he said calmly. - </p> - <p> - “Case!” Rafferty spluttered. “Case is ut? I’m sick av bein’ bossed bye - kids out av school that was buildin’ blocks whin I was buildin’ enjines. I - quit or he does!” Rafferty jerked his thumb in Holman’s direction. - </p> - <p> - “Is that all you have to say, Rafferty?” - </p> - <p> - “That’s about the size av ut.” - </p> - <p> - “Very well, Rafferty, you can get your time,” said Carleton quietly. - </p> - <p> - For a moment Rafferty stared as though he had not heard aright, then he - swung round on his heel only to turn again and face the super with a short - laugh. “All right, Mr. Carleton, you’re the docthor. It’s satisfied I am. - Whin I go out, every bloomin’ man in the shops ‘ull go out wid me!” - </p> - <p> - Carleton’s feet came off the desk like a shot, his chair came down to the - floor with a bang, and the next instant he was standing in front of the - boss fitter. - </p> - <p> - “See here, Rafferty,” he blazed, “you know me—the men know me. While - I’ve held the bank there’s been fifty-two cards in the case and every - mother’s son of you has had a square deal. You know it, don’t you? No man - on this division ever came to me with just cause for complaint but had a - chance to state his grievance on a clear track and no limit on his permit - either. Now, I’m entitled to the same line of treatment I hand out, and I - won’t stand for threats!” - </p> - <p> - Rafferty shifted uneasily and to hide his confusion reached for his - “chewing.” - </p> - <p> - “We’ve nothin’ agin you, Mr. Carleton, an’ I’m givin’ you fair warnin’,” - he mumbled as his teeth met in the plug. - </p> - <p> - “When you make trouble on this division you make trouble for me,” said - Carleton bluntly. “As for warning, I give you warning now that if you - start any disturbance in those shops it will be the worse for you. Now - go!” - </p> - <p> - They watched him through the windows as he crossed the tracks. Finally, as - he disappeared inside the shops, Carleton turned with a grave face. - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid it’s going to be a bad business,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “You don’t mean to say,” Holman burst out, “that the men are fools enough - to quit just because one man with a grouch says so, do you?” - </p> - <p> - “I told you that you didn’t know the class of men out here—they’re - partisan to the core—it’s bred in them. I’m not blaming you, Holman—not - for a minute! As I said this morning, I’ve seen it coming for a long while—long - before Williams gave up the ghost. Now it’s here, we’ll face the music, - what?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s mighty good of you to say so, old man,” said Holman, slowly, “but - I’ve put you in a bad hole, and it’s up to me to get you out of it. Inside - of two weeks with the repair shops on strike our rolling stock won’t be - able to handle the traffic.” He put on his hat and started for the door. - </p> - <p> - “Where are you going?” Carleton demanded. - </p> - <p> - “Rafferty’s not going to have this all his own way. The men have no - grievance, and I don’t believe they’ll follow him out if they’re talked to - right. I’m going over.” - </p> - <p> - “Not if I know it, you’re not,” said Carleton grimly. “There may be a - coroner’s inquest before this affair is settled, perhaps more than one if - things get nasty, but I’m hanged if I propose starting in that way this - afternoon.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s all right,” Holman replied doggedly. - </p> - <p> - “Just the same, I’m—Eh? What’s up, Carleton? What’s wrong?” - </p> - <p> - Spence had bent suddenly over the key, and Carleton, with a startled - exclamation, was staring at the words the dispatcher was hastily - scribbling on the pad. Holman leaned over the super’s shoulder and even as - he saw Carleton reach to plug in the telephone connection with the - roundhouse, he read the message: “Number Two wrecked Eagle Pass. Send - wrecker and medical assistance at once.” The next instant he was flying - across the yard to the shops. - </p> - <p> - As he burst in through the door he was greeted with a snarl. The men were - massed in a body around one of the locomotives in the fitting-shop, and - Rafferty, from the cab, was talking in fierce, heated tones. At sight of - the master mechanic he stopped short and with an oath leaped from his - perch straight for Holman. The crowd divided, making a lane between the - two men, then, with startling suddenness, breaking the ominous silence - that had fallen, there came three short blasts from the shop whistle—the - wrecker’s signal. It halted Rafferty when but an arm’s-length from the - locomotive foreman. Then Holman spoke: - </p> - <p> - “You hear that, men? Number Two has gone to glory up in Eagle Pass. You, - Rafferty, get the wrecking crew together, <i>quick!</i> The rest of you - get back to work.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re a liar!” Rafferty yelled. “A measly, putty-faced, starch-shirted - liar, d’ye hear? Ut’s a plant! You can’t work any sharp trick loike that - on me!” - </p> - <p> - There was a low, menacing growl from the men and they edged in close. But - Holman gave them no heed; he took a step nearer Rafferty, looking straight - into the other’s eyes. - </p> - <p> - “Rafferty,” he said quietly, “you’ve a wife and kids, haven’t you? And - you’re a railroad man, aren’t you? Well, there’s wives and kids and mates - up there in that wreck. The other affair can wait until we get back. Now, - will you go?” - </p> - <p> - And Rafferty went—at the head of the wreckers—out into the - yard where the switching crew were working like beavers making up the - relief train. Two passenger coaches to serve as ambulances, behind them a - flat, then the wrecking crane, the tool car, and a caboose. As Rafferty - was piling his men into the train, Holman raced across the tracks to the - station. On the platform the doctors, hastily summoned, were crowded - around Carleton. Holman stopped beside them. “We’re all ready, Carleton,” - he announced; then to the others: “You fellows had better get aboard; - we’ll be off as soon as we get the track.” - </p> - <p> - “Spence will have the line clear in a minute,” said Carleton, as the - doctors started for the coaches. “I’m sending a dispatcher up with you; he - can tap in on the wires. How many men did you scrape up?” - </p> - <p> - “The regular crew.” - </p> - <p> - “And Rafferty?” - </p> - <p> - “He’s going along.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know how you did it, and there’s no time for explanations now; - but I think, Holman, you’d better leave Rafferty behind.” - </p> - <p> - “And have the whole crew quit, too? It’s no use, Carleton, he’s got to go. - That’s all there is to it.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton shook his head doubtfully. “I don’t like the idea of you two - getting up there together. There’s no need of you going, and you’d better - not go. You don’t know the man; if you think he’ll forget——” - </p> - <p> - “You’re wrong, I do. I told you so before; anyway, it’s too late now—we’re - off. Here’s Spence with the orders.” - </p> - <p> - Before Carleton could reply, Holman had grabbed the tissue and was running - for the train. As he swung himself into the cab of the engine and handed - Hurley, the driver, his orders, Rafferty climbed in from the other side. - </p> - <p> - At sight of Holman, Rafferty hesitated and half turned around in the - gangway to go back to the caboose; but Holman reached out and caught his - arm. - </p> - <p> - “Stay where you are, Rafferty,” he said quietly. And during the - nerve-racking thirty-mile run to Eagle Pass no other words passed between - them. Sometimes in the mad slur of the locomotive as she hit the tangents - their bodies touched; that was all. - </p> - <p> - Holman, by virtue of railroad etiquette, had climbed to the fireman’s seat - and once or twice he had glanced around at the great bulk of the man - behind him, at the grim, set features, at the eyes that would not meet - his, and wondered at his own temerity in inviting a physical encounter. - And what good had it done? Was Carleton right after all? Perhaps. And yet - behind the stubbornness, the self-will, the purely physical, there must be - the other side of the man. If he could only reach it—only touch it. - He <i>had</i> touched it. His appeal for the injured. - </p> - <p> - Hurley was eating up the miles as only a man at the throttle of a wrecker - with clear rights could do it. A long scream from the whistle that echoed - through the mountains above the pounding, deafening rush of the train - brought Holman back to his immediate surroundings. Another minute and they - had swung round the curve and thundered over the trestle that made the - approach to the Pass. - </p> - <p> - Half a mile ahead of them up the track they saw the horror. Hurley latched - in his throttle and began to check. As the brake-shoes bit into the tires, - Holman slipped off his seat and faced Rafferty. There was a curious look - in the other’s eyes, and Holman understood. Understood that here Rafferty - was his master—and knew it. So this was the meaning of it. This was - how he had touched the other’s better nature! Rafferty had cunningly - seized the opportunity of placing him at an even greater disadvantage than - before. For an instant he hesitated as he bit his lip, then he canceled - the personal equation. “Go ahead, Rafferty,” he said quietly, answering - the unspoken challenge, “you’re better up in this sort of thing than I am. - You’re in charge.” - </p> - <p> - And Rafferty without a word swung himself from the cab. - </p> - <p> - To Holman the first five minutes was unnerving. It was his first bad - wreck. Down East it had never been his province to go out with the crew—nor - was it here, he reflected grimly, and at that moment was grateful for the - veteran Rafferty. It was like some hideous nightmare to him. All along the - line of burning wreckage lay the dead, their silence the more awful by - contrast with the shrieks and cries of the wounded still imprisoned in the - wreck. And then the feeling passed and he worked—worked like a - madman. - </p> - <p> - Once a woman had caught his arm and, sobbing, dragged him toward the - stateroom end of one of the Pullmans. Through the smoke and scorching heat - of the flames he had fought his way in, then back with the child. The - woman had thrown her arms hysterically around his neck. - </p> - <p> - It was all a mad, furious turmoil, and he gloried in it. The crunch of the - ax through glass and woodwork, the wild rush into the heart of things to - stagger back blinded and choked with his helpless burden. The fierce joy - if life still lingered; the tender reverence if life were gone. - </p> - <p> - Up the track toward the engine there was a crash and a chorus of excited - cries. He rushed in that direction. A half-dozen of the wrecking crew were - grouped around the forward baggage-car. As Holman reached them, - disheveled, clothes torn and scorched, face blackened with smoke and - daubed with blood where glass and splinters had cut him, the men drew back - aghast, staring white-faced. - </p> - <p> - “By God!” one cried. “It’s <i>him!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “Of course it’s me! Are you crazy? What’s the matter with you?” - </p> - <p> - The man pointed to the blazing car. “Some one said you was in there, and - he went in after you just before she crumpled up.” - </p> - <p> - “Who?” Holman shouted. - </p> - <p> - “Rafferty.” - </p> - <p> - Holman made a dash for the car. The men held him back. “Don’t try it, sir; - it’s too late to do any good.” - </p> - <p> - He shook them off, and with his arms crossed in front of his head to - protect his face he half stumbled, half fell through the opening that had - once been a door. The car was half over on its side. The trunks, dashed - into a heap on top of each other when the car had left the track, were all - that supported the burning roof timbers. Between the trunks and the edge - of the car there was a little space with the floor at an angle of - forty-five degrees, and along this, head down, Holman crawled blindly. The - floor was already beginning to smolder, the metal-bound edges of the - trunks blistered his hands as he touched them. His senses reeled, but on - and on he crawled, and in his mind over and over again the one thought: - “Rafferty! My God, Rafferty!” - </p> - <p> - Then his hands touched something soft, and slowly, painfully, inch by - inch, he struggled back dragging Rafferty after him. Somehow he reached - the door, then a confused jumble of noises and nothing more until he - returned to consciousness, and to the knowledge that he was back in his - room at Big Cloud with the almond-eyed factotum in attendance. - </p> - <p> - “Belly much better? Likee eat?” inquired that individual solicitously. - </p> - <p> - Holman grinned in spite of the pain. “No,” he answered; then as he closed - his eyes again he muttered: “Tell Carleton I was right.” - </p> - <p> - And he was, for two days afterward Rafferty publicly abdicated. He - gathered the men in the fitting-shop and mounted to the cab of an engine - jacked halfway up to the ceiling as before, only on this occasion it was - at noon hour and not in the company’s time. His words were few and to the - point, delivered with a force and eloquence that was all his own: - </p> - <p> - “I sed he was a damned pink-faced dude, so I did. Well, I take ut back, - d’ye moind? An’ fwhat’s more, I’ll flatten the face av any man fwhat sez I - iver sed ut!” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - II—THE LITTLE SUPER - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>ommy Regan backed - the big compound mogul down past the string of dark-green coaches that he - had pulled for a hundred and fifty miles, took the table with a slight - jolt, and came to a stop in the roundhouse. As he swung himself from the - cab, Healy, the turner, came up to him. - </p> - <p> - “He’s a great lad, that av yours,” Healy began, with a shake of his head—“a - great lad; but mind ye this, Tommy Regan, there’ll be trouble for me an’ - you an’ him an’ the whole av us, if you don’t watch him.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter this time, John?” - </p> - <p> - “Matter,” said Healy, ruefully; “there’s matter enough. The little cuss - come blame near running 429 into the pit a while back, so he did.” - </p> - <p> - “Where is he now?” Regan asked, with a grin. - </p> - <p> - “Devil a bit I know. I chased him out, an’ he started for over by the - shops. An’ about an hour ago your missus come down an’ said the bhoy was - no-wheres to be found, an’ that you was to look for him.” Regan pulled out - his watch. “Six-thirty. Well,” he said, “I’ll go over and see if Grumpy - knows anything about him. Next time the kid shows up around here, John, - you give him the soft side of a tommy-bar, and send him home.” - </p> - <p> - Healy scratched his head. “I will,” he said; “I’ll do ut. He’s a foine - lad.” - </p> - <p> - Regan crossed the yard to the gates of the big shops. They were still - unlocked, and he went through into the storekeeper’s office. Grumpy was - sorting the brass time-checks. He glanced up as Regan came in. - </p> - <p> - “I suppose you’re lookin’ fer yer kid again,” he said sourly. - </p> - <p> - “That’s what I am, Steve,” Regan returned, diplomatically dispensing with - the other’s nickname. - </p> - <p> - “Well, he ain’t here,” Grumpy announced, returning to his checks. “I’ve - just been through the shops, an’ I’d seen him if he was.” - </p> - <p> - The engineer’s face clouded. “He must be somewhere about, Steve. John said - he saw him come over here, and the wife was down to the roundhouse looking - for him, so he didn’t go home. Let’s go through the shops and see if we - can’t find him.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t get no overtime fer chasin’ lost kids,” growled Grumpy. - </p> - <p> - Nevertheless, he got up and walked through the door leading into the - forge-shop, which Regan held open for him. The place was gloomy and - deserted. Here and there a forge-fire, dying, still glowed dully. At the - end of the room the men stopped, and Grumpy, noting Regan’s growing - anxiety, gave surly comfort. - </p> - <p> - “Wouldn’t likely be here, anyhow,” he said. “Fitting-shop fer him; but - we’ll try the machine-shop first on the way through.” - </p> - <p> - The two men went forward, prying behind planers, drills, shapers, and - lathes. The machines took grotesque shapes in the deepening twilight, and - in the silence, so incongruous with the usual noisy clang and clash of his - surroundings, Regan’s nervousness increased. - </p> - <p> - He hurried forward to the fitting-shop. Engines on every hand were - standing over their respective pits in all stages of demolition, some on - wheels, some blocked high toward the rafters, some stripped to the bare - boiler-shell. Regan climbed in and out of the cabs, while Grumpy peered - into the pits. - </p> - <p> - “Aw! he ain’t here,” said Grumpy in disgust, wiping his hands on a piece - of waste. “I told you he wasn’t. He’s home, mabbe, by now.” - </p> - <p> - Regan shook his head. “Bunty! Ho, Bunt-<i>ee</i>” he called. And again: - “Bun-<i>tee!</i>” - </p> - <p> - There was no answer, and he turned to retrace his steps when Grumpy caught - him by the shoulder. The big iron door of the engine before them swung - slowly back on its hinges, and from the front end there emerged a - diminutive pair of shoes, topped by little short socks that had once been - white, but now hung in grimy folds over the tops of the boots. A pair of - sturdy, but very dirty, bare legs came gradually into view as their owner - propelled himself forward on his stomach. They dangled for a moment, - seeking footing on the plate beneath; then a very small boy, aged four, in - an erstwhile immaculate linen sailor suit, stood upright on the - foot-plate. The yellow curls were tangled with engine grease and cemented - with cinders and soot. Here and there in spots upon his face the skin - still retained its natural color. - </p> - <p> - Bunty paused for a moment after his exertions to regain his breath, then, - still gripping a hammer in his small fist, he straddled the draw-bar, and - slid down the pilot to the floor. - </p> - <p> - Grumpy burst into a guffaw. - </p> - <p> - Bunty blinked at him reprovingly, and turned to his father. - </p> - <p> - “I’s been fixin’ the ‘iger-’ed,” he announced gravely. - </p> - <p> - Regan surveyed his son grimly. “Fixing what?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - “The ‘iger-’ed,” Bunty repeated. Then reproachfully: “Don’t know w’at a - ‘iger-’ed is?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh,” said Regan, “the nigger-head, eh? Well, I guess there’s another - nigger-head will get some fixing when your mother sees you, son.” - </p> - <p> - He picked the lad up in his arms, and Bunty nestled confidingly, with one - arm around his father’s neck. His tired little head sank down on the - paternal shoulder, and before they had reached the gates Bunty was sound - asleep. - </p> - <p> - In the days that followed, Bunty found it no easy matter to elude his - mother’s vigilance; but that was only the beginning of his troubles. The - shop gates were always shut, and the latch was beyond his reach. Once he - had found them open, and had marched boldly through, to find his way - barred by the only man of whom he stood in awe. Grumpy had curtly ordered - him away, and Bunty had taken to his heels and run until his small body - was breathless. - </p> - <p> - The roundhouse was no better. Old John would have none of him, and Bunty - marveled at the change. - </p> - <p> - He was a railroad man, and the shops were his heritage. His soul protested - vigorously at the outrage that was being heaped upon him. - </p> - <p> - It took him some time to solve the problem, but at last he found the way. - Each afternoon Bunty would trudge sturdily along the track for a quarter - of a mile to the upper end of the shops, where the big, wide engine doors - were always open. Here four spur-tracks ran into the erecting-shop, and - Bunty found no difficulty in gaining admittance. Once safe among the - fitting-gang, the little Super, as the men called him, would strut around - with important air, inspecting the work with critical eyes. - </p> - <p> - One lesson Bunty learned. Remembering his last interview with his mother, - he took good care not to be locked in the shops again. So each night when - the whistle blew he fell into line with the men, and, secure in their - protection, would file with them past Grumpy as they handed in their - time-checks. And Grumpy, unmindful of the spur-tracks, wondered how he got - there, and scowled savagely. - </p> - <p> - When Bunty was six, his father was holding down the swivel-chair in the - Master Mechanic’s office of the Hill Division, and Bunty’s allegiance to - the shops wavered. Not from any sense of disloyalty; but with his father’s - promotion a new world opened to Bunty, and fascinated him. It was now the - yard-shunter and headquarters that engaged his attention. The years, too, - brought other changes to Bunty. The curls had disappeared, and his hair - was cut now like his father’s. Long stockings had replaced the socks, and - he wore real trousers; short ones, it is true, but real trousers none the - less, with pockets in them. - </p> - <p> - When school was over, he would fly up and down the yard on the stubby - little engine, and Healy, doing the shunting then and forgetting past - grievances, would let Bunty sit on the driver’s seat. In time Bunty - learned to pull the throttle, but the reversing-lever was too much for his - small stature, and the intricacies of the “air” were still a little beyond - him. But Healy swore he’d make a driver of him—and he did. - </p> - <p> - The evenings at the office Bunty loved fully as well. Headquarters were - not much to boast about in those days. That was before competition forced - a doubletrack system, and the train-dispatcher, with his tissue sheets, - still held undisputed sway. They called them “offices” at Big Cloud out of - courtesy—just the attic floor over the station, with one room to it. - The floor space each man’s desk occupied was his office. - </p> - <p> - Here Bunty would sit curled up in his father’s chair and listen to the men - as they talked. If it was anything about a locomotive, he understood; if - it was traffic or bridges or road-bed or dispatching, he would pucker his - brows perplexedly and ask innumerable questions. But most of all he held - Spence, the chief dispatcher, in deep reverence. - </p> - <p> - Once, to his huge delight, Spence, holding his hand, had let him tap out - an order. It is true that with the O. K. came back an inquiry as to the - brand the dispatcher had been indulging in; but the sarcasm was lost on - Bunty, for when Spence with a chuckle read off the reply, Bunty gravely - asked if there was any answer. Spence shook his head and laughed. “No, - son; I guess not,” he said. “We’ve got to maintain our dignity, you know.” - </p> - <p> - That winter, on top of the regular traffic, and that was not light, they - began to push supplies from the East over the Hill Division, preparing to - double track the road from the western side of the foothills as soon as - spring opened up. And while the thermometer crept steadily to zero, the - Hill Division sweltered. - </p> - <p> - Everybody and everything got it, the shops and the road-beds, the train - crews and the rolling-stock. What little sleep Carleton, the super, got, - he spent in formulating dream plans to handle the business. Those that - seemed good to him when he awoke were promptly vetoed by the barons of the - General Office in the far-off East. - </p> - <p> - Regan got no sleep. He raced from one end of the division to the other, - and he did his best. Engine crews had to tinker anything less than a major - injury for themselves: there was no room in the shops for them. - </p> - <p> - But the men on the keys got it most of all. As the days wore into months, - Spence’s face grew careworn and haggard; and the irritability from - overwork of the men about him added to his discomfort. Human nature needs - a safety-valve, and one night near the end of January when Regan and - Carleton and Spence were gathered at the office, with Bunty in his - accustomed place in his father’s chair, the master mechanic cut loose. - </p> - <p> - “It’s up to you, Spence,” he cried savagely, bringing his fist down with a - crash on the desk. “There ain’t a pair of wheels on the division fit to - pull a hand-car. Every engine’s a cripple, and getting lamer every day. - The engine ain’t built, nor never will be, that’ll stand the schedule - you’re putting them on through the hills, especially through the Gap. - That’s a three per cent, with the bed like an S. You can’t make time - there; you’ve got to crawl. You’re pulling the stay-bolts out of my - engines, that’s what you’re doing.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton, being in no angelic mood, and glad to vent his feelings, growled - assent. - </p> - <p> - Spence raised his head from the keys, a red tinge of resentment on his - cheeks. He picked up his pipe, packing it slowly as he looked at Regan and - the super. “I’m taking all they’re sending,” he said quietly. He reached - over for the train-sheet and handed it to the super. “You and Regan here - are growling about the schedule. It’s your division, Carleton; but I’m not - sure <i>you</i> know just what we’re handling every twenty-four hours. - It’s push them through on top of each other somehow, or tell them - down-East we can’t handle them. Do you want to do that?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Carleton, “I don’t; and what’s more, I won’t.” - </p> - <p> - Spence nodded. “I rather figured that was your idea. Well, we’ve about all - we can do without nagging one another. I’m near in now, and so are you and - Regan here, both of you. I’ve got to make time, Gap or no Gap. There’s so - much moving there isn’t siding enough to cross them.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re right,” said Carleton; “we can’t afford to jump each other. We’re - all doing our best, and each of us knows it. How’s Number One and Two - tonight?” - </p> - <p> - Spence studied for a moment before he answered: “Number One is forty - minutes off, and Number Two’s an hour to the bad.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton groaned. The Imperial Limited West and East, officially known on - the train-sheets as One and Two, carried both the transcontinental mail - and the de-luxe passengers. Of late the East had been making pertinent - suggestions to the Division Superintendent that it would be as well if - those trains ran off the Hill Division with a little more regard for their - established schedule. So Carleton groaned. He got up and put on his hat - and coat preparatory to going home. “Look here,” he said from the doorway, - “they’ll stand for ‘most anything if we don’t misuse One and Two. They’re - getting mighty savage about that, and they’ll drop hard before long. You - fellows have got to take care of those trains, if nothing else on the - division moves. That’s orders. I’ll shoulder all kicks coming on the rest - of the traffic. Good-night.” - </p> - <p> - When Bunty left the office that night and walked home with his father, he - had learned that there was another side to railroading besides the - building and repairing of engines, and the delivery of magic tissue sheets - to train crews that told them when and where to stop, and how to thread - their way through hills and plains on a single-track road, with heaps of - other trains, some going one way, some another. He understood vaguely and - in a hazy kind of way that somewhere, many, many miles away, were men who - sat in judgment on the doings of his father and Spence and Carleton; that - these men were to be obeyed, that their word was law, and that their names - were President and Directors. - </p> - <p> - So Bunty, trotting beside his father, pondered these things. Being too - weighty for him, he appealed: “Daddy, what’s president and directors?” - </p> - <p> - Regan’s temper being still ruffled, he answered shortly: “Fools, mostly.” - </p> - <p> - Bunty nodded gravely, and his education as a railroad man was almost - complete. The rest came quickly, and the Gap did it. - </p> - <p> - The Gap! There was not a man on the division, from track-walker to - superintendent, who would not jump like a nervous colt if you said “Gap!” - to them offhand and short-like. A peaceful stretch of track it looked, a - little crooked, as Regan said, hugging the side of the mountain at the - highest point of the division. The surroundings were undeniably grand. A - sheer drop of eighteen-hundred feet to the canon below, with the - surrounding mountains rearing their snow-capped peaks skyward, completed a - picture of which the road had electrotypes and which it used in their - magazine-advertising. What the picture did not show was the two-mile drop, - where the road-bed took a straight three per cent and sometimes better, to - the lower levels. So when Carleton or Spence or Regan, reading their - magazines, saw the picture, they shuddered, and, remembering past history - and fearful of the future, turned the page hurriedly. - </p> - <p> - But to Bunty the Gap possessed the fascination of the unknown. He was - wakened early the next morning by his father’s voice talking excitedly - over the special wire with headquarters about the Gap and a wreck. He sat - bolt upright, and listened with all his might; then he crawled noiselessly - out of bed, and began to dress hastily. He heard his father speaking to - his mother, and presently the front door banged. Bunty was dressed by that - time and he crept downstairs and opened the door softly. - </p> - <p> - It was just turning daylight as he started on a run for the yard. It was - not far to the office,—a hundred yards or so,—and Bunty - reached there in record time. Across the tracks by the roundhouse they - were coupling on to the wrecker; and answering hasty summons, men, running - from all directions, were quickly gathering. - </p> - <p> - Bunty hesitated a minute on the platform, then he entered the station and - tiptoed softly up the stairs. The office door was open, and from the top - stair Bunty could see into the room. The night lamp was still burning on - the dispatcher’s desk, and Spence was sitting there, working with frantic - haste to clear the line. In the center of the room, the super, his father, - and Flannagan, the wrecking boss, were standing. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a freight smash,” Carleton was saying to Flannagan—“east edge - of the Gap. You’ll have rights through, and no limit on your permit. Tell - Emmons if he doesn’t make it in better than ninety minutes he’ll talk to - me afterward. By the time you get there, Number Two will be crawling up - the grade. She’s pulling the Old Man’s car, and that means get her through - somehow if you have to drop the wreck, over the cliff. You can back down - to Riley’s to let her pass. We’ll do the patching up afterward. - Understand?” - </p> - <p> - Flannagan nodded, and glanced impatiently at Spence. - </p> - <p> - The super opened and shut his watch. “Ready, Spence?” he asked shortly. - </p> - <p> - “Just a minute,” Spence answered quietly. - </p> - <p> - Bunty waited to hear no more. He turned and ran down the stairs and across - the tracks as fast as his legs would carry him. He scrambled breathlessly - up the steps of the tool-car and edged his way in among the men grouped - near the door. He was fairly inside before they noticed him. - </p> - <p> - “Hello,” cried Allan, Bunty’s bosom friend of the fitting-gang days, - “here’s the little Super! What you doin’ here, kid?” - </p> - <p> - “I’m going up to the wreck,” Bunty announced sturdily. - </p> - <p> - The men laughed. - </p> - <p> - “Well, I guess <i>not</i> much, you’re not,” said Allan. “What do you - think your father would say?” - </p> - <p> - “Nothing,” said Bunty, airily. “I just comed from the office,” he added - artfully, “and I’ll tell you about the wreck if you like.” - </p> - <p> - The men grouped around him in a circle. - </p> - <p> - “It’s at the Gap,” Bunty began, sparring for time as through the window he - saw Flannagan coming from the office at a run. “And it’s a freight train, - and—and it’s all smashed up, and——” - </p> - <p> - The train started with a jerk that nearly took the men off their feet. At - the same time Flannagan’s face appeared at the car door. - </p> - <p> - “All here, boys?” he called. Then he announced cheerfully: “The devil’s to - pay up the line!” - </p> - <p> - Meanwhile, Bunty, taking advantage of the interruption, had squirmed his - way through the men to the far end of the car, and the train had bumped - over the switches on to the main line before they remembered him. Then it - was too late. They hauled him out from behind a rampart of tools, where he - had intrenched himself, and Flannagan shook his fist, half-angrily, - half-playfully, in Bunty’s face. - </p> - <p> - “You little devil, what are you doing here, eh?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - And Bunty answered as before: “I’m going up to the wreck.” - </p> - <p> - “Humph!” said Flannagan, with a grin. “Well, I guess you are, and I guess - you’ll be sorry, too, when you get back and your dad gets hold of you.” - </p> - <p> - But Bunty was safe now, and he only laughed. - </p> - <p> - Breakfastless, he shared the men’s grub and listened wide-eyed as they - talked of wrecks in times gone by; but most of all he listened to the - story of how his father, when he was pulling Number One, had saved the - Limited by sticking to his post almost in the face of certain death. - Bunty’s father was his hero, and his small soul glowed with happiness at - the tale. He begged so hard for the story over again that Allan told it, - and when he had finished, he slapped Bunty on the back. “And I guess - you’re a chip of the old block,” he said. - </p> - <p> - And Bunty was very proud, squaring his shoulders, and planting his feet - firmly to swing with the motion of the car. - </p> - <p> - The speed of the train slackened as they struck the grade leading up the - eastern side of the Gap. Flannagan set the men busily at work overhauling - the kit. He paused an instant before Bunty. “Look here, kid,” he said, - shaking a warning finger, “you keep out of the way, and don’t get into - trouble.” - </p> - <p> - It would have taken more than words from Flanna-gan to have curbed Bunty’s - eagerness; so when the train came to a stop and the men tumbled out of the - car with a rush, he followed. What he saw caused him to purse his lips and - cry excitedly, “Gee!” - </p> - <p> - Right in front of him a big mogul had turned turtle. Ditched by a spread - rail, she had pulled three boxcars with her, and piled them up, mostly in - splinters, on the tender. They had taken fire, and were burning furiously. - Behind these were eight or ten cars still on the road-bed, but badly - demolished from bumping over the ties when they had left the rails. Still - farther down the track in the rear were the rest of the string, apparently - uninjured. The snow was knee-deep at the side of the track, but Bunty - plowed manfully through it, climbing up the embankment to a place of - vantage. - </p> - <p> - His eyes blazed with excitement as he watched the scene before him and - listened to the hoarse shouts of the men, the crash of pick and ax, and, - above it all, the sharp crackle of the fire as the flames, growing in - volume, bit deeper and deeper into the wreck. Fiercely as the men fought, - the fire, with its long start, kept them from making any headway against - it. Already it had reached some of the cars standing on the track. - </p> - <p> - From where Bunty stood he could see the track dipping away in a long grade - to the valley below. They called that grade the Devil’s Slide, and the - wreck was on the edge of it, with the caboose and some half-dozen cars - still resting on the incline. As he looked, far below him he saw a trail - of smoke. It was Number Two climbing the grade. By this time the - excitement of his surroundings had worn off a little, and the arrival of - the Limited offered a new attraction. - </p> - <p> - He clambered down from his perch and began to pick his way past the wreck. - Flannagan, begrimed and dirty, was talking to Emmons. “I don’t like to do - it,” Bunty heard Flannagan say, “but we’ll have to blow up that box-car if - we can’t stop the fire any other way, or we’ll have a blaze down the whole - line. The train crew says there’s turpentine—two cars of it—next - the flat there, and if that catches—Hi, there, kid,” he broke off to - yell, as he caught sight of Bunty, “you get back to the tool-car, and stay - there!” - </p> - <p> - And Bunty ran—in the other direction. He knew Number Two would stop - a little the other side of the wreck, and that there would be a great big - ten-wheeler pulling her, all as bright as a new dollar and glistening in - paint and gold-leaf. When he pulled up breathless and happy by the side of - Number Two, Masters, the engineer, was giving Engine 901 an oil round, - touching the journals critically with the back of his hand as he moved - along. - </p> - <p> - At sight of Bunty, the engineer laid his oil-can on the slide-bars and - grinned as he extended his hand. “How are you, Bunty?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - And Bunty, accepting the proffered hand, replied gravely: “I’m pretty - well, Mr. Masters, thank you.” - </p> - <p> - “Glad to hear it, Bunty. How did you get here?” - </p> - <p> - “I comed up with the wrecker-train. It’s a’ awful smash.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it, now! Think they’ll have the line cleared soon?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, no,” Bunty replied, eyeing the cab of the big engine wistfully. “Not - for ever and ever so long.” - </p> - <p> - Masters’ eyes followed Bunty’s glance. “Want to get up in the cab, Bunty?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, please!” Bunty cried breathlessly. - </p> - <p> - “All right,” said Masters, boosting the lad through the gangway. Then - warningly: “Don’t touch anything.” - </p> - <p> - And Bunty promised. - </p> - <p> - It was only four hundred yards up to the wreck; but that was enough. - Masters and his firemen left their train and went to get a view at close - quarters. When it was all over, it was up to the wrecking boss and the - engine crew of Number Two. Flannagan swore he blocked the trucks of the - cars on the incline; but Flannagan lied, and he got clear. Masters and his - mate had no chance to lie, for they broke rules, and they got their time. - </p> - <p> - Be that as it may, Bunty sat on the driver’s seat of the Imperial Limited - and watched the engineer and fireman start up the track. He lost sight of - the men long before they reached the wreck. They were still in view, but - he was very busy: he was playing “pretend.” - </p> - <p> - Bunty’s imagination was vivid enough to make the game a fascinating one - whenever he indulged in it, and that was often. But now it was almost - reality, and his fancy was little taxed to supply what was lacking. He was - engineer of the Limited, and they had just stopped at a station. He leaned - out of the cab window to get the “go-ahead” signal. Then his hand went - through the motion of throwing over the reversing-lever and opening the - throttle. And now he was off; faster and faster. He rocked his body to and - fro to supply the motion of the cab. He sat very grim and determined, - peering straight ahead. He was booming along now at full speed. They were - coming to a crossing. “<i>Too-oo-o, toot, toot!</i>” cried Bunty at the - top of his shrill treble, for the rules said you must whistle at every - crossing, and Bunty knew the rules. Now they were coming to the next - station, and he began to slow up. “<i>Ding-dong, ding—</i>” - </p> - <h3> - <i>BANG!</i> - </h3> - <p> - Bunty nearly fell from his seat with fright. Ahead of him, up the track, - there was a column of smoke as a mass of wreckage rose in the air, and - then a crash. Flannagan had blown up a car. Bunty stared, fascinated, not - at the explosion, but at the rear end of the wreck on the grade. He rubbed - his eyes in bewilderment, then he scrambled over the side of the seat. He - paused half-way off, looking again through the front window to make sure. - There was no doubt of it: the cars were beginning to roll down the track - toward him. He waited for no more, but rushed to the gangway to jump off. - Then he stopped as the story Allan had told about his father came back to - him. Bunty’s heart thumped wildly as he turned white-faced and determined. - No truly engineer would leave his train; his father had not, and Bunty did - not. - </p> - <p> - The reversing-lever was in the back notch where Masters had left it when - he stopped the train. It was Bunty’s task to reach and open the throttle. - He climbed up on the seat and stood on tiptoe. Leaning over, he grasped - the lever with both hands and pulled it open. What little science of - engine-driving Bunty possessed, was lost in the terror that gripped him. - The runaway cars were only a couple of hundred yards away now, and, - gaining speed with every rail they traveled, spelt death and’ destruction - to the Imperial Limited, if they ever reached her. The men at the top of - the grade were yelling their lungs out and waving their arms in frantic - warning. - </p> - <p> - The train started with a jolt that threw Bunty back on the seat. For an - instant the big drivers raced like pin-wheels, then they bit into the - rails, and aided by the grade, Number Two began to back slowly down the - hill. - </p> - <p> - Bunty picked himself up, his little frame shaking with dry sobs. The - freight-cars had gained on him in the last minute, and had nearly reached - him. Again he leaned over for the throttle, and hanging grimly to it, - pulled it open another notch, and then another, and then wide open. 901 - took it like a frightened thoroughbred. Rearing herself from the track - under her two hundred and ten pounds of steam, she jumped into the cars - behind her for a starter with a shock that played havoc with the - passengers’ nerves. Then she settled down to travel. The Devil’s Slide is - two miles long, and some pretty fair running has been made on it in times - of stress; but Bunty holds the record,—it’s good yet,—and - Bunty was only an amateur! - </p> - <p> - It was neck and neck for a while, and there was almost a pile-up on the - nose of 901’s pilot before she began to hold her own. Gradually she began - to pull away, and by the time they were half-way down the hill the - distance between her and the truant freight-cars was widening. The speed - was terrific. - </p> - <p> - Pale and terror-stricken, Bunty now crouched on the driver’s seat. Time - and again the engineer’s whistle in the cab over his head signaled, now - entreatingly, now with frantic insistence. But Bunty gave it no heed; his - only thought was for those cars in front of him that were always there. He - cried to himself with little moans. - </p> - <p> - There was a sickening slur as they flew round a curve. 901 heeled to the - tangent, one set of drivers fairly lifted from the track. When she found - her wheel base again, Bunty, shaken from his hold, was clinging to the - reversing-lever. He shut his eyes as he pulled himself back to his seat. - When he looked again, he saw the freight-cars hit the curve above him, - then slew as they jumped the track and, with a crash that reached him - above the roar and rattle of the train, the booming whir of the great - drivers beneath him, go pitching headlong down the embankment. - </p> - <p> - Bunty rose to his knees, and for the first time looked out of the side - window, to find a new terror there as the rocks and trees and poles - flashed dizzily by him. He turned and looked behind. A man was clinging to - the hand-rail of the mail-car, and another, lying flat, was crawling over - the coal heaped high on the tender. Bunty dashed the tears from his eyes; - he was no “fraidy” kid. He stood up, and holding on to the frame of the - window, staggered toward the throttle. As he reached for it, 901 lurched - madly, and Bunty lost his balance and fell headlong upon the iron floor - plate of the cab. Then it was all dark. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">N</span>umber Two pulled - into Big Cloud that night ten hours late, and it brought Bunty. His father - and Carleton and Spence and the shop-hands were on the platform. From the - private car, which carried the tail-lights, an elderly gentleman got off - with Bunty in his arms. The men cheered, and while the master mechanic - rushed forward to take his son, the super and Spence drew back - respectfully. - </p> - <p> - “Mr. Regan,” said the old gentleman, with tears in his eyes, “you ought to - be pretty proud of this little lad.” - </p> - <p> - Regan tried to speak, but the words choked somehow. - </p> - <p> - The old gentleman swung himself back upon the car. “Good-by, Bunty!” he - called. - </p> - <p> - And Bunty, from the depths of the blanket they had wrapped around him, - called back, “Good-by, sir!” When Bunty was propped up in bed, his father - told him how the express messenger had stopped the train and carried him - back into the Pullmans. - </p> - <p> - Bunty listened gravely. “Yes,” he said, nodding his head; “they was awful - good to me, and the man that tooked me off the train told me stories, and - then I told him some, too.” - </p> - <p> - “What did you tell him?” Regan asked. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, ’bout trains and shops and presidents and directors and—and lots - of things.” - </p> - <p> - “Presidents and directors!” said Regan, in surprise. “What did you tell - him about them?” - </p> - <p> - “I told him what you said—that they was fools, and you knew, ’cause - you’d seen them.” - </p> - <p> - Regan whistled softly. - </p> - <p> - “And,” continued Bunty, “he laughed, and when I asked him what he was - laughing at, he gived me a piece of paper and told me to give it to you, - and you’d tell me.” - </p> - <p> - Regan groaned. “Guess it’s my time all right,” he muttered. “Where’s the - paper, Bunty?” - </p> - <p> - “He putted it in my pocket.” - </p> - <p> - Regan drew the chair with Bunty’s clothing on it toward him, and began a - hurried search. He fished out a narrow slip of paper and unfolded it on - his knee. It was a check for one thousand dollars payable to Master Bunty - Regan, and signed by the President of the road. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - III—“IF A MAN DIE” - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">E</span>ast and West now, - the Transcontinental is doubletracked, all except the Hill Division—and - that, in the nature of things, probably never will be. If you know the - mountains, you know the Hill Division. From the divisional point, Big - Cloud, that snuggles at the eastern foothills, the right of way, like the - trail of a great sinewy serpent, twists and curves through the mountains, - through the Rockies, through the Sierras, and finally emerges to link its - steel with a sister division, that stretches onward to the great blue of - the Pacific Ocean. - </p> - <p> - It is a stupendous piece of track. It has cost fabulous sums, and the - lives of many men; it has made the fame of some, and been the graveyard of - more. The history of the world, in big things, in little things, in - battles, in strife, in suddenf death, in peace, in progress, and in - achievement, has its counterpart, in miniature, in the history of the Hill - Division. There is a page in that history that belongs to “Angel” Breen. - This is Breen’s story. - </p> - <p> - It has been written much, and said oftener, that men in every walk of - life, save one, may make mistakes and live them down, but that the - dispatcher who falls once is damned forever. And it is true. I am a - dispatcher. I know. - </p> - <p> - Where he got the nickname “Angel” from, is more than I can tell you, and - I’ve wondered at it often enough myself. Contrast, I guess it was. - Contrast with the boisterous, rough and ready men around him, for this - happened back in the early days when men were what a life of hardship and - no comfort made them. No, Breen wasn’t soft—far from it. He was just - quiet and mild-mannered. It must have been that—contrast. Anyway, he - was “Angel” when I first knew him, and you can draw your own conclusions - as to what he is now—I’m not saying anything at all about that. - </p> - <p> - Where did he come from? What was he before he came here? I don’t know. I - don’t believe anybody knew, or ever gave the matter a thought. That sort - of question was never asked—it was too delicate and pointed in the - majority of cases. A man was what he was out here, not what he had been; - he made good, or he didn’t. Not that I mean to imply that there was - anything crooked or anything wrong with Breen’s past, I’m sure there - wasn’t for that matter, but I’m just trying to make you understand that - when I say Breen had the night trick in the dispatcher’s office here in - Big Cloud, I’m beginning at the beginning. - </p> - <p> - Breen wasn’t popular. He wasn’t a good enough mixer for that. Personally, - it isn’t anything I’d hold up against him, or any other man. Popularity is - too often cheap, and being a “good fellow” isn’t always a license for a - man to puff out his chest—though most of them do it, and that’s the - high sign that what I say is right. No, I’m not moralizing, I’m telling a - story, you’ll see what I mean before I get through. I say Breen wasn’t - popular. He got the reputation of thinking himself a little above the rank - and file of those around him, stuck-up, to put it in cold English, and - that’s where they did him an injustice. It was the man’s nature, - unobtrusive, retiring—different from theirs, if you get my point, - and they couldn’t understand just because it was different. The - limitations weren’t all up to Breen. - </p> - <p> - If they had known, or taken the trouble to know, as much about him as they - could have known before passing judgment on him, perhaps things might have - been a little different; perhaps not, I won’t say, for it’s pretty - generally accepted in railroad law that a dispatcher’s slip is a capital - offense, and there’s no court of appeal, no stay of execution, no - anything, and to all intents and purposes he’s dead from the moment that - slip is made. There have been lots of cases like that, lots of them, and - there’s no class of men I pity more—a slip, and damned for the rest - of their lives! I don’t say that because I’m a dispatcher myself. We’re - only human, aren’t we? Mistakes like that, God knows, aren’t made - intentionally. Sometimes a man is overworked, sometimes queer brain kinks - happen to him just as they do to every other man. We’re ranked as human in - everything but our work. I’m not saying it’s not right. In the last - analysis I suppose it has to be that way. It’s part of the game, and we - know the rules when we “sit in.” We’ve no reason to complain, only I get a - shiver every time I read a newspaper headline that I know, besides being a - death-warrant, is tearing the heart out of some poor devil. You’ve seen - the kind I mean, read scores of them—“Dispatcher’s Blunder Costs - Many Lives”—or something to the same effect. Maybe you’ll think it - queer, but for days afterward I can’t handle an order book or a train - sheet when I’m on duty without my heart being in my mouth half the time. - </p> - <p> - What’s this got to do with Breen? Well, in one way, it hasn’t anything to - do with him; and, then again, in another way, it has. I want you to know - that a blunder means something to a dispatcher besides the loss of his - job. Do you think they’re a coldblooded, calloused lot? I want you to know - that they care. Oh, yes, they’re human. They’ve got a heart and they’ve - got a soul; the one to break, the other to sear. My God! think of it—a - slip. That’s the ghastly horror of it all—a <i>slip!</i> don’t you - think they can <i>feel?</i> don’t you think their own agony of mind is - punishment enough without the added reproach, and worse, of their fellows? - But let it go, it’s the Law of the Game. - </p> - <p> - I said they didn’t know much about Breen out here then except that he was - a pretty good dispatcher, but as far as that goes it didn’t help him any, - rather the reverse, when the smash came. The better the man the harder the - fall, what? It’s generally that way, isn’t it? Perhaps you’re wondering - what I know about him. I’ll tell you. If any one knew Breen, I knew him. I - was only a kid then, I’m a man now. I hadn’t even a coat—Breen gave - me one. I’m a dispatcher—Breen taught me, and no better man on the - “key” than Breen ever lived, a better man than I could ever hope to be, - yet he slipped. Do you wonder I shiver when I read those things? I’m not a - religious man, but I’ve asked God on my bended knees, over and over again, - to keep me from the horror, the suffering, the blasted life that came to - Breen and many another man—through a slip. Yes, if any one knew - Breen, I did. All I know, all I’ve got, everything in this whole wide - world, I owe to Breen—“Angel” Breen. - </p> - <p> - You probably read of the Elktail wreck at the time it happened, but you’ve - forgotten about it by now. Those things don’t live long in the mind unless - they come pretty close home to you; there’s too many other things - happening every hour in this big pulsing world to make it anything more - than the sensation of the moment. But out here the details have cause - enough to be fixed in the minds of most of us, not only of the wreck - itself, but of what happened afterward as well—and I don’t know - which of the two was the worse. You can judge for yourself I’m not going - into technicalities. You’ll understand better if I don’t. You’ll remember - I said that the Hill Division is only single-tracked. That means, I don’t - need to tell you, that it’s up to the dispatcher every second, and all - that stands between the trains and eternity is the bit of tissue tucked in - the engineer’s blouse and its duplicate crammed in the conductor’s side - pocket. Orders, meeting points, single track, you understand? The - dispatcher holds them all, every last one of them, for life or death, men, - women and children, train crews and company property, all—and Breen - slipped! - </p> - <p> - No one knows to this day how it happened. I daresay some eminent authority - on psychology might explain it, but the explanation would be too - high-browed and too far over my head to understand it even if he did. I - only know the facts and the result. Breen sent out a lap order on Number - One, the Imperial Limited, westbound, and Number Eighty-Two, a fast - freight, perishable, streaking east. Both were off schedule, and he was - nursing them along for every second he could squeeze. Back through the - mountains, both ways, all through the night, he’d given them the best of - everything—the Imperial clear rights, and Eighty-Two pretty nearly, - if not quite, as good. Then he fixed the meeting point for the two trains. - </p> - <p> - I read a story once where the dispatcher sent out a lap order on two - trains and his mistake was staring at him all the time from his order - book. I guess that was a slip of the pen, and he never noticed it. That - was queer enough, but what Breen did was queerer still. His order book - showed straight as a string. The freight was to hold at Muddy Lake, ten - miles west of Elktail, for Number One. Number One, of course, as I told - you, running free. Somehow, I don’t know how, it’s one of those things you - can’t explain, a subconscious break between the mind and the mechanical, - physical action, you’ve noticed it in little things you’ve done yourself, - Breen wired the word “Elktail” instead of “Muddy Lake”—and never - knew it—never had a hint that anything was wrong—never caught - it on the repeat, and gave back his O. K. The order, the written order in - the book, was exactly as it should be. It read Muddy Lake—that was - right, Muddy Lake. You see what happened? There wasn’t time for the - freight to make Elktail, but she got within three miles of it—and - that’s as far as she ever got! In a nasty piece of track, full of trestles - and gorges, where the right of way bends worse than the letter S, they - met, the two of them, head on—Number One and Number Eighty-Two! - </p> - <p> - And Breen didn’t know what he had done even after the details began to - pour in. How could he know? What was Eighty-Two doing east of Muddy Lake? - She should have been waiting there for Number One to pass her. The order - book showed that plain enough. And all through the rest of that night, - while he worked like a madman clearing the line, getting up hospital - relief, and wrecking trains—with Carle-ton, he was super then, - gray-faced and haggard, like the master of a storm-tossed liner on his - bridge giving orders, pacing the room, cursing at times at his own - impotency—Breen didn’t know, neither of them knew, where the blame - lay. But the horror of the thing had Breen in its grip even then. I was - there that night, and I can see him now bent over under the green-shaded - lamp—I can see Carleton’s face, and it wasn’t a pleasant face to - see. One thing I remember Breen said. Once, as the sounder pitilessly - clicked a message more ghastly than any that had gone before, adding to - the number of those whose lives had gone out forever, adding to the tale - of the wounded, to the wild, mad story of chaos and ruin, Breen lifted his - head from the key for a moment, pushed his hair out of his eyes with a - nervous, shaky sweep of his hand, and looked at Carleton. - </p> - <p> - “It’s horrible, horrible,” he whispered; “<i>but think of the man who did - it</i>. Death would be easy compared to what he must feel. It makes me as - weak as a kitten to think of it, Carleton. My God, man, don’t you see! I, - or any other dispatcher, might do this same thing to-morrow, the next day, - or the day after. Tell me again, Carleton, tell me again, that order’s - straight.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t lose your nerve,” Carleton answered sharply. “Whoever has - blundered, it’s not you.” - </p> - <p> - Irony? No. It’s beyond all that, isn’t it? It’s getting about as near to - the tragedy of a man’s life as you can get. It’s getting as deep and - tapping as near bed-rock as we’ll ever do this side of the Great Divide. - Think of it! Think of Breen that night—it’s too big to get, isn’t - it? God pity him! Those words of his have rung in my ears all these years, - and that scene I can see over again in every detail every time I close my - eyes. - </p> - <p> - In the few hours left before dawn that morning, there wasn’t time to give - much attention to the cause. There was enough else to think of, enough to - give every last man on the division from car tink to superintendent all, - and more, than they could handle—the investigation could come later. - But it never came. - </p> - <p> - There was no need for one. How did they find out? It came like the crack - of doom, and Breen got it—got it—and it seemed to burst the - floodgates of his memory open, seemed to touch that dormant chord, and he - knew, knew as he knew that he had a God, what he had done. - </p> - <p> - They found the order that made the meeting point Elktail tucked in - Mooney’s jumper when, after they got the crane at work, they hauled him - out from under his engine. Who was Mooney? Engineer of the freight. They - found him before they did any of his train crew, or his fireman either, - for that matter. Dead? Yes. I’m a dispatcher, look at it from the other - side if you want to, it’s only fair. That bit of tissue cleared Mooney, of - course—but it sent him to his death. Yes, I know, good God, don’t - you think I <i>know</i> what it means—to slip? - </p> - <p> - It was just before Davis, Breen’s relief, came on for the morning trick, - in fact Davis was in the room, when Breen got the report. He scribbled it - on a pad, word by word as it came in, for Carleton to see. For a minute it - didn’t seem to mean anything to him, and then, as I say, he got it. I - never saw such a look on a man’s face before, and I pray God I never may - again. He seemed to wither up, blasted as the oak is blasted by a - lightning stroke. The horror, the despair, the agony in his eyes are - beyond any words of mine to describe, and you wouldn’t want to hear it if - I could tell you. He held out his arms pitifully like a pleading child. - His lips moved, but he had to try over and over again before any sound - came from them. There was no thought of throwing the blame on anybody - else. Breen wasn’t that kind. Oh, yes, he could have done it. He could - have put the blunder on the night man at the Gap where Mooney received his - Elktail holding order, and Breen’s order book would have left it an open - question as to which of the two had made the mistake—would probably - have let him out and damned the other. You say from the way he acted he - didn’t think of that and therefore the temptation didn’t come to him. Yes, - I know what you mean. Not so much to Breen’s credit, what? Well, I don’t - know, it depends on the way you look at it. I’d rather believe the thought - didn’t come because the man’s soul was too <i>clean</i>. It was clean them—no - matter what he did afterward. - </p> - <p> - There have been death scenes of dispatchers before, many of them—there - will be others in the days to come, many of them. So long as there are - railroads and so long as men are frail as men, lacking the infallibility - of a higher power, just so long will they be inevitable. But no death - scene of a dispatcher’s career was ever as this one was. Breen was his own - judge, his own jury, his own executioner. Do you think I could ever forget - his words? He pointed his hand toward the window that faced the western - stretch of track, toward the foothills, toward the mighty peaks of the - Rockies that towered beyond them, and the life, the being of the man was - in his voice. They came slowly, those words, wrenched from a broken heart, - torn from a shuddering soul. - </p> - <p> - “I wish to God that it were me in their stead. Christ be merciful! I did - it, Carleton. I don’t know how. I did it.” - </p> - <p> - No one answered him. No one spoke. For a moment that seemed like all - eternity there was silence, then Breen, his arms still held out before - him, walked across the room as a blind man walks in his own utter - darkness, walked to the door and passed out—alone. Those few steps - across the room—alone! I’ve thought of that pretty often since—they - seemed so horribly, grimly, significantly in keeping with what there was - of life left for the stricken man—<i>alone</i>. It’s a pretty hard - word, that, sometimes, and sometimes it brings the tears. - </p> - <p> - I don’t know how I let him go like that. I was too stunned to move I - guess, but I reached him at the foot of the stairs as he stepped out onto - the platform. There wasn’t anything I could say, was there? What would you - have said? - </p> - <p> - No man knew better than Breen himself what this would mean to him. He was - wrecked, wrecked worse than that other wreck, for his was a living death. - There weren’t any grand jurys or things of that kind out here then, not - that it would have made any difference to Breen if there had been. You - can’t put any more water in a pail when it’s already full, can you? You - can’t add to the maximum, can you? don’t you think Breen’s punishment was - beyond the reach of man or men to add to, or, for that matter, to abate by - so much as the smallest fraction? It was, God knows it was—all - except one final twinge, that I believe now settled him, though I’ll say - here that whatever it did to Breen it’s not for me to judge her. Who am I, - that I should? It is between her and her Maker. I’ll come to that in a - minute. - </p> - <p> - Yes, Breen knew well enough what it meant to him, but his thoughts that - morning as we walked up the street weren’t, I know right well, on himself—he - was thinking of those others. And I, well, I was thinking of Breen. - Wouldn’t you? I told you I owed Breen everything I had in the world. - Neither of us said a word all the way up to his boarding-house. It was - almost as though I wasn’t with him for all the attention he paid to me. - But he knew I was there just the same. I like to think of that. I wasn’t - very old then—I’m not offering that as an excuse, for I’m not - ashamed to admit that I was near to tears—if I’d been older perhaps - I could have said or done something to help. As it was, all I could do was - to turn that one black thought over and over and over again in my mind. - Breen’s living death, death, death, death. That’s the way it hit me, the - way it caught me, and the word clung and repeated itself as I kept step - beside him. - </p> - <p> - He was dead, dead to hope, ambition, future, everything, as dead as though - he lay outstretched before me in his coffin. It seemed as if I could see - him that way. And then, don’t ask me why, I don’t know, I only know such - things happen, come upon you unconsciously, suddenly, there flashed into - my mind that bit of verse from the Bible, you know it—“if a man die, - shall he live again?” I must have said it out loud without knowing it, for - he whirled upon me quick as lightning, placed his two hands upon my - shoulders, and stared with a startled gaze into my eyes. I say startled. - It was, but there was more. There seemed for a second a gleam of hope - awakened, hungry, oh, how hungry, pitiful in its yearning, and then the - uselessness, the futility of that hope crushed it back, stamped it out, - and the light in his eyes grew dull and died away. - </p> - <p> - We had halted at the door of his boarding-house and I made as though to go - upstairs with him to his room, but he stopped me. - </p> - <p> - “Not now, Charlie, boy,” he said, shaking his head and trying to smile; - “not now. I want to be alone.” - </p> - <p> - And so I left him. - </p> - <p> - Alone! <i>He wanted to be alone</i>. Were ever words more full of cruel - mockery! It seems hard to understand sometimes, doesn’t it? And we get to - questioning things we’d far better leave alone. I know at first I used to - wonder why Almighty God ever let Breen make that slip. He could have - stopped it, couldn’t He? But that’s riot right. We’re running on train - orders from the Great Dispatcher, and the finite can’t span the infinite. - </p> - <p> - Maybe you’ll think it queer that I left Breen like that, let him go to his - room alone. You’re thinking that in his condition he might do himself harm—end - it all, to put it bluntly. Well, that thought didn’t come to me then, it - did afterward, but not then. Why? It must have been just the innate - consciousness that he wouldn’t do that sort of thing. Some men face things - one way, some face them another. It’s a question of individuality and - temperament. I don’t think Breen could have done anything like that, I - know he seemed so far apart from it in my mind that, as I say, the thought - didn’t come to me. He was too big a man, big enough to have faced what was - before him, faced conditions, faced the men, though God knows they treated - him like skulking coyote, if it had not been for her. I want to stand - right on this. Breen would never have done what he did if she had $cted - differently. That much I know. But, I want to say it again, I’ve no right - to judge her. - </p> - <p> - Perhaps you’ve read that story of Kipling’s about the Black Tyrone - Regiment that saw their dead? Well, Breen, as I told you, at the - beginning, wasn’t popular, and the boys had seen their dead. Do you - understand? Pariah, outcast, what you like, they made him, all except pity - they gave him, and I say he would have taken it all, accepted it all, only - there are some things too heavy for a man to bear, aren’t there? Load - limit, the engineers call it when they build their bridge. Well, there’s a - load limit on the heart and brain and soul of a man just as there is on a - bridge; and while one, strained beyond the breaking point, goes crashing - in a horrid mass of twisted wreckage to the bottom of the canon, to the - bottom of the gorge, into the rushing, boiling waters of the river - beneath, the other crashes, a damned soul, to the bottom of hell. Kitty - Mooney had seen her dead. Kitty Mooney, the engineer’s sister! And Breen - loved her, was going to marry her. That’s all. - </p> - <p> - How do I know? How do you know? Perhaps it was grief, perhaps it was - hysteria, perhaps it was according to the light God gave her and she - couldn’t understand, perhaps it was only wild, unreasoning, frantic - passion. I don’t know. I only know she called him—a <i>murderer</i>. - She couldn’t have loved him, you say. Perhaps no, perhaps yes. Does it - make any difference? Breen thought she did, and Breen loved <i>her</i>. I - don’t know. I only know that where he looked for a ray of mercy, <i>her</i> - mercy, to light the blackened depths, for the touch, <i>her</i> touch, - that would have held him back from the brink, for the word of comfort, <i>her</i> - word, that would have bid him stand like a gallant soldier facing untold - odds, he received, instead, a condemnation more terrible than any that had - gone before, and a bleeding heart dried bitter as gall, a patient, - grief-stricken man became a vicious snapping wolf, and “Angel” Breen—a - devil. - </p> - <p> - Would I have been a stronger man than Breen? Would you? Would I have done - differently than Kitty Mooney did if I had been in her place? Would you? - We don’t know, do we? No one knows. God keep us from ever knowing. The - poor devil in the gutters, the wretched, ruined lives of women who have - lost their grip and drunk the dregs, the human, stranded, battered wrecks - we see around us, were once like you and me. We don’t know, do we? God - pity them! God keep us from the sneer! Our strength has never been - measured. It may be no greater than theirs. To-morrow it may be you or I. - </p> - <p> - It was pretty lawless out here in those days. We had the riff-raff of the - East, and worse; and there was nothing to restrain them, nothing much to - keep them in check, and they did about as they liked. They brought the - touch into the picture of the West that the West hasn’t lived down yet, - and I’m not sure ever will. The brawling, gambling, gun-handling type, the - thief, the desperado, the bad man, rotten bad, bad to the core. They’ve - been stamped out now most of them, but it was different then. <i>They</i> - didn’t turn a cold shoulder to Breen. Why should they? They were outcasts - and pariahs, too, weren’t they? And Breen, well, I guess you understand as - well as I do, and you know as I know that when a man like that goes he - goes the limit. There’s no middle course for some men, they’re not made - that way. - </p> - <p> - Whatever holds them for good, or whatever holds them for bad, it holds - them all, either way, all, body, mind and spirit, all. And that is true in - spite of the fact that, often enough, there’s some one thing, it may be a - little thing, it may be a big thing, but some one thing that the worst of - us balk at, can’t do. It’s not morality, it’s not conscience, a man gets - way beyond all that; it’s a memory of the past perhaps, a something bred - in him from babyhood. I don’t know. You can’t treat human nature like a - specimen on the glass slide under a microscope. There is no specimen. As - there are millions of people, so is each one in some way different from - the other. You can’t classify, you can’t tabulate the different kinks into - a list and learn it by heart, can you? The man who says he knows human - nature says he is as wise as the God who made him, and that man is a poor - fool. That’s right, isn’t it? And so I say that, strange as it may seem, - in the worst of us, fall as low as we will, there’s generally some one - thing our soul, what’s left of it, revolts at doing. Breen was a railroad - man. Railroading was in his blood. I want you to get that. It was part of - him. Any man that’s worth his salt in this business is that way. It’s in - the blood or it isn’t; you’re a railroad man or you’re not. - </p> - <p> - Breen disappeared from Big Cloud and I didn’t see him from the day Kitty - Mooney turned him from her door until the night—but I’m coming to - that—that’s the end. There’s a word or two that goes before—so - that you’ll understand. He disappeared from Big Cloud, but he didn’t leave - the mountains. Maybe back of it all, an almost impossible theory if you - like, but I can understand it, a something in him wouldn’t let him run - away. He did run away, you say. Yes, but there’s the queer brain kink - again. Perhaps he temporized. You temporize. I temporize. We try to fool - and delude sometimes, snatch at loopholes, snatch at straws, to bolster up - our self-respect, don’t we? That’s what I mean when I say it’s possible he - couldn’t run away. He clung to the straw, the loophole, that running away - was measured in <i>miles</i>. I don’t say that was it, for I don’t know. - It’s possible. We heard of him from time to time as the months went by, - and the things we heard weren’t pleasant things to hear. He drifted from - bad to worse, until that something that he couldn’t do brought him to a - halt—brought the end. - </p> - <p> - Don’t ask me when Breen threw in his lot with Black Dempsey and the band - of fiends that called him leader—the ugliest, soul-blackened set of - fiends that ever polluted the West, and that’s using pretty strong - language. Don’t ask me how Breen got to Big Cloud that night away from the - others waiting to begin their hellish work. Don’t ask me. I don’t know. <i>Why</i> - he did it—is different. That, I can tell you. What they wanted him - to do, to have a part in, was that one thing I was speaking about, the one - thing he couldn’t do. Breen was a railroad man, railroading was in his - blood, that’s all—but it’s everything—railroading was in his - blood. As for the rest, maybe he didn’t know what they were really up to - until the last moment, and then stole away from them. Maybe they found it - out, suspected him, and some of them followed him, tried to stop him, - tried to keep him from reaching here. But what’s the use of speculating? I - never knew, I never will know. Breen can’t tell me, can he? And all that I - can tell you is what I saw and heard that night. - </p> - <p> - I had the night trick then—Breen’s job—they gave me Breen’s - job. It seemed somehow at first like sacrilege to take it—as though - I was robbing him of it, taking it away from him, wronging, stripping, - impoverishing the man to whom I owed even the knowledge that made me fit, - that made it possible, to hold down a key—his key. Of course, that - was only sensitiveness, but you understand, don’t you? It caught me hard - when I first “sat in,” but gradually the feeling wore off; not that I ever - forgot, I haven’t yet for that matter, only time blunts the sharp edges, - and routine, habit, and custom do the rest. I don’t need to tell you that - I remember that night. Remember it! - </p> - <p> - That was before this station was built, and in those days we had an old - wooden shack here that did duty for freight house, station, division - headquarters, and everything else all rolled into one. The dispatcher’s - room was upstairs. - </p> - <p> - Things were moving slick as a whistle that night. No extra traffic, no - road troubles, in—out, in—out, all along the line the trains - were running like clockwork from one end of the division to the other. If - there was anything on my mind at all it was the Limited, Number Two, - eastbound. We were handling a good deal of gold in those days, there was a - lot of it being shipped East then—is still, from the Klondyke now, - you know—and we were getting a fair share of the business away from - the southern competition. We hadn’t had any trouble, weren’t looking for - any, but it was pretty generally understood that all shipments of that - kind were to get special attention. Number Two was carrying an extra - express car with a consignment for the mint that night, so, naturally, I - had kept my eye on her more closely than usual all the way through the - mountains from the time I got her from the Pacific Division. At the time - I’m speaking about, four o’clock in the morning, I was almost clear of - her, for she wasn’t much west of Coyote Bend, fifteen miles from here, and - she had rights all the way in. Half an hour more at the most, and she - would be off my hands and up to the dispatchers of the Prairie Division. - She had held her schedule to the tick every foot of the way, and all I was - waiting for was the call from Coyote Bend that would report her in and out - again into the clear for Big Cloud. Coyote Bend is the first station west - of here, you understand? There’s nothing between. She was due at Coyote at - 4.05, and I want you to remember this—I said it before, but I want - to repeat it. I want you to get it <i>hard</i>—she had run to the - second all through the night. - </p> - <p> - My watch was open on the table before me, and I watched the minute hand - creep round the dial. 4.03, 4.04, 4.05, 4.06, 4.07, 4.08. I was alone in - the office. The night caller had gone out perhaps ten minutes before to - call the train crew of the five o’clock local. There wasn’t anything to be - nervous about. I don’t put it down to that. Three minutes wasn’t anything. - Perhaps it was just impatience, fretfulness. You know how it is when - you’re waiting for something to happen, and I was expecting the sounder to - break every second with that report from Coyote Bend, Anyway, put it down - to what you like, though I didn’t want a drink particularly I pushed back - my chair, got up, and walked over to the water cooler. The dispatcher’s - table was on the east side of the room, the door opened on the south side, - and the water cooler was over in the opposite corner. I’m explaining this - so that you’ll understand that the door was <i>between</i> the water - cooler and the table. That old shack was rough and ready, and I’ve - wondered more than once what ever kept it from falling to pieces. It - didn’t take more than a breath of wind to set every window-sash in the - outfit rattling like a corps of snare drums. That’s why, I guess, I didn’t - hear any one coming up the stairs. It was blowing pretty hard that night. - But I heard the door open. I thought it was the caller back again, and I - wondered how he’d made his rounds in such quick time. With the tumbler - half up to my lips I turned around—then the glass slipped from my - fingers and crashed into slivers on the floor. My mouth went dry, my heart - seemed to stop. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. It was Breen—“Angel” - Breen! - </p> - <p> - I saw him start at the noise of the splintering glass, but he didn’t look - at me. He clung swaying to the door jamb for an instant, his face chalky - white, then he reeled across the room—<i>and dropped into his old - chair</i>. I saw him glance at my watch and his face seemed to go whiter - than before, then he snatched at the train sheet and a smile—no, it - wasn’t exactly a smile, you couldn’t call it that, his whole face seemed - to change, light up, and his lips moved—I know now in a prayer of - gratitude. You understand, don’t you? He knew the time-card, knew that - Number Two, after he had seen my watch, should have been <i>out</i> of - Coyote Bend four, perhaps five, minutes before, but the train sheet showed - her: still unreported. His fingers closed on the key and he began to make - the Coyote Bend call. Over and over, quick, sharp, clear, incisive, with - all the old masterful touch of his sending Breen was rattling the call—cc,cx—cc,cx—cc,cx—cc,cx. - </p> - <p> - And then I found my voice. - </p> - <p> - “God in Heaven, Breen!” I stammered, and started toward him. “You! What———” - </p> - <p> - The sounder broke. Coyote Bend answered. And on the instant Breen flashed - this order over the wire. - </p> - <p> - “Hold Number Two. Hold Number Two”—twice the sender spelled out the - words. - </p> - <p> - Then Coyote Bend repeated the order, and Breen gave back the O. K. - </p> - <p> - “Breen!” I shouted. “What are you doing? Are you crazy! What are you doing - here? Speak, man, what——” - </p> - <p> - He had straightened in his chair, and a sort of low, catchy gasp came from - his lips. It seemed as though it took all his power, all his strength, to - lift his eyes to mine. I sprang for the key, but he jerked himself - suddenly forward and pushed me desperately away. And then he called me by - the old name, not much above a whisper, I could hardly catch the words, - and I didn’t understand, didn’t know, that the man before me was a - wounded, <i>dying man</i>. My brain was whirling, full of that other - night, full of the days and months that had followed. I couldn’t think. I—— - </p> - <p> - “Charlie—boy, it’s all right. Black Dempsey in the Cut. I was afraid - I was too late—too late. They shot—me—here”—he was - tearing with his fingers at his waistcoat. - </p> - <p> - And then I understood—too late. As I reached for him, he swayed - forward and toppled over, a huddled heap, over the key, over the order - book, over the train sheet that once had taken his life and now had given - it back to him—dead. - </p> - <p> - What is there to say? Whatever he may have done, however far he may have - fallen, back of it all, through it all, bigger than himself, stronger than - any other bond was the railroading that was in his blood. Breen was a - railroad man. - </p> - <p> - I don’t know why, do I? You don’t know why, after Number Two had run to - schedule all that night, it happened just when it did. It might have - happened at some other time—but it didn’t. Luck or chance if you - like, more than that if you’d rather think of it in another way, but just - a few miles west of Coyote Bend something went wrong in the cab of Number - Two. Nothing much, I don’t remember now what it was, don’t know that I - ever knew, nothing much. Just enough to hold her back a few minutes, the - few minutes that let Breen sit in again on the night dispatcher’s trick, - sit in again at the key, hold down his old job once more before he quit - railroading forever with the order that he gave his life to send, to keep - Number Two from rushing to death and destruction against the rocks and - boulders Black Dempsey and his gang had piled across the track in the Cut - five miles east of Coyote Bend. - </p> - <p> - I don’t know. “If a man die, shall he live again?” I leave it to you. I - only know that they think a lot of him out here, think a lot of Breen, - “Angel” Breen—now. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - IV—SPITZER - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>pitzer was just - naturally born diffident. Sometimes that sort of thing wears off as one - grows older, sometimes it doesn’t. When it doesn’t, it is worse than the - most virulent disease—it had been virulent with Spitzer for all of - his twenty-two years. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer wasn’t much to look at, neither was he of much account on the Hill - Division. Some men rise to occasions, others don’t; as for Spitzer—well, - he was a snubby-nosed, peaked-faced, touzled-haired little fellow with - washed-out blue eyes that always seemed to carry around an apology in - their depths that their owner existed, and this idea was backed up a good - bit by Spitzer’s voice. Spitzer had a weak voice and that militated - against him. The ordinary voice of the ordinary man on the Hill Division - was not weak—it was assertive. Spitzer suffered thereby because - everybody crawled over him. Nobody thought anything of Spitzer. They all - knew him, of course, that is, those whose duties brought them within the - zone of Spitzer’s orbit, which was restricted to Big Cloud or, rather, to - the roundhouse at Big Cloud. Nobody ever gave him credit for courage - enough to call his soul his own. Even when it came to pay day he took his - check as though it was a mistake and that it really wasn’t meant for him. - He just dubbed along, doing his work day after day like a faithful dog, - only he was a hanged sight less obtrusive. Summed up in a word, Spitzer - ranked as a nonentity, physically, mentally, professionally. - </p> - <p> - Of course he never got ahead. He just kept on sweeping out the roundhouse - and puttering around playing bell-boy to every Tom, Dick and Harry that - lifted a finger at him. Year in, year out, he swept and wiped in the - roundhouse. As far as seniority went he was it, but when it came to - promotion he wasn’t. Promotion and Spitzer were so obviously, so - ostentatiously at variance with each other that no one ever thought of - such a thing. When there was a vacancy others got it. Spitzer saw them - move along, firing, driving spare, up to full-fledged regulars on the - right-hand side of the cabs, men that had started after he did; but - Spitzer still wiped and swept out the roundhouse. - </p> - <p> - Carleton, the super, called him a landmark, and that hit the bull’s-eye. - Summer, winter, fall, spring, good weather, bad weather, - five-foot-five-with-his-boots-on Spitzer, lugging a little tin - dinner-pail, trudged down Main Street in Big Cloud as regular as - clockwork, and reported at the roundhouse at precisely the same hour every - morning—five minutes of seven. Never a miss, never a slip—five - minutes of seven. The train crews got to setting their watches by him, and - the dispatchers wired the meteorological observatory every time their - chronometors didn’t tally—that is, tally with Spitzer—and the - meteorological crowd put Spitzer first across the tape every shot. - </p> - <p> - It was just the same at night, only then Spitzer went by the six o’clock - whistle. Ten hours a day, Sundays off—sometimes—wiping, - sweeping, sweeping, wiping, from his boarding-house to the roundhouse in - the morning, from the roundhouse to his boarding-house at night—that - was Spitzer, self-effaced, self-obliterated, innocuous, modest Spitzer. - </p> - <p> - Night times? Spitzer didn’t exist, there was no Spitzer—it wasn’t - expected of him! If any one had been asked they would have looked their - amazement, but then no one ever was asked—or asked, which is the - same thing the other way. Spitzer was like a tool laid away after the - day’s work and forgotten absolutely and profoundly until the following - morning. No one knew anything about Spitzer after the six o’clock whistle - blew, no one knew and cared less—that is, none of the railroad crowd - knew, and they, when all is said and done, were Big Cloud, they owned it, - ran it, absorbed it, and properly so, since Big Cloud was the divisional - point on the Hill Division. - </p> - <p> - In the ineffable perversity of things is the spice and variety of life. - Tommy Regan, the master mechanic, was a man not easily jolted, not easily - disturbed. He was very short, very broad, with little black eyes, and a - long, scraggly, drooping-at-the-corners, brown mustache. Also, he was - blessed with a well-defined, well-nourished paunch—which is a sign - irrefutable of contentment, a calm and placid outlook upon life in general - and particular, and a freedom from the ills of haste and worry. A man with - a paunch is a man apart and greatly to be envied, even when that paunch, - as was the case with Regan, is of Irish extraction, for then the - accompanying touch of Celtic temper makes him more like an ordinary, - cross-grained, irritable, everyday mortal and less of a temperamental - curiosity. Regan was justly proud of both—his paunch and his - nationality. Regan put it the other way—his nationality and his - paunch. That, however, is a matter for individual decision and the - relative importance of things is as one sees it; the main thing is that - one permitted him to use fiery words on occasion, and the other enabled - him to preserve, ordinarily, a much to be commended state of equanimity. - </p> - <p> - Perversity of perversities! It was Spitzer that jolted Regan—not - once, more than once. And before he got through, jolted him so hard that - Regan hasn’t got over the wonder of it yet. - </p> - <p> - “Think of it,” he’ll say, when the subject is brought up. “Think of it! - You know Spitzer, h’m? Well, <i>think</i> of it! SPITZER!” And if it’s - summer he’ll mop his beady brow, and if it’s winter he’ll twiddle his - thumbs with his fingers laced over his <i>embonpoint</i>, which is to say - over the lower button of his waistcoat. - </p> - <p> - Regan’s first jolt came to him one morning as, after a critical inspection - of his pets in the roundhouse—big six- and eight-wheeled mountain - engines—-he strolled out and leaned against the push-bar on the - turntable, mentally debating the respective merits of a rust-joint and a - straight patch as specifically applied to number 583 that had been run - into the shops the day before for repairs. - </p> - <p> - A figure emerged from the engine doors at the far end of the roundhouse - and came toward him. Regan’s eyes, attracted, barely glanced in that - direction, and then went down again in meditation, as he kicked a little - hole in the cinders with the toe of his boot—it was only Spitzer. - </p> - <p> - When he looked up again Spitzer was nearer, quite near. Spitzer had halted - before him and was standing there patiently, an embarrassed flush on his - cheeks, wiping his hands nervously on an exceedingly dirty piece of - packing which in his abstraction, for Spitzer was plainly abstracted, he - had picked up for a piece of waste. - </p> - <p> - “Huh!” said Regan, staring at Spitzer’s hands, “what you trying to do? - Black up for a minstrel show?” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer dropped the packing as though it had been a handful of thistles, - and rubbed his hands up and down the legs of his overalls. - </p> - <p> - “Well?” Regan invited. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer began to talk, rapidly, hurriedly—that is, his lips moved - rapidly, hurriedly. - </p> - <p> - Regan listened attentively and with a strained and hopeless expression, as - he strove to catch a word and hence the drift of Spitzer’s remarks. - </p> - <p> - “How?” he demanded, when he saw Spitzer was at an end. “Speak out, man. - You won’t wake the baby up.” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer began all over again. This time he did a little better. - </p> - <p> - “A dollar twenty-five,” repeated the master mechanic numbly. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer brightened visibly, and nodded. - </p> - <p> - Regan stared, bewildered and dumfounded. Gradually, impossible, - incomprehensible, incongruous as it appeared, it dawned on him that - Spitzer, even Spitzer, <i>Spitzer</i> was asking for a <i>raise!</i> - </p> - <p> - “A dollar twenty-five.” was all Regan could repeat over again, and the - words came away with a gasp. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer, misinterpreting the tone, his face grew rueful and full of - trouble. He was appalled at his own temerity in broaching the subject in - the first place, but now he had overstepped the bounds—he had asked - for too much! - </p> - <p> - “A dollar twenty,” he ventured, in timid compromise—Spitzer was - getting a dollar fifteen. - </p> - <p> - “How long you been working here?” inquired Regan, recovering a little and - beginning to get a grip on himself. - </p> - <p> - “Four years,” said Spitzer faintly. - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord!” mumbled Regan. “Four years. A dollar twenty-five, h’m? Well, - I dunno, I guess we can manage that.” And then, as a new thought suddenly - struck him: “What the blazes would <i>you</i> do with more money, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - But Spitzer only grinned sheepishly as, after murmuring his thanks, he - walked back and disappeared in the roundhouse. - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord!” muttered Regan, looking after him. - </p> - <p> - “Four years, and a dollar and a quarter, <i>and</i> Spitzer! Good Lord!” - </p> - <p> - Regan went around more or less dazed all that day. He ordered the patch on - 583 when he had definitely decided on the rust-joint as the best tonic for - the engine’s complaint, and he figured out how much one dollar and fifteen - cents a day came to for a year barring Sundays, then he did the same with - a dollar twenty-five as the multiplicand and compared the results. - Spitzer’s demand was not exorbitant, and it wasn’t much to upset any man—that - was just it—it was Spitzer, and Spitzer wasn’t much. Effect, - psychological or otherwise, is by no manner of means to be measured by the - mere magnitude of the cause, it is the phenomenal and unusual that is to - be treated with wholesome respect, and for safe handling requires a - double-tracked, block system with the cautionary signals up from start to - finish—the master mechanic found it that way anyhow, and he ought to - know. - </p> - <p> - He unburdened himself that night after supper to Carleton and a few of the - others over at division headquarters, which had been moved upstairs over - the station, where the chiefs used to meet regularly each evening for a - pipe, with a round of pedro thrown in to liven things up a bit—Big - Cloud not being blessed with many attractions in the amusement line. - </p> - <p> - Carleton grinned. - </p> - <p> - “Bad company,” he suggested. “Hard lot, that of yours over in the - roundhouse, Tommy. They’re spoiling his manners. Been a long time in - coming, but you know the old story of the water and the stone. What?” - </p> - <p> - “What in blazes would <i>he</i> do with more money?” inquired Spence, the - chief dispatcher, in unfeigned astonishment. - </p> - <p> - Regan glared disdainfully. He had put precisely the same question to - Spitzer himself, but since then he had been brushing up his mathematics. - </p> - <p> - “Do with it!” he choked. “Thirty dollars and eighty cents—<i>a year</i>. - Hell of a problem, ain’t it?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, you needn’t run off your schedule,” said Spence, a little tartly. - “You’re the one that’s making most of the fuss over it.” - </p> - <p> - “Tell you what, Tommy,” remarked Carleton, still grinning, “you want to - look out for Spitzer from now on. I guess his emancipation has begun—nothing - like a start. Before you know it he’ll be running roughshod over the - motive power department, including the master mechanic.” - </p> - <p> - “I give him the raise,” said Regan, more to himself than aloud. “‘Twas - coming to him, what? Four years, and the first time I ever heard a yip out - of him.” - </p> - <p> - “You’ll hear more,” prophesied Carleton; “even if he doesn’t talk very - loud.” - </p> - <p> - “Think so?” said Regan, puckering up his eyes. - </p> - <p> - “I do,” said Carleton. - </p> - <p> - And Regan did. - </p> - <p> - Not at once, not for several weeks. But in the meantime a change came over - Spitzer. He swept and wiped and reported at five minutes of seven every - morning and kept himself just as much in the background, just as much out - of everybody’s way, just as unobtrusive as he had before, but Spitzer was - none the less changed. - </p> - <p> - It began the day after he got his raise. It was an indefinite, elusive, - negative sort of a change, not the kind you could lay your hand on and - describe in so many words. Regan tried to, and gave it up. The nearest he - came to anything concrete was one day when he came around the tail-end of - a tender and, unexpectedly, upon Spitzer. Spitzer was sweeping as usual, - but Spitzer was also whistling—which was not usual. Regan, it is - true, couldn’t puzzle very much out of that, but then Regan had his - limitations. - </p> - <p> - Mindful of Carleton’s words, Regan kept his eye in a mildly curious kind - of a way on the little faded, blueeyed drudge, and as he noticed the first - change without being able to define it, he now, after a week or so, - noticed a second, with the difference that this time the diagnosis was - painfully obvious—Spitzer’s return to Spitzer’s normal self. Spitzer - stopped whistling. - </p> - <p> - Regan began to catch Spitzer’s eyes fixed on him with a hesitating, - irresolute, anxious gaze about every time he entered the roundhouse. And - though he didn’t quite grasp it, something of the truth came to him. - Spitzer was screwing up his courage to the sticking point preparatory to - another step onward in his belated march toward emancipation. - </p> - <p> - It was a month to the day from the first interview when Spitzer tackled - the master mechanic again, and as before, out by the turntable in front of - the roundhouse, and, if anything, in a manner even more nervous and ill at - ease than on the former occasion. He stammered once or twice in an effort - to begin—and his effort was utter failure. - </p> - <p> - Regan eyed him in profound distrust. Once in four years wasn’t so much, - and after all, even Spitzer, now that the shock was over, might be - expected to do that. But again in a month—and from Spitzer! - Something was wrong—perhaps Carleton was right. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” he snapped, “you got your raise. Ain’t you satisfied?” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer nodded dumbly. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, what’s the matter with you if you’re satisfied?” exploded the - master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - “I want to get———” the last word trailed off into - tremulous, quavering incoherency. - </p> - <p> - “You want to get what?” growled Regan. “Don’t sputter as though you’d - swallowed your teeth. What is it you want to get?” - </p> - <p> - “Firing,” blurted Spitzer after a desperate struggle. - </p> - <p> - Regan gasped for his breath. Spitzer! SPITZER—in a cab! He couldn’t - have heard straight. - </p> - <p> - “Say it again,” whispered the master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - “Firing,” repeated Spitzer, with more confidence now that the plunge was - taken. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Regan weakly to himself. “That’s it. I got it right—firing! - He wants to get <i>firing!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “I—I can do it,” faltered Spitzer. “I got to.” - </p> - <p> - “Eh? What’s that?” said Regan. “You got to? Say, you, Spitzer, what the - devil’s the matter with you anyway?” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer wriggled like a worm on a hook, and his face went the color of a - semaphore arm—a deep red one. Spitzer was suffering acutely. - </p> - <p> - “Well, well,” prodded Regan. “Release the air! Take the brakes off!” - </p> - <p> - “I’m,” began Spitzer shamefacedly, “I’m———” He gulped - down his Adam’s apple hard, twice, and then it came away with a rush: “I’m - going to get married to Merla Swenson.” - </p> - <p> - Regan’s jaw sagged like the broken limb of a tree, and his eyes fairly - popped out and hung down over the roll of his cheeks. Then gradually, very - gradually, he began to double up and unhandsome contortions afflicted his - facial muscles. Spitzer! Spitzer was enough! But Spitzer <i>and</i> Merla - Swenson! Six-foot-heavy-boned-long-armed Swedish-maiden Merla! Oh, - contrariety, variety, perversity of life! - </p> - <p> - “Haw!” he roared suddenly. “Haw, haw! Haw, haw, haw!” And again—only - louder. The turner and a helper or two poked their noses out of the - roundhouse doors to get a line on the disturbance. - </p> - <p> - Can a stone float? Can a feather sink? Astonishing, bewildering, - dumfounding, impossible, oh, yes; but it was also very funny. It was the - funniest thing that Regan had ever heard in his life. - </p> - <p> - “Haw, haw!” he screamed. “Ho, ho! Haw, haw!” - </p> - <p> - His paunch shook like jelly, and he held both hands to his sides to ease - the pain. He straightened up preparatory to going off into another burst - of guffaws, and then, with his mouth already opened to begin, he stopped - as though he had been stunned. Spitzer was still standing before him, and - Spitzer’s head was turned away, but Regan caught it, caught the two big - tears that rolled slowly down the grimy cheeks. And in that moment he - realized what neither he nor any other man on the Hill Division had ever - realized before—that Spitzer, too, was <i>human</i>. - </p> - <p> - Regan coughed, choked, and cleared his throat. Here was Spitzer in a new - light, but the Spitzer of years was not so readily to be consigned to the - background of oblivion. Spitzer in a cab was as much an anomaly as ever, - conjugal aspirations to the contrary. - </p> - <p> - “Firing?” said he, with grave consideration that he meant, by contrast, - should serve as palliation for the sting of his mirth. “Firing? I’m afraid - not. You’re not fit for it. You’re not big enough.” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer dashed his hands across his eyes. - </p> - <p> - “I <i>can</i> fire,” he announced with a surprising show of spirit, “an’ I - <i>got</i> to. There’s smaller ones than me doing it.” - </p> - <p> - “What do you mean by ‘got to’?” demanded the master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer shifted uneasily and kicked at the ground. - </p> - <p> - “Merla an’ me’s been making up for quite a while,” he stammered: “but she - wouldn’t say nothing one way or the other till I got a raise.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, you got it,” said Regan. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer nodded miserably. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, an’ now she says ‘tain’t enough to get married on, an’—an’ - we’ll have to wait till I get firing.” - </p> - <p> - “Good Lord!” murmured Regan, and he mopped his brow in deep perplexity. - The destiny of mortals was in his hands—but so was the motive power - department of the Hill Division. He could no more see Spitzer in a cab - than he could see the time-honored camel passing through the eye of a - needle. Then inspiration came to him. - </p> - <p> - “Look here, Spitzer,” said he, soothingly. “There ain’t any use talking - about firing, and I ain’t going to let you build up any false hopes. But - I’ll tell you what, you don’t need to feel glum about it. She loves you, - don’t she?” - </p> - <p> - Spitzer’s lips moved. - </p> - <p> - “H’m?” inquired Regan solicitously, bending forward. - </p> - <p> - “Yes; she says she does,” repeated Spitzer in thin tones. - </p> - <p> - “Yes; well then, when you know women, and as much about ‘em as I do, - you’ll know that nothing else counts—nothing but the love, I mean. - It’s their nature, and they’re all alike. That’s the way it is with all of - ‘em”—Regan waved his hand expansively. - </p> - <p> - “It’ll be all right. You’ll see. She won’t hold out on that line.” - </p> - <p> - Some men profit much by little experience, others profit little by much - experience. Spitzer, possibly, had had little, very little, but the - dejected droop of his shoulders, as he started back for the roundhouse, - intimated that in the matter of knowledge as applied to the eternal - feminine he was perhaps, in so far as it lay between himself and the - master mechanic, the better qualified of the two to speak. And that, - certainly, when concretely applied, which is to say applied to Merla - Swenson. - </p> - <p> - Regan couldn’t have kept the story back to save his life, and it didn’t - take long for the division to get it. They all got it—train crews - and engine crews on way freights, stray freights, locals, extras and - regulars, the staff, the shop hands, the track-walkers and the section - gangs down to the last car-tink. At first the division looked incredulous, - then it grinned, and then it howled, and its howl was the one word - “Spitzer!” with seventeen exclamation points after it to make the tempo - and rhythm hang out in a manner befitting and commensurate with the - occasion. - </p> - <p> - It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good. Dutchy Damrosch did the business - of his life—he did more business than he had ever dreamed of doing - in his wildest flights of imagination, for Dutchy had the lunch counter - rights at Big Cloud. What’s that got to do with Spitzer and his marital - ambition? Well, a whole lot! Merla Swenson was second girl in Dutchy’s - establishment, and Merla was the “fee-ancy” of Spitzer—which was a - rotten bad pun of Spider Kelly’s, the conductor, and due more to the - brogue-like twist of his tongue than to any malice aforethought. - </p> - <p> - To see any girl that was in love with Spitzer was worth the price of - coffee and sinkers any old time. The lunch counter took on the air of a - dime museum, and the visitors questioned Merla anxiously, a little - suspicious that after all there might be a nigger in the woodpile - somewhere in the shape of a “frame-up” with the hoax on themselves. - </p> - <p> - Merla settled all doubts on that score. Unruffled, calmly, stoically, - dispassionately she answered the same question fifty times a day, and each - time in the same way. - </p> - <p> - “Yah, I ban love Spitzer,” was her infallible reply, in a tone that made - the bare possibility that she could have done anything else seem the very - acme of absurdity. Merla’s inflexion struck deep at the root of things - inevitable. - </p> - <p> - After that there was nothing to be said. A few, very few, and as the days - went by their numbers thinned with amazing rapidity, had the temerity to - snicker audibly. They only did it once, as with arms akimbo and hands on - hips Merla advanced to the edge of the counter with a look in her - steadfast, blue eyes, that was far from inviting, and inquired: “Him ban - goot mans, I tank?” - </p> - <p> - It was put in the form of a question, it is true, but the “put” was of - such cold uncompromise that the result was always the same. The offender - hastily buried his nose in his coffee-cup, dug for a dime to square his - account—with Dutchy—and made for the platform. - </p> - <p> - This was all very well, but unless Regan died and some one with a little - less—or a little more, depending on how you look at it—imagination - took his place, Spitzer’s chances of getting into a cab were as good as - ever, which is to say that they were about as good as the goodness of a - plugged nickel. And the trouble was that, as far as Spitzer could see, the - master mechanic wasn’t sprouting out with any visible signs of premature - decay. Furthermore, as he had suspicioned and now discovered, Regan <i>wasn’t</i> - the last word on women; not, perhaps, that Merla put firing before love, - only she was uncommonly strong on firing. Spitzer was unhappy. - </p> - <p> - All things come to those who wait, they say. So they do, perhaps; but the - way of their coming is sometimes not to be understood or fathomed. The - story of a man who fell from the eighteenth story window of an office - building, and, incidentally, broke his neck has no place here except in a - general way. A friend who took a passing interest in the event was curious - enough to investigate the cause, and he traced it back step by step, - logically, surely, inevitably, beyond the possibility of refutation, to - the fact that the second hook from the top on the back of the man’s wife’s - dress—not the man’s dress, the dress of the man’s wife—was - missing on the morning of the day of his untimely decease. The man—not - the man’s friend—was an inventor. But no matter. It just shows. - Regan being still alive, the chances are better than a thousand to one - that Spitzer would have known a cold and forlorn old age, as Robert Louis - puts it, and Merla would never have had a second edition of herself if it - hadn’t been for a few measly, unripe crab-apples. What? Yes, that’s it—crab-apples. - That’s the way Spitzer got where he is to-day—just crab-apples. - Funny how things happen sometimes when you come to think of it, isn’t it? - Spitzer and the man who broke his neck aren’t the only ones who’ve had - their ups and downs that way, not by several. There isn’t any moral to - this except that here and there you’ll find a man who isn’t as, modest - about his own ability as he ought to be! - </p> - <p> - Spitzer’s nocturnal habits, that were a matter of so much unconcern and of - which the railroad crowd at Big Cloud were so densely in ignorance, have a - part in this. The truth is that between the lunch-counter and the station - is the baggage and freight-shed, and behind the freight-shed it is very - dark; and also, not less pertinent, is the fact that Merla was possessed - of no other quarters than those shared by her sister-inarms in Dutchy’s - employ—which were neither propitious nor commodious. Hence—but - the connection is obvious. - </p> - <p> - On Merla’s night off at eight o’clock, Spitzer sneaked down through the - fields and across the platform, weather permitting, and on those nights - Merla donned her bonnet “for a walk”—at the same hour. When the - station-clock struck ten and, coincidentally, Number One’s mellow chime - sounded down the gorge, Merla retraced her steps to the upstairs rear of - the lunch-counter, and Spitzer retraced his across the platform to the - fields in the direction of the town and his boarding-house; only, of late, - Spitzer had taken to lingering on the platform way up at the far end where - it was also very dark and equally as deserted. - </p> - <p> - Here he would gaze wistfully at the big mogul with valves popping and the - steam drumming at her gauges, as she waited on the siding just in front of - him—‘Big Cloud being a divisional point where the engines were - changed—to back down onto Number One for the first stretch of the - mountain run—Burke’s run with 503, and big Jim MacAloon looking - after the shovel end of it. - </p> - <p> - There wasn’t anything novel in the sight, but it didn’t seem to strike - Spitzer as monotonous although, when it was all over and he watched the - vanishing tail lights, he always sighed. It was just the same performance - each time. Ten minutes or so before Number One, westbound, was due, - MacAloon would run 503 out of the roundhouse, over the turntable, up the - line, and back onto the siding. Then Burke would appear on the scene, - light a torch, and poke around with a long-spouted oil can. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer would usually reach his position up the platform in time to see - the engineer’s final jab with the torch between the drivers or into the - link-motion before swinging himself through the gangway into the cab, as - the Limited with snapping trucks and screeching brake-shoes rolled into - the station; but one night it fell out a little differently. The station - clock had struck ten, Merla had hastened to her domicile, and Spitzer to - the far end of the platform as usual, but Number One was late. - </p> - <p> - Suddenly Spitzer jumped and his heart seemed to shoot into his mouth. - There was a wild, piercing scream of agony. It came again. The blood left - Spitzer’s cheeks. He saw Burke fly around the end of the pilot, the torch - dancing in his hand, and make for the cab. Spitzer involuntarily leaped - from the platform to the track and ran in the same direction, then the - safety-valve popped with a terrific roar, drowning out all other sounds. - He clambered cautiously into the cab. On the floor MacAloon was going - through a performance that would have beggared the efforts of a writhing - python, and the while he groaned and yelled. - </p> - <p> - As Spitzer watched, Burke, who was bending over MacAloon with an anxious - face, suddenly reached forward and picked up a little round object that - rolled from the pocket of the fireman’s jumper, then another and another. - Spitzer instinctively craned forward, and in so doing attracted Burke’s - notice for the first time. Burke’s look of anxiety gave way to a grin and - he held out the objects to Spitzer, just as if it wasn’t Spitzer at all - but an ordinary man—humor, like death, is a great leveler, but no - matter, let that go. Burke held them out to Spitzer, Spitzer took them, - and even Spitzer grinned. It didn’t need any doctor to diagnose MacAloon’s - complaint—and the complaint wasn’t poetic! Cramps, old-fashioned, - unadulterated cramps—just plain cramps and green crab-apples! Some - things lay a man out worse perhaps—but there aren’t many. - </p> - <p> - Burke’s grin didn’t last long, for at that moment came Number One’s long, - clear siren note, and back over the tender a streak of light shot out in a - wide circle from around a butte and then danced along the rails and began - to light up the platform, as the Limited thundered, five minutes late, - into the straight stretch. - </p> - <p> - “Holy fishplates!” yelled Burke. “I’ve got to get a man to fire. Spitzer, - you run like hell to the roundhouse and——” - </p> - <p> - Burke stopped. Spitzer stopped him. There are moments in everybody’s life - when they rise above themselves, above habit, above environment, above - everything, if even for only a brief instant. A chance like this would - never come again. If he could fire one trip maybe Regan would change his - mind. Spitzer grasped at it frantically, despairingly. - </p> - <p> - “Burke, I <i>can</i> fire,” he fairly screamed. “Give me a chance, Burke. - I’ll never get one if you don’t.” Burke gasped for a moment like a man - with his breath knocked out of him, then something like a dry chuckle - sounded in his throat. No one knows but Burke what decided him. It might - have been either of two things, or a combination of them both—Spitzer’s - pleading face, or the desire to take a rise out of Regan—Burke and - Regan not having been on the best of terms since the last general - elections. Be that as it may, Burke pointed at the squirming fireman. - “Take his feet,” he grunted. - </p> - <p> - Together they lifted and dragged the stricken Mac-Aloon out of the cab and - to the ground. 1108, pulling Number One, had come to a stop abreast of - them by now, and Burke shouted at the engine crew. - </p> - <p> - “Here!” he bawled. “Lend a hand!” - </p> - <p> - And as both men stuck their heads out of the gangway, he and Spitzer - boosted the fireman up to them. - </p> - <p> - “Got cramps,” explained Burke tersely. “You’ll be able to fix him up in - the roundhouse. Five minutes late, h’m? Well, hurry, you’re clear. There’s - your ‘go-ahead.’ Pull out and let me get hold.” - </p> - <p> - Burke turned to Spitzer, as 1108 slipped away from the baggage-car and - moved up the track, and pointed to the gangway of his own engine. - </p> - <p> - “Get in,” he said grimly. “You’ll get a chance to fire, and, take it from - me, you’ll never get a chance to do that or anything else again this side - of the happy hunting-grounds, my bucko, if you throw me down.” - </p> - <p> - And while Regan quarreled amiably over a game of pedro upstairs in the - station with Carleton, 503, with Spitzer, touzled-haired, mild-eyed, - heart-beating-like-a-trip-hammer Spitzer, in the cab, backed down on the - Imperial Limited and coupled on for the mountain run. There was a quick - testing of the “air,” a hurried running up and down the platform, and then - Burke, leaning from the window with his arms stretched out inside the cab - and fingers on the throttle, opened a notch, and the platform began to - slide past them. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer wrinkled his face and stared at the gauge needle—two hundred - and ten pounds, all the way, all the time—two hundred and ten - pounds. It was up to him. With a jerk of the chain, he swung the furnace - door wide and a shovelful of coal shot, neatly scattered, over the grate. - </p> - <p> - There is art in all things; there is the quintessence of art in the - prosaic and laborious task of firing an engine. Spitzer was not without - art, for in a way he had had years of experience; but banking a fire in - the roundhouse, and nursing a roaring pit of flame to its highest degree - of efficiency in a swaying, lurching cab, are two different and distinct - operations that are in no way to be confounded. 503 began to lurch and - sway. Notch by notch Burke was opening her out, and the bark of her - exhaust was coming like the quick crackle of a gatling. Five minutes late - in the mountains on a time schedule already marked up to a dizzy height - that called for more chances than the passengers paid for is—well, - it’s five minutes, just <i>five minutes</i>, that’s all. Some men would - have left it for the Pacific Division crowd the next day on a level track - and a straight sweep—but not Burke. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer’s initiation was in ample form and he got the full benefit of all - the rites and ceremonies with every detail of the ritual worked in—and - no favors shown. So far all was well, the rough country was all in front - of the pilot, and Spitzer was all business. His pulse was beating in tune - to only one thing—the dancing needle on the gauge. Again he swung - the door open, and the red flare lighted up the heavens and played on - features that Regan would never have known for Spitzer’s—they were - set, grim and determined, covered with little sweat beads that glistened - like diamonds. The singing sweep of the wind was in his ears as he poised - his shovel. There was a sickening slur. 503 shot round a tangent—and - the shovelful of coal shot like bullets all over the cab, and, including - Burke, hit about everything in sight but the objective point aimed at. - Simultaneously, Spitzer promptly performed a gyration that resembled - something like a back hand-spring and landed well up on the tender, to - roll back to the floor of the cab again with an accompanying avalanche of - coal. - </p> - <p> - He picked himself up and glanced apprehensively at the engineer. There was - not a scowl, not even a grin on Burke’s face, just an encouraging flirt of - the hand—but the flirt was momentous. Wise and full of guile was - Burke, for with that little act Spitzer, biblically speaking, girded up - his loins and got his second wind. - </p> - <p> - They were well into the foothills now, and the right of way was an amazing - wonder. Diving, twisting, curving, it circled and bored and trestled its - way, and buttes, canons, gorges and coulees roared past like flights of - fancy. - </p> - <p> - The speed was terrific. To Spitzer it was all a wild, mad medley of things - he had never known before, of things that had neither beginning nor end. - The giddy slew as the big mountain racer hit the curves, the crunching - grind of the flanges as for an instant she lifted from her wheel-base, the - pitch, the roll, the staggering reel, the gasp for breath, the beat of the - trucks, the whir of the racing drivers, the rush of the wind, the echoing - thunder of the flying coaches behind—it was all there, all separate, - all welded into one, a creation, new, vernal, life, the life of the rail, - that beat at his eardrums and quickened the pounding throb of his heart. - </p> - <p> - At first, from time to time, Burke leaned over his levers to glance at the - pressure gauge, but after a bit he crouched a little further forward in - his seat and his eyes held on the track ahead where the beam of the - electric headlight flooded the glittering ribbons of steel. He was getting - what MacAloon or no other man had ever given him before—two hundred - and ten pounds <i>all</i> the way. SPITZER was firing Number One, the - Imperial Limited, westbound, on the mountain run, <i>three</i> minutes - late! - </p> - <p> - The sweat was rolling in streams from the little fellow now, and he clung - in the gangway for a moment’s breathing spell, leaning out, staring ahead - at a few shining lights in the distance. Came the hoarse scream of the - whistle, the clattering crash as they shattered the yard switches, a - blurred vision of dark outlines dotted with tiny scintillating points, and - station, yard, lights, switches and all were behind him. - </p> - <p> - Spitzer drew his sleeve across his forehead, and turned again to his work - as they thundered over a long steel trestle—Thief Creek. Spitzer - knew the road well enough at second hand, if not from personal experience. - Just ahead was The Pass—Sucker Pass—straight enough for its - quarter-mile stretch, but where the rock walls rose up on either side so - close as to almost scratch the paint off the rolling stock. Eased for a - moment in scant deference to switches and trestle just passed, Spitzer - felt the forward leap of the racer as Burke threw her wide open again. He - bent for his shovel—and then, quick as the winking of an eye, sudden - as doom, came a tearing, rending crash, a scream from Burke, and the - right-hand side of the cab seemed literally torn in two. - </p> - <p> - A flying piece of woodwork that struck him across the eyes, a terrific - jolt as the engine lifted and fell back, sent Spitzer headlong to the - floor of the cab. Dazed, half mad with the pain, the blood streaming from - his forehead, he staggered to his feet. Burke lay coiled in an inert heap - just in front of him by the furnace door. A whizzing piece of steel rose - up, crunched, slithered, gashed a track of ruin for itself, and was gone. - It had missed Burke only by a hair’s-breadth—next time there might - not be even that limit of safety. With a cry, Spitzer leaped forward and - dragged the unconscious engineer across the cab. Again the jolt, the slur, - the stagger, the desperate wrench. It seemed like years, like eternity to - Spitzer. He was living a lifetime in the passing of a second—it had - been no more than that, no more than two or three at most. - </p> - <p> - There are some things worse, much worse, in railroading than a broken - crank-pin and a rod amuck, but not when it comes in The Pass, where - derailment at their racing speed spelt death, quick and sudden. There was - just one chance for the trailing string of coaches, just one for every - last soul aboard—Spitzer. But between Spitzer and the throttle and - the air-latch was a thing of steel that rose and fell, now swinging a - splintering, murderous arc through the shattered side of the cab, now - grinding into the ties land roadbed, threatening with every revolution to - pitch 503 and the train behind her headlong from the rails to crumple like - flimsy egg-shells against the narrow rocky walls that lined The Pass. Just - one chance for the train crew and passengers—<i>just one in a - thousand for Spitzer</i>. And little five-foot-five Spitzer, diffident, - retiring, self-effaced, unobtrusive Spitzer, with a dry, choking sob in - his throat, flung himself forward to stop the train. His hands clutched - desperately at the levers, there was a hiss, the vicious eventualities, - and that’s the way it was with about nine hundred and ninety-nine out of - every thousand colonists. The company, of course, did take <i>some</i> - risk—they took a chance on the one-thousandth man. The company had - sporting blood. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - V—SHANLEY’S LUCK - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>f Shanley had only - known what was going to happen, he could have saved some of his money on - that ticket. As it stands now, he has still got transportation coming to - him from Little Dance on the Hill Division to Bubble Creek, B. C. That may - be an asset, or it may not—Shanley never asked for it. - </p> - <p> - Third class, colonist, no stop over allowed, redhaired, freckle-faced, an - uptilt to the nose, a jaw as square as the side of a house, shoulders like - a bull’s, and a fist that would fell an ox—that was Shanley. That - was Shanley until the sprung rail that ditched the train at Little Dance - caused him the loss of two things—his erstwhile status in the - general passenger agent’s department, and a well-beloved and reeking - brier. - </p> - <p> - Both were lost forever—his status partly on account of the reasons - before mentioned, and partly because Shanley wasn’t particularly - interested in Bubble Creek; his brier because it became a part, an - integral part, of that memorable wreck, as Shanley, who was peacefully - smoking in the front-end compartment of the colonist coach when the - trouble happened, left the pipe behind while he catapulted through the - open door—it was summer and sizzling hot—and landed, a very - much dazed, bewildered, but not otherwise hurt Shanley, halfway up the - embankment on the off side of a scene of most amazing disorder. - </p> - <p> - The potentialties that lie in a sprung rail are something to marvel at. Up - ahead, the engine had promptly turned turtle, and, as promptly giving vent - to its displeasure at the indignity heaped upon it, had incased itself in - an angry, hissing cloud of steam; behind, the baggage and mail cars seemed - to have vied with each other in affectionate regard for the tender. Only - the brass-polished, nickel-plated Pullmans at the rear still held the - rails; the rest was just a crazy, slewed-edge-ways, up-canted, - toppled-over string of cars, already beginning to smoke as the flames - licked into them. - </p> - <p> - The shouts of those who had made their escape, the screams of those still - imprisoned within the wreckage, the sight of others crawling through the - doors and windows brought Shanley back to his senses. He rose to his feet, - blinked furiously, as was his habit on all untoward occasions, and the - next instant he was down the embankment and into the game—to begin - his career as a railroad man. That’s where he started—in the wreck - at Little Dance. - </p> - <p> - In and out of the blazing pyre, after a woman or a child; the crash of his - ax through splintering woodwork; the scorching heat; prying away some poor - devil wedged down beneath the débris; tinkling glass as the heat cracked - the windows or he beat through a pane with his fist—it was all hazy, - all a dream to Shanley as, hours afterward, a grim, gaunt figure with - blackened, bleeding face, his clothes hanging in ribbons, he rode into the - Big Cloud yards on the derrick car. - </p> - <p> - Some men would have hit up the claim agent for a stake; Shanley hit up - Carleton for a job. But for modesty’s sake, previous to presenting himself - before the superintendent’s desk, he borrowed from one of the wrecking - crew the only available article of wearing apparel at hand—a very - dirty and disreputable pair of overalls. Dirty and disreputable, but—whole. - </p> - <p> - “I want a job, Mr. Carleton,” said he bluntly, when he had gained - admittance to the super. - </p> - <p> - “You do, eh?” replied Carleton, looking him up and down. “You do, eh? - You’re a pretty hard-looking nut, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - Shanley blinked, but, being painfully aware that he undoubtedly did look - all if not more than that, and being, too, not quite sure what to make of - the super, he contented himself with the remark: - </p> - <p> - “I ain’t a picture, I suppose.” - </p> - <p> - “H’m!” said Carleton. “Been up at the wreck, I hear—what?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Shanley shortly. No long story, no tale of what he’d done, no - anything—just “Yes,” and that was what caught Carleton. - </p> - <p> - “What can you do?” demanded the super. - </p> - <p> - “Anything. I’m not fussy,” replied Chanley. - </p> - <p> - “H’m!” said Carleton. “You don’t look it.” And he favored Shanley with - another prolonged stare. - </p> - <p> - Shanley, at first uncomfortable, shifted nervously from one foot to the - other; then, as the stare continued, he began to get irritated. - </p> - <p> - “Look here,” he flung out suddenly. “I ain’t on exhibition. I come for a - job. I ain’t got any letters of recommendation from pastors of churches in - the East. I ain’t got anything. My name’s Shanley, an’ I haven’t even got - anything to prove <i>that</i>.” - </p> - <p> - “You’ve got your nerve,” said Carleton, leaning back in his swivel chair - and tucking a thumb in the armhole of his vest. “Ever worked on a - railroad?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” answered Shanley, a little less assertively, as he saw his chances - of a job vanishing into thin air, and already regretting his hasty speech—a - few odd nickels wasn’t a very big stake for a man starting out in a new - country, and that represented the sum total of Shanley’s worldly wealth. - “No, I never worked on a railroad.” - </p> - <p> - “H’m,” continued Carleton. “Well, my friend, you can report to the - trainmaster in the morning and tell him I said to put you on breaking. Get - out!” - </p> - <p> - It came so suddenly and unexpectedly that it took Shanley’s breath. - Carleton’s ways were not Shanley’s ways, or ways that Shanley by any - peradventure had been accustomed to. A moment before he wouldn’t have - exchanged one of his nickels for his chances of a job, therefore his reply - resolved itself into a sheepish grin; moreover—but of this hereafter—Shanley - back East was decidedly more in the habit of having his applications - refused with scant ceremony than he was to receiving favorable - consideration, which was another reason for his failure to rise to the - occasion with appropriate words of thanks. - </p> - <p> - Incidentally, Shanley, like a select few of his fellow creatures, had his - failings; concretely, his particular strayings from the straight and - narrow way, not having been hidden under a bushel, were responsible, with - the advice and assistance of a distant relative or two—advice being - always cheap, and assistance, in this case, a marked-down bargain—for - his migration to the West, as far West as the funds in hand would take him—Bubble - Creek, B. C, the distant relatives saw to that. They bought the ticket. - </p> - <p> - Shanley, still smiling sheepishly and in obedience to the super’s - instruction to “get out,” was halfway to the door when Carleton halted - him. - </p> - <p> - “Shanley!” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, sir?” said Shanley, finding his voice and swinging around. - </p> - <p> - “Got any money?” - </p> - <p> - Shanley’s hand mechanically dove through the overalls and rummaged in the - pocket of his torn and ribboned trousers—the pocket had not been - spared—the nickels, every last one of them, were gone. The look on - his face evidently needed no interpretation. - </p> - <p> - Carleton was holding out two bills—two tens. - </p> - <p> - “Cleaned out, eh? Well, I wouldn’t blame any one if they asked you for - your board bill in advance. Here, I guess you’ll need this. You can pay it - back later on. There’s a fellow keeps a clothing store up the street that - it wouldn’t do you any harm to visit—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - With gratitude in his heart and the best of resolutions exuding from every - pore—he was always long on resolutions—Shanley being - embarrassed, and therefore awkward, made a somewhat ungraceful exit from - the super’s presence. - </p> - <p> - But neither gratitude nor resolutions, even of steelplate, double-riveted - variety, are of much avail against circumstances and conditions over which - one has absolutely, undeniably, and emphatically no control. If - Dinkelman’s clothing emporium had occupied a site between the station and - MacGuire’s Blazing Star saloon, instead of the said Blazing Star saloon - occupying that altogether inappropriate position itself, and if Spider - Kelly, the conductor of the wrecked train, had not run into Shanley before - he had fairly got ten yards from the super’s office, things undoubtedly - would have been very different. Shanley took that view of it afterward, - and certainly he was justified. It is on record that he had no hand in the - laying out of Big Cloud nor in the control of its real estate, rentals, or - leases. - </p> - <p> - Railroad men are by no stretch of the imagination to be regarded as hero - worshipers, but if a man does a decent thing they are not averse to - telling him so. Shanley had done several very decent things at the wreck. - Spider Kelly invited him into the Blazing Star. - </p> - <p> - Shanley demurred. “I’ve got to get some clothes,” he explained. - </p> - <p> - “Get ‘em afterward,” said Kelly; “plenty of time. Come on; it’s just - supper-time, and there’ll be a lot of the boys in there. They’ll be glad - to meet you. If you’re hungry you’ll find the best free layout on the - division. There’s nothing small about MacGuire.” - </p> - <p> - Shanley hesitated, and, proverbially, was lost. - </p> - <p> - An intimate and particular description of the events of that night are on - no account to be written. They would not have shocked, surprised, or - astonished Shanley’s distant relatives—but everybody is not a - distant relative. Shanley remembered it in spots—only in spots. He - fought and whipped Spider Kelly, who was a much bigger man than himself, - and thereby cemented an undying friendship; he partook of the hospitality - showered upon him and returned it with a lavish hand—as long as - Carleton’s twenty lasted; he made speeches, many of them, touching wrecks - and the nature of wrecks and his own particular participation therein—which - was seemly, since at the end, about three o’clock in the morning, he slid - with some dignity under the table, and, with the fond belief that he was - once more clutching an ax and doing heroic and noble service, wound his - arms grimly, remorselessly, tenaciously, like an octopus, around the table - leg—and slept. - </p> - <p> - MacGuire before bolting the front door studied the situation carefully, - and left him there—for the sake of the table. - </p> - <p> - The sunlight next morning was not charitable to Shanley. Where yesterday - he had borne the marks of one wreck, he now bore the marks of two—his - own on top of the company’s. Up the street Dinkelman’s clothing emporium - flaunted a canvas sign announcing unusual bargains in men’s apparel. This - seemed to Shanley an unkindly act that could be expressed in no better - terms than “rubbing it in.” He gazed at the sign with an aggrieved - expression on his face, blinked furiously, and started, with a step that - lacked something of assurance, for the railroad yards and the - trainmaster’s office. - </p> - <p> - He was by no means confident of the reception that awaited him. If there - is one characteristic over and above any other that is common to human - nature, it is the faculty, though that’s rather an imposing word, of - worrying like sin over something that <i>may</i> happen—but never - does. Shanley might just as well have saved himself the mental worry anent - the trainmaster’s possible attitude. He did not report to the trainmaster - that morning, never saw that gentleman until long, very long afterward. - Instead, he reported to Carleton—at the latter’s urgent solicitation - in the shape of a grinning call-boy, who intercepted his march of progress - toward the station. - </p> - <p> - “Hi, you, there, cherub face!” bawled the urchin politely. “The super - wants you—on the hop!” - </p> - <p> - Shanley stopped short, and, resorting to his favorite habit, blinked. - </p> - <p> - “Carleton. Get it? Carleton,” repeated the messenger, evidently by no - means sure that he was thoroughly understood; and then, for a parting shot - as he sailed gayly up the street: “Gee, but you’re pretty!” - </p> - <p> - Carleton! Shanley had forgotten all about Carleton for the moment. His - hand instinctively went into his pocket—and then he groaned. He - remembered Carleton. But worst of all, he remembered Carleton’s twenty. - </p> - <p> - There were two courses open to him. He could sneak out of town with all - possible modesty and dispatch, or he could face the music. Not that - Shanley debated the question—the occasion had never yet arisen when - he hadn’t faced the music—he simply experienced the temptation to - “crawl,” that was all. - </p> - <p> - “It looks to me,” he ruminated ruefully, “as though I was up against it - for fair. Just my luck, just my blasted luck, always the same kind of - luck, that’s what. ‘Tain’t my fault neither, is it? I ain’t responsible - for that darned wreck—if ‘twasn’t for that I wouldn’t be here. An’ - Kelly, Spider he said his name was, if ‘twasn’t for him I wouldn’t be here - neither. What the blazes did <i>I</i> have to do with it? I always have to - stand for the other cuss. That’s me every time, I guess. An’ that’s - logic.” - </p> - <p> - It was. Neither was there any flaw in it as at first sight might appear, - for the last test of logic is its power of conviction. Shanley, from being - a man with some reasonable cause for qualms of conscience, became, in his - own mind, one deeply sinned against, one injured and crushed down by the - load of others he was forced to bear. - </p> - <p> - He explained this to Carleton while the thought of his burning wrongs was - still at white heat, and before the super had a chance to get in a word. - He began as he opened the office door, continued as he crossed the room, - and finished as he stood before the super’s desk. - </p> - <p> - The scowl that had settled on Carleton’s face, as he looked up at the - other’s entrance, gradually gave way to a hint of humor lurking around the - corners of his mouth, and he leaned back in his chair and listened with an - exaggerated air of profound attention. - </p> - <p> - “Just so, just so,” said he, when Shanley finally came to a breathless - halt. “Now perhaps you will allow <i>me</i> to say a word. It may not have - occurred to you that I sent for you in order that <i>I</i> might do the - talking—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - This really seemed to require no answer, so Shanley made none. - </p> - <p> - “Yesterday,” went on Carleton, “you came to me for a job, and I gave you - one, didn’t I?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” admitted Shanley, licking his lips. - </p> - <p> - “Just so,” said Carleton mildly. “I hired you then. I fire you now. Pretty - quick work, what?” - </p> - <p> - “You’re the doctor,” said Shanley evenly enough. He had, for all his - logic, expected no more nor less—he was too firm a believer in his - own particular and exclusive brand of luck. “You’re the doctor,” he - repeated. “There’s a matter of twenty bucks——— - </p> - <p> - “I was coming to that,” interrupted Carleton; “but I’m glad <i>you</i> - mentioned it. I’ll be honest enough to admit that I hardly expected you - would. A man who acts as you’ve acted doesn’t generally—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - “I told you ‘twasn’t my fault,” said Shanley stubbornly. - </p> - <p> - Carleton reached for his pipe, and struck a match, surveying Shanley the - while with a gaze that was half perplexed, half quizzical. - </p> - <p> - “You’re a queer card,” he remarked at last. “Why don’t you cut out the - booze?” - </p> - <p> - “‘Twasn’t my fault, I tell you,” persisted Shanley. “You’re a pretty good - hand with your fists, what?” said Carleton irrelevantly. “Kelly’s no - slouch himself.” - </p> - <p> - Shanley blinked. It appeared that the super was as intimately posted on - the events of the preceding evening as he was himself. The remark - suggested an inspection of the fists in question. They were grimy and - dirty, and most of the knuckles were barked; closed, they resembled a pair - of miniature battering-rams. - </p> - <p> - “Pretty good,” he admitted modestly. - </p> - <p> - “H’m! About that twenty. You intend to pay it back, don’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “I’m not a thief, whatever else I am,” snapped Shanley. “Of course, I’ll - pay it back. You needn’t worry.” - </p> - <p> - “When?” insisted Carleton coolly. - </p> - <p> - “When I get a job.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll give you one,” said Carleton—“Royal” Carle-ton the boys called - him, the squarest man that ever held down a division. “I’ll give you one - where your fists will be kept out of mischief, and where you can’t hit the - high joints quite as hard as you did last night. But I want you to - understand this, Shanley, and understand it good and plenty and once for - all, it’s your last chance. You made a fool of yourself last night, but - you acted like a man yesterday—that’s why you’re getting a new deal. - You’re going up to Glacier Canon with McCann on the construction work. You - won’t find it anyways luxurious, and maybe you’ll like McCann and maybe - you won’t—he’s been squealing for a white man to live with. You can - help him boss Italians at one seventy-five a day, and you can go up on - Twenty-nine this morning, that’ll take care of your transportation. What - do you say?” - </p> - <p> - Shanley couldn’t say anything. He looked at the super and blinked; then he - looked at his fists speculatively—and blinked. - </p> - <p> - Carleton was scribbling on a piece of paper. - </p> - <p> - “All right, h’m?” he said, looking up and handing over the paper. “There’s - an order on Dinkelman, only get some one else to show you the way this - time, and take the other side of the street going up. Understand?” - </p> - <p> - “Mr. Carleton,” Shanley blurted out, “if ever I get full again, you——” - </p> - <p> - “I will!” said Carleton grimly. “I’ll fire you so hard and fast you’ll be - out of breath for a month. Don’t make any mistake about that. No man gets - more than two chances with me. The next time you get drunk will finish - your railroad career for keeps, I promise you that.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Shanley humbly; and then, after a moment’s nervous hesitation: - “About Kelly, Mr. Carleton. I don’t want to get him in bad on this. You - see, it was this way. He left early—that’s what started the fight. I - called him a—a—quitter—or something like that.” - </p> - <p> - “H’m, yes; or something like that,” repeated Carleton dryly. “So I - believe. I’ve had a talk with Kelly. You needn’t let the incomprehensible - workings of that conscience of yours prick you any on his account. Kelly - knows when to stop. His record is O. K. in this office. Kelly doesn’t get - drunk. If he did, he’d be fired just as fast as you will be if it ever - happens again.” - </p> - <p> - “If I’m never fired for anything but that,” exclaimed Shanley in a burst - of fervent emotion, “I’ve got a job for life. I’ll prove it to you, Mr. - Carleton. I’m going to make good. You see if I don’t.” - </p> - <p> - “Very well,” said Carleton. “I hope you will. That’s all, Shanley. I’ll - let McCann know you’re coming.” - </p> - <p> - Shanley’s second exit from the super’s presence was different from the - first. He walked out with a firm tread and squared shoulders. He was - rejuvenated and buoyant. He was on his mettle—quite another matter, - entirely another matter, and distinctly apart from the paltry - consideration of a mere job. He had told Carleton that he would make good. - Well, he would—and he did. Carleton himself said so, and Carleton - wasn’t in the habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a man—not - many. He did sometimes, but not often. - </p> - <p> - Shanley did not take the other side of the street on the way to - Dinkelman’s—by no means. He deliberately passed as close to the - Blazing Star saloon as he could, passed with contemptuous disregard, - passed boastfully in the knowledge of his own strength. A sixteen-hundred - class engine with her four pairs of forty-six-inch drivers can pull - countless cars up a mountain grade steep enough to make one dizzy, but - Shanley would have backed himself to win against her in a tug of war over - the scant few inches that separated him from MacGuire’s dispensary as he - brushed by. None of MacGuire’s for him. Not at all. Red-headed, - freckle-faced, barked-knuckled, - bulwarked-and-armor-cased-against-temptation Shanley dealt that morning - with Mr. Dinkelman, purveyor of bargains in men’s apparel. - </p> - <p> - The dealings were liberal—on the part of both men. On Shanley’s part - because he needed much; on Mr. Dinkelman’s part because it was Mr. - Dinkelman’s business, and his nature, to sell much—if he could—safely. - This was eminently safe. Carleton’s name in the mountains stood higher - than guaranteed, gilt-edged gold bonds any time. - </p> - <p> - The business finally concluded, Shanley boarded Twenty-nine, local - freight, west, and in due time, well on in the afternoon, righteously - sober, straight as a string, cleaned, groomed, and resplendent in a new - suit, swung off from the caboose at Glacier Canon as the train - considerately slackened speed enough to give him a fighting chance for - life and limb. - </p> - <p> - He landed safely, however, in the midst of a jabbering Italian labor gang, - who received his sudden advent with patience and some awe. A short, - squintfaced man greeted him with a grin. - </p> - <p> - “Me name’s McCann,” said he of the squint face. “This is Glacier Canon, - fwhat yez see av ut. Them’s the Eyetalians. Yon’s fwhere I roost an’ by - the same token, fwhere yez’ll roost, too, from now on. Above is the shack - av the men. Are yez plased wid yer introduction? ‘Tis wan hell av a hole - ye’ve come to. Shanley’s the name, eh? A good wan, an’ I’m proud to make - the acquaintance.” - </p> - <p> - Shanley blinked as he stretched out his hand and made friends with his - superior, and blinked again as he looked first one way and then another in - an effort to follow and absorb the other’s graphic description of the - surroundings. - </p> - <p> - The road foreman’s summary was beyond dispute. Glacier Canon was as wild a - piece of track as the Hill Division boasted, which was going some. The - right of way hugged the bald gray rock of the mountains that rose up at - one side in a sheer sweep, and the trains crawled along for all the world - like huge flies at the base of a wall. On the other side was the Glacier - River with its treacherous sandy bed that had been the subject of more - reports and engineers’ gray hairs than all the rest of the system put - together. The construction camp lay just to the east of the Canon, and at - the foot of a long, stiff, two-mile, four-per-cent grade. That was the - reason the camp was there—that grade. - </p> - <p> - Locking the stable door when the horse is gone is a procedure that is very - old. It did not originate with the directors of the Transcontinental—they - never claimed it did. But their fixed policy, if properly presented before - a court of arbitration, would have gone a long way toward establishing a - clear title to it. If they had built a switchback at the foot of the grade - in the first place, Extra Number Eighty-three, when she lost control of - herself near the bottom coming down, would have demonstrated just as - clearly the necessity for one being there as she demonstrated most - forcibly what would happen when there wasn’t. All of which is by way of - saying that rock or no rock, expense or no expense, the door was now to be - locked, and McCann and his men were there to lock it. - </p> - <p> - McCann explained this to Shanley as he walked him around, up the track to - the men’s shanties, over the work, and back again down the track to - inspect the interior of the dwelling they were to share in common—a - relic of deceased Extra Number Eighty-three in the shape of a truckless - box-car with dinted and bulging sides—dinted one side and bulged the - other, that is. - </p> - <p> - “But,” said Shanley, “I dunno what a switchback is.” - </p> - <p> - “Who expected it av ye?” inquired McCann. “An’ fwhat difference does ut - make? Carleton sint word ye were green. Ye’ve no need to know. So’s ye can - do as yez are told an’ make them geesers do as they are told, <i>an’’</i> - can play forty-foive at night—that’s the point, the main point wid - me, an’ it’s me yez av to get along wid——‘twill be all right. - Since Meegan, him that was helpin’ me, tuk sick a week back, I’ve been - alone. Begad, playin’ solytare is——” - </p> - <p> - “I can play forty-five,” said Shanley. - </p> - <p> - McCann’s face brightened. - </p> - <p> - “The powers be praised!” he exclaimed. “I’ll enlighten ye, then, on the - matter av switchbacks, me son, so as ye’ll have an intilligent conception - av the work. A switchback is a bit av a spur track that sticks out loike - the quills av a porkypine at intervuls on a bad grade such as the wan - forninst ye. ‘Tis run off the main line, d’ye mind, an’ up contrariwise to - the dip av the grade. Whin a train comin’ down gets beyond control an’ so - expresses herself by means av her whistle, she’s switched off an’ given a - chance to run uphill by way av variety until she stops. An’ the same holds - true if she breaks loose goin’ up. Is ut clear?” - </p> - <p> - “It is,” said Shanley. “When do I begin work?” - </p> - <p> - “In the mornin.’ ‘Tis near six now, an’ the bhoys’ll be quittin’ for the - night. Forty-foive is a grand game. We’ll play ut to-night to our better - acquaintance. I contind ‘tis the national game av the ould sod.” - </p> - <p> - Whether McCann’s contention is borne out by fact, or by the even more - weighty consideration of public opinion, is of little importance. Shanley - played forty-five with McCann that night and for many nights thereafter. - He lost a figure or two off the pay check that was to come, but he won the - golden opinion of the little road boss, which ethically, and in this case - practically, was of far greater value. - </p> - <p> - “He’s a bright jool av a lad,” wrote McCann across the foot of a weekly - report. - </p> - <p> - And Carleton, seeing it, was much gratified, for Carleton wasn’t in the - habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a man—not - many. He did sometimes, but not often. Shanley was making good. Carleton - was much gratified. - </p> - <p> - Of the three weeks that followed Shanley’s advent to Glacier Canon, this - story has little to do in a detailed way; but, as a whole, those three - weeks are pointed, eloquent, and important—very important. - </p> - <p> - Italian laborers have many failings, but likewise they have many virtues. - They are simple, demonstrative, and their capacity for adoration—of - both men and things—is very great. - </p> - <p> - From Jacko, the water boy, to Pietro Maraschino, the padrone, they adored - Shanley, and enthroned him as an idol in their hearts, for the very simple - reason that Shanley, not being a professional slave-driver by trade, - established new and heretofore undreamed-of relations with them. Shanley - was very green, very ignorant, very inexperienced—he treated them - like human beings. That was the long and short of it. Shanley became - popular beyond the popularity of any man, before or since, who was ever - called upon to handle the “foreign element” on the Hill Division. - </p> - <p> - And the work progressed. Day by day the cut bored deeper into the stubborn - mountain-side; day by day the Glacier River gurgled peacefully along over - its treacherous sandy bed, one of the prettiest scenic effects on the - system, so pretty that the company used it in the magazines; day by day - regulars and extras, freights and passengers, east and west, snorted up - and down the grade, the only visitations from the outside world; night - after night Shanley played forty-five with McCann in the smoky, truckless - box-car. - </p> - <p> - Also the camp was dry, very dry, dryer than a sanatorium—that is, - than <i>some</i> sanatoriums. Carle-ton had been quite right. There was no - opportunity for Shanley to hit the high joints quite as hard as he had - that night in Big Cloud—there was no opportunity for him to hit the - high joints <i>at all</i>. Shanley had not seen a bottle for three weeks. - Therefore Shanley felt virtuous, which was proper. - </p> - <p> - Some events follow others as the natural, logical outcome and conclusion - of preceding ones; others, again, are apparently irrelevant, and the - connection is not to be explained either by logic, conclusion, or - otherwise. Rain, McCann’s departure for Big Cloud, and Pietro Maraschino’s - birthday are an example of this. - </p> - <p> - When it settles down for a storm in the mountains, it is, if the elements - are really in earnest, torrential, and prolonged, and has the effect of - tying up construction work tighter than a supreme court injunction could - come anywhere near doing it. - </p> - <p> - McCann had business in Big Cloud, whether personal or pertaining to the - company is of no consequence, and the day the storm set in—the - morning having demonstrated that its classification was not to be - considered as transient—he seized the opportunity to flag the - afternoon freight eastbound. This was natural and logical, and an - opportunity not to be neglected. - </p> - <p> - That this day, however, should be the anniversary of the day the padrone’s - mother of blessed memory had given birth to Pietro Maraschino in sunny - Naples fifty-three years before is, though apparently irrelevant, far from - being so; and since its peculiar and coincident happening cannot be laid - at the door of either logical, natural, scientific, or philosophical - conclusions, and since it demands an explanation of some sort, it must, - perforce, be attributed to the metaphysical—which is a name given to - all things about which nobody knows anything. - </p> - <p> - “Yez are in charge,” said McCann grandiloquently, waving his hand to - Shanley as he swung into the caboose. “Yez are in charge av the work, me - son. See to ut. I trust ye.” - </p> - <p> - As the work at the moment was entirely at a standstill and bid fair to - remain so until McCann’s return on the morrow, this was very good of - McCann. But all men like words of appreciation, most of them whether they - deserve them or not, so Shanley went back into the box-car out of the rain - to ponder over the tribute McCann had paid him, and to ponder, too, over - the new responsibility that had fallen to his lot. - </p> - <p> - He did not ponder very long; indeed, the freight that was transporting - McCann could hardly have been out of sight over the summit of the grade, - when a knock at the door was followed by the entrance of the dripping - figure of the padrone. - </p> - <p> - Shanley looked up anxiously. - </p> - <p> - “Hello, Pietro,” he said nervously, for the weather wasn’t the kind that - would bring a man out for nothing, and he was keenly alive to that new - responsibility. “Hello, Pietro,” he repeated. “Anything wrong?” - </p> - <p> - Pietro grinned amiably, shook his head, unbuttoned his coat, and held out—a - bottle. - </p> - <p> - Shanley stared in amazement, and then began to blink furiously. - </p> - <p> - “Here!” said he. “What’s this?” - </p> - <p> - “Chianti,” said Pietro, grinning harder than ever. - </p> - <p> - “Key-aunty.” Shanley screwed up his face. “What the devil is key-aunty?” - </p> - <p> - “Ver’ good wine from Italia,” said the beaming padrone. - </p> - <p> - “It is, is it? Well, it’s against the rules,” asserted Shanley with - conviction. “It’s against the rules. McCann’u’d skin you alive. He would. - Where’d you get it? What’s up, eh? It’s against the rules. I’m in charge.” - </p> - <p> - Pietro explained. It was his birthday. It was very bad weather. For the - rest of the afternoon there would be no work. They would celebrate the - birthday, Meester McCann had taken the train. As for the wine—Pietro - shrugged his shoulders—his people adored wine. Unless they were very - poor his people would have a little wine in their packs, perhaps. He was - not quite sure where they had got it, but it was very thoughtful of them - to remember his birthday. Each had presented him with a little wine. This - bottle was an expression of their very great good estime of Meester - Shanley. Perhaps, later, Meester Shanley would come himself to the shack. - </p> - <p> - “It’s against the rules,” blinked Shanley. “McCann ‘u’d skin you alive. - Maybe I’ll drop in by and by. You can leave the bottle.” - </p> - <p> - Pietro bobbed, grinned delightedly, handed over the bottle, and backed out - into the storm. - </p> - <p> - Shanley, still blinking, placed the bottle on the table, and gazed at it - thoughtfully for a few minutes—and his thoughts were of Carleton. - </p> - <p> - “If ‘twere whisky,” said he, “I’d have no part of it, not a drop, not even - a smell. I would not. I would not touch it. But as it is——” - Shanley uncorked the bottle. - </p> - <p> - Not at all. One does <i>not</i> get drunk on a bottle of Chianti wine. A - single bottle of Chianti wine is very little. That is the trouble—it - is <i>very</i> little. After three weeks of abstinence it is very little - indeed—so little that it is positively tantalizing. - </p> - <p> - The afternoon waned rapidly—and so did the Chianti. Outside, the - storm instead of abating grew worse—the thunder racketing through - the mountains, the lightning cutting jagged streaks in the black sky, the - rain coming down in sheets that set the culverts and sluiceways running - full. It was settling down for a bad night in the mountains, which, in the - Rockies, is not a thing to be ignored. “’tis no wonder McCann found it - lonely,” muttered Shanley, as he squeezed the last drop from the bottle. - “‘Tis very lonely, indeed”—he held the bottle upside down to make - sure that it was thoroughly drained—“most uncommon lonely. It is - that. Maybe those Eyetalians ‘ll be thinkin’ I’m stuck up, perhaps—which - I am not. It’s a queer name the stuff has, though it’s against the rules, - an’ I can’t get my tongue around it, but I’ve tasted worse. For the sake - of courtesy I’ll look in on the birthday party.” - </p> - <p> - He incased himself in a pair of McCann’s rubber boots, put on McCann’s - rubber coat, and started out. - </p> - <p> - “An’ to think,” said he, as he sloshed and buffeted his way up the two - hundred yards of track to the construction shanties, “to think that Pietro - came out in cruel bad weather like this all for to present his compliments - an’ ask me over! ‘Twould be ungracious to refuse the invitation; besides - my presence will keep them in due bounds an’ restraint. I’ve heard that - Eyetalians, being foreigners, do not practice restraint—but, being - foreigners, ‘tis not to be held against them. I’m in charge, an’ I’ll see - to it.” - </p> - <p> - They greeted him in the largest of the three bunk-houses. They greeted him - heartily, sincerely, uproariously, and with fervor. They were unfeignedly - glad to see him, and if he had not been by nature a modest man he would - have understood that his popularity was above the popularity ever before - accorded to a boss. Likewise, their hospitality was without stint. If - there was any shortage of stock—which is a matter decidedly open to - question—they denied themselves that Shanley might not feel the - pinch. Shanley was lifted from the mere plane of man—he became a - king. - </p> - <p> - A little Chianti is a little; much Chianti is to be reckoned with and on - no account to be despised. Shanley not only became a king, he became - regally, imperially, royally, and majestically drunk. Also there came at - last an end to the Chianti, at which stage of the proceedings Shanley, - with extravagant dignity and appropriate words—an exhortation on - restraint—waddled to the door to take his departure. - </p> - <p> - It was very dark outside, very dark, except when an intermittent flash of - lightning made momentary daylight. Pietro Maraschino offered Shanley one - of the many lanterns that, in honor of the festive occasion, they had - commandeered, without regard to color, from the tool boxes, and had strung - around the shack. Further, he offered to see Shanley on his way. - </p> - <p> - The offer of assistance touched Shanley—it touched him wrong. It - implied a more or less acute condition of disability, which he repudiated - with a hurt expression on his face and forceful words on his tongue. He - refused it; and being aggrieved, refused also the lantern Pietro held out - to him. He chose one for himself instead—the one nearest to his - hand. That this was red made no difference. Blue, white, red, green, or - purple, it was all one to Shanley. His fuddled brain did not - differentiate. A light was a light, that was all there was to that. - </p> - <p> - The short distance from the shanty door to the right of way Shanley - negotiated with finesse and aplomb, and then he started down the track. - This, however, was another matter. - </p> - <p> - Railroad ties, at best, do not make the smoothest walking in the world, - and to accomplish the feat under some conditions is decidedly worthy of - note. Shanley’s performance beggars the English language—there is no - metaphor. For every ten feet he moved forward he covered twenty in - laterals, and, considering that the laterals were limited to the paltry - four, feet, eight and one-half inches that made the gauge of the rails, - the feat was incontestably more than worthy of mere note—it was - something to wonder at. He clung grimly to the lantern, with the result - that the gyrations of that little red light in the darkness would have put - to shame an expert’s exhibition with a luminous dumb-bell. The while - Shanley spoke earnestly to himself. - </p> - <p> - “Queshun is am I drunk—thash’s the queshun. If I’m drunk—lose - my job. Thash what Carleton said—lose my job. If I’m not drunk—s’all - right. Wish I knew wesser I’m drunk or not.” - </p> - <p> - He relapsed into silent communion and debate. This lasted for a very long - period, during which, marvelous to relate, he had not only reached a point - opposite his box-car domicile, but, being oblivious of that fact, had kept - on along the track. Progress, however, was becoming more and more - difficult. Shanley was assuming a position that might be likened somewhat - to the letter C, owing to the fact that the force of gravity seemed to be - exerting an undue influence on his head. Shanley was coming to earth. - </p> - <p> - As a result of his communion with himself he began to talk again, and his - words suggested that he had suspicions of the truth. - </p> - <p> - “Jus’ my luck,” said he bitterly. “Jus’ my luck. Allus same kind of luck. - What’d I have to do wis Peto Mara—Mars—Marscheeno’s birthday? - Nothing. Nothing ‘tall. ‘Twasn’t my fault. Jus’ my luck. Jus’ my——” - </p> - <p> - Shanley came to earth. Also his head came into contact with the unyielding - steel of the left-hand rail, and as a result he sprawled inertly full - across the right of way, not ten yards west of where the Glacier River - swings in to crowd the track close up against the mountain base. - </p> - <p> - Providence sometimes looks after those who are unable to look after - themselves. By the law of probabilities the lantern should have met - disaster quick and absolute; but, instead, when it fell from Shanley’s - hand, it landed right side up just outside the rail between two ties, and, - apart from a momentary and hesitant flicker incident to the jolt, burned - on serenely. And it was still burning when, five minutes later, above the - swish of leaping waters from the Glacier River now a chattering, angry - stream with swollen banks, above the moan of the wind and the roll of the - thunder through the mountains, above the pelting splash of the steady - rain, came the hoarse scream of Number One’s whistle on the grade. - </p> - <p> - Sanderson, in the cab, caught the red against him on the right of way - ahead, and whistled insistently for the track. This having no effect, he - grunted, latched in the throttle, and applied the “air.” The ray of the - headlight crept along between the rails, hovered over a black object - beside the lantern, passed on again and held, not on the glistening - rain-wet rails—<i>they</i> had disappeared—but on a crumbling - road-bed and a dark blotch of waters, as with a final screech from the - grinding brake-shoes Number One came to a standstill. - </p> - <p> - “Holy MacCheesar!” exclaimed Sanderson, as he swung from the cab. - </p> - <p> - He made his way along past the drivers to where the pilot’s nose was - inquisitively poked against the lantern, picked up the lantern, and bent - over Shanley. - </p> - <p> - “Holy MacCheesar!” he exclaimed again, straightening up after a moment’s - examination. “Holy MacCheesar!” - </p> - <p> - “What’s wrong, Sandy?” snapped a voice behind him, the voice of Kelly, - Spider Kelly, the conductor, who had hurried forward to investigate the - unscheduled stop. - </p> - <p> - “Search me,” replied Sanderson. “Looks like the Glacier was up to her old - tricks. There’s a washout ahead, and a bad one, I guess. But the meaning - of this here is one beyond me. The fellow was curled up on the track just - as you see him with the light burning alongside, that’s what saved us, but - he’s as drunk as a lord.” - </p> - <p> - As Kelly bent over the prostrate form, others of the train crew appeared - on the scene. One glance he gave at Shanley’s - never-under-any-circumstances-to-be-for-gotten homely countenance, and - hastily ordered the men to go forward and investigate the washout ahead. - Then he turned to the engineer. - </p> - <p> - “The man is not drunk, Sandy,” said he. - </p> - <p> - “He is gloriously and magnificently drunk, Kelly,” replied the engineer. - </p> - <p> - “What would he be doing here, then? He is not drunk.” - </p> - <p> - “Sleeping it off. He is disgracefully drunk.” - </p> - <p> - “Can ye not see the bash on his head where he must have stumbled in the - dark trying to save the train and struck against the rail? He is not - drunk.” - </p> - <p> - “Can ye not smell?” retorted Sanderson. “He is dead drunk!” - </p> - <p> - “I have fought with him and he licked me. He is a man and a friend of - mine”—Kelly shoved his lantern into Sanderson’s face. “<i>He is not - drunk</i>.” - </p> - <p> - “He is <i>not</i> drunk,” said Sanderson. “He is a hero. What will we do - with him?” - </p> - <p> - “We’ll carry him, you and me, over to the construction shanty, it’s only a - few yards, and put him in his bunk. He works here, you know. McCann’s in - Big Cloud, for I saw him there. After that we’ll run back to the Bend for - orders and make our report.” - </p> - <p> - “Hurry, then,” said the engineer. “Take his legs. What are you laughing - at?” - </p> - <p> - “I was thinking of Carleton,” said Kelly. “Carleton? What’s Carleton got - to do with it?” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll tell you later when we get to the Bend. Come on.” - </p> - <p> - “H’m,” said Sanderson, as they staggered with their burden over to the - box-car shack. “I’ve an idea that bash on the head is more dirt than hurt. - He’s making a speech, ain’t he?” - </p> - <p> - “Jus’ my luck,” mumbled the reviving Shanley dolefully. “Jus’ my luck. - Alius same kind of luck.” - </p> - <p> - “Possibly,” said Kelly. “Set him down and slide back the door. That’s - right. In with him now. We haven’t got time to make him very comfortable, - but I guess he’ll do. I can fix him up better at the Bend than I can - here.” - </p> - <p> - “At the Bend? What d’ye mean?” demanded Sanderson. - </p> - <p> - “You’ll see,” replied Kelly, with a grin. “You’ll see.” - </p> - <p> - And Sanderson saw. So did Carleton—in a way. Kelly’s report, when - they got to the Bend, was a work of art. He disposed of the nature and - extent of the washout in ten brief, well-chosen words, but the operator - got a cramp before Kelly was through covering Shanley with glory. The - passengers, packed in the little waiting-room clamoring for details, - yelled deliriously as he read the message aloud—and promptly took up - a collection, a very generous collection, because all collections are - generous at psychological moments—that is to say, if not delayed too - long to allow a recovery from hysteria. - </p> - <p> - At Big Cloud, the dispatcher, because the washout was a serious matter - that not only threatened to tie up traffic, but was tying it up, sent a - hurry call to Carleton’s house that brought the super on the run to the - office. By this time the collection had been counted, and the total wired - in, as an additional detail—one hundred and forty dollars and - thirty-three cents. The odd change being a contribution from a Swede in - the colonist coach who could not speak English, and who paid because a man - in uniform, a brakeman acting as canvasser, made the request. A Swede has - a great respect for a uniform. - </p> - <p> - “H’m,” said Carleton, when he had read it all. “I know a man when I see - one. Tell Shanley to report here. I guess we can find something better for - him to do than bossing laborers. What? Yes, send the letter up on the - construction train. One hundred and forty, thirty-three, h’m? Tell him - that, too. He’ll feel good when he sees it in the morning.” - </p> - <p> - But Shanley did not feel good when he saw it in the morning, for he was - nursing a very bad headache and a stomach that had a tendency to - squeamishness. The letter was lying on the floor, where some one had - considerately chucked it in without disturbing him. His eyes fell on it as - he struggled out of his bunk. He picked it up, opened it, read it—and - blinked. His face set with a very blank and bewildered expression. He read - it again, and again once more. Then he went to the door and looked out. - </p> - <p> - A construction train was on the line a little below him, and a gang of - men, not his nor Pietro Maraschino’s men, were busily at work. As he - gazed, his face puckered. The problem that had so obsessed him on his - return journey from the birthday celebration the night before was a - problem no longer. - </p> - <p> - “I <i>was</i> drunk,” said he, with conviction. “I <i>must</i> have been.” - </p> - <p> - He went back to the letter and studied it again, scratching his head. - </p> - <p> - “Something,” he muttered, “has happened. What it is, I dunno. I was drunk, - an’ I’m not fired. I was drunk, an’ I’m promoted. I was drunk, an’ I’m - paid well for it, very well. I was drunk—an’ I’ll keep my mouth - shut.” - </p> - <p> - Which was exactly the advice Kelly took pains to give him half an hour - later, when Number One crawled down to the Canon and halted for a few - minutes opposite the dismantled box-car, while the construction train put - the last few touches to its work. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - VI—THE BUILDER - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here are two sides - to every story—which is a proverb so old that it is in the running - with Father Time himself. It is repeated here because there must be <i>some</i> - truth in it—anything that can stand the wear and tear of the ages, - and the cynics, and the wise old philosophical owls without getting any - knock-out dints punched in its vital spots must have some sort of merit - fundamentally, what? Anyway, the company had their side, and the men’s - version differed—of course. Maybe each, in a way, was more or less - right, and, equally, in a way, more or less wrong. Maybe, too, both sides - lost their tempers and got their crown-sheets burned out before the - arbitration pow-wow had a chance to get the line clear and give anybody - rights, schedule or otherwise. However, be that as it may, whoever was - right or whoever was wrong, one or the other, or both, it is the strike, - not the ethics of it, that has to do with—but just a moment, we’re - over-running our holding orders. - </p> - <p> - From the time the last rail was spiked home and bridging the Rockies was a - reality, not a dream—from then to the present day, there isn’t any - very much better way of describing the Hill Division than to call it rough - and ready. Coming right down to cases, the history of that piece of track, - the history of the men who gave the last that was in them to make it, and - the history of those who have operated it since isn’t far from being a - pretty typical and comprehensive example of the pulsing, dominating, - dogged, go-forward spirit of a continent whose strides and progress are - the marvel of the world; and, withal, it is an example so compact and - concrete that through it one may see and view the larger picture in all - its angles and in all its shades. Heroism and fame and death and failure—it - has known them all—but ever, and above all else, it has known the - indomitable patience, the indomitable perseverance, the indomitable - determination against which no times, nor conditions, nor manners, nor - customs, nor obstacles can stand—the spirit of the New Race and the - Great New Land, the essence and the germ of it. - </p> - <p> - Building a road through the Rockies and tapping the Sierras to give zest - to the finish wasn’t an infant’s performance; and operating it, - single-track, on crazy-wild cuts and fills and tangents and curves and - tunnels and trestles with nature to battle and fight against, isn’t any - infant’s performance, either. The Hill Division was rough and ready. It - always was, and it is now—just naturally so. And Big Cloud, the - divisional point, snuggling amongst the buttes in the eastern foothills, - is even more so. It boasts about every nationality classified in certain - erudite editions of small books with big names, and, to top that, has an - extra anomaly or two left over and up its sleeve for good measure; but, - mostly, it is, or rather was—it has changed some with the years—composed - of Indians, bad Americans, a scattering of Chinese, and an indescribable - medley of humans from the four quarters of Europe, the Cockney, the - Polack, the Swede, the Russian and the Italian—laborers on the - construction gangs. Big Cloud was a little more than rough and ready—it - wasn’t exactly what you’d call a health resort for finnicky nerves. - </p> - <p> - So, take it by and large, the Hill Division, from one end to the other, - wasn’t the quietest or most peaceful locality on the map even before the - trouble came. After that—well, mention the Big Strike to any of the - old-timers and they’ll talk fast enough and hard enough and say enough in - a minute to set you wondering if the biographers hadn’t got mixed on dates - and if Dante hadn’t got his material for that little hair-stiffener of his - no further away than the Rockies, and no longer back than a few years ago. - But no matter—— - </p> - <p> - The story opens on the strike—<i>not</i> the ethics of it. There’s - some hard feeling yet—too much of it to take sides one way or the - other. But then, apart from that, this is not the story of a strike, it is - the story of men—a story that the boys tell at night in the darkened - roundhouses in the shadow of the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the - steam purrs softly at the gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a - catchy sob. They tell it, too, across the tracks at headquarters, or on - the road and in construction camps; but they tell it better, somehow, in - the roundhouse, though it is not an engineer’s tale—and Clarihue, - the night turner, tells it best of all. Set forth as it is here it takes - no rank with him,—but all are not so fortunate as to have listened - while Clarihue talked. - </p> - <p> - Just one word more to make sure that the red isn’t against us anywhere and - we’ll get to Keating and Spirlaw—just a word to say that Carleton, - “Royal” Carle-ton, was superintendent then, and Regan was master mechanic, - Harvey was division engineer, Spence was chief dispatcher, and Riley was - trainmaster. Pretty good men that little group, pretty good railroaders—there - have never been better. Some of them are bigger now in the world’s eyes, - heads of systems instead of departments—and some of them will never - railroad any more. However——— - </p> - <p> - If you haven’t forgotten Shanley you will recall the Glacier Canon, and, - most of all, you will recall the Glacier River with its treacherous sandy - bed that snuggled close to the right of way and forced the track hard - against the rocky walls of the mountain’s base. The havoc the Glacier - played with the operating department on the night of Shanley’s memorable - heroism was not the first time it had misbehaved itself, nor was it the - last—that was the trouble. It washed out the road-bed with such - consistent persistency, on so little provocation, and did it so - effectually as to stir at last to resentment even the torpid blood of the - directors down East. So they voted the sum, though it hurt, and solaced - themselves with the thought that after all it was economy—which was - true. - </p> - <p> - There was only one thing to do against that overhospitable and - affectionate little stream, and that was to get away from it; but, before - proceeding to do so—in order to get elbow room to work so that the - flyers and the fast mails and the traffic generally wouldn’t be hung up - every time a Polack swung a pick—they pushed the track out over the - chattering river on a long, temporary, hybrid trestle of wood and steel. - That done, the rest was up to Spirlaw—up to Spirlaw and Keating. - </p> - <p> - The plans called for the shaving down of the mountain-side, the barbering, - mostly, to be done with dynamite, for the beard of the Rockies is not the - down of a youth. So, when the trestle was finished, Spirlaw with a gang of - some thirty Polacks moved into construction camp, promptly tore up the old - track, and set themselves to the task in hand. A little later, Keating - joined them. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw was a road boss, and the roughest of his kind. Physically he was a - giant; and which of the three was the hardest, his face, his fist, or his - tongue, would afford the sporting element a most excellent opportunity to - indulge in a little book-making with the odds about even all round. His - hair was a coarse mop of tawny brown that straggled over his eyes; and his - eyes were all black, every bit of them—there didn’t seem to be any - pupil at all, which gave them a glint that was harder than a cold chisel. - Take him summed up, Spirlaw looked a pretty tough proposition, and in some - ways, most ways perhaps, he was—he never denied it. - </p> - <p> - “What the blue blinding blazes, d’ye think, h’m?” he would remark, - reaching into his hip pocket for his “chewing,” as he swept the other arm - comprehensively over the particular crowd of sweating foreigners that - happened to be under his particular jurisdiction at the time. “What d’ye - think! You can’t run cuts an’ fills with an outfit like this on soft soap - an’ candy sticks, can you? Well then—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - That last “h’m” was more or less conclusive—very few cared to pursue - the argument any further. At a safe distance, the Big Fellows on the - division, as a salve to their consciences when humanitarian ideas were in - the ascendancy, would bombard Spirlaw with telegrams which were forceful - in tone and direful in threat—but that’s all it ever amounted to. - Spirlaw’s work report for a day on anything, from bridging a canon to - punching a hole in the bitter hard rock of the mountain-side, was a report - that no one else on the division had ever approached, let alone duplicated—and - figures count perhaps just a little bit more in the operating department - of a railroad than they do anywhere else in the world. Spirlaw used the - telegrams as spills to light a pipe as hard-looking as himself, whose bowl - was down at the heels on one side from much scraping, and on such - occasions it was more than ordinarily unfortunate for the sour-visaged - Polack who should chance to arouse his ire. - </p> - <p> - Some men possess the love of a fight and their natures are tempestuous by - virtue of their nationality, because some nationalities are addicted that - way. This may have been the case with Spirlaw—or it may not. There’s - no saying, for Spirlaw’s nationality was a question mark. He never - delivered himself on the subject, and, certainly, there was no figuring it - out from the derivation of his name—<i>that</i> could have been most - anything, and could have come from most anywhere. - </p> - <p> - To say that “opposites attract” isn’t any more original, any less - gray-bearded, than the words at the head of these pages. Generally, that - sort of thing is figured in the worn-out, stale, - familiarity-breeds-con-tempt realm of platitude, and at its unctuous - repetition one comes to turn up his nose; but, once in a while, life has a - habit of getting in a kink or a twist that gives you a jolt and a - different side-light, and then, somehow, a thing like that rings as fresh - and virile as though you had just heard it for the first time. As far as - any one ever knew, Keating was the only one that ever got inside of - Spirlaw’s shell, the only one that the road boss ever showed the slightest - symptoms of caring a hang about—and yet, on the surface, between the - two there was nothing in common. Where one was polished the other was - rough; where one was weak the other was strong. Keating was small, thin, - pale-faced, and he had a cough—a cough that had sent him West in a - hurry without waiting for the other year that would have given him his - engineer’s diploma from the college in the East. - </p> - <p> - When the boy, he wasn’t much more than a boy, dropped off at Big Cloud, - and Carleton read the letter he brought from one of the big Eastern - operators, the super raised his eyebrows a little, looked him over and - sent him out to Spirlaw. Afterwards, he spoke to Regan about him. - </p> - <p> - “I didn’t know what to do with him, Tommy; but I had to do something, - what? Any one with half an eye could tell that he had to be kept out of - doors. Thought he might be able to help Spirlaw out a little as assistant, - h’m? Guess he’ll pick up the work quick enough. He don’t look strong.” - </p> - <p> - “Mabbe it’s just as well,” grinned the master mechanic. “He won’t be able - to batter the gang any. One man doing that is enough—when it’s - Spirlaw.” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw heard about it before he saw Keating, and he swore fervently. - </p> - <p> - “What the hell!” he growled. “Think I’m runnin’ a nursery or an outdoor - sanatorium? I guess I’ve got enough to do without lookin’ after sick kids, - I guess I have. Fat lot of help he’ll be—help my eye! I don’t need - no help.” - </p> - <p> - But for all that, somehow, from the first minute when Keating got off the - local freight, that stopped for him at the camp, and shoved out his hand - to Spirlaw it was different—after that it was <i>all</i> Keating as - far as the road boss was concerned. - </p> - <p> - Queer the way things go. Keating looked about the last man on earth you - would expect to find rubbing elbows with an iron-fisted foreman whose - tongue was rougher than a barbed-wire fence; the last man to hold his own - with a slave-driven gang of ugly Polacks. He seemed too quiet, too shy, - too utterly unfit, physically, for that sort of thing. The blood was all - out of the boy—he got rid of it faster than he could make it. But - his training stood him in good stead, and, within his limitations, he took - hold like an old hand. That was what caught Spirlaw. He did what he was - told, and he did what he could—did a little more than he could at - times, which would lay him up for a bad two or three days of it. - </p> - <p> - “Good man,” Spirlaw scribbled across the bottom of a report one day—a - day that was about equally divided between barking his knuckles on a - Polack’s head and feeding cracked ice to Keating in his bunk. Cracked ice? - No, it wasn’t on the regular camp bill of fare—but the company - supplied it for all that. Spirlaw, with supreme contempt for the - dispatchers and their schedules and their train sheets, held up Number - Twelve and the porter of the Pullman for a goodly share of the commodity - possessed by that colored gentleman. That’s what Spirlaw thought of - Keating. - </p> - <p> - For the first few weeks after he struck the camp Keating didn’t have very - much to say about himself, or anything else for that matter; but after he - got a little nearer to Spirlaw and the mutual liking grew stronger, he - began to open up at nights when he and the road boss sat outside the door - of the construction shanty and watched the sun lose itself behind the - mighty peaks, creep again with a wondrous golden-tinted glow between a - rift in the range, and finally sink with ensuing twilight out of sight. - Keating could talk then. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t see what you ever took up engineerin’ for,” remarked Spirlaw one - evening. “It’s about the roughest kind of a life I know of, an’ you———” - </p> - <p> - “I know, I know,” Keating smiled. “You think I’m not strong enough for it. - Why, another year out here in the West and I’ll be like a horse.” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, you will,” agreed Spirlaw, hastily. “I didn’t mean just that.” Then - he sucked his briar hard. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw wasn’t much up on therapeutics, he knew more about blasting rock, - but down in his heart there wasn’t much doubt about another year in the - West for the boy, and another and another, <i>all of them</i>—only - they would be over the Great Divide that one only crosses once when it is - crossed forever. Six months, four, three,—just months, not years, - was what he read in Keating’s face. “What I meant,” he amended, “was that - you don’t have to. From what you’ve said, I figur’ your folks back there - would be willin’ to stake you in most any line you picked out, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - “No, I don’t have to,” Keating answered, and his face lighted up as he - leaned over and touched the road boss on the sleeve. “But, Spirlaw, it’s - the greatest thing in all the world. Don’t you see? A man does something. - <i>He builds</i>. I’m going to be a builder—a builder of bridges and - roads and things like that. I want to do something some day—something - that will be worth while. That’s why I’m going to be an engineer; because, - all over the world from the beginning, the engineers have led the way and—and - they’ve left something behind them. I think that’s the biggest thing they - can say of any man when he dies—that he was a builder, that he left - something behind him. I’d like to have them say that about me. Well, after - I put in another year out here—I’m a heap better even now than when - I came—I’m going back to finish my course, and then—well, you - understand what I want to do, don’t you?” - </p> - <p> - There were lots of talks like that, evening after evening, and they all of - them ended in the same way—- - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw would knock out his pipe against a stone or his boot heel, and - “figur’ he’d stroll up the camp a bit an’ make sure all was right for the - night.” - </p> - <p> - A pretty hard man Spirlaw was, but under the rough and the brutal, the - horny, thick-shelled exterior was another self, a strange side of self - that he had never known until he had known Keating. It got into him pretty - deep and pretty hard, the boy and his ambitions; and the irony of it, grim - and bitter, deepened his pity and roused, too, a sense of fierce, hot - resentment against the fate that mocked in its pitiless might so - defenseless and puny a victim. To himself he came to call Keating “The - Builder,” and one day when Harvey came down on an inspection trip, he told - the division engineer about it—that’s how it got around. - </p> - <p> - Carleton, when he heard it, didn’t say anything—just crammed the - dottle in his pipe down with his forefinger and stared out at the switches - in the yards. They were used to seeing the surface of things plowed up and - the corners turned back in the mountains, there weren’t many days went by - when something that showed the raw didn’t happen in one way or another, - but it never brought callousness or indifference, only, perhaps, a truer - sense of values. - </p> - <p> - They had been blasting in the Canon for a matter of two months when the - first signs of trouble began to show themselves, and the beginning was - when the shop hands at Big Cloud went out—the boiler-makers and the - blacksmiths, the painters, the carpenters and the fitters. The - construction camp, that is Spirlaw, didn’t worry very much about this for - the very simple reason that there didn’t appear to be any reason why it, - or he, should—that was Regan’s hunt. But when the train crews - followed suit and stray rumors of a fight or two at Big Cloud began to - come in, with the likelihood of more hard on the heels of the first, it - put a different complexion on things; for the rioting, what there had been - of it, lay, not at the door of the railroad boys, but with the town’s - loafers and hangers-on, these and the foreign element—particularly - the foreign element—the brothers and the cousins of the Polacks who - were swinging the picks and the shovels under the iron hand of Spirlaw, - their temporary lord and master—the Polacks, gently ungentle, when - amuck, as starved pumas. - </p> - <p> - Then the Brotherhood said “quit,” and the engine crews followed the - trainmen. Things began to look black, and headquarters began to find it - pretty hard to move anything. The train schedule past the Canon was cut - better than in half, and the faces of the men in the cabs and the cabooses - were new faces to those in camp—the faces of the men the company - were bringing in on hurry calls from wherever they could get them, from - the plains East or the coast West. - </p> - <p> - Every day brought reports of trouble from one end of the line to the - other, more rioting, more disorder at Big Cloud; and, in an effort to nip - as much of it in the bud as possible, Carleton issued orders to stop all - construction work—all except the work in Glacier Canon, for there - the temporary trestle lay uneasy on his mind. - </p> - <p> - The day the stop orders went out elsewhere a letter went out to Spirlaw. - Spirlaw read it and his face set like a thunder cloud. He handed it to - Keating. - </p> - <p> - Keating read it—and looked serious. - </p> - <p> - “I guess things aren’t any too rosy down there,” he commented; then - slowly: “I’ve noticed our men seemed a bit sullen lately. They don’t care - anything much about the strike, it must be a sort of sympathetic movement - with the rest of their crowd that’s running wild at Big Cloud—only I - don’t just figure how they can know very much about what’s going on. We - don’t ourselves, for that matter.” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw smiled grimly. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll tell you how,” he said. “I caught a Polack in the camp last night - that didn’t belong here—and I broke his head for the second time, - see? He used to work’ for me about a year ago—that’s when I broke it - the first time. He’s one of their influential citizens—name’s - Kuryla. Sneaked in here to stir up trouble—guess he’s sorry for it, - I guess he is.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s the first I’ve heard of it,” said Keating, his eyes opening a - little wider in surprise. - </p> - <p> - “You was asleep,” explained Spirlaw tersely. - </p> - <p> - Keating stared curiously at the road boss for a minute, then he glanced - again at the super’s letter which he still held in his hand. - </p> - <p> - “Carleton says he is depending on you to put this work through if it’s a - possible thing. You don’t really think we’ll have any serious trouble here - though, do you?” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw bit deeply into his plug before he answered. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, son; I do,” he said at last, “And there’s a good many reasons why we - will, too. Once start ‘em goin’ an’ there’s no worse hellions on earth - than the breed we’re livin’ next door to. Furthermore they don’t <i>love</i> - me—they’re just afraid of me as, by the holy razoo, I mean ‘em to - be. Let ‘em once get a smell of the upper hand an’ it would be all day <i>an</i>’ - good-by. Let ‘em get goin’ good at Big Cloud an’ they’ll get goin’ good - here—they’ll kind of figur’ then that there ain’t any law to bother - ‘em—an’, unless I miss my guess, Big Cloud’s in for the hottest - celebration in its history, which will be goin’ some for it’s had a few - before that weren’t tame by a damn sight.” - </p> - <p> - “Well,” inquired Keating, “what do you intend to do?” - </p> - <p> - “H’m-m,” drawled Spirlaw reflectively, and there was a speculative look in - his eyes as they roved over his assistant. “That’s what I’ve been chewin’ - over since I caught that skunk Kuryla last night. As far as I can figur’ - it the chance of trouble here depends on how far those cusses go at Big - Cloud. If I knew that, I’d know what to expect, h’m? I thought I’d send - you up to headquarters for a day. You could have a talk with the super, - tell him just where we stand here, an’ size things up there generally. - What do you say?” - </p> - <p> - “Why, of course. All right, if you want me to,” agreed Keating readily. - </p> - <p> - “That’s the boy,” said Spirlaw, heartily. “Number Twelve will be along in - half an hour. I’ll flag her, an’ you can go an’ get ready now. I’ll give - you a letter to take along to Carleton.” - </p> - <p> - As Keating, with a nod of assent, turned briskly away, Spirlaw watched him - out of sight—and the hint of a smile played over the lips of the - road boss. He pulled a report sheet from his pocket, and on the back of it - scrawled laboriously a letter to the superintendent of the Hill Division. - It wasn’t a very long letter even with the P. S. included. His smile - hardened as he read it over. - </p> - <p> - “Supt., Big Cloud,” it ran. “Dear Sir:—Replying to yours 8th inst., - please send a couple of good.45s, and <i>plenty of stuffing</i>. (‘Plenty - of stuffing’ was heavily underscored.) Yrs. Resp., H. Spirlaw. P.S. <i>Keep - the boy up there out of this</i>.” (The P. S. was even more heavily - underscored than the other.) - </p> - <p> - Wise and learned in the ways of men—and Polacks—was Spirlaw. - Spirlaw was not dealing with the <i>possibility</i> of trouble—it - was simply a question of how long it would be before it started. He folded - the letter, sealed it in one of the company’s manilas, and, as he watched - Number Twelve disappear around the bend steaming east for Big Cloud with - Keating aboard her and the epistle reposing in Keating’s pocket, he - stretched out his arms that were big as derrick booms and drew in a long - breath like a man from whose shoulders has dropped a heavy load. - </p> - <p> - That day Spirlaw talked from his heart to the men, and they listened in - sullen, stupid silence, leaning on their picks and shovels. - </p> - <p> - “You know me,” he snapped, and his eyes starting at the right of the group - rested for a bare second on each individual face as they swept down the - line. “You know <i>me</i>. You’ve been actin’ like sulky dogs lately—don’t - think I haven’t spotted it. You saw what happened to that coyote friend of - yours that sneaked in here last night. I meant it as a lesson for the - bunch of you as well as him. The yarns he was fillin’ you full of are - mostly lies, an’ if they ain’t it’s none of your business, anyhow. It - won’t pay you to look for trouble, I promise you that. You can take it - from me that I’ll bash the first man to powder that tries it. Get that? - Well then, wiggle them picks a bit an’ get busy!” - </p> - <p> - “The man that hits first,” said Spirlaw to himself, as he walked away, “is - the man that usually comes out on top. I guess them there few kind words - of mine ‘ll give ‘em a little something to chew on till Carle-ton sends - that hardware down, I guess they will, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - The camp was pretty quiet that night—quieter than usual. The - cook-house and the three bunk-houses, that lay a few hundred yards east of - the trestle, might have been occupied by dead men for all the sounds that - came from them. Occasionally, Spirlaw, sitting out as usual in front of - his own shanty, that was between the trestle and the gang’s quarters, saw - a Polack or two skulk from one of the bunk-houses to the other—and - he scowled savagely as he divided his glances between them and the sky. It - looked like a storm in the mountains, and a storm in the mountains is - never by any possibility to be desired—least of all was it to be - desired just then. The men at work was one thing; the men cooped up for a - day, or two days, of enforced idleness with the temper they were in was - another— - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw turned in that night with the low, ominous roll of distant thunder - for a lullaby. - </p> - <p> - Once in the night he woke suddenly at the sound of a splitting crash, and - once, twice, and again, like a fierce, winking stream of flame, the - lightning filled the shack bright as day, while on the roof the rain beat - steadily like the tattoo of a corps of snare drums. Spirlaw smiled grimly - as the darkness shut down on him again. - </p> - <p> - “Got the little builder out just about the right time, h’m?” he remarked - to himself; and, turning over in his bunk, went to sleep again—but - even in his sleep the grim smile lingered on his lips. - </p> - <p> - The morning broke with the steady downpour unabated. Everything ran water, - and the rock cut was filled with it. Work was out of the question. Spirlaw - ate his breakfast, that the dripping camp cook brought him, and then, - putting on his rubber boots and coat, started over for the track. Number - Eleven was due at the Canon at seven-thirty, and she would have the - package of “hardware” he had asked Carleton for. - </p> - <p> - But though seven-thirty came, Number Eleven did not—neither did any - other train, east or west. The hours passed from a long morning to drag - through a longer afternoon. Something was wrong somewhere—and badly - wrong at that. Spirlaw’s face was blacker than the storm. Twice, once in - the morning and once in the afternoon, he started down the track in the - direction of Keefer’s Siding, which was just what its name proclaimed it - to be—a siding, no more, no less, only there was an operator there. - Each time, however, he changed his mind after getting no further than a - few yards. The Polacks could be no less alive to the fact than himself - that something out of the ordinary was in the air, and second - considerations swung strongly to the advisability of sticking close to the - camp, so that his presence might have the effect of dampening the ardor of - any mischief that might be brewing. - </p> - <p> - It was not until well on toward eight o’clock in the evening and the last - of the twilight that the hoarse screech of a whistle sounded down the - canon grade—a long blast and three short ones. It was belated Number - Eleven whistling for the camp—she wouldn’t stop, just slow down to - transact her business. Spirlaw, who was in his shanty at the time, - snatched up his hat, dashed out of the door, and headed for the bend of - the track. As he did so, out of the tail of his eye, he caught sight of - the Polacks clustered with out-poked heads from the open doors of the - bunk-houses. - </p> - <p> - As he reached the line, Number Eleven came round the curve, and the door - of the express car swung back. The messenger dropped a package into his - hand that the road boss received with a grim smile, and a word into his - ear that caused Spirlaw’s jaw to drop—nor was that all that dropped, - for, from the rear end, as the train rolled by—dropped Keating. - </p> - <p> - White-faced and shaky the boy looked—more so than usual. Spirlaw - stared as though he had seen an apparition, stared for a minute in silence - before he could lay tongue to words—then they came like the - out-spout of a volcano. - </p> - <p> - “What the hell’s the meanin’ of this?” he roared. - </p> - <p> - “Who in the double-blanked blazes let you out of Big Cloud, h’m? I’ll have - some——” - </p> - <p> - “Let’s get in out of the wet,” broke in Keating, smiling through a spell - of coughing that racked him at that moment. “You can growl your head off - then, if you like”—and he started on a run for the shack. - </p> - <p> - Once inside, Spirlaw rounded on the boy again, and he stopped only when he - was out of breath. - </p> - <p> - “Didn’t Carleton tell you to stay where you was?” he finished bitterly. - </p> - <p> - “Oh yes,” said Keating, “that’s about the first thing he <i>did</i> say - after he had read your letter, when I gave it to him yesterday. Then I - tumbled to why you had sent me out of camp. You’re about as square as they - make them, Spirlaw. You needn’t blame Carle-ton, <i>he</i> had about all - he could do without paying any attention to me or any one else. Had any - wires or news in here?” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “No; but I knew something was up, because Number Eleven is the first train - in or out to-day. The express messenger just said they’d cut loose in Big - Cloud and wrecked about everything in sight, but I guess he was puttin’ it - on a bit.” - </p> - <p> - “He didn’t put on anything,” said Keating slowly. “My God, Spirlaw, it was - an awful night! The freight-house and the shops and the roundhouse, what’s - left of them, are ashes. They cut all the wires and then they cut loose - themselves—the Polacks and that crowd, you know. Yes, they wrecked - everything in sight, and there’s a dozen lives gone to pay for it.” - Keating stopped suddenly, and again began to cough. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw looked at the boy uneasily, and mechanically fumbled with the - cords of the package he had laid upon the table. By the time he had - removed the wrappers and disclosed two ugly, businesslike looking.45s and - a half-dozen boxes of cartridges, Keating’s paroxysm had passed. - </p> - <p> - “I guess it was exciting enough for <i>me</i>, anyhow”—Keating tried - hard to make his laugh ring true. “I’m a little weak from it yet.” - </p> - <p> - “If you weren’t sick,” Spirlaw burst out, “I’d make you sick for comin’ - back here. You know well enough we’ll get it next—you knew so well - you came back to help——” - </p> - <p> - “I told Carleton he ought to send some help down here,” Keating - interrupted hastily; “and he just looked at me like a crazy man—he - was half mad anyhow with the ruin of things. ‘Help!’ he flung out at me. - ‘Where’s it coming from? Let Spirlaw yank up his stakes and pull out if - things get looking bad!’” - </p> - <p> - “Pull out!” shouted Spirlaw, in a sudden roar. “Pull out! <i>Me!</i> Not - for all the cross-eyed, hamstrung Polacks on the system!” - </p> - <p> - “I think you’d better,” said Keating quietly. “After what I saw last - night, I think you’d better. There was no holding them—they were - like savages, and the further they went the worse they got. They were - backed up by whisky and the worst element in town. I was in the station - with Carleton, Regan, Harvey, Riley and Spence and some of the other - dispatchers. It was a regular pitched battle, and in spite of their - revolvers the station would have gone with the rest if, along toward - morning, the striking trainmen and the Brotherhood hadn’t taken a hand and - helped us out. I don’t know that it’s over yet, that it won’t break out - again to-night; though I heard Carleton say there’d be a detachment of the - police in town by four o’clock. I wish you would pull out, Spirlaw. You - said yourself that all these fellows here needed to start them sticking - their claws into you was a little encouragement from the other end. - They’ve been afraid of you, but they hate you like poison. Once started, - they’ll be worse than the crowd at Big Cloud for hate is a harder driver - than whisky. Then besides, I really think you’d be of more use in Big - Cloud. You could do some good there no matter what the end was, while here - you’re alone and you stand to lose everything and gain nothing. I wish you - would pull out, Spirlaw, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw reached out his hand and laid it on Keating’s shoulder, as he - shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve got a whole <i>lot</i> to lose,” he answered, his hard face - softening a little. “A whole lot. I can’t say things the way you do, but I - guess you’ll understand. You got something that means a whole lot to you, - that you’d risk anything for—what you want to do and what you want - to leave behind you when it comes along time to cash in. Well, I guess - most of us have in one way or another, though mabbe it don’t rank - anywheres up to that. I reckon, too, a whole lot of us don’t never think - to put it in words, an’ a whole lot of us couldn’t if we tried to, but - it’s there with any man that’s any good. I’d rather go out for keeps than - pull out—I’d rather they’d plant me. D’ye think I’d want to live an’ - have to cross the street because I couldn’t look <i>even a Polack</i> in - the eyes—a man would be better dead, what?” - </p> - <p> - For a moment Keating did not answer, he seemed to be weighing the - possibility of still shaking the determination of the road boss before - accepting it as irrevocable: then, evidently coming to the conclusion that - it was useless to argue further, he pointed to the revolvers. - </p> - <p> - “Then the sooner you load those the better,” he jerked out. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw looked at him curiously, questioningly. - </p> - <p> - “Because,” went on Keating, answering the unspoken interrogation, “when I - dropped off the train I saw that fellow Kuryla—he was pointed out to - me in Big Cloud yesterday—and three or four more drop off on the - other side. I didn’t know they were on the train until then, of course, or - I would have had them put off. There isn’t much doubt about what they are - here for, is there?” - </p> - <p> - “So that’s it, is it?” Spirlaw ripped out with an oath. “No, there ain’t - much doubt!” - </p> - <p> - He snatched up a cartridge-box, slit the paper band with his thumb nail, - and, breaking the revolvers, began to cram the cartridges into the - cylinders. His face was twitching and the red that flushed it shaded to a - deep purple. Not another word came from him—just a deadly quiet. He - thrust the weapons into his pockets, strode to the door, opened it, - stepped over the threshold—and stopped. An instant he hung there in - indecision, then he came back, shut the door behind him, sat down on the - edge of his bunk, and looked at Keating grimly. - </p> - <p> - “There’s been one train along, there’ll be another,” he snapped. “An’ the - first one that comes you’ll get aboard of. I hate to keep those whinin’ - coyotes waitin’, but——” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll take no train,” Keating cut in coolly; “but I’ll take a revolver.” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw growled and shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “Why didn’t you tell me about Kuryla at first?” he demanded abruptly. - </p> - <p> - “You know why as well as I do,” smiled Keating. “I wanted to get you away - from here if I could. There wouldn’t have been any use trying at all if - I’d begun by telling you that. Wild horses wouldn’t have budged you then. - As for a train, what’s the use of talking about it, there probably won’t - be another one along under an hour. In the meantime, give me one of the - guns.” - </p> - <p> - “Not m——” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw’s refusal died half uttered on his lips, as he sprang suddenly to - his feet; then he whipped out the revolvers and shoved one quickly into - Keating’s hand. - </p> - <p> - Carried down with the sweep of the wind came the sound of many voices - raised in shouts and discordant song. It grew louder, swelled, and broke - into a high-pitched, defiant yell. - </p> - <p> - “Whisky!” gritted Spirlaw between his teeth. - </p> - <p> - “That devil Kuryla and the coyotes that came with him knew the best an’ - quickest way to start the ball rollin’. Well, son, I reckon we’re in for - it. The only thing I’m sorry about is that you’re here; but that can’t be - helped now. You were white clean through to come—Holy Mother, listen - to that!”—another yell broke louder, fiercer than before over the - roar of the storm. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw stepped to the door and peered out. It was already getting dark. - The rain still poured in sheets, and the wind howled down the gorge in - wild, furious, spasmodic gusts. Thin streaks of light strayed out from the - doors of the bunk-houses, and around the doors were gathered shadowy - groups. A moment more and the shadowy groups welded into a single dark - mass. Came a mad, exultant yell from a single throat. It was caught up, - flung back, echoed and reechoed by a score of voices—and the dark - mass began to move. - </p> - <p> - “Guess you’d better put out that light, son,” said Spirlaw coolly. - “There’s no use makin’ targets of our——” - </p> - <p> - Before he ended, before Keating had more than taken a step forward, a lump - of rock shivered the little window and crashed into the lamp—it was - out for keeps. A howl followed this exhibition of marksmanship, and, - following that, a volley of stones smashed against the side of the shack - thick and fast as hail—then the onrush of feet. - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw’s revolver cut the black with a long, blinding flash, then - another, and another. Screams and shrieks answered him, but it did not - halt the Polacks. In a mob they rushed the door. Spirlaw sprang back, - trying to close it after him; instead, a dozen hands grasped and half - wrenched it from its hinges. - </p> - <p> - “Lie down on the floor, Spirlaw, <i>quick!</i>”—it was Keating’s - voice, punctuated with a cough. The next instant his gun barked, playing - through the doorway like a gatling. - </p> - <p> - From the floor the road boss joined in. The mob wavered, pitched swaying - this way and that, then broke and ran, struggling with each other to get - out of the line of fire. - </p> - <p> - “Hurrah!” cried Keating. “I guess that will hold them.” - </p> - <p> - “‘Tain’t begun,” was Spirlaw’s grim response. “Where’s them cartridges?” - </p> - <p> - “On the table—got them?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Spirlaw, after a minute’s groping. “Here, put a box in your - pocket.” - </p> - <p> - “What are they up to now?” asked Keating as, in the silence that had - fallen, they reloaded and listened. - </p> - <p> - “God knows,” growled Spirlaw; “but I guess we’ll find out quick enough.” - </p> - <p> - As he spoke, from a little distance away, came the splintering crash of - woodwork—then silence again. - </p> - <p> - “That’s the storehouse,” Spirlaw snarled. “They’re after the bars an’ - anything else they can lay their hands on. Guess they weren’t countin’ on - our havin’ anything more than our fists to fight with, guess they - weren’t.” - </p> - <p> - Keating’s only reply was a cough. - </p> - <p> - The minutes passed, two, three, five of them. Once outside sounded what - might have been the stealthy scuffle of feet or only a storm-sound so - construed by the imagination. Then, from the direction of the riverbed, - sudden, sharp, came a terrific roar. - </p> - <p> - “My God!” yelled Spirlaw. “There’s the trestle gone—they’ve blown it - up! They’re sure to have laid a fuse here, too. Get out of here quick! - Fool that I was, I might have known it was the <i>dynamite</i> they were - after.” - </p> - <p> - Both men were scrambling for the door as he spoke. They reached it not an - instant too soon. The ground behind them lifted, heaved; the walls, the - roof of the shack rose, cracked like eggshells, and scattered in flying - pieces—and the mighty, deafening detonation of the explosion echoed - up and down the gorge, echoed again—and died away. - </p> - <p> - The mob caught sight of them as they ran and, foiled for the moment, sent - up a yell of rage—then started in pursuit. - </p> - <p> - “Make for the cut,” shouted Spirlaw. “We can hold them off there behind - the rocks.” - </p> - <p> - Keating had no breath for words. Panting, sick, his head swimming, a fleck - of blood upon his lips, he struggled after the giant form of the road - boss; while, behind, coming ever closer, ringing in his ears, were the - wild cries of the maddened Polacks. The splash of water revived him a - little as they plunged along the old right of way where the river, flooded - by the storm, had again claimed its own. The worst of it was up to his - armpits. A grip on his shoulder and a pull from Spirlaw helped him over. - They gained the other side with a bare two yards separating them from the - mob behind, went on again—and then Spirlaw caught his foot, tripped - and pitched headlong, causing Keating, at his heels, to stumble and fall - over him. - </p> - <p> - Like wild beasts the Polacks surged upon them. Keating tried to regain his - feet—but he got no further than his knees as a swinging blow from a - pick-handle caught him on his head. Half-stunned, he sank back and, as - consciousness left him, he heard Spirlaw’s great voice roar out like the - maddened bellow of a bull, saw the giant form rise with, it seemed, a - dozen Polacks clinging to neck and shoulders, legs and body, saw him shake - them off and the massive arms rise and fall—and all was a blur, all - darkness. - </p> - <p> - The road boss lay stretched out a yard away from him when he opened his - eyes. He was very weak. He raised himself on his elbow. From the camp down - the line he could see the lights in the bunk-houses, hear drunken, - chorused shouts. He crept to Spirlaw, called him, shook him—the big - road boss never moved. The Polacks had evidently left both of them for - dead—and one, it seemed, was. He slid his hand inside the other’s - vest for the heart beat. So faint it was at first he could not feel it, - then he got it, and, realizing that Spirlaw was still alive he - straightened up and looked helplessly around—and, in a flash, like - the knell of doom, Spirlaw’s words came back to him: “<i>There’s the - trestle gone!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Sick the boy was with his clotting lungs, deathly sick, weak from the blow - on his head, dizzy, and his brain swam. <i>There’s the trestle gone!</i>”—he - coughed it out between blue lips. - </p> - <p> - “<i>There’s the trestle gone!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Keefer’s Siding was a mile away. Somehow he must reach it, must get the - word along the line that the <i>trestle was out</i>, get the word along - before the stalled traffic moved, before the first train east or west - crashed through to death, before more wreck and ruin was added to the tale - that had gone before. He bent to Spirlaw’s ear and three times called him - frantically: “Spirlaw! Spirlaw! <i>Spirlaw!</i>” There was no response. He - tried to lift him, tried to drag him—the great bulk was far beyond - his strength. And the minutes were flying by, each marking the one perhaps - when it would be too late, too late to warn any one that the trestle was - out. - </p> - <p> - Just up past the rock cut, a bare twenty yards away where the leads to the - temporary track swung into the straight of the main line, was the platform - handcar they had used for carrying tools and the odds and ends of supplies - between the storehouse and the work—if he could only get Spirlaw - there! - </p> - <p> - He called him again, shook him, breathing a prayer for help. The road boss - stirred, raised himself a little, and sank down again with a moan. - </p> - <p> - “Spirlaw, <i>Spirlaw</i>, for God’s sake, man, try to get up! I’ll help - you. You must, do you hear, <i>you must!</i>”—he was dragging at the - road boss’s collar. - </p> - <p> - Keating’s voice seemed to reach the other’s consciousness, for, weakly, - dazed, without sense, blindly, Spirlaw got upon his knees, then to his - feet, and, staggering, reeling like a drunken man, his arm around - Keating’s neck, his weight almost crushing to the ground the one sicker - than himself, the two stumbled, pitched, and, at the end, <i>crawled</i> - those twenty yards. - </p> - <p> - “The handcar, Spirlaw, the handcar!” gasped Keating. “Get on it. You must! - Try! Try!” - </p> - <p> - Spirlaw straightened, lurched forward, and fell half across the car with - out-flung arms—unconscious again. - </p> - <p> - The rest Keating managed somehow, enough so that the dangling legs freed - the ground by a few inches; then, with bursting lungs, far spent, he - unblocked the wheels, pushed the car down the little spur, swung the - switch, dragged himself aboard, and began to pump his way west toward - Keefer’s Siding. - </p> - <p> - No man may tell the details of that mile, every inch of which was wrung - from blood that oozed from parted, quivering lips; no man may question - from Whom came the strength to the frail body, where strength was not; the - reprieve to the broken lungs, that long since should have done their worst—only - Keating knew that the years were ended forever, that with every stroke of - the pump-handle the time was shorter. The few minutes to win through—that - was the last stake! - </p> - <p> - At the end he choked—fighting for his consciousness, as, like - dancing points, switch lights swam before him. He checked with the brake, - reeled from the car, fell, tried to rise and fell back again. Then, on his - hands and knees, he crept toward the station door. It had come at last. - The hemorrhage that he had fought back with all his strength was upon him. - He beat upon the door. It opened, a lantern was flashed upon him, and he - fell inside. - </p> - <p> - “The trestle’s out at the Glacier—hold trains both ways—Polacks—Spirlaw - on—handcar—I———” - </p> - <p> - That was all. Keating never spoke again. - </p> - <p> - “I dunno as you’d call him a builder,” says Clarihue, the night turner, - when <i>he</i> tells the story in the darkened roundhouse in the shadow of - the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the steam purrs softly at the - gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a catchy sob, “I dunno as you - would. It depends on the way you look at it. Accordin’ to him, he was. He - left something behind him, what?” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - VII—THE GUARDIAN OF THE DEVIL’S SLIDE - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here is one bad - piece of track on the Hill Division, particularly bad, which is the same - as saying that it is the worst piece of track, bar none, on the American - Continent. Not that the engineers were to blame—they weren’t. It was - Dame Nature in the shape of the Rockies—Dame Nature and the - directors. - </p> - <p> - Sir Ivers Clayborn, gray-haired and grizzled, a man schooled in the - practical school of many lands and many years, who was chief consulting - engineer when the road was building, advised a double-looped tunnel that, - according to his sketch, looked something like the figure 8 canted over - sideways. The directors poised their glasses and examined the sketch with - interest until they caught sight of the penciled estimate in the corner. - That settled it. They did not even take the trouble to vote. They asked - for an alternative—and they got it. They got the Devil’s Slide. - </p> - <p> - First and last, it has euchred more money out of the treasury of the - Transcontinental than it would have taken to build things Sir Ivers’ way - to begin with; and it has taken some years, a good many of them, for the - directors to learn their lesson. The old board never did, for that matter; - but, thanks perhaps to younger blood, they’ve begun now to build as they - should have built in the first place. It isn’t finished yet, that - double-looped tunnel, it won’t be for years, but, no matter, it’s begun, - and some day a good many more than a few men will sleep the easier because - of it. - </p> - <p> - From Carleton, the super, to the last section hand and track-walker, the - Devil’s Slide was a nightmare. The dispatchers, under their green-shaded - lamps, cursed it in the gray hours of dawn; the traffic department cursed - it spasmodically, but at such times so whole-heartedly and with such - genuine fervor and abandon that its occasional lapses into silence were - overlooked; the motive power department in the shape of Regan, the master - mechanic, cursed it all the time, and did it breathlessly. It had only one - friend—the passenger agent’s department. The passenger agent’s - department swore <i>by</i> it—on account of the scenery. - </p> - <p> - “Scenery!” gulped the dispatchers, and the white showed under their nail - tips as their fingers tightened on their keys. - </p> - <p> - “Scenery!” howled the traffic department, and reached for the claim file. - </p> - <p> - “Scenery!”—Regan didn’t say it—he choked. Just choked, and - spat the exclamation point in a stream of black-strap. - </p> - <p> - “Scenery!” murmured Mr. General Passenger Agent esthetically, waving a - soft and diamond bedecked hand from the platform of Carleton’s private - car. “Wonderful! Grand! Magnificent! We’ve got them all beaten into a - coma. No other road has anything like it anywhere in the world.” - </p> - <p> - “They have not,” agreed Carleton, and the bitterness of his soul was in - his words. - </p> - <p> - Everybody was right. - </p> - <p> - The general passenger agent was right—the scenic grandeur was beyond - compare, and he made the most of it in booklets, in leaflets, in - pamphlets, and in a score of pages in a score of different magazines. - </p> - <p> - The others were right—the Devil’s Slide was everything that the - ethics of engineering said it shouldn’t be. It was neither level nor - straight. In its marvelous two miles from the summit of the pass to the - canon below, its nearest approach to the ethical was three percent drop. - There wasn’t much of that—most of it was a straight five! It - twisted, it turned, it slid, it slithered, and it dove around projecting - mountain-sides at scandalous tangents and with indecent abruptness. - </p> - <p> - Chick Coogan swore, with a grin, that he could see his own headlight - coming at him about half the time every trip he made up or down. That, of - course, is exaggerating a little—but not much! Coogan sized up the - Devil’s Slide pretty well when he said that, all things considered, pretty - well—there wasn’t much chance to mistake what he meant, or what the - Devil’s Slide was, or what he thought of it. Anyway, be that as it may, - Coogan’s description gave the division the only chance they ever had to - crack a smile when the Devil’s Slide was in question. - </p> - <p> - They smiled then, those railroaders of the Rockies, but they’ll look at - you queerly now if you mention the two together—Coogan and the - Devil’s Slide. Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes. - </p> - <p> - Any one on the Hill Division can tell you the story—they’ve reason - to know it, and they do—to the last man. If you’d rather get it - first hand in a roundhouse, or between trains from the operator at some - lone station that’s no more than a siding, or in the caboose of a way - freight—if you are a big enough man to ride there, and that means - being bigger than most men—or anywhere your choice or circumstance - leads you from the super’s office to a track-walker’s shanty, if you’d - rather get it that way, and you’ll get it better, far better, than you - will here, don’t try any jolly business to make the boys talk—just - say a good word for Coogan, Chick Coogan. That’s the “open sesame”—and - the only one. - </p> - <p> - There’s no use talking about the logical or the illogical, the rational or - the irrational, when it comes to Coo-gan’s story. Coogan’s story is just - Coogan’s story, that’s all there is to it. What one man does another - doesn’t. You can’t cancel the human equation because there’s nothing to - cancel it with; it’s there all the time swaying, compelling, dominating - every act in a man’s life. The higher branches of mathematics go far, and - to some men three dimensions are but elemental, but there is one problem - even they have never solved and never will solve—the human equation. - What Coogan did, you might not do—or you might. - </p> - <p> - Coogan didn’t come to the Transcontinental a fullblown engineer from some - other road as a good many of the boys have, though that’s nothing against - them; Coogan was a product of the Hill Division pure and simple. He began - as a kid almost before the steel was spiked home, and certainly before the - right of way was shaken down enough to begin to look like business. He - started at the bottom and he went up. Call-boy, sweeper, wiper, fireman—one - after the other. Promotion came fast in the early days, for, the Rockies - once bridged, business came fast, too; and Coogan had his engine at - twenty-one, and at twenty-four he was pulling the Imperial Limited. - </p> - <p> - “Good goods,” said Regan. “That’s what he is. The best ever.” - </p> - <p> - Nobody questioned that, not only because there was no one on the division - who could put anything over Coogan in a cab, but also because, and perhaps - even more pertinent a reason, every one liked Coogan—some of them - did more than that. - </p> - <p> - Straight as a string, clean as a whistle was Coogan, six feet in his - stockings with a body that played up to every inch of his height, black - hair, jet black, black eyes that laughed with you, never <i>at</i> you, a - smile and a cheery nod always—the kind of a man that makes you feel - every time you see them that the world isn’t such an eternal dismal grind - after all. That was Chick Coogan—all except his heart. Coogan had a - heart like a woman’s, and a hard luck story from a ‘bo stealing a ride, a - railroad man, or any one else for that matter, never failed to make him - poorer by a generous percentage of what happened to be in his pocket at - the time. Who wouldn’t like him! Queer how things happen. - </p> - <p> - It was the day Coogan got married that Regan gave him 505 and the Limited - run as a sort of wedding present; and that night Big Cloud turned itself - completely inside out doing honor and justice to the occasion. - </p> - <p> - Big Cloud has had other celebrations, before and since, but none quite so - unanimous as that one. Restraint never did run an overwhelmingly strong - favorite with the town, but that night it was hung up higher than the arms - on the telegraph poles. Men that the community used to hide behind and - push forward as hostages of righteousness, when it was on its good - behavior and wanted to put on a front, cut loose and outshone the best—or - the worst, if you like that better—-of the crowd that never made any - bones about being on the other side of the fence. They burned red flares, - very many of them, that Carleton neglected to imagine had any connection - with the storekeeper and the supply account; they committed indiscretions, - mostly of a liquid nature, that any one but the trainmaster, who was - temporarily blind in both eyes, could have seen; and, as a result, the - Hill Division the next day was an eminently paralytic and feeble affair. - This is a very general description of the event, because sometimes it is - not wise to particularize—this is a case in point. - </p> - <p> - Coogan’s send-off was a send-off no other man, be he king, prince, - president, sho-gun, or high mucky-muck of whatever degree, could have got—except - Coogan. Coogan got it because he was Coogan, just Coogan—and the - night was a night to wonder at. - </p> - <p> - Regan summarized it the next evening over the usual game of pedro with - Carleton, upstairs over the station in the superb office. - </p> - <p> - “Apart from Coogan and me,” said the master mechanic, in a voice that was - still suspiciously husky, “apart from Coogan and me and <i>mabbe</i> the - minister—” the rest was a wave of his hand. Regan could wave his - hand with a wealth of eloquence that was astounding. . - </p> - <p> - “Quite so,” agreed Carleton, with a grin. “Too bad to drag <i>them</i> - into it, though. Both ‘peds’ to me, Tommy. It’s a good thing for the - discipline of the division that bigamy is against the law, what?” - </p> - <p> - “They’ll be talking of it,” said Regan reminiscently, “when you and me are - on the scrap heap, Carleton.” - </p> - <p> - “I guess that’s right,” admitted the super. “Play on, Tommy.” - </p> - <p> - But it wasn’t. They only talked of Coogan’s wedding for about a year—no, - they don’t talk about it now. We’ll get to that presently. - </p> - <p> - The Imperial Limited was the star run on the division—Regan gave - Coogan the thirty-third degree when he gave him that—that and 505, - which was the last word in machine design. And Coogan took them, took them - and the schedule rights that pertained thereto, which were a clear and a - clean-swept track, and day after day, up hill and down, Number One or - Number Two, as the case might be, pulled into division on the dot. - Coogan’s stock soared—if that were possible; but not Coogan. The - youngest engineer on the road and top of them all, would have been excuse - enough for him to show his oats and, within decent limits, no one would - have thought the worse of him for it—Coogan never turned a hair. He - was still the friend of the ‘bo and the man in trouble, still the Coogan - that had been a wiper in the roundhouse; and yet, perhaps, not quite the - same, for two new loves had come into his life—his love for Annie - Coogan, and his love, the love of the master craftsman, for 505. In the - little house at home he talked to Annie of the big mountain racer and - Annie, being an engineer’s daughter as well as an engineer’s wife, - listened with understanding and a smile, and in the smile was pride and - love; in the cab Coogan talked of Annie, always Annie, and one day he told - his fireman a secret that made big Jim Dahleen grin sheepishly and stick - out a grimy paw. - </p> - <p> - Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes—and always, it seems, the - cards are stacked. - </p> - <p> - The days and the weeks and the months went by, and then there came a - morning when a sober-, serious-faced group of men stood gathered in the - super’s office, as Number Two’s whistle, in from the Eastbound run, - sounded down the gorge. They looked at Regan. Slowly, the master mechanic - turned, went out of the room and down the stairs to the platform, as 505 - shot round the bend and rolled into the station. For a moment Regan stood - irresolute, then he started for the front-end. He went no further than the - colonist coach, that was coupled behind the mail car. Here he stopped, - made a step forward, changed his mind, climbed over the colonist’s - platform, dropped down on the other side of the track, and began to walk - toward the roundhouse—they changed engines at Big Cloud and 505, - already uncoupled, was scooting up for the spur to back down for - the’table. - </p> - <p> - The soles of Regan’s boots seemed like plates of lead as he went along, - and he mopped his forehead nervously. There was a general air of desertion - about the roundhouse. The’table was set and ready for 505, but there - wasn’t a soul in sight. Regan nodded to himself in sympathetic - understanding. He crossed the turntable, walked around the half circle, - and entered the roundhouse through the engine doors by the far pit—the - one next to that which belonged to 505. Here, just inside, he waited, as - the big mogul came slowly down the track, took the’table with a slight - jolt, and stopped. He saw Coogan, big, brawny, swing out of the cab like - an athlete, and then he heard the engineer speak to his fireman. - </p> - <p> - “Looks like a graveyard around here, Jim. Wonder where the boys are. I - won’t wait to swing the’table, they’ll be around in a minute, I guess. I - want to get up to the little woman.” - </p> - <p> - “All right,” Dahleen answered. “Leave her to me, I’ll run her in. Good - luck to you, Chick.” - </p> - <p> - Coogan was starting across the yards with a stride that was almost a run. - Regan opened his mouth to shout—and swallowed a lump in his throat - instead. Twice he made as though to follow the engineer, and twice - something stronger than himself held him back; and then, as though he had - been a thief, the master mechanic stole out from behind the doors, went - back across the tracks, climbed the stairs to Carleton’s room with lagging - steps, and entered. - </p> - <p> - The rest were still there: Carleton in his swivel chair, Harvey, the - division engineer, Spence, the chief dispatcher, and Riley, the - trainmaster. Regan shook his head and dropped into a seat. - </p> - <p> - “I couldn’t,” he said in a husky voice. “My God, I <i>couldn’t</i>” he - repeated, and swept out his arms. - </p> - <p> - A bitter oath sprang from Carleton’s lips, lips that were not often - profane, and his teeth snapped through the amber of his briar. The others - just looked out of the window. - </p> - <p> - MacVicar, a spare man, took the Limited out that night, and it was three - days before Coogan reported again. Maybe it was the fit of the black - store-clothes and perhaps the coat didn’t hang just right, but as he - entered the roundhouse he didn’t look as straight as he used to look and - there was a queer inward slope to his shoulders and he walked like a man - who didn’t see anything. The springy swing through the gangway was gone. - He climbed to the cab as an old man climbs—painfully. The boys hung - back and didn’t say anything, just swore under their breaths with full - hearts as men do. There wasn’t anything <i>to</i> say—nothing that - would do any good. - </p> - <p> - Coogan took 505 and the Limited out that night, took it out the night - after and the nights that followed, only he didn’t talk any more, and the - slope of the shoulders got a little more pronounced, a little more - noticeable, a little beyond the cut of any coat. And on the afternoons of - the lay-overs at Big Cloud, Coogan walked out behind the town to where on - the slope of the butte were two fresh mounds—one larger than the - other. That was all. - </p> - <p> - Regan, short, paunchy, big-hearted Regan, tackled Jim Dahleen, Coogan’s - fireman. - </p> - <p> - “What’s he say on the run, Jim, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - “He ain’t talkative,” Dahleen answered shortly. - </p> - <p> - “What the hell,” growled the master mechanic deep in his throat, to - conceal his emotion. “‘Tain’t doing him any good going up there - afternoons. God knows it’s natural enough, but ‘tain’t doing him any good, - not a mite—nor them either, as far as I can see, h’m? You got to <i>make</i> - him talk, Jim. Wake him up.” - </p> - <p> - “Why don’t <i>you</i> talk to him?” demanded the fireman. - </p> - <p> - “H’m, yes. So I will. I sure will,” Regan answered. - </p> - <p> - And he meant to, meant to, honestly. But, somehow, Coogan’s eyes and - Coogan’s face said “no” to him as they did to every other man, and as the - days passed, almost a month of them, Regan shook his head, perplexed and - troubled, for he was fond of Coogan. - </p> - <p> - Then, one night, it happened. - </p> - <p> - Regan and Carleton were alone over their pedro at headquarters, except for - Spence, the dispatcher, in the next room. It was getting close on to - eleven-thirty. The Imperial Limited, West-bound, with Coogan in the cab, - had pulled out on time an hour and a half before. The game was lagging, - and, as usual, the conversation had got around to the engineer, - introduced, as it always was, by the master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - “I sure don’t know what to do for the boy,” said he. “I’d like to do - something. Talking don’t amount to anything, does it, h’m?—even if - you <i>can</i> talk. I can’t talk to him, what?” - </p> - <p> - “A man’s got to work a thing like that out for himself, Tommy,” Carleton - answered, “and it takes time. That’s the only thing that will ever help - him—time. I know you’re pretty fond of Coogan, even more than the - rest of us and that’s saying a good deal, but you’re thinking too much - about it yourself.” - </p> - <p> - Regan shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “I can’t help it, Carleton. It’s got <i>me</i>. Time, and that sort of - thing, may be all right, but it ain’t very promising when a man broods the - way he does. I ain’t superstitious or anything like that, but I’ve a - feeling I can’t just explain that somehow something’s going to break. Kind - of premonition. Ever have anything like that? It gets on your mind and you - can’t shake it off. It’s on me to-night worse than it’s ever been.” - </p> - <p> - “Nonsense,” Carleton laughed. “Premonitions are out of date, because - they’ve been traced back to their origin. Out here, I should say it was a - case of too much of Dutchy’s lunch-counter pie. You ought to diet anyway, - Tommy, you’re getting too fat. Hand over that fine-cut of yours, I———” - </p> - <p> - He stopped as a sharp cry came from the dispatcher’s room, followed by an - instant’s silence, then the crash of a chair sounded as, hastily pushed - back, it fell to the floor. Quick steps echoed across the room, and the - next moment Spence, with a white face and holding a sheet of tissue in his - hand, burst in upon them. - </p> - <p> - Carleton sprang to his feet. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter, Spence?” he demanded sharply. - </p> - <p> - “Number One,” the dispatcher jerked out, and extended the sheet on which - he had scribbled the message as it came in off the sounder. - </p> - <p> - Carleton snatched the paper, and Regan, leaping from his chair, looked - over his shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “Number One, engine 505, jumped track east of switch-back number two in - Devil’s Slide. Report three known to be killed, others missing. Engineer - Coogan and fireman Dahleen both hurt,” they read. - </p> - <p> - Carleton was ever the man of action, and his voice rang hard as chilled - steel. - </p> - <p> - “Clear the line, Spence. Get your relief and wrecker out at once. Wire - Dreamer Butte for their wrecker as well, so they can work from both ends. - Now then, Tommy—my God, what’s the matter with you, are you crazy?” - </p> - <p> - Regan was leaning over the back of his chair, his face strained, his arm - outstretched, finger pointing to the wall. - </p> - <p> - “I knew it,” he muttered hoarsely. “I knew it. That’s what it is.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton’s eyes traveled from the master mechanic to the wall and back - again in amazed bewilderment, then he shook Regan by the shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “That’s what, what is?” he questioned brusquely. “Are you mad, man?” - </p> - <p> - “The date,” whispered Regan, still pointing to where a large single-day - calendar with big figures on it hung behind the super’s desk. “It’s the - twenty-eighth.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know what you mean, Tommy,”—Carleton’s voice was quiet, - restrained. - </p> - <p> - “Mean!” Regan burst out, with a hard laugh. “I don’t mean anything, do I? - ‘tain’t anything to do with it, it’s just coincidence, mabbe, and mabbe - it’s not. <i>It’s a year ago to-night Coogan was married.</i>” - </p> - <p> - For a moment Carleton did not speak; like Regan, he stared at the wall. - </p> - <p> - “You think that——” - </p> - <p> - “No, I don’t”—Regan caught him up roughly—“I don’t think - anything at all. I only know it’s queer, ghastly queer.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton nodded his head slowly. Steps were coming up the stairs. The - voice of Flannagan, the wrecking boss, reached them, other voices excited - and loud joined in. He slapped the master mechanic on the back. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t wonder it caught you, Tommy,” he said. “It’s almost creepy. But - there’s no time for that now. Come on.” - </p> - <p> - Regan laughed, the same hard laugh, as he followed the chief into the - dispatcher’s room. - </p> - <p> - “East of number two switch-back, eh?” he swore. “If there’s any choice for - hellishness anywhere on that cursed stretch of track, that’s it. My God, - it’s come, and it’s come good and hard—good and hard.” - </p> - <p> - It had. It was a bad mess, a nasty mess—but, like everything else, - it might have been worse. Instead of plunging to the right and dropping to - the canon eighteen hundred feet below, 505 chose the inward side and - rammed her nose into the gray mass of rock that made the mountain wall. - The wreckers from Dreamer Butte and the wreckers from Big Cloud tell of it - to this day. For twenty-four hours they worked and then they dropped—and - fresh men took their places. There was no room to work—just the - narrow ledge of the right of way on a circular sweep with the jutting - cliff of Old Piebald Mountain sticking in between, hiding one of the gangs - from the other, and around which the big wrecking cranes groped dangling - arms and chains like fishers angling for a bite. It was a mauled and - tangled snarl, and the worst of it went over the canon’s edge in pieces, - as axes, sledges, wedges, bars and cranes ripped and tore their way to the - heart of it. And as they worked, those hard-faced, grimy, sweating men of - the wrecking crews, they wondered—wondered that any one had come out - of it alive. - </p> - <p> - Back at headquarters in Big Cloud they wondered at it, too—and they - wondered also at the cause. Every one that by any possible chance could - throw any light upon it went on the carpet in the super’s office. - Everybody testified—everybody except Dahleen, the fireman, and - Coogan, the engineer; and they didn’t testify because they couldn’t. - Coogan was in the hospital with queer, inconsequent words upon his tongue - and a welt across his forehead that had laid bare the bone from eye to the - hair-line of his skull; and Dahleen was there also, not so bad, just - generally jellied up, but still too bad to talk. And the testimony was of - little use. - </p> - <p> - The tender of switch-back number one reported that the Limited had passed - him at perhaps a little greater speed than usual—which was the speed - of a man’s walk, for trains crawl down the Devil’s Slide with fear and - caution—but not fast enough to cause him to think anything about it. - </p> - <p> - Hardy, the conductor, testified. Hardy said it was the “air;” that the - train began to slide faster and faster after the first switch-back was - passed and that her speed kept on increasing up to the moment that the - crash came. He figured that it couldn’t be anything else—just the - “air”—it wouldn’t work and the control of the train was lost. That - was all he knew. - </p> - <p> - And while Regan swore and fumed, Carleton’s face set grim and hard—and - he waited for Dahleen. - </p> - <p> - It was a week before the fireman faced Carleton across the super’s desk, - but when that time came Carle-ton opened on him straight from the - shoulder, not even a word of sympathy, not so much as “glad to see you’re - out again,” just straight to the point, hard and quick. - </p> - <p> - “Dahleen,” he snapped, “I want to know what happened in the cab that - night, and I want a straight story. No other kind of talking will do you - any good.” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen’s face, white with the pallor of his illness, flushed suddenly - red. - </p> - <p> - “You’re jumping a man pretty hard, aren’t you, Mr. Carleton?” he said - resentfully. - </p> - <p> - “Maybe I’ve reason to,” replied Carleton. “Well, I’m waiting for that - story.” - </p> - <p> - “There is no story that I know of,” said Dahleen evenly. “After we passed - switch-back number one we lost control of the train—the ‘air’ - wouldn’t work.” - </p> - <p> - “Do you expect me to believe that?” - </p> - <p> - “You don’t seem to,” retorted Dahleen, with a set jaw. - </p> - <p> - “What did you do to stop her?” - </p> - <p> - “What I could,” said Dahleen, with terse finality. - </p> - <p> - Carleton sprang to his feet, and his fist crashed down upon the desk. - </p> - <p> - “You are lying!” he thundered. “That wreck and the lives that are lost are - at your door, and if I could prove it!”—he shook his fist at the - fireman. “As it is I can only fire you for violation of the rules. I - thought at first it was Coogan and that he’d gone off his head a bit, and - you are cur enough to let the blame go there if you could, to let me and - every other man think so!” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen’s fists clenched, and he took a step forward. - </p> - <p> - “That’s enough!” he cried hoarsely. “Enough from you or any other man!” - </p> - <p> - Carleton rounded on him more furiously than before. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve given you a chance to tell a straight story and you wouldn’t. God - knows what you did that night. I believe you were fighting drunk. I - believe that gash in Coogan’s head wasn’t from the wreck. If I knew I’d - fix you.” He wrenched open a drawer of his desk, whipped out a metal - whisky flask, and shook it before Dahleen’s eyes. “<i>When you were picked - up this was in the pocket of your jumper!</i>” - </p> - <p> - The color fled from Dahleen’s face leaving it whiter than when he had - entered the room. He wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. All the - bluster, all the fight was gone. He stared mutely, a startled, frightened - look in his eyes, at the damning evidence in the super’s hand. - </p> - <p> - “Forgotten about it, had you?” Carleton flung out grimly. “Well, have you - anything to say?” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “Ain’t anything to say, is there?”—his voice was low with just a - hint of the former defiance. “It’s mine, but you can’t <i>prove</i> - anything. You can’t prove I drank it. D’ye think I’d be fool enough to do - anything but keep my mouth shut?” - </p> - <p> - “No; I can’t <i>prove</i> it”—Carleton’s voice was deadly cold. - “You’re out! I’ll give you twelve hours to get out of the mountains. The - boys, for Coogan’s sake alone if for no other, would tear you to pieces if - they knew the story. No one knows it yet but the man who found this in - your pocket and myself. I’m not going to tell you again what I think of - you—<i>get out!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen, without a word, swung slowly on his heel and started for the - door. - </p> - <p> - “Wait!” said Carleton suddenly. “Here’s a pass East for you. I don’t want - your blood on my hands, as I would have if Coogan’s friends, and that’s - every last soul out here, got hold of you. You’ve got twelve hours—after - that they’ll know—to set Coogan straight.” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen hesitated, came back, took the slip of paper with a mirthless, - half-choked laugh, turned again, and the door closed behind him. - </p> - <p> - Dahleen was out. - </p> - <p> - Carleton kept his word—twelve hours—and then from the division - rose a cry like the cry of savage beasts; but Regan was like a madman. - </p> - <p> - “Curse him!” he swore bitterly, breaking into a seething torrent of oaths. - “What did you let him go for, Carleton? You’d no business to. You should - have held him until Coogan could talk, and then we’d have had him.” - </p> - <p> - “Tommy”—Carleton laid his hand quietly on the master mechanic’s - shoulder—“we’re too young out in this country for much law. I don’t - think Coogan knows or ever will know again what happened in the cab that - night. The doctors don’t seem quite able to call the turn on him - themselves, so they’ve said to you and said to me. But whether he does or - not, it doesn’t make any difference as far as Dahleen goes. It would have - been murder to keep him here. And if Coogan ever can talk he’ll never put - a mate in bad no matter what the consequences to himself. There’s nothing - against Dahleen except that he had liquor in his possession while on duty. - That’s what I fired him for—that’s the only story that’s gone out of - this office. You and I and the rest are free to put the construction on it - that suits us best, and there it ends. If I was wrong to let him go, I was - wrong. I did what I thought was right—that’s all I can ever do.” - </p> - <p> - “Mabbe,” growled Regan, “mabbe; but, damn him, he <i>ought</i> to be - murdered. I’d like to have had ‘em done it! It’s that smash on the head - put Coogan to the bad. You’re right about one thing, I guess, he’ll never - be the same Coogan again.” - </p> - <p> - And in a way this was so; in another it wasn’t. It was not the wound that - was to blame, the doctors were positive about that; but Coogan, it was - pitifully evident, was not the same. Physically, at the end of a month, he - left the hospital apparently as well as he had ever been in his life; but - mentally, somewhere, a cog had slipped. His brain seemed warped and - weakened, simple as a child’s in its workings; his memory fogged and - dazed, full of indefinite, intangible snatches, vague, indeterminate - glimpses of his life before. One thing seemed to cling to him, to - predominate, to sway him—the Devil’s Slide. - </p> - <p> - Regan and Carleton talked to him, trying to guide his thoughts and - stimulate his memory. - </p> - <p> - “You remember you used to drive an engine, don’t you, Chick?” asked - Carleton. - </p> - <p> - “Engine?” Coogan nodded. “Yes; in the Devil’s Slide.” - </p> - <p> - “505,” said Regan quickly. “You know old 505.” - </p> - <p> - Coogan shook his head. - </p> - <p> - Carleton tried another tack. - </p> - <p> - “You were in a bad accident, Coogan, one night. You were in the cab of the - engine when she went to smash. Do you remember that?” - </p> - <p> - “The smash was on the Devil’s Slide,” said Coogan. - </p> - <p> - “That’s it,” cried Carleton. “I knew you’d remember.” - </p> - <p> - “They’re always there,” said Coogan simply, “always there. It is a bad - track. I’m a railroad man and I know. It’s not properly guarded. I’m going - to work there and take care of it.” - </p> - <p> - “Work there?” said Regan, the tears almost in his eyes. “What kind of - work? What do you want to do, Chick?” - </p> - <p> - “Just work there,” said Coogan. “Take care of the Devil’s Slide.” - </p> - <p> - The super and the master mechanic looked at each other—and averted - their eyes. Then they took Coogan up to his boarding-house, where he had - moved after Annie and the little one died. - </p> - <p> - “He’ll never put his finger on a throttle again,” said Regan with a choke - in his voice, as they came out. “The best man that ever pulled a latch, - the best man that ever drew a pay-check on the Hill Division. It’s hell, - Carleton, that’s what it is. I don’t think he really knew you or me. He - don’t seem to remember much of anything, though he’s natural enough and - able enough to take care of himself in all other ways. Just kind of - simple-like. It’s queer the way that Devil’s Slide has got him, what? We - can’t let him go out there.” - </p> - <p> - “I wonder if he remembers Annie,” said Carleton. “I was afraid to ask him. - I didn’t know what effect it might have. No; we can’t let him go out on - the Devil’s Slide.” - </p> - <p> - But the doctors said yes. They went further and said it was about the only - chance he had. The thing was on his mind. It was better to humor him, and - that, with the outdoor mountain life, in time might bring him around - again. - </p> - <p> - And so, while Regan growled and swore, and Carleton knitted his brows in - perplexed protest, the doctors had their way—and Coogan, Chick - Coogan, went to the Devil’s Slide. Officially, he was on the pay-roll as a - section hand; but Millrae, the section boss, had his own orders. - </p> - <p> - “Let Coogan alone. Let him do what he likes, only see that he doesn’t come - to any harm,” wired the super. - </p> - <p> - And Coogan, when Millrae asked him what he wanted to do, answered simply: - “I’m going to take care of the Devil’s Slide.” - </p> - <p> - “All right, Chick,” the section boss agreed cheerily. “It’s up to you. - Fire ahead.” - </p> - <p> - At first no one understood, perhaps even at the end no one quite - understood—possibly Coogan least of all. He may have done some good—or - he may not. In time they came to call him the Guardian of the Devil’s - Slide—not slightingly, but as strong men talk, defiant of ridicule, - with a gruff ring of assertion in their tones that brooked no question. - </p> - <p> - Up and down, down and up, two miles east, two miles west, Coogan patroled - the Devil’s Slide, and never a weakened rail, a sunken tie, a loosened - spike escaped him—he may have done some good, or he may not. - </p> - <p> - He slept here and there in one of the switch-back tender’s shanties, moved - and governed by no other consideration than fatigue—day and night - were as things apart. He ate with them, too; and scrupulously he paid his - footing. Twenty-five cents for a meal, twenty-five cents for a bunk, or a - blanket on the floor. They took his money because he forced it upon them, - furiously angry at a hint of refusal; but mostly the coin would be slipped - back unnoticed into the pocket of Coogan’s coat—poor men and rough - they were, nothing of veneer, nothing of polish, grimy, overalled, - horny-fisted toilers, their hearts were big if their purses weren’t. - </p> - <p> - At all hours, in the early dawn, at midday or late afternoon, the train - crews and the engine crews on passengers, specials and freights, passed - Coogan up and down, always walking with his head bent forward, his eyes - fastened on the right of way—passed with a cheery hail and the flirt - of a hand from cab, caboose, or the ornate tail of a garish Pullman. And - to the tourists he came to be more of an attraction than the scenic - grandeur of the Rockies themselves; they stared from the observation car - and listened, with a running fire of wondering comment, as the - brass-buttoned, swelled-with-importance, colored porters told the story, - until at last to have done the Rockies and have missed the Guardian of the - Devil’s Slide was to have done them not at all. It was natural enough, - anything out of the ordinary ministers to and arouses the public’s - curiosity. Not very nice perhaps, no—but natural. The railroad men - didn’t like it, and that was natural, too; but their feelings or opinions, - in the very nature of things, had little effect one way or the other. - </p> - <p> - Coogan grew neither better nor worse. The months passed, and he grew - neither better nor worse. Winter came, and, with the trestle that went out - in the big storm that year, Coogan went into Division for the last time, - went over the Great Divide, the same simple, broken-minded Coogan that had - begun his self-appointed task in the spring—he may have done some - good, or he may not. They found him after two or three days, and sent him - back to Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - “He’d have chosen that himself if he could have chosen,” said Carleton - soberly. “God knows what the end would have been. The years would have - been all alike, he’d never have got his mind back. It’s all for the best, - what?” - </p> - <p> - Regan did not answer. Philosophy and the master mechanic’s heart did not - always measure things alike. - </p> - <p> - The Brotherhood took charge of the arrangements, and Coogan’s funeral was - the biggest funeral Big Cloud ever had. Everybody wanted to march, so they - held the service late in the afternoon and closed down the shops at - half-past four: and the shop hands, from the boss fitter to the water boy, - turned out to the last man—and so did every one else in town. - </p> - <p> - It was getting dark and already supper time when it was over, but - Carleton, who had left some unfinished work on his desk, went back to his - office instead of going home. He lighted the lamp, put on the chimney, but - the match was still burning between his fingers when the door opened and a - man, with his hat pulled far down over his face, stepped in and closed it - behind him. - </p> - <p> - Carleton whirled around, the match dropped to the floor, and he leaned - forward over his desk, a hard look settling on his face. The man had - pushed back his hat. It was Dahleen, Coogan’s fireman, Jim Dahleen. - </p> - <p> - For a moment neither man spoke. Bitter words rose to Carleton’s tongue, - but something in the other’s face checked and held them back. It was - Dahleen who spoke first. - </p> - <p> - “I heard about Chick—that he’d gone out,” he said quietly. “I don’t - suppose it did him any good, but I kind of had to chip in on the good-by—Chick - and me used to be pretty thick. I saw you come down here and I followed - you. Don’t stare at me like that, you’d have done the same. Have you got - that flask yet?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” Carleton answered mechanically, and as mechanically produced it - from the drawer of his desk. - </p> - <p> - “Ever examine it particularly?” - </p> - <p> - “Examine it?” - </p> - <p> - “I guess that answers my question. I was afraid you might, and I wanted to - ask you for it that day, only I thought you’d think it mighty funny, - refuse, and well—well, get to looking it over on your own hook. Will - you give it here for a minute?” - </p> - <p> - Carleton handed it over silently. - </p> - <p> - Dahleen took it, pulled off the lower half that served as drinking cup, - laid his finger on the inside rim, and returned it to the super. - </p> - <p> - Carleton moved nearer to the light—then his face paled. <i>It was - Coogan’s flask!</i> The inscription, a little dulled, in fine engraving, - was still plain enough. “To Chick from Jim, on the occasion of his - wedding.” Carleton’s hand was trembling as he set it down. - </p> - <p> - “My God!” he said hoarsely. “It was Coogan who was drunk that night—not - you.” - </p> - <p> - “I figured that’s the way you’d read it, you or any other railroad man,” - said Dahleen. “It was him or me and one of us drunk, in the eyes of any of - the boys on the road, from the minute that flask showed up. There was only - one thing would have made you believe different, and I couldn’t tell you—then. - I’d have taken the same stand you did. But you’re wrong.. Coogan wasn’t - drunk that night—he never touched a drop. I wouldn’t be telling you - this now, if he had, would I?” - </p> - <p> - “Sit down,” said Carleton. - </p> - <p> - Dahleen took the chair beside the desk, and resting his feet on the - window-sill stared out at the lights twinkling below him. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I gave him the flask,” he said slowly, as though picking up the - thread of a story, “for a wedding present. The day he came back to his run - after the little woman and the baby died he had it in his pocket, and he - handed it to me. ‘<i>I’m afraid of it, Jimmy</i>,’ he said. That was all, - just that—only he <i>looked</i> at me. Then he got down out of the - cab to oil round, me still holding it in my hand for the words kind of hit - me—they meant a whole lot. Well, before he came back, I lifted up my - seat and chucked it down in the box underneath. I don’t want to make a - long story of this. You know how he took to brooding. Sometimes he - wouldn’t say a word from one end of the run to the other. And once in a - while he seemed to act a little queer. I didn’t think much of it and I - didn’t say anything to anybody, figuring it would wear off. When we pulled - out of Big Cloud the night of the wreck I didn’t see anything out of the - ordinary about him, I’d kind of got used to him by then and if there was - any difference I didn’t notice it. He never said a word all the way out - until we hit the summit of the Devil’s Slide and started down. I had the - fire-box door open and was throwing coal when he says so sudden as almost - to make me drop my shovel: - </p> - <p> - “‘Jimmy, do you know what night this is?’” - </p> - <p> - “‘Sure,’ says I, never thinking, ‘it’s Thursday.’ - </p> - <p> - “He laughed kind of softlike to himself. - </p> - <p> - “‘It’s my wedding night, Jimmy,’ he says. ‘My wedding night, and we’re - going to celebrate.’ - </p> - <p> - “The light from the fire-box was full on his face, and he had the queerest - look you ever saw on a man. He was white and his eyes were staring and he - was pushing his hand through his hair and rocking in his seat. I was - scart. I thought for a minute he was going to faint, then I remembered - that whisky and jumped for my side of the cab, opened the seat and - snatched it up. I went back to him with it in my hand. I don’t think he - ever saw it—I know he didn’t. He was laughing that soft laugh again, - kind of as though he was crooning, and he reached out his hand and pushed - me away. - </p> - <p> - “‘We’re going to celebrate, Jimmy,’ says he again. ‘We’re going to - celebrate. It’s my wedding night.’ - </p> - <p> - “I felt the speed quicken a bit, we were on the Slide then, you know, and - I saw his fingers tightening on the throttle. Then it got me, and my heart - went into my mouth—Chick was clean off his head. I slipped the flask - into my pocket, and tried to coax his hands away from the throttle. - </p> - <p> - “‘Let me take her a spell, Chick,’ says I, thinking my best chance was to - humor him. - </p> - <p> - “He threw me off like I was a plaything. Then I tried to pull him away and - he smashed me one between the eyes and sent me to the floor. All the time - we was going faster and faster. I tackled him again, but I might as well - have been a baby, and then—then—well, that wound in his head - came from a long-handled union-wrench I grabbed out of the tool box. He - went down like a felled ox—but it was too late. Before I could reach - a lever we were in splinters.” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen stopped. Carleton never stirred, he was leaning forward, his - elbows on his desk, his chin in his hands, his face strained, eyes - intently fastened on the other. - </p> - <p> - Dahleen fumbled a second with his watch chain, twisting it around his - fingers, then he went on: - </p> - <p> - “While I laid in the hospital I turned the thing over in my mind pretty - often, long before the doctors thought I knew my own name again, and I - figured that, if it was ever known, old Coogan was down and out for fair - even if when he got better his head turned out all right again, because he - wouldn’t be ever trusted in a cab under any circumstances, you understand? - If he didn’t come out straight why that ended it, of course; but I had it - in my mind that it was only what they call a temporary aberration. I - couldn’t queer him if that was all, could I? So I said to myself, ‘Jimmy, - all you know is that the “air” wouldn’t work.’ That’s what I told you that - day; and then you sprang that flask on me. You were right, I <i>had</i> - forgotten it. Whisky in the cab on the night of an accident is pretty near - an open and shut game. It was him or me, and I couldn’t tell you the story - then without doing Coogan cold, but Coogan’s gone now and it can’t hurt - him. That’s all.” - </p> - <p> - The tick of the clock on the wall, the click of the sounder from the - dispatcher’s room next door were the only sounds for a long minute, then - Carleton’s chair scraped and he stood up and put out his hand. - </p> - <p> - “Dahleen,” he said huskily, “I’d give a good deal to be as white a man as - you are.” - </p> - <p> - Dahleen shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “Any one would have done it for Coogan,” he said. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - VIII—THE BLOOD OF KINGS - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here never was, - and there isn’t now, anything elusive about the Hill Division, unless you - get to talking about the mileage—when you strike the mileage you - strike deep water, and the way of it is this. Most things that are big and - vital and enduring develop with the years to their own maturity, and with - maturity comes perfection—as nearly as anything is perfect. When the - last rail that proclaimed man’s mastery of the Rockies and the Sierras an - accomplished fact was spiked to the ties with much ceremony and more - eclat, to say nothing of the somewhat wobbly and uncertain blows with - which the silk-hatted, very-important-national-personage performed this - crowning act, while the rough-and-readys whose toil and sweat and grime - and blood had bought the miles the orators were eulogizing, being no - longer of the elect, looked on from a respectful distance—when all - this was done the Hill Division, even then, was no more than the rough - draft of a masterpiece. - </p> - <p> - In the years that followed came the pruning and the changes, the smoothing - and the toning down—tunnels bored through the mountain-sides - lessened the grades and lopped off winding miles around projecting spurs; - trestles with long embankment approaches added their quota to this - much-to-be-desired result; while in the foothills, instead of circling - around and around, to the right and the left and the left and the right of - an endless procession of buttes, the buttes themselves came to be bisected - with mathematical precision. All told, many miles, very many miles, have - been wiped out in this fashion—the elusive part of it is that, - measured in the dollars and cents paid by the tourists for transportation - and the shippers and consignees for freight hauls, the line is just as - long as ever it was! And it would appear that a good deal of money had - been spent with nothing to show for it; but then against this is the fact - that the directors down East were never rated as imminent or near-imminent - subjects for a lunacy commission. The mileage is elusive—let it go - at that. - </p> - <p> - For the rest, the right of way from Big Cloud, the divisional point, just - East of the mighty blue-blurred, snow-capped range that towers to the - skyline North and South—from there to the rolling, undulating - country that reaches West from the base of the Sierras, the Hill Division - is, without question, the most marvelous piece of track ever conceived by - man, and it stands a perpetual and enduring monument to the brains and the - genius, ay, and the manhood, too, of those who built it. - </p> - <p> - Such is the Hill Division. You who know the Rockies know it for the - grandeur of its scenery, know it for the glory of its conquest over - obstacles seemingly insurmountable; but there is another side that you may - not know, a side that the maps and plans and blueprints and the railroad - folders and the windows of the observation cars, big as they are, do not - show—and that side is the human side. It is full of tears and - laughter, full of sorrow and joy, of dangers and death and mistakes and - triumph—its history would fill many pages, but it is a history that - will never be written, for the generals and the rank and file of its army - have fought their battles without the blare of trumpets, have done their - work and their duty as they saw it, simply and with few words, without - thought of personal profit and, much less, of fame. They tell their own - stories amongst themselves, and they hold in honor those entitled thereto—which - is a meed beyond any recognition of governments or kings or - principalities, because it is the tribute of man to man, without glamor - and without pretense. If you are a man as they measure men, they will tell - you the stories, too; and, if you care to smoke, they will offer you their - black plugs with the heart-shaped tin tags that their favorite - manufacturer imbeds therein and, further, they will hand you their clasp - knives with which to slice it. If you are wise you will understand that - you are honored above most men, and you will be becomingly humble and will - listen. But if this, through circumstance and misfortune, has never been - your lot, then, here and there, inadequately and meagerly, you may run - across, in print, a stray breath from the Hill Division—this is a - case in print—the story of “King” Gilleen. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen was a man you would never pass in a crowd without turning your - head to look at him a second time, not even in a big crowd, for nature had - dealt with Gilleen generously—or otherwise—whichever way it - pleases you best to consider it. He had red hair of a shade that might be - classified as brilliant, but which Regan, the master mechanic, described - in metaphor. Said Regan: “You could see that head a mile away on the other - side of a curve in a blizzard at night when he pokes it out of the cab - window. You’ll never get Gilleen on the carpet because his headlight’s - out, what?” Certainly, at any rate, Gilleen’s hair was undeniably red. He - had blue eyes, and a very small nose which, for all that, was, next to his - hair, the most prominent feature he possessed—small noses with a - slight up-cant to the tip <i>are</i> pronounced, mere size to the - contrary. His face was freckled and so were his hands; also, he was no - small chunk of a man, not so very tall, but the shoulders on him were - something to envy if you were friendly with him, or to respect if you were - not. That was Gilleen, all except the fact that he admitted with emphasis - to the blood of some wild Irish race of kings coursing through his veins. - This last point was never established—every one took Gilleen’s word - for it, that is every one but Regan, who was Irish himself and, more - pertinent still, Gilleen’s direct superior. On this point Regan, who was - never averse to doing it, could get a rise out of Gilleen quicker than the - bite of a hungry trout. - </p> - <p> - “By Christmas,” Gilleen would sputter on such occasions, “I’ll have you - know I’m no liar, an’ if ‘twere not for the missus an’ the six kids”—here - Gilleen would always stop to count, owing to a possible arrival since the - last clash, realizing that any slip would be instantly and mercilessly - turned against him by the grinning master mechanic—“if’twere not for - them, Regan, you listen to me, I’d bash your face an’ then ram the measly - job you give me down your throat, I would that!” - </p> - <p> - “Well,” Regan would return, “when you get to sitting on a dinky, gilded - throne, sunk to the crown-sheet in the bogs though it will be, I’d ask no - more nor as much from your hands as you get from mine—which is more - than your deserts. Who but me would do as much for you? You ought to be - back wiping. I’ve thought some seriously of it, h’m? Six, is it now?—well, - it’s a grand race!” - </p> - <p> - Whereupon Gilleen would say hot words and say them fervently, while he - shook his fist at the master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll show you some day, Regan,” was his final word. “I’ll show you what - kind of a race it is, an’ don’t you forget it!” - </p> - <p> - All of which is neither very interesting nor in any degree witty—it - simply shows where Gilleen’s nickname came from. Everybody on the division - called him “King”—not to his face, they do now, but they didn’t - then. Queer the way a little thing like that acts on a man sometimes. - Gilleen was well enough liked in a way, but no one ever really took him - seriously in anything. Associate a man with a joke and henceforward and - forever after, usually, the two are inseparable. He may have aspirations, - ambitions, what you will, but he is given no credit for having them—with - Gilleen it was that way. Just Gilleen, “King” Gilleen—and a grin. - </p> - <p> - The Lord only knows what possessed Gilleen to adhere with such - stout-hearted loyalty to his ancestors—you may put an interrogation - mark after that last word, if you like—it began with perhaps no more - than a boyish boast when his official connection with the system was no - further advanced than to the degree of holding down the job of assistant - boiler-washer in the roundhouse. The more they guyed him the more - stubbornly he stuck—it was a matter worth fighting for, and Gilleen - fought. He threw pounds, reach, and other advantages to the winds and took - on anybody and everybody. By the time he had moved up to firing he had - fought all who cared to fight, who were not a few; and when, following - that in the due course of promotion, he got his engine, he had by blows, - not argument, established his assertion outwardly at least. At a safe - distance the division, remembering broken noses and missing teeth and no - longer denying him his royal blood, gave him his way, smiled tolerantly in - self-solace and called him “nutty.” - </p> - <p> - Regan, of course, still guyed—but Regan was master mechanic. Not - that he did it by virtue of the immunity his official position afforded - him, he never gave that a thought. He did it because he was Regan, and - Regan was built that way. He could no more forego the chance of a laugh or - an inward chuckle than he could forego the act of breathing—and - live. A joke was a joke, just fun with him, that was all. - </p> - <p> - But with Gilleen it was different. Being unable to use his fists as was - his wont, and being possessed of no other safety-valve, the pressure - mounted steadily until it registered a point on his mental gauge that - spoke eloquently of trouble to come. - </p> - <p> - And so matters stood when, following a rather dull summer, the fall - business opened with a rush and a roar. Things moved with a jump, and the - rails hummed under a constant stream of traffic east and west. Here, at - least, was no joke—a rush on the Hill Division, single-track, - through the mountains, never was. A month of it, and every one from - car-tink to superintendent began to show the effects of the strain. It was - double up everywhere, extra duty, extra tricks. The dispatchers caught - their share of it and their eyes grew red and heavy under the lamps at - night, and the heads of the day-men ached as they figured a series of - meeting points that had no beginning and no end; but, bad as it was for - the men on the keys, it was worse for some of those in the cabs. - Schedulers went to smash. Perishables and flyers were given the best of it—the - rights of the rest were the sidings. It was a case of crawl along, sneak - from one to the other, with layout after layout, until the ordinary length - of a day’s duty lapped over into fifteen-hour stretches and sometimes to - twenty-four. Sleep, what they could get of it, the engine crews snatched - bolt upright in their seats while they waited for Number One’s headlight - to shoot streaming out of the East, or nodded until roused by the roar and - thunder of a flying freight, cars and cars of it crammed with first-class - ratings, streaking East, as it hurtled by with insolent disregard for - every mortal thing on earth. - </p> - <p> - Maybe Gilleen got a little more of it than any one else on the throttles, - maybe he did—or maybe he didn’t. Gilleen thought he did anyhow, and - naturally he put it down to Regan’s account. Regan was head of the motive - power department of the Hill Division—there was no one else <i>to</i> - put it down to. It was Regan or imagination. Gilleen, not being strong on - imagination, did not debate the question—he let it go at Regan. - </p> - <p> - In from one run, shot out on another—that was Gilleen’s schedule. - The little woman in the little house uptown off Main street got to be - mostly a memory to Gilleen, and as for the six brick-headed scions of his - kingly race he came to wonder if they really existed at all. - </p> - <p> - Things boomed and hummed on the Hill Division, and while everybody on it - snarled and swore and nagged at each other, as weary, worn-out, - dropping-with-fatigue men will do, the smiles broadened on the lips and - spread over the faces of the directors down East, as they rubbed their - palms beneficently, expectantly, scenting extra dividends and soaring - stock. - </p> - <p> - It was noon one day when Gilleen, with a trailing string of slewing - freights behind him, pulled into the Big Cloud yards, uncoupled, backed - down the spur, crossed the’table, and ran into the roundhouse. As he swung - from the gangway, Regan came hurrying in through the engine doors of - Gilleen’s pit from the direction of headquarters, and walked up to the - engineer. - </p> - <p> - “Gilleen,” said he briskly, “you’ll have to take out Special Eighty-three. - 1603’s ready with a full head on pit two.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s that?” snapped Gilleen. “Take out a special <i>now?</i> You know - damn well I’m just in from a run. I’m tired. You’ll rub it in once too - often, Regan.” - </p> - <p> - “We’re all tired, aren’t we?” returned the master mechanic tartly. “Do you - think you’re the only one? As for rubbing it in, you’d better draw your - fire, my bucko. There’s no rubbing in being done except in your eye! - Anyhow, that’s enough talk. Special Eighty-three’s carded on rush orders - from down East, and she’s been in here an hour now.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, why didn’t you let the crew that brought her in keep goin’ then?” - snarled Gilleen. It was a fool question and he knew it; but, as he had - said, he was tired, and his temper, never angelic, was now pretty well on - edge. - </p> - <p> - Regan glared at him a moment angrily. Regan, too, was tired and irritable, - harassed beyond the limit that most men are harassed. The demand upon the - motive power department for men and engines had kept him up more than one - night trying to figure out a problem that was well-nigh impossible. - </p> - <p> - “Let ‘em go on!” he snorted. “You know well enough I haven’t anything on - the Prairie Division men. You know that—what d’ye say it for, h’m? - You’re the first man in—and you go out first.” - </p> - <p> - “It strikes me I’m <i>generally</i> the first man in these days,” retorted - Gilleen angrily; “an’ I’m sick of gettin’ the short end of it. I guess I - won’t go out this time.” - </p> - <p> - It took a breathing spell before the master mechanic could explode - adequately. - </p> - <p> - “You call yourself a railroad man!” he flung out furiously. “What are you - whining about? Every man’s got his shoulder to the wheel and pushing - without talk. We haven’t got any room here for quitters. I guess that - blood of yours you’re so pinhead-brained proud——” - </p> - <p> - Regan did not finish. With a bellow of rage the red-haired engineer went - at the other like a charging bull, and the master mechanic promptly - measured his length on the roundhouse floor from a wallop on the head that - made him see stars. - </p> - <p> - Regan scrambled to his feet. His heart was the heart of a fighter, even if - his build was not. Straight at Gilleen he flew, and the passes and lunges - and jabs he made—while the engineer played on the master mechanic’s - paunch like a kettle-drum and delivered a second wallop on the head as a - plaster for the first—are historic only for their infinitesimal - coefficient of effectiveness. It is unquestionably certain that the master - mechanic then and there would have proceeded to make up for some of his - lost sleep, at least, if Gilleen’s fireman and a wiper or two hadn’t got - in between the two men just when they did. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen was boiling mad. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” he bawled, “got anything more to say about quittin’ or that other - thing? I guess I won’t go out this time, what?” - </p> - <p> - Regan was equally mad. And as he felt tenderly of his forehead, where a - lump was rapidly approximating the formation of a goose egg, he grew - madder still. - </p> - <p> - “You won’t go out, won’t you?” he roared. “Well <i>I</i> guess you will; - and, what’s more, you’ll go out <i>now</i>—and get your time! I fire - you, understand?” - </p> - <p> - “You bet!’” said “King” Gilleen—and that’s all he said. He looked at - the master mechanic for a minute, but didn’t <i>say</i> anything more—just - laughed and walked out of the roundhouse. - </p> - <p> - Naturally enough, the story got up and down the division, and everybody - talked about it. With their rough and impartial justice they put both men - in the wrong, but mostly Gilleen for insubordination. The affront Gilleen - had suffered was not so big and momentous, a long way from being the vital - thing in their eyes that it was in his. Gilleen was just nutty on that - point, that was all there was to that. Regan’s judgment had been bad and - the moment he had seized for his thrust and fling was by no manner of - means a psychological one; but, for all that, Gilleen had no business to - strike the master mechanic. He had got what was coming to him—that - was the verdict. He was out and out for good. It was pretty generally - conceded that it would be a long while before he pulled a throttle on the - Hill Division again. - </p> - <p> - What sympathy the engineer got, for he got some, wasn’t on his own - account. It was on account of his family—not the ancestral end of - it, however. Six kids and a wife do not leave much change out of a - paycheck even when it’s padded by overtime; six kids and a wife with no - pay-check is pretty stiff running. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen was too hot under the collar to give a thought to that when he - marched out of the roundhouse that noon; but it wasn’t many hours, after - he had put in a few to make up for the sleep he hadn’t had during the - preceding weeks, that the problem was up to him for consideration with a - vote for adjournment for once ruled out as not in order. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Gilleen may or may not have shared her spouse’s opinions on the - subject of his illustrious descent—if she did she never put on any - “airs” about it. Washing and dressing and cooking was about all one woman - could manage for a household as big as hers. That’s what she said anyway, - whenever any one asked her about it. And one glance at the red-headed - brood that filled the front yard and swung on the front gate, whose hinges - creaked in loud and bitter protest, was enough to preclude any dispute on - that score. Just a little bit of a woman she was physically; but bigger - practically than the whole corps of leading lights in social and domestic - economy—which, come to think of it, is damning Mrs. Gilleen with - faint praise, whereas too much couldn’t be said for her. However, let that - go. Mrs. Gilleen <i>was</i> practical, and she had the matter up to the - engineer almost before he had the sleep washed out of his eyes. No - nagging, no reproach, nothing of that kind—Mrs. Gilleen wasn’t that - sort of a woman. “King,” or not, Gilleen might have been, Katie Gilleen - was a <i>queen</i>, not in looks perhaps, but a queen—that’s flat. A - fine woman is the finest thing in the world, and if that were said a - little more often than it is maybe things generally wouldn’t be any the - worse for it—which is not a plank in the platform of the - Suffragettes, though it may sound like it. - </p> - <p> - “Michael,” said she, “you rowed with Mr. Regan, and he fired you. Will he - take you back?” - </p> - <p> - Gilleen lowered the towel to his chin to catch the dripping water from his - hair—he had just buried his head in the washbowl the minute before—and - looked at his wife. - </p> - <p> - “I wouldn’t <i>ask</i> him, Kate,” he said shortly. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Gilleen was proud, too—but for all that she sighed. - </p> - <p> - “What will you do, then, Michael?” she asked. - </p> - <p> - “I dunno yet, little woman. Some of the others will give me a job, I - guess. Mabbe I’ll try the train crews. I’ll hit ‘em up for something, - anyway.” - </p> - <p> - “But there’s ever so much less money in that”—Mrs. Gilleen’s tones - were judicial, not plaintive. - </p> - <p> - “I know it,” returned Gilleen; “but it’ll tide us over an’ keep the steam - up till we get a chance to pull out for somewheres where a man can get an - engine without a grinning fool of a master mechanic to doublecross him - with the worst of it every chance he gets.” - </p> - <p> - “I hope it will all come out right,” said Mrs. Gilleen, a little - wistfully. - </p> - <p> - “It will,” Gilleen assured her. “Don’t you worry. I’ll get after a job - right away as soon as I’ve had a bite.” - </p> - <p> - It came easier even than Gilleen had figured it would—such as it was—and - it was about the last job Gilleen had thought of as a possibility. Things - have a peculiar way of working themselves out sometimes, and, curiously - enough, by means which, on the surface, are, more often than not, - apparently trivial and inconsequent. Certainly, if Gilleen, on his way to - the station that morning, had not run into Gleason, the yard-master, why - then—but he did. - </p> - <p> - “Call-boys kind of scarce around your diggin’s since yesterday, ain’t - they, Gilleen?” was Gleason’s greeting. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Gilleen. “I’m out.” - </p> - <p> - “See you’re headin’ for the station,” remarked Gleason tentatively. “Goin’ - down to patch it up?” - </p> - <p> - “No!” answered Gilleen with a hard ring in his voice—the “no” was - emphatic. - </p> - <p> - Gleason stared at the engineer for a minute, then took a bite from his - plug, and the motion of his head might have been a nod of understanding or - merely a wrench or two to free his teeth from the black-strap in which - they were imbedded. - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Gilleen again; “I’m not. I’m goin’ down for another job.” - </p> - <p> - “What kind of a job?” inquired Gleason. - </p> - <p> - “Any kind from any one that will put me on—except Regan.” - </p> - <p> - Gleason thought of his choked yards—the rush had in no way - overlooked him. Men, men that knew a draw-bar and a switch-handle from a - hunk of cheese, were as scarce in his department as they were in any of - the others. - </p> - <p> - “Yards?” he queried—and blinked. - </p> - <p> - “D’ye mean it?” demanded Gilleen, taking him up short. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, I mean it.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re on,” said Gilleen. “Night switchman,” amplified the yard-master. - “You can begin to-night.” - </p> - <p> - “All right, I’ll be on deck,” agreed Gilleen; “an’ thanks, Gleason. I’m - much obliged to you.” - </p> - <p> - “Humph!” grunted Gleason. “‘Tain’t much of a stake compared with an - engine, but it’s yours, an’ welcome.” - </p> - <p> - It was quite true. Comparatively, it wasn’t much of a stake, and even the - first night of it was enough to throw the comparison into strong and - bitter relief. If anything would have put a finishing touch on Gilleen’s - feelings anent the master mechanic it was that first night on yard - switching, that and, of course, the nights that followed. It wasn’t so - much the work, though that was hard enough, and, being green, the engineer - made about twice as much for himself as there was any need of, it was a - not-to-be-denied tendency of his eyes to stray toward the roundhouse every - time a gleaming headlight showed on the turn-table. If Gilleen had never - known before how much he loved an engine he knew it in those dark hours - while he swung a lantern from the roofs of a freight string, or hopped the - foot-board of the switcher. Up and down the yards from dusk till dawn, to - the accompaniment of the wheezing, grunting, coughing, foreshortened - apology for a shunter, the clash of brake-beams, the bump and rattle, - staccato, diminuendo, as a line of box-cars grumbled into motion, didn’t - take on any roseate hues from the angle Gilleen looked at it; nor did an - occasional ten-wheeler, out or in, sailing grandly past him with impudent - airs help any, either. Gilleen’s language became as freckled as his face - and hands and as fiery as his head. Even that grand old Irish race from - which he sprang, that wild and untamed breed of kingly sires paled into - insignificance—Gilleen was more occupied with Regan. What he thought - he said, and said it aloud without making any bones about it—said it - through his teeth, with his fists clenched. - </p> - <p> - Perhaps it was just as well Gilleen was on nights, for, ordinarily, the - master mechanic had nothing to bring him around the yards, shops or - roundhouse after sundown—Regan’s evenings being spent with - Carle-ton, the super, a pipe and a game of pedro upstairs over the station - in the superintendent’s office next door to the dispatcher’s room—just - as well for both their sakes; for Regan’s physically; for Gilleen’s - because, little fond of his job as he was, there, were certain necessities - that even little Mrs. Gilleen with all her practicability and economy - could not supply without money. Anyway, the days went by and the two men - did not meet, though Gilleen’s orations got around to Regan’s ears fast - enough. The master mechanic only laughed when he heard them. - </p> - <p> - “Gilleen,” said he, “is like the parrot that said ‘sic ‘em!’ and said it - once too often. He talks too much. If he’d kept his mouth shut I’d have - given him his run back, after a lay off to teach him manners. As it is, if - he likes switching let him keep at it. Mabbe by the time he’s tired the - throne of his ancestors ‘ll be ready for him, what?” - </p> - <p> - All this was enough to spell ructions in the air, and, ordinarily, the - division to a man would have hung mildly expectant on the result of the - final showdown. But the Hill Division just then wasn’t hankering for - anything more to liven it up—it was getting all of that sort of - thing it wanted and a little besides. Attending strictly to business was - about all it could do, a trifle beyond what it could do, and everything - else was apart—the boom showed more signs of increasing than it did - of being on the wane. There wasn’t any let-up anywhere—things - sizzled. - </p> - <p> - It never rains but it pours, they say; and that’s one adage, at least, - that the railroad men of Big Cloud, and the town itself for that matter, - will swear by to this day. There are a few things that Big Cloud remembers - vividly and with astounding minuteness for detail, but the night the shops - went up tops them all. - </p> - <p> - When it was all over they decided that a slumbering forge-fire in the - blacksmith shop was at the bottom of it—not that any one really - knew, or knows now, but they put it down to that because it sounded - reasonable and because there wasn’t anything else <i>to</i> put it down - to. However, whether that was the cause or whether it wasn’t, on one point - there was no possible opening for an argument—and that was the - effect and the result. - </p> - <p> - If you knew Big Cloud in the old days, you know where the shops were and - what they looked like; if you didn’t, it won’t take a minute to tell you. - You could see them from the station platform across the tracks far up at - the west end of the yards; and they looked more like a succession of barns - nailed on to each other than anything else, except for the roofs which - were low and flat—the buildings being all one-storied. What with the - quarters of the boiler-makers, the carpenters, the machinists and the - fitters, the old shops straggled out over a goodly length of ground, and a - grimy, ramshackle, dirty, blackened, Godforsaken looking structure it was. - To-day, thanks to that fire and the Big Strike when it came along, there’s - a modern affair of structural steel—and the rest is but a memory. - However—— - </p> - <p> - Night in the mountains in the Fall comes early, and by nine o’clock on the - night the fire broke out it had shut down pitch dark. Nothing showed in - the yards but the twinkling switch lights, the waving lamps of the men, - and an occasional gleam from the shunter’s headlight when it shot away - from the end of a boxcar. Across the tracks the station lights were like - fireflies, and there was a glimmer or two showing from the roundhouse. - Apart from the fact that a pretty strong west wind was brushing the yards, - if you could count that as anything apart, there was nothing out of the - ordinary, everything was going on as usual, when, suddenly without - warning, a wicked fang of flame shot skyward, then another higher than the - first. It was answered by a yell from the yardmen, caught up in the - roundhouse, and then the switcher’s whistle shrieked the alarm. A minute - more, and everything with steam enough to lift a valve joined in. Dark - forms began to run in the direction of the shops, and then the bell in the - little English chapel uptown took a hand in the clamor. The alarm was - unanimous enough and general enough when it came, there was never any - doubt about that, but the fire must have got a pretty stiff start before - it broke through the windows to fling its first challenge at the railroad - men. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen and the rest of the yard crew were on the run for the scene when - Gleason’s voice, bawling over the din, halted them. - </p> - <p> - “Clean out three, four an’ five, an’ get ‘em down to the bottom of the - yards, an’ look lively!” he yelled. “Leave that string of gondolas on six - till the last. Jump now, boys! Eat ‘em up!” - </p> - <p> - Oil-spattered floors and oil-smeared walls are a feeding ground for a fire - than which there is no better. The flame tongues leaped higher and higher - throwing a lurid glare down the yards, and throwing, too, as the wind - caught them up and whirled them in gusts, a driving rain of sparks that - threatened the long, dark lines of rolling stock, for the most part choked - to the doors with freight—freight enough to total a sum in - claim-checks that would blanch the cheeks of the most florid director on - the board of the Transcontinental. - </p> - <p> - With Gleason in command, Gilleen and his mates went at their work heads - down. There wasn’t anything fancy or artistic about the way they banged - those cars to safety—there wasn’t time to be fussy. Behind them the - south end of the shops was already a blazing mass. The little switcher - took hold of first one string then another, shook it angrily for a minute - as her exhaust roared into a quick crackle of reports and the drivers spun - around like pin-wheels making the steel fly fire, then with a cough and a - grunt and a final push she would snap the cars away from her, and the - string would go sailing down the yard to bump and pound to a stop, with an - echoing crash, into whatever might be at the other end. There was a car or - two the next morning with front-ends and rear-ends and both ends at once, - that looked as though they had been in a cyclone; and there was a - claim-voucher or two put through for a consignment of nursing bottles and - a sewing machine—not that the two necessarily go together, but no - matter, they did then. Anyway, the record the yardmen made that night is - the record today, and in no more than ten minutes there wasn’t a car - within three hundred yards of the shops. - </p> - <p> - But while the yard crew worked others were not idle. Regan and Carleton, - both of them, had caught the first flash from the windows of the super’s - room, and they were down the stairs, across the yards and into the game - from the start. Joined by the nightmen and the hostlers and the wide-eyed - call-boys they tackled the blaze. By the time they had dragged and coupled - the fifty-foot hose lengths, it took five lengths, along the tracks from - the roundhouse, the needle on the stationary’s gauge, luckily not yet - quite dead from the day’s work and whose fire-box Clarihue, the turner, - now crammed with oil-soaked packing, began to climb, and they got an - uncertain, weakly stream playing—uncertain, but a stream. After - that, things went with a rush—both ways—the fire and the - fight. - </p> - <p> - From the gambling hells and the saloons, from the streets and their homes - came the population of Big Cloud, the Polacks, the Russians, the railroad - men, the good and the bad whites, the half-breeds—and the local fire - brigade. Two more streams they ran from the roundhouse and that was the - limit—the rest of the hose was liquid rubber somewhere under the - blaze. - </p> - <p> - Regan, with a bitter, hard look on his face for the shops were Regan’s, - was everywhere at once, and what man could do he did; but, inch by inch, - the flames were getting the better of him. The yards were as bright as day - now, and the heat was driving the circle of fighters back, stubbornly as - they fought to hold their ground. It looked like a grand slam for the fire - with the four aces in one hand. Twice Regan had been on the point of - ordering the men to the roof, and twice he held back—once he had - even ordered a ladder planted, only to order it away again. The building - was only wood, and old, and the roof was none too strong at best; but now, - under and supported by the roof of the fitting-shop, put in a month before - in lieu of the old system of jacking and blocking by hand, making the risk - a hundredfold greater, were the heavy steel girders and hydraulic - traveling cranes that whipped the big moguls like jack-straws from their - wheels preparatory to stripping them to their bare boiler-shells. Regan - shook his head—it was asking a man to take his life in his hands. - For the moment he stood a little apart in front of the crowd and just - behind the nozzle end of one of the streams. Again he measured the - chances, and again he shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “I can’t ask a man to do it,” he muttered; “but we ought to have a stream - up there, it’s——” - </p> - <p> - “Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?”—the words came sharp - and quick from his elbow, stinging hot like the cut of a whip-lash. It was - “King” Gilleen, red-haired, blue-blooded, freckled-skinned Gilleen. - </p> - <p> - The master mechanic whirled like a shot, and for a minute the two men - stared into each other’s eyes, stared as the leaping flames sent - flickering shadows across the grim, set features of them both, stared at - each other face to face for the first time since that noon in the - roundhouse days before. - </p> - <p> - “Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?” said Gilleen again, and his - laugh rang hard and cold. “<i>You</i> ain’t a quitter, are you? There’s - nothin’ wrong with <i>your</i> blood, is there? If you’re not afraid—come - on!”—as he spoke he stepped forward, pushed the men from the nozzle—and - looked back at the master mechanic. - </p> - <p> - Regan’s lips were like a thin, white line. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen laughed out again, and it carried over the roar and the crackle of - the flames, the snapping timbers, the hiss and spit of the water, the - voices of the crowd. - </p> - <p> - “Put up the ladder!”—it was Regan’s voice, deadly cold. “Lash a - short end around that nozzle, an’ stand by to pass it up”—he was at - the foot of the ladder almost before they got it in position, and the next - instant began to climb. - </p> - <p> - Like a flash, Gilleen, surrendering the fire-hose temporarily, sprang - after him—and up. - </p> - <p> - It wasn’t far—the shops were low, just one story high—and both - men were on the roof in a minute. Gilleen caught the coiled rope they - slung him from below, and together he and the master mechanic hauled up - the writhing, spluttering hose. - </p> - <p> - A shower of sparks and a swirling cloud of smoke enveloped them as they - stood upright and began to advance. It cleared away leaving them - silhouetted against the leaping wall of flame a few yards in front of them—and - a cheer went up from the throats of the crowd below. - </p> - <p> - Not a word passed between the two men. Foot by foot they moved forward, - laying the hose in a line behind them to lessen the weight and the - side-pull, that at first had called forth all their strength to direct the - play of the stream; foot by foot they went forward, closer and closer, - perilously close, to the blistering, scorching, seething mass—for - neither of them would be the first to hold back. - </p> - <p> - High into the heavens streamed the great yellow-red forks of angry flame, - and over all, like a gigantic canopy, rolled dense volumes of gray-black - smoke. Came at the two men spurting, fiery tongues, stabbing at them, - robbing them of their breath, mocking at their puny might. - </p> - <p> - Another step forward and Regan reeled back, one hand went to his face—and - the nozzle almost wrenched itself from the engineer’s grasp. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a grand race!” laughed Gilleen, but the laugh was more of a gasping - cough, and the cough came from cracked and swollen lips. “It’s a grand - race, Regan; an’ the blood——” - </p> - <p> - With a choking sob, Regan steadied himself and seized hold of the nozzle - again. - </p> - <p> - They held where they were now—it was the fire, not they, that was - creeping forward, pitilessly, inevitably, licking greedily at the tarred - roof until it grew soft beneath their feet and the bubbles puffed up and - formed and broke. - </p> - <p> - A cry of warning came from below, and with it came the ominous rending - groan of yielding timbers. It came again, the cry, and rang in Gilleen’s - ears almost without sense. He could scarcely see, his eyes were scorched - and blinded, his lungs were full of the stinging smoke, choking full. - Beside him Regan hung, dropping weak. “Get back, for God’s sake, get back! - “—it was Carleton’s voice. “Do you hear!” shouted the super - frantically. “Get back! The roof is sagging! Run for——” - </p> - <p> - Like the roar of a giant blast, as a park of artillery belches forth in - deafening thunder, there came a terrific crash and, fearful in its echo, a - cry of horror rose from those below. Where there had been roof a foot in - front of the men was now—nothingness. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen, with a shout, as he felt the edge crumple under him, flung - himself backward and as he leaped he snatched at Regan. His fingers - brushed the master mechanic’s sleeve, hooked, slipped—and he struck - on his back a full yard away. He reeled to his feet like a drunken man, - and dug at his eyes with his fists. Over the broken edge of the shattered - roof, hanging into the black below, was the dangling hose—but Regan - was gone. Weak, spent, exhausted, the master mechanic, unequal to the - exertion of Gilleen’s leap, had pitched downward, clutching desperately, - feebly, vainly, as he went. Regan was gone, and twenty feet, somewhere, - below—he lay. - </p> - <p> - Gilleen staggered forward. It was the far end of the beams that had given - away and the six or seven yards of the roof that had fallen still - separated him from the heart of the blaze. The advancing flames lighted up - a scene of wreck and ruin below in the fitting-shop—girders and - steel Ts and cranes and tackles, splotches of roofing, shattered timbers, - lay aver the black looming shapes of the monster engine-shells blocked on - the pit. - </p> - <p> - “Regan!” he called; and again: “Regan! <i>Regan!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Above the roaring crackle of the fire, above the surging, pounding noises - that beat mercilessly at his eardrums, faint, so faint it seemed like - fancy, a low moan answered him. Once more it came and upon Gilleen surged - new-born strength and life. He began to drag at the hose with all his - might, dropping it foot by fool over the jagged edge of the roof until it - reached well down to the snarled and tangled wreckage below. And then a - mighty yell went up from a hundred throats—and again and again: - </p> - <p> - “Gilleen! King Gilleen! King! <i>King!</i>” - </p> - <p> - There was no gibe now—just a bursting cheer from the full hearts of - men. “King!” they roared, and the shout swelled, but Gilleen never heard - them as they crowned him. King he was at last in the eyes of all men, a - king that knows no blood nor race nor throne nor retinue—Gilleen was - lowering himself down the hose. - </p> - <p> - It was a question of minutes. The fire was sweeping in a mad wave across - the intervening space. The engineer’s feet touched something solid and he - let go his hold of the hose—and stumbled, lost his balance, and - pitched forward striking on his head with a blow that dazed and stunned - him. Mechanically he understood that what he had taken for flooring was a - workbench. He got to his feet again, the blood streaming from his - forehead, and shouted. This time there was no answer. Staggering, falling, - tripping, stumbling, he began to search frantically amid the debris. The - air was thick with the smothering smoke, hot, stifling, drying up his - lungs. He began to moan, crying the name of the master mechanic over and - over again, crying it as a man cries out in delirium. Bits of oil-soaked - waste and wads of packing, catching from the glowing cinders, were blazing - around his feet, the onrush of the flames swept a blighting wave upon him - that sent him reeling back, scorching, blistering the naked skin of his - face and hands. Again he fell. A great sheet of fire leapt high behind - him, held for an instant, and then the dull red glow settled around him - again—but in that instant, just a little to the right, pinned under - a scanling, half hidden by a snarled knot of roof and girders, was the - master mechanic’s form. - </p> - <p> - On his knees, groping with his hands, Gilleen reached him, and began to - tear furiously, savagely, madly, at the timber that lay across Regan’s - chest. He moved it little by little, every inch tasking his weakening - muscles to the utmost. Blackness was before him, he could no longer see, - he could no longer breathe, hot, nauseating fumes strangled him and sent - the blood bursting from his nostrils. He tried to lift Regan’s shoulders—and - sank down beside the master mechanic instead. Feebly he raised his head—there - came the splintering crash of glass, a rushing stream tore through a - window, hissed against the boiler-shell above him, and, glancing off, - lashed a cold spray of water into his face. - </p> - <p> - The window! Three yards to the window! He was up again, and pulling at the - dead weight of the master mechanic. Just three yards! He cried like a - child as he struggled, and the tears ran down his cheeks in streams. A - foot, two feet, three—<i>two more yards to go</i>. Axes were - swinging now in front of him, shouts reached him. Half the distance was - covered—but he had gone to his knees. Everything around was hot, it - was all fire and hell and madness. A yard and a half—only a yard and - a half. Alone he could make it easily enough and maybe Regan was dead - anyhow, alone and there was safety and life, alone—then he laughed. - “It’s a grand race, Regan, a grand race,” he sobbed hysterically, and his - grip tightened on the master mechanic, and he won another foot and another - and another. A black form wavered before him, he felt an arm reach out and - grasp him—then he tottered, swayed, and dropped inert, unconscious. - </p> - <p> - They got him out, and they got Regan out, and they got the fire out by the - time there wasn’t much left to burn; and, after a week or two, both men - got out of the hospital. That’s about all there is to it, except that - Gilleen’s red head now decorates the swellest cab on the division, and - that he never fought for his title after that night—he never had to; - though, if you feel like questioning it, you can still get plenty of - fight, for all that—any of the boys will accommodate you any time. - </p> - <p> - Regan isn’t an artist as a pugilist, but even so it is unwise to take - risks—unscientific men by lucky flukes have handed knockouts to - their betters. - </p> - <p> - “If Gilleen says so that’s enough, whether it’s so or not, what?” Regan - will fling at you. “It’s pretty <i>good</i> blood, ain’t it, no matter - what kind it is? Well then—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - IX—MARLEY - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here are some men - they remember on the Hill Division—Marley is one of them; and his - story goes back to the days before the fire wiped out what the strike had - left of the old rambling shops at the western end of the Big Cloud yards, - back to the time when “Royal” Carleton was young in the superintendency of - the division, when Tommy Regan, squat, fat and paunchy was master - mechanic, and Harvey, was division engineer, and Spence was chief - dispatcher, when the Big Fellows, as they were called, wrestled with the - rough of it, shaking the steel down into a permanent right of way, - shackling the Rockies, welding the West and the East. - </p> - <p> - Marley was not a “Big Fellow” in either sense of the word. - </p> - <p> - Officially, when he started in, he wasn’t anything—that is, anything - in particular. Sort of general assistant, assistant section hand, - assistant boiler washer, assistant anything you like to everybody—Marley’s - duties, if nothing else, were multifarious. - </p> - <p> - Physically, he was a queer card. He was built on plans that gave you the - impression Dame Nature had been doing a little something herself along the - lines of original research and experimentation—and wasn’t well - enough satisfied with the result to duplicate it! Anyway, as far as any - one ever knew, there wasn’t but one Marley produced. Maybe nature, even, - isn’t infallible; maybe she made a mistake, maybe she didn’t. You couldn’t - call him deformed—and yet you could! That’s Marley exactly—when - you get to describing him you get contradictory. It must have been his - neck. That lopped off two or three inches from his stature—because - he hadn’t any! But if that shortened him down to, say, five feet five, - which isn’t so short after all—there’s the contradiction again, you - see—the length of his arms at least was something to marvel at, they - made up for the neck. Regan used to say Marley could stand on the floor of - the roundhouse and clean out an engine pit without leaning over. The - master mechanic was more or less gifted with imagination, but he wasn’t so - far out, not more than a couple of feet or so, at that. Marley’s hair, - more than anything else that comes handy by way of comparison, was like - the stuff, in color and texture, the fellows on the stage light and put in - their mouths so as to blow out smoke like a belching stack under forced - draft—tow, they call it. Eyes—no woman ever had any like them—big - and round and wide, with a peculiar violet tinge to them, and lids that - had a trick of closing down with a little hesitating flutter like a girl - trying to flirt with you. - </p> - <p> - But what’s the use! Marley, piecemeal, would never look like the - short-stepping, springy-walked, foreshortened, arms-flopping Marley with - the greasy black peaked cap pulled over his forehead, the greasy jumper - tucked into greasier overalls who sold his hybrid services to the - Transcontinental for the munificent sum of a dollar ten a day. - </p> - <p> - Marley’s arrival and introduction to Big Cloud was, like Marley himself, - decidedly out of the ordinary and by no manner of means commonplace. - Marley arrived “‘boing it” in a refrigerator car. - </p> - <p> - They ice the cars at Big Cloud and, luckily for Marley, the particular one - he had, in some unexplained way, managed to appropriate required a little - something more than icing. They pulled him out in about as flabby a - condition as a sack of flour. He didn’t say anything for himself mainly - because he was pretty nearly past ever saying anything for himself or - anybody else. The boys who found him cursed fluently because he wasn’t a - pleasant sight, and then carried him up Main Street on the door of a - box-car with the hazy notion that MacGuire’s Blazing Star Saloon was the - most fitting Mecca available. - </p> - <p> - Marley continued to play in luck. Mrs. Coogan, the mother of Chick Coogan, - that is, who went out in the Fall blizzard on the Devil’s Slide some years - before, spotted the procession as it passed her little shack, halted it, - made a hasty, but none the less comprehensive, examination, amplified it - by a few scathing remarks on discovering the proposed destination, - peremptorily ordered them into her bit of a cottage and installed Marley - therein. - </p> - <p> - He was pretty far gone, pretty far—and he hung on the ragged edge - for weeks. Nobody knows what Mrs. Coogan did for him except Marley - himself; but it was generally conceded that she did more than she could - afford for anybody, let alone doing it for a stray hobo. - </p> - <p> - Marley got well in time, of course, for, than old, motherly Mrs. Coogan - there was no better nurse, even if she had few comforts and dainties and - less money to buy them with; and then Marley got a job—or rather - Mrs. Coogan got one for him. - </p> - <p> - There wasn’t anything Mrs. Coogan could have asked for and not got that - was within their power to give her—she was Chick’s mother, and with - Carleton or Regan or any of the rest of them that was enough. But Mrs. - Coogan never asked anything for herself—she had the Coogan pride. - </p> - <p> - “The good Lord be praised,” she would say—Mrs. Coogan was sincerely - devout. “I’m able to worrk, so I am, an’ fwhy should I?” - </p> - <p> - Why should she? They smiled at her as men smile when something touches - them under the vest, and they want to say the proper thing—and - can’t. They smiled—and gave her their washing. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Coogan tackled Regan on Marley’s behalf. - </p> - <p> - The master mechanic scratched his head in perplexity, but his reply was - prompt and hearty enough. - </p> - <p> - “Sure. Sure thing, Mrs. Coogan,” he said. “Send him down to me. I’ll find - him something to do.” - </p> - <p> - To Marley he talked a little differently. - </p> - <p> - “I ain’t quite sure I like the looks of you,” he flung out bluntly enough, - taking in the new man from head to toe. “There’s no job for you, but I’ll - give you a chance.” - </p> - <p> - Marley’s eyes came down in a flutter. - </p> - <p> - “Thanks, sir,” he mumbled nervously. - </p> - <p> - Tommy Regan wasn’t used to being “sir” ed—the Hill Division did its - business with few handles and it wasn’t long on the amenities. - </p> - <p> - “Humph!” he ejaculated with a snort, and a stream of black-strap laid the - dust on a good few inches of engine cinders. “You can hand any thanks - you’ve got coming over to Mother Coogan. And say”—the master - mechanic wriggled his fat forefinger under Marley’s nose—“thanks are - all right as far as they go, but I figure you owe her something over and - above that, what?” - </p> - <p> - A faint flush came into Marley’s cheeks and he darted a quick look at - Regan. His eyes were on the ground and his hands had suddenly disappeared - in his pockets before he answered. - </p> - <p> - “I’m going to board with her a spell,” he said in a slow way, as though he - was measuring every word before it was uttered. - </p> - <p> - “Are, eh?” grunted Regan, but the grunt carried a grudging note of - approval. “Well, maybe that’ll help some. You can report at noon, Marley, - and make yourself generally handy around. I reckon you’ll find enough to - do.” - </p> - <p> - “Thanks, sir,” said Marley again, as he turned away. - </p> - <p> - Regan, leaning on the turntable push-bar in front of the roundhouse, - followed with his eyes as the other crossed the tracks in the direction of - the town, then he spat profoundly again. - </p> - <p> - “Queerest looking specimen that ever blew into the mountains, and we’ve - had some before that were in a whole class by themselves at that,” he - remarked, screwing up his eyebrows. “Makes you think of a blasted gorilla - the way he’s laid out, what? Well, we’ll give him a try anyway,” and, with - a final glance in the direction of the retreating figure, the master - mechanic went into the roundhouse for his morning inspection of the big - moguls on the pits. - </p> - <p> - It took the division and Big Cloud some time to size up the new man, and - then just about when they thought they had they found they hadn’t. - </p> - <p> - Marley, if he was nothing else, was a contradictory specimen. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Coogan said it was like the good Lord was kind of paying her special - attention, kind of giving her another son—“so quiet an’ - accommodatin’ an’ handy to have around. A good bhoy was Marley—a - foine lad.” One hand would rest on her hip, and the other would smooth the - thin white hair over her ear with quick, nervous, little pats as she - talked, and the gray Irish eyes, a little dim now, would light up happily. - “Yes, ut’s more than I deserve; but I always knew the Lord wud - provide.‘tain’t so easy to move the tubs around as it uster be. I guess I - knew it, but I wasn’t willin’ to admit it till I had somebody to do it for - me. Sivinty-wan I was last birthday.‘tain’t old for a man, but a woman—indade - he’s a foine lad, an’ ‘tis myself that ses ut.” - </p> - <p> - Down at headquarters Mrs. Coogan’s praise went a long way, and after - Carleton and Regan and the others in the office got accustomed to seeing - him around they came to accept him in a passive, indifferent sort of a - way. He was a curious case, if you like, but inoffensive—they let it - go at that. - </p> - <p> - The men had their view-point. Marley didn’t talk much, didn’t draw out the - way a new hand was expected to in order to establish his footing with the - fraternity. Least of all did he make any overtures tending to anything - like an intimate relationship with any of his new associates. Marley was - never one of the group behind the storekeeper’s office that had stolen out - from the shops for a drag at their pipes and a breath of air; never on the - platform to exchange a word of banter with the crews of the incoming - trains; never amongst the wipers and hostlers in the roundhouse who - lounged in idle moments in the lee of a ten-wheeler with an eye out across - the yards against the possible intrusion of Regan or some other embodiment - of authority. He was civil enough and quick enough to answer when he was - spoken to, but his words were few—no more than a simple negative or - affirmative if he could help it. And when he himself was in question there - was not even that—Marley became dumb. - </p> - <p> - All this did not help him any—he wasn’t what you’d call exactly - popular! So, if he had little to say for himself, the men had plenty, and - the general opinion was that he was a surly brute that by no possible - chance was any credit to the Hill Division and by no manner of means an - acquisition to Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - A few, very few, took a more charitable view, basing it on the shy, slow - flutter of Marley’s eyelids—they charged it up to an acute - sensitiveness of his grotesque and abnormal appearance. That isn’t the way - they put it, though. - </p> - <p> - “Looks like hell, an’ he knows it,” said they judicially. “Let the beggar - alone.” - </p> - <p> - It was good advice, whether their analysis was or wasn’t—Pete - Boileau, the baggage master, can vouch for that. As the time-worn saying - has it, it came like a bolt from the blue, and—but just a minute, - we’re overrunning our targets and that means trouble. - </p> - <p> - Things had gone along, as far as Marley was concerned, without anything - very startling or out of the way happening for quite a spell, and Regan, - who had stood closer to Chick Coogan than any other man on the division - before the young engineer died, had begun to look on Marley with a little - more interest—as a sort of <i>deus ex machina</i> for Mrs. Coogan. - It seemed to afford the big-hearted master mechanic a good deal of relief. - He got to talking about it to Carleton one morning about a month after - Marley’s advent to the Hill Division. - </p> - <p> - “No, of course, I don’t know anything about him,” he said. “Nobody does, I - guess they don’t. But he minds his own business and does what he has to do - well enough, h’m? The old lady’s been getting a little feeble lately—kind - of wearing out, I guess she is. I was thinking Marley was worth a little - more than a dollar ten a day, what?” - </p> - <p> - They were sitting in the super’s office, and Carle-ton’s glance, straying - out through the window from where he sat at his desk, fastened on Marley’s - clumsy, ungainly figure hopping across the yard tracks from the roundhouse - toward the station platform. He smiled a little and looked back at Regan. - </p> - <p> - “I guess so, Tommy—if it will do her any good. I wouldn’t bank on - it, though. He’s a queer card. Impresses you with the feeling that there’s - something you ought to know about him—and don’t. I’ve a notion, - somehow, I’ve seen him before.” - </p> - <p> - “Have you?” said Regan. “That’s funny. I’ve thought I had myself once or - twice, but I guess it’s imagination more than anything else. Anyway, he - seems to remember what Mrs. Coogan did for him. I dunno what she’d do even - now without the board money, little as it is, to help out. There’s no use - borrowing trouble I suppose, but later on I dunno what on earth she’ll do. - She’s prouder than a sceptered queen—and she won’t be able to wash - much longer, nor take a boarder either, what?” - </p> - <p> - Carleton sucked at his briar for a moment in silence. “We’ve all got to - face the possibility of the scrap heap some day, Tommy,” he said soberly. - “But it’s harder for a woman, I’ll admit—bitter hard. Sometimes - things don’t seem just right. If you want to give Marley a small raise, go - ahead.” - </p> - <p> - The master mechanic nodded his head. - </p> - <p> - “I think I will,” he announced. “He’s queer if you like, but that’s his - own business. Never a word out of him nor a bit of trouble since——” - </p> - <p> - Regan’s words stopped as though they had been chopped off with a knife. - Both men, as though actuated by a single impulse, had leaped to their - feet. Behind them their chairs toppled unheeded with a crash to the floor, - and for an instant, as their eyes met each other’s, the color faded in - their cheeks. It had come and gone like a flash—a wild, hoarse - scream of rage, a brute scream, horrid, blood curdling, like the jungle - howl of some maddened beast plunged in a savage, blind, all-possessing - paroxysm of fury. - </p> - <p> - Themselves again in a second, the master mechanic and superintendent - sprang to the window. - </p> - <p> - On the platform, up at the far end, the great form of Pete Boileau rocked - and swayed like a drunken man, and clinging to him, his legs twined around - the other’s knees, his arms locked around the baggage-master’s body just - above the elbows—was Marley! - </p> - <p> - Regan and Carleton gazed spellbound. There was something uncanny, inhuman - about the scene—like a rabid dog that had leaped, snarling, for the - throat hold. - </p> - <p> - Suddenly, Marley’s legs with a quick, wriggling slide, released their - hold, his whole form appeared to shrink, grow smaller, he seemed to crouch - on his knees at the other’s feet, then his body jerked itself erect to its - full stature with a movement swift as a loosed bowstring, his arms flew up - carrying a great burden, and over his shoulders, over his head, a - sprawling form hurtled through the air. - </p> - <p> - “Merciful God! He’s killed him!” gasped Carleton, dashing for the door. - “Come on, Tommy <i>Quick!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Both men were down the stairs in a space of time that Regan, at least, - chunky and fat, has never duplicated before or since. Carleton, hard-faced - and tightlipped, led the way, with the picture beating into his brain of - Boileau’s senseless form on the ground and the other above tearing like a - beast at its prey. He wrenched the door of the station open, sprang out on - to the platform, stopped involuntarily, and then ran forward again. - </p> - <p> - The baggage-master’s form was on the ground lying in a curled-up, huddled - heap, and he was senseless all right—if he wasn’t something more - than that. But the rest of Carleton’s mental picture was wrong, dead - wrong. Right beside where the fight, if fight it could be called, had - taken place was a baggage truck, and over this, his head down, his two - great arms wound round his face, shoulders heaving in convulsive sobs, - Marley was crying like a broken-hearted child. - </p> - <p> - Take him any way you like, look at him any way you like, Marley, whatever - else he was, was a contradictory specimen. - </p> - <p> - Any other man with a skull a shade less tender than Boileau’s—it - must have been made of boiler plate—would never have drawn another - pay check. And even granting the boiler plate part of it, it was something - to wonder at. He had gone through the air like a rocket, and his head had - caught the full of it when he landed. How far? Carleton never said. He - measured it—twice. But he never gave out the figures of Boileau’s - aerial flight. Pete was a big man, six feet something, and heavy for his - height. The strength of four ordinary men concentrated in one pair of arms - might have done it perhaps; mathematically it wouldn’t figure out any - other way. Carleton never said. But what’s the use! The division did some - tall thinking over it—and Marley cried! - </p> - <p> - They picked up Pete Boileau and carried him into the station, and the - contents of a fire bucket over his head opened his eyes. But it was a good - fifteen minutes before he could talk, and by that time when they got over - their scare and thought of Marley the baggage truck was deserted. - </p> - <p> - “What started it!” growled Boileau, repeating Carleton’s inquiry. “I’m - hanged if I know. I was jossing him a little—nothing to make anybody - sore. I was only funning anyhow, and laughing when I said it.” - </p> - <p> - “Said what?” demanded Regan, cutting in. - </p> - <p> - “Why, nothing much. He looked so queer hopping across the tracks like a - monkey on a stick that I just asked him why he didn’t cut out railroading - and hit up a museum for a job, and then before I knew it he let out a - screech and was on me like a blasted catamount.” - </p> - <p> - “Serves you right,” said the master mechanic gruffly. “I guess you won’t - nag him again, I guess you won’t. And none of the other men won’t neither - if they’ve had any notion that way.” - </p> - <p> - “He’s a wicked little devil,” snarled Boileau. “And the strength of him”—the - baggage-master shivered—“he ain’t human. He’ll kill somebody yet, - that’s what he’ll do!” - </p> - <p> - Pete’s summing up was a popular one—the men promptly ticketed and - carded Marley as per Boileau’s bill of lading. There wasn’t any more doubt - about him, no discussions, no anything. They knew Marley at last, and they - liked him less than ever; but, also, they imbibed a very wholesome respect - for the welfare of their own skins. A man with arms whose strength is the - strength of derrick booms is to be approached with some degree of caution. - </p> - <p> - Marley himself said nothing. Carleton and Regan got him on the carpet and - tried to get his version of the story, but for all they got out of him - they might as well have saved their time. - </p> - <p> - A pathetic enough looking figure, in a way, he was, as he stood in the - superb office the afternoon of the fight. The shoulders were drooping - giving the arms an even longer appearance than usual, no color in his - face, the violet eyes almost black, with a dead, hunted look in them. - Sorrow, remorse, dread—neither Regan nor Carleton knew. They - couldn’t understand him—then. Marley offered no explanation, - volunteered nothing. Boileau’s story was right—that was all. - </p> - <p> - “You might have killed the man,” said Carleton sternly, at the end of an - unsatisfactory twenty minutes. - </p> - <p> - “You can thank your Maker you haven’t his blood on your hands—it’s a - miracle you haven’t. Don’t you know your own strength? We can’t have that - sort of thing around here.” - </p> - <p> - Marley’s face seemed to grow even whiter than before and he shivered a - little, though the afternoon was dripping wet with the heat and the - thermometer was sizzling well up in the nineties—he shivered but his - lips were hard shut and he didn’t say a word. - </p> - <p> - Carleton, for once in his life when it came to handling men, didn’t seem - to be altogether sure of himself. An ordinary fight was one thing, and, - generally speaking, strictly the men’s own business; but everything about - Marley, from his arrival at Big Cloud to the sudden beastlike ferocity he - had displayed that morning, put a little different complexion on the - matter. A puzzled look settled on the super’s face as he glanced from - Marley to the master mechanic, while his fingers drummed a tattoo on the - edge of his desk. - </p> - <p> - “You had some provocation, Marley,” he said slowly, “I don’t want you to - think I’m not taking that into consideration—but not enough to work - up any such deviltry as you exhibited. You’ll never get on with the men - here after this. They’ll make things pretty hard for you. I think you’d - better go—for your own sake.” - </p> - <p> - There was dead silence in the super’s room for a half minute, then Regan, - who had been sitting with his chair tilted back and his feet up on the - window-sill, dropped the chair legs to the floor and swung around. - </p> - <p> - “I put Logan up firing yesterday,” said he. “There’s a night job wiping in - the roundhouse. What do you say about it, Carleton?” - </p> - <p> - It was Marley who answered. - </p> - <p> - “<i>Yes!</i>” he said fiercely. - </p> - <p> - Carleton jabbed at the bowl of his pipe with his forefinger and his - eyebrows went up at Marley’s sudden animation. Marley’s eyes met his with - a single quick glance, and then the eyelids fluttered down covering them. - There was something in the look that caught the super, something he - couldn’t define. There was a plea, but there was something more—like - a pledge, almost, it seemed. - </p> - <p> - “All right,” he said shortly; then, nodding at Mar-ley in dismissal: “I - hope you will remember what I’ve said. You may go.” - </p> - <p> - Marley hesitated as though about to speak and changed his mind, evidently, - for he turned, walked straight to the door and out, then his boots creaked - down the stairs. - </p> - <p> - “He’ll be away from the men there, all except a few,” said the master - mechanic, as though picking up the thread of a discussion. “And as for - them, I’ll see there’s no trouble. There’s Mrs. Coogan now that——” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, Tommy”—Carleton smiled a little—“I didn’t put your - interest all down to love for Marley.” - </p> - <p> - “What gets me,” muttered Regan screwing up his eyes, as his teeth met in - the plug he had dragged with some labor from his hip pocket, “what gets me - is the way he went to crying afterward. Like a kid, he was. It was the - blamedest thing I ever saw, what?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t think he’s responsible for himself when he gets like that,” - replied Carleton. “That’s exactly what I am afraid of. It comes over him - in a flash, making a very demon of him, and then the relaxation the other - way is just as uncontrollable. I don’t suppose he can help it, he’s made - that way. It wouldn’t make so much difference in an ordinary man, but with - strength like his”—Carleton blew a ring of smoke ceilingwards—“you - saw what he did to Boileau.” - </p> - <p> - “I ain’t likely to forget it,” said Regan. “But if he’s left alone I guess - he’ll be all right. Any man that’s fool enough to do anything else now - will do it with his eyes open, and it’s his own funeral.” - </p> - <p> - Those of the night crew in the roundhouse were evidently of the same mind. - They received him, it is true, with little evidence of cordiality, but - their aloofness was decidedly pronounced, and they looked askance at the - queer figure as it dodged in and out of the shadows cast by the big - mountain racers, or, at times, stood silently by one of the engine doors - under the dim light of an oil lamp staring out across the black of the - turntable to the twinkling switch lights in the yard. They didn’t like - him, but they had learned their lesson well; and, as the weeks slipped - away, they practised it—he was to be left alone. - </p> - <p> - One thing they grudgingly admitted—Marley could work, and did. - Clarihue, the night turner, was man enough to give another his due any - time, no matter what his own personal feelings might be, and there was - some talk, after a bit, between him and the master mechanic about Marley - getting the next spare run firing. - </p> - <p> - Clarihue even went so far as to hint at it as a possibility to Marley, and - for his pains got a surprise—he wasn’t used to seeing the chance of - promotion turned down. Marley had shaken his head and would have none of - it. He was satisfied where he was. That was all there was to that. - Clarihue drew back into his shell after that. Marley could wipe till his - hair was gray for all he cared. - </p> - <p> - So Marley wiped; but at Mrs. Coogan’s cottage, as the summer waned, there - wasn’t as much washing done as there had been, and the company doctor got - to dropping in too frequently to put his visits down to the old-time - occasional friendly calls for an afternoon chat. And then, one day in the - early fall, the washing stopped altogether, and the doctor’s face was - puckered and serious as he left the cottage and headed down Main Street to - the station. He entered Carleton’s office and, after a few words between - them, the super sent for Regan. - </p> - <p> - That evening Carleton’s private car was waiting on the siding when Number - Two, the Eastbound Limited, Chick Coogan’s old train, pulled in. - </p> - <p> - As the little yard switcher importantly coughed the super’s car on to the - rear Pullman, Regan, in his Sunday best, a store suit of black twill, with - boiled shirt and stiff collar, came out of the station with Mrs. Coogan on - his arm. - </p> - <p> - An incongruous pair they looked. The little old lady’s walk was in painful - contrast to the burly master mechanic’s stride—her short steps had a - painful, hesitating, uncertain waver to them. One hand gripped tenaciously - at Regan’s coat-sleeve, while the other held the faded, old-fashioned - shawl close about her thin, bent shoulders. She carried her head drooped - forward a little, hiding the face under the quaint poke bonnet. - </p> - <p> - A moment later Carleton, too, emerged from the station and joined them. - </p> - <p> - The station hands and the loungers eyed the trio with curiosity, and then - stared in amazement as the two officials helped the old lady up the steps - of the private car—Mrs. Coogan was getting the best of it, whatever - it meant. - </p> - <p> - The three disappeared inside, but presently Regan and Carleton came out - again, and the super dropped to the station platform. He held out his hand - to the master mechanic as Frank Knowles, the conductor, lifted his finger - to Burke in the cab. - </p> - <p> - “Good-by, Tommy; and good luck,” he called, as the train began to move - out. “Don’t hurry, take all the time you need.” - </p> - <p> - “All right,” Regan shouted back. “Good-by.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton stood for a moment watching the tail lights grow dimmer until, - finally, they shot suddenly out of sight with the curve of the track, then - he turned to walk back along the platform—and stopped. - </p> - <p> - Crouched back against the wall of the freight house, deep in the shadows, - was Marley. - </p> - <p> - “Here you, Marley,” Carleton called. - </p> - <p> - Marley, evidently believing himself to have been unobserved, started - violently, and then came slowly forward. - </p> - <p> - “What are you hiding there for?” demanded the super. - </p> - <p> - “I wanted to see Mrs. Coogan off,” Marley answered a little defiantly. - </p> - <p> - The tone of the other’s voice did not please Carleton. - </p> - <p> - “You’ve a queer way of doing it then,” he snapped shortly. - </p> - <p> - Marley was twisting his hands, staring down the track. - </p> - <p> - “I said good-by before I came down to work,”—he spoke as though - talking to himself. - </p> - <p> - “Oh!” said Carleton, and looked at Marley sharply, “I suppose you know - what she went East for?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Marley gruffly. That was all—just “yes.” And with that - he turned abruptly and started across the tracks for the roundhouse. - </p> - <p> - Carleton, taken aback, watched him in angry amazement, then the scowl that - had settled on his face broke in a smile, and he shrugged his shoulders. - </p> - <p> - “Guess Tommy is right,” he muttered, as he went on toward the office. - “Marley’s all in a class by himself. We’ve never had anything like him in - the mountains before.” - </p> - <p> - It was four days before Mrs. Coogan and the master mechanic came back. - Days during which Marley slipped into Dutchy’s lunch counter at deserted - moments for his meals, and, if that were possible, drew into himself - closer than ever. - </p> - <p> - The boys were curious about Mrs. Coogan, naturally; curious enough even to - question Marley. He had one answer, only one. “She’s sick, I guess,” he - said. They got nothing more out of him than that. - </p> - <p> - One thing Marley did, though, that Clarihue, while he thought nothing of - it at the time, remembered well enough afterwards. He asked the turner to - give him a sheet of railroad paper and a manila, and in his spare moments - the night before Mrs. Coogan came back he labored, bent over the little - desk where the engine crews signed on and off, scratching painstakingly - with a pen. Clarihue caught a glimpse of the sheet in passing before - Marley hastily covered it up—just a glimpse, not enough to read a - single word, just enough to marvel a little at the wiper’s hand. Marley - was a pretty good penman. - </p> - <p> - Marley, of course, being on night duty slept daytimes, but the afternoon - Regan brought Mrs. Coogan back to the cottage he must have heard them - coming, for he was standing in the little sitting-room when they came in. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Coogan kind of hesitated on the threshold, then she called out - quickly in a faltering way: - </p> - <p> - “Marley, Marley, is that you?” - </p> - <p> - Marley was twisting his hands nervously. His eyes shot a rapid glance from - the old lady to the master mechanic, and then the eyelids fluttered down. - </p> - <p> - “Sure,” he said, “it’s me.” - </p> - <p> - She stumbled toward him and burst into tears, crying as though her heart - would break. - </p> - <p> - “Marley, Marley,” she sobbed, “Don’t lave them do ut. Don’t lave them do - ut, there’s a good bhoy, Marley.” - </p> - <p> - Marley never moved, just licked his lips with his tongue and his face grew - whiter. Queer, the way he acted? Well, perhaps. Never a move to catch the - frail, tottering figure, never a word to soothe the pitiful grief. He - stood like a man listening as a judge pronounces his doom. Oh, yes, queer, - if you like. Marley, whatever else he was, was a contradictory specimen. - </p> - <p> - It was Regan who caught the old lady in his arms, and led her gently into - her bedroom off the parlor. - </p> - <p> - “You mustn’t give way like that, Mrs. Coogan,” he said kindly. “Just lie - down for a spell and you’ll feel better. I’ll ask Mrs. Dahleen, next door, - to come in.” - </p> - <p> - It took the master mechanic several minutes to quiet her and persuade her - to do as he asked, but when he came out again Marley was still standing, - exactly as before, in the centre of the room. With a black scowl on his - face, Regan motioned the other outside, and, once on the street, he laid - the wiper low. Hard tongued was Regan when his temper was aroused and he - did not choose his words. - </p> - <p> - “What d’ye mean by treating her like that, you scrapings from the junk - heap, you!” he exploded. “You know well enough what she went away for, and - if you’ve any brains in that ugly head of yours you know well enough what - she’s come back to, without any printed instructions to help you out. What - are you playing at, eh? What do you mean? You’re not fit to associate with - a dog! And she the woman that spent about her all to save your miserable - carcass, you. - </p> - <p> - “You’d better stop!”—the words came like the warning hiss of a - serpent before it strikes. Marley’s face was livid, and his great gnarled - hands were creeping slowly upward above his waist line. - </p> - <p> - With a startled oath, Regan leaped quickly back: and then, separated by a - yard, the men stood eying each other in silence. - </p> - <p> - It was gone in a flash as it had come, for Marley, with a shudder, dropped - his hands limply to his sides, and the color crept slowly back into his - cheeks. - </p> - <p> - “There is no chance for her?”—no trace of the passionate outburst of - an instant before remained. The question came low, hesitating—more - like an assertion combined with a wistful appeal for contradiction. - </p> - <p> - It took Regan longer to recover himself, and it was a minute before he - answered. Then he shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “She’ll be stone blind in a month,” he said gruffly. - </p> - <p> - Marley’s eyes came up to the master mechanic’s—and dropped instantly - with their habitual little flutter. - </p> - <p> - “Ain’t no doubt, no chance of a mistake?” he ventured. - </p> - <p> - Again Regan shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “Not a chance. The best man we could find East made the examination. We’re - arranging to get her into an institute—a home for the blind - somewhere.” - </p> - <p> - “I thought you would”—Marley’s voice was monotonous. “That’s what - she was talking about, wasn’t it?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Regan. - </p> - <p> - Marley wagged his head with a judicial air. - </p> - <p> - “That’ll kill her,” he remarked, as though stating a self-evident, but - commonplace, fact. “That’ll kill her.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid it will,” the master mechanic admitted gravely. “But there’s - nothing else to do. It’s impossible for her to stay here. She’s got to - have some one to look after her, and she has no money. God knows I wish we - could, but we can’t see any other way than put her in some place like - that.” - </p> - <p> - “I thought you would if it turned out bad,” said Marley again, in dead - tones. “I figured it out that way when you were gone.” His hands were - traveling in an aimless fashion in and out of his pockets. Suddenly he - half pulled out an envelope, started, hastily shoved it back, and looked - at Regan. “I—I got a letter to post,” he muttered. - </p> - <p> - “Well, supposing you have,” said Regan a little savagely—Regan - wasn’t interested in letters just then,—“supposing you have, you - needn’t——” - </p> - <p> - But Marley was well across the street. - </p> - <p> - The master mechanic gasped angrily, choked—and went into Mrs. - Dahleen’s cottage on his errand. It was wasted breath to talk to Marley - anyhow. - </p> - <p> - It didn’t take long for the news to spread around Big Cloud, and for three - days they talked about Mrs. Coogan pretty constantly—after that they - talked about Marley. - </p> - <p> - The Westbound Limited schedules Big Cloud for 2: 05 in the afternoon, and - on the third day after Mrs. Coogan’s return Marley came down the street - about half-past one, and crossed the tracks to the shops. Regan was in the - fitting-shop when Marley walked in. - </p> - <p> - “I’d like to speak to you,” said Marley, going straight up to the master - mechanic. - </p> - <p> - “Well?” grunted Regan, none too cordially. - </p> - <p> - “I’d like you to come over to Mr. Carleton’s office with me.” - </p> - <p> - There was something in Marley’s voice, feverish, impelling, something in - his face, that stopped the impatient question that sprang to Regan’s lips. - He looked at the ungainly, grotesque figure of the wiper for an instant - curiously, then without a word led the way out of the shops. - </p> - <p> - They traversed the yard in silence, climbed the stairs in the station, and - entered the super’s room. Marley closed the door and stood with his back - against it. - </p> - <p> - Carleton, at his desk, looked from one to the other in surprise. - </p> - <p> - “Hello,” said he. “What’s up?” - </p> - <p> - The master mechanic jerked his thumb at Marley, and appropriated a chair. - </p> - <p> - “He wanted me to come over. I don’t know what for.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton turned inquiringly to the wiper. - </p> - <p> - “What is it?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - Marley walked slowly across the room until he reached the super’s desk. - His face was drawn, and he wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. - </p> - <p> - “It’s about Mrs. Coogan,” he said jerkily. “Five thousand would be enough, - wouldn’t it?” - </p> - <p> - Carleton stared at the man as though he were mad, and Regan hitched his - chair suddenly forward. - </p> - <p> - “Will you swear to give it to her if I get it for you?”—Marley’s - hand, clenched, was on the desk, and he leaned his body far forward toward - the super. There was no flutter of the eyelids now, and his eyes stared - into Carleton’s without a flicker. “<i>Swear it!</i>” he cried fiercely. - </p> - <p> - Carleton drew back involuntarily. - </p> - <p> - “Marley,” he said soothingly, “you’re not yourself, you——” - </p> - <p> - “No, I’m not mad,” Marley broke in passionately. “I know what I’m talking - about. I know she’d die in one of them charity places. It’s up to me. She - treated me white—the only soul on God’s earth that ever did. And - maybe, maybe too, it’ll help square accounts. You’ll play fair and swear - she gets the money, won’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t understand,” said Carleton slowly; “but I’ll swear to give her - anything you have to give.” Marley nodded quickly. - </p> - <p> - “That’s all I want,” he said. “There ain’t much to understand.” He fumbled - in his pocket and brought out a newspaper clipping, a column long, which - he laid on the desk. “I guess you’ll get it all there.” The heavy “set” of - the heading leaped up at Carleton. “$5,000 REWARD.” Below, halfway down - the column, was the reproduction of a photograph—Marley’s. - </p> - <p> - Regan was up from his chair, bending over the super’s shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “I thought I’d seen you somewhere before”—Carle-ton’s voice sounded - strained and hollow in his own ears. “It must have been the picture. I - remember now. You—you killed a man in Denver a year ago.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s all there,” said Marley, licking his lips again. “I never saw him - before. I killed him like I almost killed Boileau this summer. I didn’t - know till afterward that he was rich, not until the family hung out that - reward.” - </p> - <p> - Carleton did not speak. Regan reached viciously for his plug. Marley - stirred uneasily, and drew the back of his hand across his forehead. It - came away soggy wet. In the silence the chime of the Limited’s whistle - floated in through the open window, then, presently, the roar of the train - and the grinding shriek of the brake-shoes. - </p> - <p> - “My God,” said Carleton in a whisper, “you want me to give you up and get - the reward—for her!” - </p> - <p> - A queer smile flickered across Marley’s face. Heavy steps came running up - the stairs. There was a smart rap upon the door and a man stepped quickly - inside. For a second his eyes swept the little group. Then he whirled like - a flash, and the blue-black muzzle of a revolver held a bead on Marley’s - heart. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, Shorty,” he cried grimly, “we’ve got you at last, eh? Put out your - hands!” - </p> - <p> - Without protest, with the same queer smile on his face, Marley obeyed. - There was a little click of steel, and he dropped his locked wrists before - him. - </p> - <p> - “You’re Mr. Carleton, aren’t you?”—the newcomer had swung to the - desk. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Carleton numbly. - </p> - <p> - “I’m Hepburn of the Denver police,” went on the officer. “We appreciate - this, Mr. Carleton. Shorty here has been badly wanted for a long time. We - got your letter yesterday.” - </p> - <p> - Hepburn paused to reach into his pocket, and in the pause Carleton’s eyes - met Marley’s—and he understood. Marley had written the letter - himself and signed his, Carleton’s, name. And, too, it was clear enough - now, the telegram he had puzzled over the previous afternoon. It was lying - before him on his desk. - </p> - <p> - His eyes dropped to it. “Will be on hand on arrival of Limited, (signed) - Denver.” - </p> - <p> - “We can’t give you any receipt for him as you requested,” continued - Hepburn, drawing a paper out of his pocket; “but here’s an acknowledgment - that his capture is due to information furnished by you. I guess that will - answer the purpose. You won’t have any trouble getting the reward.” He - handed the paper to Carleton. - </p> - <p> - The super took it mechanically, and started as it crackled in his fingers. - </p> - <p> - “Now,” said Hepburn briskly, “I don’t want to appear abrupt, but there’s a - local East at two-twenty. We’ll move along, Shorty. Good-by, Mr. Carleton. - Next time you’re in Denver look us up.” He took Marley’s arm and moved - toward the door. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t—tell her, Mr. Carleton”—there was a catch in Marley’s - voice, and the words came low. - </p> - <p> - Carleton did not answer. He was staring at the paper in his hand—Marley’s - price. - </p> - <p> - Regan had turned his back, with a hasty movement of his fist to his eyes. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t tell her”—the plea came again from the doorway. - </p> - <p> - Carleton tried to speak and his voice broke, then he cleared his throat. - </p> - <p> - “She will never know, Marley,” he said huskily. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - X—THE MAN! WHO DIDN’T COUNT - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>e was a little - gray-haired hostler, wiper, sweeper, assistant night man in the roundhouse - at Big Cloud, anything you like, and this is the story he told me one - night, leaning against the blackened jamb of one of the big doors, wiping - his hands occasionally upon a hunk of greasy waste. - </p> - <p> - They were a rough lot out in the mountains in the days when the Hill - Division was shaking her steel into something like a permanent right of - way—a pretty rough lot. The railroaders because they had to be; the - rest because they were just that way naturally. Miners and Indians made up - the citizenship mostly, and there’s no worse mixture. They’ve got the - redskins corralled on reserves now; but they hadn’t then, and it didn’t - take more than one bad word and one drop of bad whisky to set things in - lively motion. - </p> - <p> - There’s a few highfaluting poems, and some other things, about the noble - red man that works you up so when you read them that you get to wishing - the Almighty had seen fit to let you be a red man, too. Well, that’s all - right in its way because, after you’ve rubbed elbows with some of the real - thing, you realize that the world owes the poets a living just as much as - it does anybody else, and that what they say has to sound good; so you - just come to keep the cautionary signals up by instinct, and let it go at - that. - </p> - <p> - But, to give the poets their due, there’s one thing they never trip up on, - and that’s the Indian’s compound efficiency for smell. The Indian can - smell. When he sticks out his chest, faces southeast, and begins to draw - in the God-given mountain air, you’re free to bet that the distilleries - down Kentucky way are doing enough business to make regular dividend - checks a sure thing. That’s generally good whisky. Bad whisky, in smell - and otherwise, carries farther—and it’s only fifteen miles from here - to Coyote Bend! - </p> - <p> - Coyote Bend wasn’t even a pin prick on the engineers’ blue prints when - they mapped out the right of way, and there wasn’t any such place when the - steel was all spiked down until the day some wandering prospector staked - out a bunch of claims—and the news spread. - </p> - <p> - Gold in the Rockies? No; there’s never been much of it <i>found</i>, but - there’s an all-fired big superstition that the mother lode of the whole - country is tucked away here somewhere. That’s why, in two days, the - wilderness and a gurgling stream that trickled peacefully down through a - high-walled canon became Coyote Bend; and that’s why the local freight - began to make regular stops to dump off supplies alongside the track. - There was no station, of course, no agent, no nothing; the stuff was just - dumped, that’s all. The consignees picked out their goods if they could - read, or guessed at it if they couldn’t. - </p> - <p> - Maybe I ought to have told you this before; anyway, I’ll stick it in now. - There are three men that figure in this story, though one of them doesn’t - count for much. He was a young chap named Charlie Lee. A graduate of an - Eastern college he was, and all he had to his name was his diploma and the - clothes he stood in when he hit the West. He struck the super for a job, - and he got it—braking on the local freight. Hell for a man like him, - eh? Well, it was, in more ways than one! Anyway, from that day to this it - was the best job he ever held down long enough to draw a second month’s - pay check. - </p> - <p> - The other two were Matt Perley and Faro Clancy—“Breed” Clancy, they - called him behind his back. - </p> - <p> - Perley was a very good sort, pretty straight, pretty clean, measuring by - the standards out here in those days; a little bit of a sawed-off, - blond-haired, blueeyed man, full of grit inside, and an out-and-out - railroad man—only a freight conductor, conductor on the local, but - he knew his business; he’d have gone up, ‘way up, in time. - </p> - <p> - Clancy was a hellion, there’s no other name for him, and even that doesn’t - express it—no one word could. Indian one way, Irish the other. He - looked mostly Indian; the Irish came out in the brogue. Black, swarthy, - small eyes like needle points, coarse dry hair that straggled down over - his eyebrows, a hulking bony frame with the strength of a wrecking crane—that’s - Clancy, Breed Clancy. - </p> - <p> - Oh, yes, he was slick, slick as they’re made—with his hands. Faro, - stud poker, dice, anything—it was his business; that, and running - booze joints. Mining camps and brand-new boom towns were Clancy’s meat - mostly—after Perley drove him out of Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - Don’t ask me. I don’t know what there was between them. That was before my - time. A woman probably—a woman’s generally blamed anyhow. Anyway, - one night Perley got the drop on Breed and marched him down the street in - front of his pistol and out of the town. After that, Clancy kept away from - Big Cloud. As I say, that part was before my time. I only know there was - bad blood between them; wicked bad blood on one side, as you’ll see. - Clancy disappeared from Big Cloud, and the two didn’t foul each other - again until Coyote Bend started. - </p> - <p> - Breed Clancy hit the Bend with the first inrush of the miners, and before - any of them had time to much more than get a pick into the ground he was - busy knocking together a bit of a shack he called a hotel, and was - ordering the furnishings—liquid furnishings, you understand—from - Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - There were three barrels of it, the hardest kind of fire water that ever - went into the mountains waybilled to Clancy at Coyote Bend by the local, - on the first trip that Charlie Lee ever made with Matt Perley. I’m getting - back to Lee now, you see. - </p> - <p> - Well, it was about noon when they whistled for the Bend that day, and Lee, - riding the brake wheels on the front end, could see about a dozen - “blankets” squatting alongside the right of way about where the train - would stop. Grouped behind these were a number of stragglers from the - camp, among whom was a big fellow in a red shirt you could see farther - than a semaphore arm. - </p> - <p> - Now, I don’t say those Indians were attracted by the gold rush to Coyote - Bend. Coyote Bend, or any other place, old or new, stale or prosperous, - would get its share of the redskins. Where they came from or where they - went nobody knew. They’d drop in from nowhere, and, if they liked the - place, they’d grunt and settle down for a spell; if they didn’t like it, - they’d grunt, in benediction or otherwise, and leave. - </p> - <p> - I’m not saying they smelled the whisky in that train. I’m not saying they - knew Clancy was importing fire water, and they were just there to feast - their eyes on the barrels and meditate on what was inside. I’m not saying - anything at all about that, or what followed. There’s only one man that - perhaps might have explained it—-I say “perhaps” because he never - did; and also, because he knew Indian nature as well as any white man in - the West. That was Perley. - </p> - <p> - Whether Perley even knew that Clancy was at the Bend or not, I don’t know. - I only know that he could have known it if he’d bothered to read the - waybills; and it was likewise on the cards that he might have learned the - day before, down at Big Cloud, that the whisky was going up the following - morning. I don’t know, and that’s straight. Sometimes I think he did; - sometimes I think he didn’t. I don’t know. - </p> - <p> - Anyway, Lee slid to the ground as the train stopped, and went back to the - car that held the consignment for the Bend. As he fumbled with the door, - he got a whiff of raw spirit that nearly knocked him over. And then, right - behind him, rose a chorus of appreciative “ughs!” - </p> - <p> - I told you an Indian could smell whisky, but I didn’t tell you why. It’s - his ruling passion. That’s straight. I’m not judging the Indian; the taste - was born in him. There are some white men just as bad. I’m not judging - them, either. Some drink for the same reason the Indian does, some for - others, and some—some men drink because they have to. - </p> - <p> - What was I saying? Oh, yes, Lee getting that whiff. Well, before he got - the door unfastened, the man in the red shirt had pushed through the - Indians and come up beside him. - </p> - <p> - “Me name’s Clancy,” said he. “Did yez bring up any stuff for me?” - </p> - <p> - “There’s three barrels for somebody,” replied Lee, and slid open the door—and - the next minute he had jumped back with a yell, colliding with Clancy. - </p> - <p> - “Ugh!” ejaculated the apparition that confronted him. - </p> - <p> - “He’s drunk! Majestically drunk! An’ on <i>my</i> stuff!” roared Clancy; - and then, turning fiercely on Lee: “Fwhat did ye let him in there for, eh? - Fwhat did ye let him in for, ye mealy-faced little——” - </p> - <p> - “Let him in nothing!” retorted Lee, getting back his grip on himself. - “Here, you, get out—and <i>quick!</i>” - </p> - <p> - The Indian blinked gravely, but never moved. He sat cross-legged on the - floor, exactly in the middle of the car between the doors, swaying - slightly backward and forward. Beside him, up-ended and broached, was one - of Clancy’s kegs. The car reeked with the smell of it, for of the half - kegful that had gushed out what hadn’t gone into the Indian had gone on to - the floor. - </p> - <p> - The half-breed was raving mad. I’ve a notion sometimes the man wasn’t - human at all. He had his hand on Lee’s throat when Perley came running up - from the rear end. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the row?” he began, and then he stopped. He was a cool devil was - Perley, and he never turned a hair as he stepped between the two men. “Ah, - Clancy, it’s you, is it, you copper-faced renegade?”—no loud talk, - no bluster, he didn’t raise his voice; but his insult, the worst he could - have laid his tongue to, cut like the sting of a lash. - </p> - <p> - Clancy swung around like a flash—and stared into the muzzle of the - conductor’s.45. His hands were clenching and unclenching as he recognized - Perley, and the cords in his neck swelled into knotty lumps. - </p> - <p> - “Ut’s your worrk, this job, is ut?” he snarled. “Some day, Perley, I’ll - show you.” - </p> - <p> - Queer, you say, he’d act like that—nothing to warrant it. Well, - maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know what was between them before; but I do - know the awful deviltry of Breed Clancy, and I know that Lee, leaning back - against the car, shivered at the look that passed between the two of them. - </p> - <p> - Perley cut the half-breed short off. “Once,” said he contemptuously, still - quiet, not a tone raised, and his voice the more deadly for it, “once, - perhaps you’ll remember, I warned you to keep out of my road. Lee, how’d - that Indian get in the car?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know,” said Lee. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, throw him out,” said Perley shortly, snapping his watch with - his free hand. “We can’t stay here all day.” - </p> - <p> - This little ruction between Perley and the half-breed has taken me longer - to tell it, I guess, than it did to happen. Anyway, it didn’t cause the - excitement you might think it would. The “blankets” were too busy drinking - in the smell of that whisky to let their hungry eyes wander very far from - anywhere but the open door of that car. And as for the stragglers, by the - time they’d caught on to the fact that there was something on the boards - besides that drunken Indian, Perley, with the same cool contempt, had - slipped his gun back in his pocket and was boosting Lee into the car. - </p> - <p> - The Indian offered no opposition as Lee tackled him. He couldn’t—he - was beyond all that—he was so full of dead-eye it was oozing out by - the pores. He just sat there, and Lee slid him to the door just as he was, - still sitting, and dropped him out. He struck the ground with a thud, - rebounded a foot, rolled over, grunted, and lay like a log. There was a - guffaw from the camp stragglers, and a deep and envious chorus of “Ughs!” - from the “blankets.” - </p> - <p> - No, I’m not joking—it’s a long way from a joke, as you’ll see. They - <i>were</i> envious. It acted like a red rag on a bull—the - possibility of attaining the condition, the state of heavenly bliss, that - had been reached by their red brother, do you understand? - </p> - <p> - Clancy wasn’t laughing. He stood where Perley had left him, sullen and - with twitching face. I don’t know, I think it was Perley’s sheer nerve - that kept the halfbreed from drawing and shooting the conductor when his - back was turned. I don’t know—brute beast cowed by the human mind, - perhaps. No one ever knew Breed Clancy. He had his yellow streak at times, - and then again the blood that was in him made him worse than a frenzied - madman. Yes, I guess it was a case of “brute” all right, for there was no - cowing him when the frenzy was on him. - </p> - <p> - Perley wasn’t laughing, either. He was opening and shutting his watch - impatiently. “Come on! Come on!” he cried at Lee. “Get those barrels out. - We’ve got to cross Number Two at the Creek. It’ll be the carpet for ours - if we hold her up.” - </p> - <p> - Lee grabbed the broached cask and edged it toward the doorway. The - contents slopped and sloshed inside as he moved it, and occasionally a - little of the stuff would spill out through the bunghole. Then, somehow, - just as he got it to the door, his hold slipped, out it went, bounded on - the edge of the ties, and then went down the embankment right into the - hands of those squatting “blankets.” They didn’t squat long; I don’t need - to tell you that. They were on it in a mob, and they got the taste—they’d - had the smell—and the fill was to come presently. - </p> - <p> - Clancy was cursing in streams; and no fouler-mouthed man than Clancy ever - lived. He tried once to get the Indians off the barrel, and the stragglers - backed him up half-heartedly. You might as well have tried to move that - mogul on the pit there behind you. He didn’t try but once, then he fell - back on cursing again, and Perley was the target for most of it. - </p> - <p> - Perley? He never answered him, but his face grew harder and harder—and - his gun was in his hand again. “Throw out those other two barrels!” he - snapped at Lee. - </p> - <p> - “The redskins will get every last drop if I do,” objected Lee, hesitating. - </p> - <p> - “Owner’s risk. We’ve no station here. Throw ‘em out!” repeated Perley, - grimmer than before, only this time loud enough for Clancy to hear him. - </p> - <p> - “Ye do,” roared the half-breed, “ye do, an’ I’ll worse than murdher ye one - of these——” - </p> - <p> - “Throw ‘em out!” said Perley quietly, waving the go-ahead signal to the - engine crew. - </p> - <p> - And out they went—down the embankment after the first. - </p> - <p> - Lee jumped to the ground and banged the door shut, just as the drawbars - began to snap tight along the train and the local jolted into motion. He - waited beside Perley to swing the caboose as it came up. And while he - waited he watched and grinned. - </p> - <p> - Funny? I don’t know; it depends on the way you look at it, depends on what - you call fun. Lee thought it was funny—then. The air was full of - curses, Indian yells, shouts, oaths; and there was one jumbled mess of - arms, and legs, and barrels. The Indians were after their <i>fill</i>, and - this time Clancy and the stragglers were in the game for keeps. - </p> - <p> - Up ahead the engine crew hung grinning out of the gangway. Behind, the - other brakeman was occupying a reserved seat on the top of the caboose. A - quarter of a mile away over by the camp, men, attracted by the shouting, - were beginning to run toward the track. Inconsistent kind of a mix-up, eh?—Indians, - miners, whisky barrels, and railroaders. I don’t know; call it funny if - you like, though perhaps you can size it up better when I’m through. - </p> - <p> - By this time the caboose was up to where Perley and Lee were standing. - Perley motioned Lee aboard, and then swung on himself. - </p> - <p> - Just as he did so, Clancy’s red shirt loomed up out of the mêlée, his arm - lifted, and over the clack of the car trucks pounding the steel came the - tinkle of breaking glass from the shattered pane in the door—the - bullet had passed between the heads of the two men on the platform, - missing them by a hair’s breadth. Another shot followed the first, another - and another, dangerously close; splintering the woodwork around them; and - then Perley fired. The half-breed spun round like a top, clapped his hand - to his face and pitched over. - </p> - <p> - Then the curve of the track shut out the scene, but for five minutes after - they were out of sight they still got the whoops of the redskins, the - shouts and curses of the miners, and the crackle of guns like the quick - fire of a Gatling. You see it came to that before it was through, and - there was some blood spilled—a lot of it—and, not counting - Clancy’s, it wasn’t all “blanket” blood, either. - </p> - <p> - Clancy? I’m coming to him. No, he wasn’t killed—if he had been I’d - never be telling you this story. - </p> - <p> - It was two or three days before Lee and Perley got the details of what - happened. The redskins fought like fiends after the miners began to fire - on them and had killed one or two, and, though they were finally subdued, - the casualties, as I’ve said, weren’t all on their side by a hanged sight. - </p> - <p> - But I was talking about Clancy. Well, that bullet of Perley’s caught him - on the cheek bone, glanced in, plowed through his left eye, and landed up - somewhere against the cartilage of his nose—a bullet will make queer - tracks sometimes, worse than surveyors by a heap. They got him down to Big - Cloud to a doctor’s, and before he was half cured he disappeared. They had - a sort of makeshift hospital here in those days, and when I say - “disappeared” I mean they found his bed empty one morning, that was all. - </p> - <p> - I told you I didn’t know whether Perley had any hand in putting that - Indian in the car, or the other redskins at the Bend. I don’t. I told you - I didn’t know what was between him and the half-breed before all this - happened. I don’t. Perley never said. But day after day as he and Lee - pounded up and down on the local through the mountains, he began to grow - silent and moody. - </p> - <p> - Lee, young Lee then, was the only one that could get anywhere near the - inside of his vest. He took to Lee, and Lee liked him; but even Lee had - his limits when it came to confidences. There was lots Perley never opened - his lips about. No, I don’t know as it makes much difference now. - </p> - <p> - Lee was the first of the two to hear that Faro Clancy was “loose.” - </p> - <p> - “It looks to me like a bad business,” he said, after telling Perley the - news. - </p> - <p> - Perley’s eyes just narrowed a little. “It looks more like a bad shot, a - rotten bad shot,” he answered evenly. - </p> - <p> - “That, if you like,” returned Lee; “but there’ll be more to follow.” - </p> - <p> - “One would think you <i>knew</i> Clancy,” said Perley, cool as ever. - </p> - <p> - Lee was anxious. Call it presentiment or what you like, from that moment - the thing was on his nerves. Perley had been pretty good to him; had made - things a heap easier for the young fellow, green and raw as he was, in a - hundred different ways. Things like that mean something. - </p> - <p> - “Look here, Perley,” said he, “I’ve heard some talk, and I know there’s - something behind all this between you and that devil. I’m not asking for - confidences——” - </p> - <p> - Perley cut him short, and caught him almost angrily by the shoulder. - “Don’t meddle!” he snapped. “Let it drop. <i>You</i> don’t count in this, - whatever happens. Your being at the Bend that day was an accident. What’s - between me and Clancy concerns ourselves. You don’t count. Unless you’re - looking for another run besides the local, just remember that and don’t - meddle.” - </p> - <p> - That was all. Lee never mentioned it to Perley again. Perley was right, - wasn’t he? I told you there were three men in this story, but that one of - them didn’t count. No, Lee didn’t count. Why should he? - </p> - <p> - What did he have to do with it? Perley was right, I leave it to you. - </p> - <p> - You’ve been over the division, and you know the Devil’s Slide just west of - the Gap from here. You know the grade—the worst in the mountains. - The trains crawl up at the pace a man could walk, because they can’t go - any faster; and they crawl down just as slowly, because they don’t dare do - anything else. - </p> - <p> - I’ve seen the passengers get off the observation and walk—so have - you. Done it yourself probably? I thought so. Extra engine on the rear end - to push or hold back, and one in the middle if the train’s heavy, to keep - it from breaking apart—lessens the drawbar pull, you know. They’re - tunneling now to do away with that particular grade, but that’s nothing to - do with this story, nor, for that matter, with the night, some six weeks - after that business at the Bend, when the local, eastbound, was climbing - the Devil’s Slide. - </p> - <p> - It was a dirty night outside the caboose. A storm had been racketing - through the mountains all afternoon, and by the time it got dark it was a - howling gale, raining hard enough to float the ties. - </p> - <p> - Lee’s place was on the front end, going up that bit of track, but he - wasn’t well that night, and the other brakeman was doing his snatch. Touch - of mountain fever, or something, nothing serious; just enough to make him - shiver and boil alternately over the little stove in the caboose, sitting - with his back to the door. Up above him in the cupola, holding down the - swivel chair where he could watch the train—that is, see his engine - fling up the sparks, for that’s about all he could see, I guess—was - Perley. - </p> - <p> - The car was swinging like a hammock with the heave and strain of the big - pusher coupled right behind it—it acts queer, that does. Every time - I’ve felt it I’ve always thought of a cat and a mouse. It’s like the - engine had the caboose by the scruff and was trying to shake the life out - of it. - </p> - <p> - You’ve felt it a little if you’ve ever been in the rear Pullman going up—the - difference is that a caboose hasn’t any springs to speak of, you - understand? Racket enough to raise the dead. You couldn’t hear yourself - think. Not so much from the noise of the train or the storm, but from the - booming roar of the trailer’s exhaust—like she was trying to cough - her boiler tubes out every time the valves slid. - </p> - <p> - Now, there’s just one more thing I want you to get. The engine crew of a - pusher naturally can’t see any track, road-bed, or anything of that kind, - and it isn’t their business to, either. All they watch is the leader and - the intermediate, if there is one. Their headlight plays along over a few - cars if it’s high enough, or loses itself on the top of the door or the - roof of the caboose if it isn’t, understand? - </p> - <p> - Lee didn’t hear anything. He was sitting bent over with his head between - his hands, and it was the current of air from the opening door that made - him twist around and look up, thinking it had blown open. I don’t know as - you’d call him a coward; maybe yes, maybe no; anyway, he was a - white-faced, terrified man that next instant, as he started up from his - chair. He never got to his feet. Instead, he shut up like a jackknife, and - went down to the floor with a blow over the head from a revolver butt that - knocked him senseless. - </p> - <p> - It all happened in a second, but in that second Lee got it with more - vividness than a thousand hours would have given him—the great, - hulking figure, the water trickling to the floor in little pools from the - dripping clothes, the sickly pallor of the face, the thin new skin of the - livid scar across the cheek, the sightless eye—Clancy. - </p> - <p> - Lee couldn’t have lain unconscious more than twenty minutes, perhaps it - was only fifteen, for it takes about forty minutes to climb the four miles - of the Slide, you see. Call it twenty, that allows for what happened - before and what happened after. When he came to his senses the light in - the bracket lamp was out; blown out by the draft, for the door was open. A - stray beam or two from the pusher’s headlight filled the caboose with an - uncertain, wavering light—from the jolt and swing, you know, though - Lee thought at first it was his head. - </p> - <p> - He tried to get up, but he couldn’t move. He was bound hand and foot, laid - out on the flat of his back—helpless. For a minute he was too dazed - to understand, then he remembered—Clancy. He stared up into the - cupola above him. The swivel chair was empty—Perley had gone. - </p> - <p> - The car trucks were beating a steady <i>clack, clack-clack</i>, as they - pounded the fishplates; from behind came the full, deep-chested thunder of - the trailer’s exhaust; around, the hundred noises of the creaking, - groaning, swaying car; without, the patter of rain, the wail of the wind. - But over it all, low though it was, came a sound that sent a chill to - Lee’s heart. - </p> - <p> - It was like a breathless moan, do you understand? That was the inhuman - part of it; it was breathless—there was no break—a sort of - sobbing monotone. It came from behind him. Lee shivered as he listened, - and then his heart began to pound as though it would burst. He was afraid—<i>afraid</i>. - Premonition, perhaps; I don’t know. He rolled himself over on his side, - and he saw—— - </p> - <p> - How can I tell it! A figure was crouched against the side of the car in a - half-sitting posture, the face was red—red with the blood that was - flowing from the forehead. Lee shrieked aloud in terror. “Perley! Perley!” - Then he grew sick with the horror that was on him. Worse than murder the - half-breed had threatened—and he had kept his word. Perley had been - scalped! - </p> - <p> - Lee’s cry must have reached the poor wretch’s consciousness, for he - staggered to his feet, sweeping his eyes clear with both hands. Lee, sick - to the depths of his soul, the sweat breaking out in great, cold drops - upon his forehead, fought like a maniac with his bonds. - </p> - <p> - Perley never spoke, never paid any attention to Lee—he was past all - that—but his brain, at least, was still capable of coherent - impression. It must have been—to account for what he did. Right in - front of him, as he hung there tottering and swaying, was a broken bit of - mirror tacked up on the side of the car. He was staring into it. - </p> - <p> - His moaning stopped. The shock of his own awful horror must have revolted, - shaken his very being. His hand groped weakly, subconsciously perhaps, for - his pocket—his revolver—the end. - </p> - <p> - Again Lee shrieked as he struggled to free himself, and then, as Perley - fired, he burst out into a peal of wild, discordant laughter. His mind was - giving way. He began to gibber like a madman—that’s the way they - found him—with Perley’s body pitched full across his chest. - </p> - <p> - Don’t ask me. I told you Perley was a little, undersized, sawed-off man. I - don’t know, do I? The halfbreed, physically, could have handled him like a - baby, once he caught him unawares. That’s all I know. - </p> - <p> - They buried Perley down at Big Cloud; and they buried Clancy where the - posse dropped him, drilled full of holes. That’s the story. - </p> - <p> - Lee? Charlie Lee? Why, he doesn’t count, does he? He had nothing to do - with it. Well, if you’re interested in him I’ll tell you. His college - diploma never did him any good. Once he got better and out of the - hospital, he took to drinking periodically—<i>hard</i>. Between - times straight as a string, you understand, for six weeks say, then off - again. That was fifteen years ago, and he’s done it ever since. The - doctors said that blow on the head unsettled him, skull splinter, or - something like that; but medicine’s not an exact science. The doctors were - wrong. The trouble was deeper than the skull—it was in his soul. Lee - drank to save himself from the madhouse—I told you, didn’t I, that - some men drink because they have to? - </p> - <p> - Carleton, the super, and the men before Carleton, understood what the - doctors didn’t, so Lee’s working for the railroad yet. Not braking—he’s - not fit for that, but he keeps the job they gave him—and it’s kept - for him—when he gets back after his spells. I———there’s - the foreman shouting for me. Sorry, but I’ll have to go. “If you’re going - out on Number One she’s just coming down the gorge now. Good night, sir.” - </p> - <p> - I lost him in the shadows of the big mogul on the pit behind me. Then I - turned and walked slowly out of the roundhouse, over the turntable, and - across the tracks to the station platform. Number One’s mellow chime - floated down from the gorge, then the flare of the electric headlight, and - the rumble of the train. And in quick, fierce tempo, the beating, drumming - trucks caught up the name I had heard the foreman shout, and rang it over - and over again in my ears: - </p> - <p> - “Oh-you-Lee! Charlie-Lee! Lee! Charlie-Lee—Lee!” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - XI—“WHERE’S HAGGERTY?” - </h2> - <p> - “The Hill Division was proud enough over it, of course, for Carleton was - its old chief; but, none the less, it read General Order Number 38 with - dismay and misgiving. - </p> - <p> - “T. J. Hale,” the G. O. ran, “is hereby appointed Superintendent of the - Hill Division, with headquarters at Big Cloud, vice H. B. Carleton - promoted to General Manager of the System.” - </p> - <p> - “Now who in the double-blanked, blankety-blanked blazes is Hale?” demanded - the roundhouse and the engine crews. - </p> - <p> - “Carleton was all to the good, h’m?—what!” growled the dispatchers. - </p> - <p> - The train crews swung their lanterns with a defiant air, and the passenger - conductors juggled their punches around their little fingers, smiling a - superior smile to themselves. Hale might be a good, man, perhaps he was, - but Carleton was—“Royal” Carleton. “I guess he’ll get along all - right with us, <i>but</i> he don’t want to get fresh, that’s all. Where’d - he come from, h’m?” - </p> - <p> - That question, at first, no one seemed able to answer. The general - impression was that the Transcontinental had got him from some Eastern - road. Certainly he was a new man, bran new, to the System. - </p> - <p> - And then the renown of one Haggerty, who was braking on a passenger local, - became great, and, in consequence, the displeasure of the Division - increased. - </p> - <p> - Said Haggerty: “When I was on the Penn five years back, this fellow Hale - was assistant super. I knew him well. You wanter look out for him, you can - take my little word for that. He’s a holy terror, an’ that’s a fact. Got - any chewin’?” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty got his chewing, being an egregious liar; and Hale got a damaged - reputation for the same reason. - </p> - <p> - But Haggerty got more than his chewing—and he had not long to wait. - On the day that the new super was expected, Haggerty, on passenger local - Number Seven, got into Big Cloud about noon, and, taking advantage of the - ten-minute wait for refreshments, straddled a stool at the lunch-counter. - Between bites, he fired questions at Spence the dispatcher, who was - bolting his mid-day meal. - </p> - <p> - “Hale come yet?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - “Haven’t seen him,” replied Spence. - </p> - <p> - “When d’ye expect him?” persisted Haggerty. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know,” Spence answered. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, don’t be so blasted close!” snapped Haggerty. “You ain’t givin’ away - any weighty secret if you let out what time his special ‘ll be along, I - suppose.” - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t heard of any special,” said Spence. “Say, Haggerty, they tell - me Hale’s an old friend of yours, h’m? No wonder you’re anxious. I forgot - about that. As soon as I get word about him, I’ll wire up the line to you - so’s you can jump your train, come back on a hand-car, and be here on the - platform to meet him.” - </p> - <p> - “You go to blazes!” retorted Haggerty, and scowled across the counter at - an inoffensive looking little fellow who had taken the liberty of smiling - at the dispatcher’s words. - </p> - <p> - At Haggerty’s look, the smile disappeared in a cup of coffee raised - hastily to the lips. “Huh!” snorted Haggerty, by way of driving home to - the other the audacity and temerity of his act, and likewise the - inadvisability of repeating it. Haggerty was galled. Once before that - morning he had been obliged to relegate this insignificant, squint, - eye-glassed individual, who had persisted in riding on the platform, to a - proper sense of submission. And the method employed had been no more - delicate a one than that of jerking the man bodily into the car by the - collar of his coat. “Huh!” he repeated, with rising inflexion. - </p> - <p> - “No, Haggerty,” went on Spence pleasantly, “Don’t you worry. I won’t fail - you. When the super steps off the train, and the first words he says is, - ‘Where’s Haggerty?’ and you’re not here to respond in kind I can plainly - see there’ll be doings. Oh, no, don’t you fret, I’ll not throw you down on - anything like that——‘twouldn’t be wise for us, that’s got to - live with him, to rile him up at the outset! No, it certainly wouldn’t, - what?” - </p> - <p> - “You go bite on a brake-shoe, you’re too sharp to be munchin’ doughnuts,” - snarled Haggerty. And, swinging himself from his seat, he went back to his - train. - </p> - <p> - An hour later when he reached Elk River, the end of his run, he found a - telegram waiting for him from Spence. He sucked in his under lip as he - read it. - </p> - <p> - “You sly joker,” wired the dispatcher, “why didn’t you tell us that your - friend came up with you on Number Seven?” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty pushed his cap to the back of his head, and swore softly under - his breath. He began to go over in his mind the passengers that had been - aboard the train when they ran into Big Cloud. No one individual seemed to - stand out carded and waybilled as the new super. - </p> - <p> - Then an idea struck Haggerty, and he climbed into the rear coach where - Berkely, his conductor, was making up his report sheets. - </p> - <p> - “Say, Jim,” said Haggerty, “was there any passes into Big Cloud this - mornin’?” - </p> - <p> - Berkely looked up suspiciously. “You mind your own business, an’ you’ll - get along better!” he snapped. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, punk!” returned Haggerty. “My count’s the same as your’n, ain’t it? - What’s the matter with you, then? Honest, Jim, I wanter know. Was there - any passes?” - </p> - <p> - “No, there wasn’t,” grunted Berkely, cooling down a little. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, you might have said so at first, instead of jumpin’ a fellow - for nothin’,” said Haggerty, and went out of the car to hang meditatively - over the handrail and spit reflectively at the ties. - </p> - <p> - “Now wouldn’t that sting you?” he demanded of the universe in general. - “Wouldn’t that sting you? Who ever heard of a new super comin’ on the job - ridin’ a local on a <i>ticket!</i> An’ me askin’ when he was goin’ to turn - up. Oh, yes, it sure would sting you! That funny boy Spence ‘ll pass this - along an’—oh, punk! I ain’t sure it wouldn’t have been better if I’d - kept my mouth shut about knowin’ Hale, but who’d ever thought he’d come up - on <i>my</i> train! How was I to know, h’m?” And during all that - afternoon’s layup at Elk River, Haggerty pondered the matter. He continued - to ponder it as they pulled out for the return trip in the evening, and he - was still pondering it when they whistled for Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - There was no moon up that night, and it was pretty dark as they ran in. - Haggerty, with his lantern, was standing on the rear end. As the train - slowed itself to a halt, a man came tearing down the station platform at a - run. - </p> - <p> - “Where’s Haggerty?” he called breathlessly. “Where’s——” - </p> - <p> - “Here,” said Haggerty promptly, leaning out over the steps and showing his - light. “What d’ye want?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, all right,” said the man. “I’ll be back—” and he disappeared in - the shadow of the station. - </p> - <p> - “He acts like he was nutty,” muttered Haggerty, and swung himself off the - steps. - </p> - <p> - But, though Haggerty waited, the man did not come back, and he had not - come back when the train began to roll out of the station, and Haggerty - was again on the rear platform of the car. Then, just as his hand reached - out to open the door, he stopped and started suddenly as though he had - been stung. - </p> - <p> - A voice came out of the darkness from the other side of the track over by - the roundhouse. “Where’s Haggerty?” it demanded anxiously. - </p> - <p> - Then Haggerty tumbled, and his face went red with rage. He leaned far out - over the rail, and, forgetful that the pantomime was lost in the darkness, - shook his clinched fist in the direction from whence the voice had come. - </p> - <p> - “You go to he-ee-ll-lll!” he bawled, the exclamation shaken into syllables - by reason of the car wheels jolting over the siding switches at that - precise moment. And then, his senses being very acute, from where the - light shone in the dispatcher’s window he-thought he heard, above the - momentarily increasing rattle of the train, a laugh—a laugh that - produced anything but a quieting effect on his already outraged - sensibilities. - </p> - <p> - Now Haggerty was not the nature of those who can pass lightly over a joke - at their own expense, especially if that joke be too prolonged and carries - with it a hint of underlying venom. Therefore, as the “one on Haggerty” - spread over the division, and scarcely an hour of the day passed that the - cry “Where’s Haggerty?” did not reach his ears, he began to sulk and - treasure up his injury. The division was rubbing it in pretty hard. But - the curious part of it all was that his bitterness was not directed - against himself who was the direct cause of his discomfiture, nor against - Spence who was the indirect cause, but against Hale, who was no cause at - all. - </p> - <p> - Just once had Haggerty seen the superintendent. Hale was pointed out to - him on the platform at Big Cloud, and Haggerty had ducked hastily back - inside his train. Hale was the inoffensive little fellow he had treated - with such scant courtesy at the lunch-counter, the insignificant, - squint-eye-glassed individual he had hauled from the car platform by the - coat collar! When Haggerty’s mingled feelings of perturbation and - amazement permitted him any speech at all, it was rather incoherent. - </p> - <p> - “<i>That</i>—the runt!” he gasped, and subsided into an empty seat. - </p> - <p> - And in this inelegant, but pithy, summing up of the capacity and - dimensions of the new official the division was with him to the last - section hand. Him—a railroad man! The Hill Division remembered - “Royal” Carleton and was ashamed, and it rankled for the shame that it - considered had been put upon it. Out of it all, Haggerty was the only - thing of saving grace! So upon Haggerty they loosened, behind the humor, - some of their bitterness. Haggerty became the safety valve of the - division. - </p> - <p> - A month had gone by and Hale had lived well up to what his appearance had - led them to expect. He might have been an automaton for all the signs of - life that emanated from his office. Just routine, the routine business, - routine, that was all. The disquiet and unrest that brooded over the - division became contempt—the kind of contempt that made the - car-tinks put on airs, and in their heart of hearts figure themselves - better railroad men than he who sat over them in supreme authority. - </p> - <p> - Even Haggerty no longer ducked out of sight when circumstances required - that he should breathe the same air as his superior. Haggerty had acquired - a swagger; also, he now voiced his opinion, his cordially poor opinion, of - Mr. Hale without restraint and with no check upon his tongue. - </p> - <p> - And then Haggerty got a shock. It was imparted by Spence. - </p> - <p> - “Got it from Hale’s clerk last night,” said the dispatcher. “He’s going to - run an inspection special over the division, and he’s picked out the fag - end of all things for the crew. He picked you first, Haggerty.” - </p> - <p> - “Aw, forget it!” growled Haggerty, with a scowl. - </p> - <p> - “I think there’s something behind it, though,” Spence went on, his voice - modulated confidentially. “Between you and me, Haggerty, the inspection - trip is a bluff.” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty pricked up his ears. “How’s that?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said Spence serenely, backing to a safe distance, “I think he’s - hurt at the way you’ve cut him since he’s been here. He’s pining for your - company, and——” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty sprang to his feet from the baggage truck on which he had been - seated, and shook his fist frantically at the fast retreating figure. He - was still gesticulating fiercely and muttering savagely to himself when - the window in the dispatcher’s room overhead opened softly, and Spence - stuck out his head. - </p> - <p> - “Hey, there, Haggerty,” he called, “quit practising that deaf and dumb - alphabet. You haven’t got any time to waste. You want to run along and get - the missus to press out a pair of panties, and iron a boiled shirt for - you. You’ll get your orders in the morning.” - </p> - <p> - “Come down for one minute,” choked Haggerty, his rage fanned to a white - heat by the knowledge of his own impotence, for Spence, as he well knew, - was safely entrenched behind locked doors. “Just one minute, an’ I’ll make - your face look like it had never been born. I will that!” - </p> - <p> - “Haggerty,” said Spence in an injured tone, as the window closed, “you are - disgruntled.” - </p> - <p> - But Haggerty was to be still more disgruntled, for the next morning, true - to Spence’s words, he found himself assigned to Inspection Special Number - Eighty-nine. Haggerty was not happy; but he boarded the forward car, as - they pulled out for the mountains with the mental resolution that he would - keep out of the super’s way. - </p> - <p> - Resolutions, however, like many other things, are sometimes rudely upset - in the face of conditions that are not taken into account in the - reckoning. They had been running at a forty-mile clip, and were about into - the yard at Coyote Bend, when Haggerty nearly went to the floor as the - “air” came on with a sudden rush, and the train came jerking to a halt - like a bucking bronco. The whistle was going like mad for the block ahead. - Haggerty grabbed his red flag, dropped to the ground, and ran back past - the super’s car to take his distance. - </p> - <p> - Up ahead, he could see the tail end of a freight disappearing around the - bend, crawling into safety on the siding. Nothing very interesting about - that, somebody would get Tokio for laying out the Special, he supposed. - Maybe the freight had had a breakdown, and was off schedule making the - Bend. Personally, Haggerty did not care. It made very little difference to - him. He picked up a handful of stones, and began to plug them at the - nearest telegraph pole. Suddenly he changed the direction of his shots, - and let fly with all his might at a gopher he had spotted squatting in - front of his hole. - </p> - <p> - “Holy Mac!” he ejaculated in unbounded astonishment. “I believe I hit the - cuss!”—and he went back to see. - </p> - <p> - Just as he got down the embankment, the Special began to whistle for her - flag, “one—two—three—four,” and Haggerty, scrambling to - the track again, began to run. But fast as he ran, he had only covered - about half the distance when the train began to move. It was, therefore, a - very breathless and panting Haggerty who just managed to grab the rail of - the rear car—the super’s car! - </p> - <p> - There was nothing for it but to pass through and Haggerty, with his - acquired swagger, started. The super was alone in the rear compartment, - seated at a table, a mass of papers before him. Haggerty was industriously - rolling up his flag as he passed along. - </p> - <p> - “Haggerty!” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty stopped and swung around at the sound of his name. - </p> - <p> - Hale reached his hand into a box of cigars that lay open on the table, - selected one carefully, lighted it, and leaned back in his chair. “I would - like to offer you one, Haggerty,” he said quietly, “but I am afraid you - would misunderstand.” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty shifted a little before the super’s look. Somehow, there wasn’t - any squint at all; instead, behind the glasses, the gray eyes were - remarkably bright and clear, and their steadiness was discomposing—to - Haggerty. - </p> - <p> - “It seems,” said Hale, a little smile playing around the corners of his - mouth, “that they don’t measure men by the same standard out West here - that they did when we were back on the Penn together, eh?” Haggerty - reddened. His only belief would have been in bluster; but, curiously - enough, there was something about this little man, he couldn’t tell just - what, that made bluster impossible. Therefore, Haggerty held his peace, - and his fingers played nervously with the flag, twirling it around and - around awkwardly. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t make any mistake, Haggerty,” the super continued pleasantly. “I’m - not trying to rub it in. I want you to know that I’ve heard the story. I - want you to know that I didn’t nose it out. I heard it at the - lunch-counter that day after you went out, and before the men there knew - who I was. I want to start straight with you, Haggerty.” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty was puzzled and flustered at this opening. “Well, sir,” he - blurted out, “of course you know it was all a lie. I only did it for a - josh.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I understand,” Hale answered. “In itself it didn’t amount to - anything, but the consequences are a little more than you reckoned on, - aren’t they? It’s acted like a boomerang, and you’re pretty sore, - Haggerty, aren’t you?” - </p> - <p> - The openness and friendly tones of the super took hold of Haggerty, and he - warmed toward the other. - </p> - <p> - “Well, yes, sir, I suppose I am,” he admitted. - </p> - <p> - Hale nodded. “Now, I want you to see the other side of it, Haggerty—my - side. No division of any railroad, or anything else for that matter, can - do itself justice unless everyone connected with it is pulling together <i>for</i> - it. I want <i>every</i> man out here with me, and first of all I want you. - There is nothing destroys respect so much as ridicule. The division, much - after the fashion that an epidemic of measles springs up amongst children, - took it into their heads to dislike the successor of Mr. Carleton, no - matter who he might be. Now, unfortunately, instead of having checked the - spread, the germs are being fostered because, back of their fun with you, - a description of contempt for me is constantly kept alive. So I want you - to cooperate with me, Haggerty, and show them that, after all, whether I’m - a holy terror or not, whether I’m a runt of a giant, no matter what, I’m - entitled to a fair deal out here in the West. There, Haggerty, that’s a - pretty long sermon for me. I’m not much at preaching. Just turn what I’ve - said over in your mind, that’s all. I think I can safely offer you a cigar - now. Will you have one?” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty accepted the cigar with a flustered mumble of thanks, and as he - went forward to the other coach he chewed the end pensively. - </p> - <p> - “Well, how’s the little fellow? Hope the ride ain’t makin’ him car-sick,” - sneered Slakely, the conductor. - </p> - <p> - Haggerty strode up to the other, and shoved his fist savagely within an - inch of Slakely’s nose. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll have you know, the super’s all right, you walleyed coyote, you! I’m - tellin’ you he’s a <i>man</i>. Do I hear any remarks to the contrary?” - </p> - <p> - “Say,” gasped Slakely blankly, retreating down the aisle, “what’s the - matter with you, anyway?” - </p> - <p> - “That’s what’s the matter!”—Haggerty’s explanation was more forcible - than explicit, though the meaning of his clenched fist which he shook at - the other was pointed enough in its inference. “That’s what’s the matter, - my bucko,” he repeated fiercely, “an’ don’t you forget it! I’m givin’ it - to you straight, an’ I’ll take none of your lip about it neither! See?” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty had raised the standard. Not, perhaps, as the super had expected; - but according to his own ideas, or rather to his fiery temper which led - him to act blindly on the spur of the moment as his impulse directed. - </p> - <p> - But it was not this method of Haggerty’s, if such a term could by any - stretch of the imagination be applied to Haggerty, that was to bring about - the desired result, and at the same time rid him of his tormentors—tormentors - who continued to sound the cry, “Where’s Haggerty?” with undiminished - frequency—tormentors who were much too wary to allow themselves to - be caught anywhere within striking distance, for Haggerty’s forearm was a - thing to wonder at. Instead, the end came from another source as totally - different as it was unexpected. It came on the third day of the inspection - trip, up in the Rockies at the new bridge across the Stony River—and - it was the new bridge that did it. - </p> - <p> - They were to lay out there for the morning, and Haggerty started in to - employ the two or three hours of leisure this gave him by looking over the - work. It wasn’t much of a bridge as bridges go, for the Stony wasn’t much - of a river; but the approaches were enough to pull the heart out of the - stoutest bridge crew that ever toiled and sweated and slaved. Just rock, - solid, gray, massive; and so it was blast, blast, blast, hour after hour - all through the day, day after day. One span, resting on the shore - abutments, was to bridge the canon that yawned six hundred feet below, - where the Stony swirled and eddied, a foaming, angry, chattering, little - stream. - </p> - <p> - On the eastern side, where Haggerty stood, the anchorage was pretty well - under way, but over across on the western shore they were still pitting - their blasting powder against the stubborn rock of the mountainside. - Haggerty crossed over on the old bridge to take a look at this. Just as he - reached the other side a stationary engine blew shrilly for a blast, and - the men began to run for cover. Haggerty pulled his watch and marked the - time—one minute and fifteen seconds. Then the blast thundered, - echoed, reechoed, and died away through the mountains. He joined the men - as they went back to their work. - </p> - <p> - “Holy Mac!” he exclaimed to the foreman, as he peered over the edge of the - excavation and looked down some fifteen or twenty feet to the ledge where - the men were already busy again. “Holy Mac! You’ve got to look sharp, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I dunno,” replied the foreman. “We give ‘em plenty of time. When the - whistle blows the men hump it. We don’t touch the button till the last one - is crawlin’ over the top of the bank. Then, with the time fuse, there’s a - minute, lots of time.” - </p> - <p> - Haggerty looked on for awhile, then he turned away, sat down by one of the - shanties, and loaded his pipe. The pipe once alight, he settled himself in - a more comfortable position by sprawling on his back, his hands under his - head. From where he lay, he commanded a view of the other side of the - river as well as the work before him. He could see Hale across there - talking to one of the bridge engineers. He watched the two men lazily, in - drowsy contentment, until he lost sight of them as they started to come - over to his side, then his attention became riveted again on his immediate - surroundings. - </p> - <p> - They were getting ready for another blast. Haggerty sat up. It was rather - exciting to see the men come scrambling out of the hole. The whistle had - just gone three toots. They were coming now, one head after another - popping up over the edge, then the shoulders, and finally the men on their - feet running like deers for shelter—not far, only a few yards, for - the excavation itself afforded protection, once clear of it. Haggerty - himself was not fifteen yards away. - </p> - <p> - He counted the men as they came out. It was the eighteenth who, just as - his head and shoulders appeared, waved an arm and shouted: “All out. Let - ‘er go!” He saw the foreman bend over the battery and make the connection - that would spark the timefuse at the other end, and then a groan of horror - went up around him. Number Eighteen, with a cry and a desperate effort to - pull himself over the top, had slipped back and disappeared from sight! - </p> - <p> - Haggerty’s pipe dropped to the ground from between his teeth, his heart - seemed to stop its beats, a cold sweat broke out upon his face. He was on - his feet now, and the foreman’s words were ringing in his ears: “Then - there’s a minute, lots of time! <i>Then there’s a minute, lots of time!</i>” - </p> - <p> - He began to run, and the seconds, as he ran, lengthened into years and - cycles. “My God!” he muttered in a catchy way. - </p> - <p> - But fast as he ran, someone was faster than he. Five yards from the edge - of the excavation, a figure, small, short, speeding like the wind, passed - him. It was Hale—the super! - </p> - <p> - Behind, the foreman’s voice bellowed hoarsely: “Come back! Come back! Ye - can’t get to the fuse! D’ye hear!” - </p> - <p> - “Mabbe,” mumbled Haggerty between his teeth, “mabbe we can get the <i>man</i>. - Mary, Mother, help us!” - </p> - <p> - Hale, flat on the ground, was making to swing himself over as Haggerty, - for the second time, caught him by the collar of his coat. “You ain’t - strong enough,” he grunted, yanking the super back. “You help me from the - top “—and over the edge he went himself. - </p> - <p> - “Then there’s a minute, lots of time!”—the words came again - unbidden. How much, in God’s name how much, of that minute had gone, how - much was left? His teeth were set, his heart pounds so fierce and rapid - that his breath came hard and choked, as he lowered himself to a little - ledge, projecting out some seven or eight feet below the surface that had - caught and held the body of Number Eighteen. The man lay there groaning. - It was easy to see what had happened. A misplaced step in the climb, then - a loosened rock, his balance gone, and the stone had crashed down upon his - legs and ankles. - </p> - <p> - There was a look of helpless terror in the eyes of the wounded man as - Haggerty reached and bent over him. “Get out,” the white lips quivered. - “You ain’t got time. I give the signal. The blast ‘ll be goin’ now.” - </p> - <p> - “There’s a minute, lots of time,” said Haggerty in a sing-song, crazy way. - He was trying to fit the words to an air he had heard somewhere. Queer he - couldn’t remember it, the words were straight enough! Then he laughed—foolishly—as - he worked like a madman! - </p> - <p> - He had raised the man in his arms and now, heaving with all his strength, - was gradually pushing him up, up. The strain became terrific. Haggerty’s - muscles cracked. One of his arms was almost useless to him owing to the - narrowness of the ledge that, to maintain even a precarious footing as, - little by little, he rose to an upright position, forced him tight against - the wall of rock and earth. Haggerty panted with cruel, gasping sobs. - “Then there’s a minute, lots of time!” The repetition of the words came - surging upon him with a shock of horror, lending him a frenzied strength. - A desperate twist, and he had made the halfturn that brought his back to - the cutting. His other arm was free now. A heave, and he had swung Number - Eighteen above his shoulders within reach of the super’s outstretched - hands. A second more, and, with Hale pulling above and Haggerty lifting - below, the man, with a cry of agony as his wounded leg banged limply - against the ground, was forced up over the bank. - </p> - <p> - “Quick, Haggerty! For God’s sake, be quick yourself,” cried Hale. “Hurry, - man, <i>hurry!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “There’s a minute”—Haggerty sprang for the top of the bank, clutched - it—“lots of—” The last word was blotted out as he dragged - himself over the edge, and heard Hale’s sharp command: “Lie flat!” From - behind and below him came the roar of the detonation, he felt the ground - shake and quiver beneath him, the echoes were rolling and reverberating - like a park of artillery—then Hale’s low, fervent: “Thank God!” - </p> - <p> - It was Hale who got it first as the mob of men rushed forward, cheering, - laughing, gabbling hysterically. And it was at Hale’s uplifted hand that - the clamor died suddenly away, and in its stead came the super’s voice in - quiet tones: “Where’s Haggerty?” - </p> - <p> - “Aw, gwan!” sputtered Haggerty sheepishly, trying to fight his way out of - the crowd that pressed upon him to haul and maul him, to thump his back, - to shake his hand. “Aw, gwan! I wanter get me pipe that I left over by the - shanty.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - XII—McQUEEN’S HOBBY - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here isn’t much - use in talking about the logical or the illogical when you come to couple - up with a man’s hobby, because a hobby is a hobby and that’s all there is - to it—with nothing left to be said on the subject. Most men have a - hobby. McQueen’s was coal—just coal. - </p> - <p> - McQueen talked coal with a persistence that was amazing. On all occasions - and under any pretext it was coal. Was he off schedule with a regularity - that entailed his presence on the carpet before the division - superintendent, it was coal. Did he break down between meeting-points with - the attendant result that the dispatchers fretted and fumed and swore as - they readjusted their schedules and rearranged their train sheets, it was - coal. Everlastingly and eternally coal. - </p> - <p> - “What’s coal?” McQueen would demand oracularly. “It’s carbon and oxygen - and hydrogen with a dash of nitrogen, ain’t it? Well, then, what are you - talking about? Coal <i>ain’t</i> just coal, some of it’s mostly slate. Two - hundred and ten pounds all the way, all the time, with the grate bars - cluttered with that, huh! What?” - </p> - <p> - No purchasing agent that had ever hit the division had been quite able to - satisfy McQueen with the brand of the commodity that was supplied in - accordance with the requisition orders that he drew. And so, day in and - day out, big 802 puffed her way through the mountains, and McQueen, in the - cab, absorbed coal statistics, coal data, coal everything, with an - avidity, a thoroughness, and a masterliness of detail, that would have put - some noted geologists to shame and given the rest a run to hold their - rights on the marked-up schedule. - </p> - <p> - Up at headquarters—when things were running smoothly and McQueen was - behaving himself with no scores chalked up against him on the time-card—they - treated his hobby as a joke. So that when his whistle boomed out of the - gorge to the westward, or shrilled across the cut to the eastward, - followed a moment afterward by the sight of the big, flying mogul with her - string of slewing dark-green coaches, the staff on duty at Big Cloud would - lean from the upper windows and watch the Limited as she shattered the - yard switches with a roar—watch as, with a hiss of the air and the - grinding of the brake shoes as they sparked the tires, she would draw up, - panting, at the platform, and the big engineer would swing himself from - the cab for an oil around. Then the badinage flew thick and fast while - McQueen swabbed his hands on a hunk of waste and punctuated the remarks - with squirts from his long-spouted can as he filled the thirsty oil cups. - </p> - <p> - So the big fellows laughed and joked, and the Brotherhood chaffed him - unmercifully. - </p> - <p> - If anyone had asked McQueen what had started, let alone caused him to - exhaust the subject of coal with such painstaking and conscientious - insistence, he couldn’t for the life of him have answered. It had started—just - started, that’s all—and, fascinating him, had pursued its insidious - advance unchecked and unquestioned—that is, unquestioned until one - morning when Clarihue, the turner at the Big Cloud roundhouse, kind of - jerked him up a little on the proposition. - </p> - <p> - “You’re against the red, you and your coal, Mac, all right, all right,” - Clarihue chuckled, as the engineer came in to sign on for the day’s run. - </p> - <p> - McQueen was patting 802’s slide bars affectionately. “How’s that?” he - asked. - </p> - <p> - “Oil!” - </p> - <p> - “Oil?” repeated McQueen, puzzled. - </p> - <p> - “Sure thing! No more coal—no more slate—no more cinders—you - touch her off, and there you are! You’ll have to cut out the coal and plug - up on oil, Mac.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh!” said McQueen, enlightened. “Oil-burners, eh? I saw one of ‘em down - East. They’re evil smelling, inhuman, stinking brutes, that’s what they - are! don’t you let ‘em side track you like that, son. They may do down - there, but not in the hills. Not while you and me are pulling throttles, - and don’t you think so.” - </p> - <p> - Clarihue grinned. - </p> - <p> - “Well, mabbe,” said he. “But say, honest, Mac, what’s the sense of gassing - about coal the way you do? What’s to come out of it? What’s the good of - it? You just get the laugh from the boys, what?” - </p> - <p> - McQueen’s answer was to scratch his head. To put the matter into the - concrete class of practicability was a phase of the subject that he had - not considered. He scratched his head when the turner had gone; and, also, - he scratched his head for several days thereafter. Then he caught at a - happy inspiration whereby to solve the riddle, and therein he fell—but - of that in a moment. - </p> - <p> - Things were booming on the Hill Division. Traffic was doubled, trebled. - Everything on the train sheets was in sections. Promotions flew thick and - fast. Wipers were set to firing, and the firemen moved over to the - right-hand side of the cabs. Every wheel the division could beg, borrow or - steal was doing fancy time stunts smashing records. Everyone from car-tink - to superintendent, was on the jump. Even the directors, not to be outdone - in the general order of things, worked overtime rubbing fat hands in - gleeful anticipation of juicy, luscious dividends to be; only <i>they</i> - neglected to figure in Noonan as an item on the balance sheets. - </p> - <p> - Noonan? Where is the Brotherhood that does not number among its members - men with grievances, fancied or real? Noonan had a grievance,—no - particular grievance, just a grievance—and Noonan was a power in - that branch of the Brotherhood that held sway over the Hill Division. - Noonan always had a grievance; due, primarily, to the fact that he had a - deep and long-seated grudge against himself. It dated way back—he’d - been born that way. - </p> - <p> - “Grievances!” he spluttered to a group of his admirers. “Grievances? Why, - we’re against the worst of it all the time. We’re not track-walkers, are - we? Well then, who runs the road? It’s us on the throttles, what? Who’s to - blame for our measly schedule of hours and pay? We are, ‘cause we haven’t - the sand to stand up for our rights. That’s what, and don’t you forget - it!” - </p> - <p> - There was a chorus of assent. “Noonan’s right,” said one Devins, “only it - don’t look to me like now was what you might rightly call the time to - growl. Times are good, everything’s double-headed, and the paycar’s - running carload lots.” - </p> - <p> - Noonan glared. “You’ve got the brains of a piston head, that’s what you - have,” he exploded. “It’s times like these we’d win hands down. Perhaps - you’d like to wait till there’s nothing doing, and they’re laying the boys - off and everybody, mostly, is running spare! What chance d’ye think any - demands would stand then?” - </p> - <p> - Of a truth it was the accepted time and a most glorious opportunity. In - that, Noonan was right. Only one obstacle lay between him and the - accomplishment of his cherished ambition to make something of his - trouble-hunting proclivities and become a leader of men—in a strike. - That obstacle was McQueen. - </p> - <p> - McQueen was a company man. Out and out a company man; though nothing would - have surprised McQueen more than to learn that he was looked up to as a - leader by the conservative element of the Brotherhood. True, he and his - coal was the joke of the division; but that was only a joke, and in no - wise to be held up against him. His influence, of whose existence he was - oblivious, was based on things apart from that. Big, kindly, honest, - incapable of deceit, simple, straight-forward, staunch in his friendships, - somewhat inclined to stubborness in his beliefs perhaps, easily ruffled - but as easily pacified, such was McQueen. Such was the McQueen the - officials honored, and such was the McQueen with whom the boys would - gladly and loyally have shared their pay checks to the last cent. - </p> - <p> - All this Noonan knew. Knew, too, that to gain his end he must first win - over McQueen. And to that object he began to devote himself. He and - McQueen shared the honors of the fast mail, and under ordinary conditions - communication between the two men was limited to a flirt of the hand from - the cab as one or other of them tore by the siding designated as their - meeting-point by the lords of the road, the dispatchers. But now things - were a bit different, everything was more or less off schedule. And while - the Limited, East and West, was nursed along as near her running time as - possible, and generally got the best of it over everything else, there - were, nevertheless, occasions when both men were stalled together on time - orders at the same point. - </p> - <p> - Noonan tackled McQueen at the first opportunity. - </p> - <p> - He picked his way cautiously as though not quite sure of his rights and - ready for a quick reverse. - </p> - <p> - “Say, Mac,” he began, “what do you think of all this talk that’s going - ‘round?” - </p> - <p> - “Talk?” said McQueen. “What talk?” - </p> - <p> - “You don’t mean to say,” gasped Noonan, in well-simulated surprise, “that - you haven’t heard it? And the boys are slinging it pretty hot, at that!” - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t heard anything,” McQueen answered, slightly suspicious that - Noonan was about to spring one at his expense. “What you giving us?” - </p> - <p> - “Straight,” confided Noonan earnestly. “It’s strike, Mac, that’s what.” - </p> - <p> - “Strike!” ejaculated McQueen, bewildered. “What for?” - </p> - <p> - “What for!” cried Noonan. “What for? That’s a sweet question to ask. Well, - pretty dashed near everything,”—he waved his hand expansively—“hours, - scale, and—and—” - </p> - <p> - McQueen shook his head. “I’m not kicking,” he said. “I don’t see anything - to strike about. Looks to me as though you fellows were hunting trouble. - You’ll probably get it, what?” - </p> - <p> - “You never see anything,” Noonan blurted out, irritation getting the - better of diplomacy. “Nothing but the blamed coal you’re forever yapping - about.” - </p> - <p> - “What I know about coal,” returned McQueen with dignity, “you’ll never - know. It’s a subject that requires brains.” - </p> - <p> - “Is that so!” Noonan jeered. “You tell it!” - </p> - <p> - “It requires brains,” McQueen repeated stolidly. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a shame that the only man on the division that has ‘em, don’t know - how to use ‘em, then,” Noonan prodded. “Who cares about your blazing old - coal and what it’s made of? Talk’s cheap. There’s no sense to it, anyhow.” - </p> - <p> - “Maybe there isn’t, and then again maybe there is. At any rate, there’s a - dollar a day for every man pulling a throttle,” McQueen announced - triumphantly. “I don’t know yet just how much for the firemen, I haven’t - figured it on their schedule.” - </p> - <p> - Noonan pricked up his ears. “What’s that you say, Mac,” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - Here was McQueen’s vindication. They’d laugh at his absurd, pointless - theories on coal, would they? Well then, he’d show them! And it wasn’t any - of their business, either, how many days he’d racked his brains, puzzling - out an adequate solution to the question Clarihue had flung at him! He - shook two impressive fat fingers at Noonan. - </p> - <p> - “One dollar a day, every day, and the spare men proportionately, that’s - what! Do you get that, Noonan?” - </p> - <p> - “Rats!” said Noonan. “You’d better go into the shops for repairs. You need - new stay-bolts on your dome cover!” - </p> - <p> - “Never you mind my dome cover,” McQueen flung back, beginning to get - exasperated. “It may need a little tinkering, but it’s not ready for the - scrap-heap yet, the way some are I could mention—but won’t. It all - goes back to what I said. It’s a subject that requires brains—which - you haven’t got. There’s no use explaining anything to you because——” - </p> - <p> - “You can’t,” Noonan interrupted craftily. “You’re only long on wind, Mac.” - </p> - <p> - “You listen to me, you rust-jointed disgrace to the throttle!” cried - McQueen, stung into retort. “You listen to me! What are you paid for? - Mileage, ain’t it? How do you get your mileage? Steam! What makes steam? - Coal! D’ye hear? Coal! Coal, and don’t you forget it. Well then, poor coal - means poor steam, and poor steam means poor mileage, don’t, it, what?” - </p> - <p> - Noonan burst into a loud and derisive guffaw. - </p> - <p> - McQueen glared. “You’re a wild, uneducated, hee-hawing ass!” he choked. - “What do you know, anyway? Nothing! But <i>I</i> know! A dollar a day I - said, and I say so now. I figured it out. It’s the difference between high - grade coal and the muck we burn. It’s the difference between the mileage - we make and the mileage we <i>could</i> make in the same time. That totes - up one dollar a day. Supposing they wouldn’t let us have any more mileage - than they do now, well, we’d do it in better time, and the difference - would be ours, wouldn’t it? And time’s money. And <i>that</i> totes up one - dollar a day just the same. It’s the same either way—time or - mileage. Take your choice!” - </p> - <p> - “There, Johnny, that’s a good boy, run along and fetch me a bucket of - steam,” Noonan scoffed. - </p> - <p> - With a snort of unutterable contempt, McQueen turned to swing himself into - his cab. - </p> - <p> - “Hold on a minute, Mac,” Noonan cried, afraid that he had overstepped - himself. “Don’t get whiffy. I swear, I believe you’re right. Let’s see how - you figure it.” - </p> - <p> - And McQueen, mollified, figured it. Figured it with the stub of a pencil - in greasy, scrawling characters on the back of a time order. As to the - process by which the conclusion was arrived at, that was something of - which Noonan was in profound and utter ignorance. Whether it was right or - wrong, he did not know. He never knew—and cared less! Certainly the - result was there. - </p> - <p> - McQueen completed the last figure of his calculation with a flourish. - “There!” he cried exultingly. “How about it now, eh?” - </p> - <p> - Noonan took the paper, wrinkled his brows, pursed his lips, and stared at - it with the air of a connoisseur of calculus. “H’m,” said he slowly, “are - you dead sure it’s right, Mac?” - </p> - <p> - “Right!” McQueen fairly yelled, touched in another tender spot. “Right! - Confound you, it’s there in black and white, ain’t it? Figures don’t lie, - do they? Well, what in thunder’s wrong with you, then?” - </p> - <p> - “I wanted to be sure, Mac, that’s all. Holy fishplates, I knew it was bad, - rotten bad, but I didn’t think they were handing it to us like this.” - </p> - <p> - “You bet it’s bad. It’s the worst ever. There’s more kinds of coal than - there are spikes in the right of way from here to Big Cloud and back - again, but the coal we get is the last on the list. Bad! It’s what I’ve - always said, ain’t it?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s fierce!” continued Noonan with rising emphasis. “And when the boys - hear this, it’ll be the last straw. They’ll fix ‘em!” - </p> - <p> - “Fix who?” inquired McQueen, blankly. - </p> - <p> - “Why, ain’t I telling you! The company.” - </p> - <p> - “I—I was talking about the coal,” said McQueen a little uneasily. - </p> - <p> - “Sure you were,” Noonan agreed heartily. “Sure you were, and how the - company is robbing every engineer on the division of a dollar a day, to - say nothing of the firemen and the train crews. It’s enough to make a man - mad. Well, I should say yes!” - </p> - <p> - “I—I didn’t say the company was robbing us,” protested McQueen. - </p> - <p> - “What’s that!” cried Noonan sharply; then in apparent disgust: “So your - crazy old figures are just gas-bag filling like the rest of your coal - talk, eh? They <i>did</i> look pretty scaly, and that’s a fact. I had my - suspicions. That’s why I asked you if you were sure they were right. But I - might have known they weren’t without asking.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, you might, might you?” exploded McQueen, goaded once more into angry - outburst. “You and your suspicions! Who are you! I tell you they are - right, and that’s the end of it!” - </p> - <p> - “Well, if they’re right, why don’t you stand by them, then? We’re being - robbed every day we work, ain’t we?” - </p> - <p> - “Ye-e-es, I suppose we are,” McQueen admitted reluctantly; “but I didn’t - figure it out for the purpose of——” - </p> - <p> - “Mac,” Noonan interrupted unctuously, “‘tain’t for you nor me to say the - purpose it’s to be put to. There’s others besides us. But I do say, Mac, - you’re almighty smart.” - </p> - <p> - McQueen shook his head. “I’m a company man,” he said dubiously. - </p> - <p> - “Company man! Of course you are. We’re all company men. But right’s right - and wrong’s wrong before anything else. Well, ta ta, Mac, see you again. - I’m off. There’s Hake with the tissue. I’ll tell the boys where you - stand.” - </p> - <p> - It was a somewhat dazed McQueen that in turn pulled himself up into his - own cab. He stood in the gangway and squinted meditatively at the coal - heaped high on the tender. To his conscientious self-communion, his - triumphant vindication had somewhat the appearance of a boomerang. “I - don’t know,” he reflected. “It is damn poor coal, and—and figures <i>don’t</i> - lie. We—we’ve been getting the worst of it, and—and a man <i>should</i> - stand up for his rights.” And while McQueen, busy with new and momentous - problems, was steaming west into the Rockies, Noonan, with his tongue in - his cheek, was cutting along for Big Cloud with a wide-flung throttle. - </p> - <p> - That night, at Big Cloud, Noonan’s cronies got the story. That is, they - got what Noonan saw fit to tell them. And the burden of his tale was that - McQueen was with the Brotherhood and against the company. That was - sufficient. They looked with appreciative admiration at the man who had - done the trick, and then they flew to obey his orders. - </p> - <p> - By morning, every engineer on the division had the news. On way freights, - on stray freights, on regulars, specials, and sections, they got it—every - last one of them. And McQueen coming east again on Number Two got it, and - marvelled a little at his new importance, never seeing Noonan’s hand in - the marked deference paid to him. - </p> - <p> - First and last it was a bad business. Bad for the company, bad for the hot - heads led by Noonan, bad for the others, and bad for McQueen. It caught - the company none too well prepared, and Carleton, for this happened in the - days of his superintendency, was hard put to it to move anything. There - was pretty bitter feeling; and before it was over there was blood spilled. - But the roughs at Big Cloud, who didn’t know the pilot from a horn-block, - were responsible for the most of that, though, in their own way, too, they - ended it. - </p> - <p> - It came to a show-down the night they carried young Carl Davis home from - the yard on a door they had wrenched from a box-car. Davis was braking in - the yard then, and he was a nephew of McQueen’s. He had lived with the - engineer ever since, as a little chap of ten, he had come out to the West. - Childless themselves, McQueen and his wife thought as much of the lad as - though he had been their own. - </p> - <p> - McQueen in his grief didn’t get the rights of it. Only in a confused sort - of a way he understood the roughs had winged the boy with a cowardly shot, - meaning perhaps to do no more than shoot out his lamp as he swung by on - the top of a car. And while his wife with tender hands busied herself in - rendering such assistance to the surgeon as she could, McQueen sat in a - chair and stared, dry-eyed and bitter of heart, at the white face on the - bed. - </p> - <p> - Also McQueen was getting sense. Certainly, he had never intended to - strike. Now, the shock of Carl’s hurt had sobered his judgment and he saw - things as he should have seen them, saw them as he cursed himself for not - having seen them before he had allowed his senseless egotism to carry him - off his feet. As the thoughts came crowding through his brain, his cheeks - burned dull red at his own shame. But through it all he blamed only - himself, with never an inkling that he had been used as a cat’s-paw by the - crafty Noonan—that was to come afterward. - </p> - <p> - McQueen waited only to wring a half-grudging assurance from the doctor - that the boy would pull through, then he took his hat and left the house. - It was getting on toward eleven o’clock when he walked into the hall - across from the station where the boys had their headquarters, and had - been in the habit of congregating each night ever since the strike began. - Usually noisy in a good-natured, devil-may-care way, there was a subdued - and serious quiet pervading the room as McQueen stepped in. The shooting - in the yard was something they had not counted on and, like McQueen, it - was acting on them as a tonic. All except Noonan who, evidently bolstered - up with a few drinks, was more noisy, hilarious and quarrelsome than ever. - </p> - <p> - McQueen answered the questions they crowded at him as to the boy’s - condition soberly, and going over to Noonan took him by the arm and led - him into a corner. - </p> - <p> - “The game ain’t worth it,” he said shortly. “I’ve had my lesson to-night - and I’m through!” - </p> - <p> - “What for?” demanded Noonan aggressively. “We didn’t have anything to do - with it. We’re not responsible, are we?” - </p> - <p> - “We are,” said McQueen sturdily. “Morally responsible.” - </p> - <p> - “Morally responsible!” Noonan mocked with a sneer. “Oh, mamma, listen to - him! Streak of yellow, that’s you, McQueen.” Then fiercely: “You play the - scab and I’ll bash your head to jelly.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re drunk,” retorted McQueen contemptuously. - </p> - <p> - “Drunk, eh? I’m not so drunk but that I know who’s running this strike. - It’s me, and don’t you forget it! And what I says goes, d’ye hear?” - </p> - <p> - “I’m asking you to call it off. Blood on our heads I won’t stand for. Our - grievances don’t warrant what’s likely to happen here if things go on. You - owe it to the men who followed you into the strike, Noonan.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I do, do I? Followed <i>me</i> into the strike, eh? How about the men - that followed <i>you?</i>” - </p> - <p> - “That followed me?” repeated McQueen in amazement. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, that followed you! You didn’t think I took any stock in your batty - coal talk, did you? You must think I’m green! All I wanted was <i>you</i>—you - bit fast and easy enough—the rest of the softies came along then - like a pack of sheep. What d’ye think now about <i>me</i> owing it all to - the men, Mr. Morally Responsible, eh?” - </p> - <p> - It took McQueen a minute to get the whole of it—the bitter whole of - it. Then the blood rushed to his face in a crimson flood. He reached out - and grasping Noonan by neck and shoulders shook him as a terrier shakes a - rat. “You cur!” he cried hoarsely, and flung the other suddenly away - against the wall. - </p> - <p> - The men at the sound of the scuffle came running over. - </p> - <p> - “He’s a scab! Kill him!” shrieked Noonan. - </p> - <p> - McQueen turned to face the men. “If beating this strike’s a scab, I’m a - scab,” he said quietly. “I’m out to beat it right now! I’ve been a fool - and I’m ready to admit it. But I didn’t know until to-night that I’d been - bait for a whining thing like that!” pointing at Noonan. “He says some of - you men came in on the strike because I did. If that’s so, then get out of - it because I do. Get out of it before there’s more on our hands than we’ll - be able to answer for when we go into Division for the last time. That’s - all I’ve got to say. I’m going over now to ask Carle-ton to put me on - again, if it’s nothing better than pulling a way freight. And—and I - hope you’ll come with me.” - </p> - <p> - As the flood follows the fracture in the dam, so the breaking of the - tension filled the room with pandemonium. Cheers, yells, hisses, curses, - shouts—the Brotherhood was divided against itself. But ten minutes - later, the majority of them were clustered behind McQueen in the super’s - office. - </p> - <p> - Carleton and his staff were sleeping at headquarters those days, and they - gathered in a group around the green-shaded lamp on the dispatcher’s table - to face the delegation. - </p> - <p> - “Mr. Carleton,” McQueen began, “we——” - </p> - <p> - That was all. He never got any further. From the platform outside came - hoots and cat-calls, and above the chorus Noonan’s voice: - </p> - <p> - “Soak the scab! Kill him! If he’s so fond of it, let him have it! <i>Now!</i>” - </p> - <p> - The window pane was shivered with a crash, and McQueen, struck full in the - head by a huge hunk of coal, sank without so much as a moan to the floor. - </p> - <p> - They cured him of brain fever in the course of time all right, but they - never cured him of coal. Up and down from one end of the division to the - other, when he got around again, he talked coal harder than ever—it - was his business. McQueen was doing the buying for the road. - </p> - <p> - “There wasn’t anything wrong with what I said about coal,” he asserts with - a smile, when the boys put it up to him. “Not for a minute! Good coal - makes better steam, better everything, and pays the company. They saw that - all right. That’s why I’m buying it, see? As for figuring it into the - schedule, the sum was too hard and they couldn’t do it. Me? Oh, I can’t, - either, I lost the paper I did it for Noonan on. I ain’t so good on - figures as I was, what?” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - XIII—THE REBATE - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>e was known as - Dutchy, but his name was Damrosch. - </p> - <p> - This is Dutchy’s story when Dutchy and the Transcontinental were in the - making; and before, as has been recorded elsewhere, he came to Big Cloud. - He started railroading as cook’s helper on a construction gang that was - laying track across the prairie. As the mileage grew, so Dutchy grew. At - first lank and lean, he took on, little by little, the appearance of being - comfortably nourished, until, by the time they hit the Rockies, Dutchy’s - gait had become a waddle and his innocent blue eyes were almost hidden by - the great rolls of fat that puffed out his face like a toy balloon. Then - Dutchy, slow of body and likewise of brain, and yearning for a quiet and - peaceful existence, secured the lunch-counter rights for Dry Notch. - </p> - <p> - Now, Dry Notch, half-way across the prairie, consisted of a water-tank, a - small roundhouse, a smaller station and a diminutive general store. But - because of its geographical position, it was headquarters for the - Mid-Plains Division. - </p> - <p> - Here, T. V. Brett was superintendent; Thornley was his chief clerk; and - MacDonald was dispatcher. And these, with the railroad hands and - train-crews comprised the population of Dry Notch, unless there might be - added a few ranchers somewhere in the neighborhood. - </p> - <p> - The staff bunked in a room over the station, and the men had their - quarters in the roundhouse, but one and all they ate at Dutchy’s counter. - Sinkers and coffee, apple pie and sandwiches they stood as a steady diet - for a month after he had appeared upon the scene, and then a delegation - waited upon him and demanded dishes more substantial. - </p> - <p> - “You can make meat pies and chicken stew and all that sort of thing, can’t - you?” they demanded. “Sure!” said Dutchy. “But dot iss oxpensive.” Money - was no object, they assured him, and thereupon proceeded to fix a schedule - of prices—fifteen cents for a meat pie; twenty cents for a chicken - stew—with two slices of bread and butter thrown in for good measure. - </p> - <p> - “Veil,” said Dutchy, “so iss it.” - </p> - <p> - And a few nights later, true to his promise, they got their chicken stew—canned - chicken stew. - </p> - <p> - The huge pot, full to the brim, had been emptied, and Dutchy, his face - beaming with smiles, had bustled into the back room for a further supply, - when MacDonald’s voice rose plaintively: - </p> - <p> - “It’s—it’s <i>chicken</i>, isn’t it?” - </p> - <p> - The crowd looked inquiringly at the dispatcher. - </p> - <p> - “Because,” went on MacDonald softly, “I—never heard of any chickens, - in Dry Notch.” - </p> - <p> - And then, amid the laughter that ensued, Thornley rose dramatically from - his seat, and, picking up a bone from his plate, waved it aloft. - </p> - <p> - “Gentlemen, this is no time for mirth!” he cried. “We are the victims of a - swindle. We are in the clutch of an octopus—that is to say, a food - trust, composed of Dutchy and the dining-car conductors of Numbers One and - Two. It is my painful duty to assert that I recognize this bone as the - identical bone on which I fed two nights ago coming up the line on Number - One.” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy entered, staggering under the load of the replenished pot, when - Thornley solemnly demanded a rebate on the spot. - </p> - <p> - “Vat iss it?” said Dutchy, halting and peering anxiously into the pot; - then, evidently reassured that no essential ingredient had been forgotten, - he looked up at the ring of faces that were regarding him with grave - inquiry. “Vat iss a repate?” he demanded. “It something iss mit der bread - und butter for twenty cents to go, yess?” - </p> - <p> - The crowd roared, and up and down the division train-crews, engine-crews, - and section-gangs got the joke and passed it on until the lunch-counter - became known to every man on the system as “The Rebate.” - </p> - <p> - They did not explain the joke to Dutchy, and for days he endured the chaff - stolidly, though with much bewilderment, until, one afternoon, MacDonald - patiently and ploddingly acquainted him with the unhallowed baseness of - one Thornley—helping himself, by way of compensation, to the heap of - doughnuts under the glass cover. - </p> - <p> - Dutchy listened, his cheeks getting redder and redder as MacDonald, - exaggerating some hundredfold, suavely rubbed it in. - </p> - <p> - “Dot Thornley iss—iss a pig!” shouted Dutchy suddenly, as the light - burst in upon him. - </p> - <p> - MacDonald nodded assent, his mouth too full of doughnut to speak. - </p> - <p> - “Und I a fool iss, yess?” continued the proprietor, pounding a fat fist on - the counter. - </p> - <p> - Again MacDonald nodded, smiling sweetly—and reached for another - doughnut. - </p> - <p> - But this time Dutchy’s fingers were firmly clasped around the cover, and - he peered suspiciously through the glass at the number of doughnuts - remaining, then glared at the dispatcher. - </p> - <p> - “You—you git out from here!” he said slowly, but with rising - emphasis. - </p> - <p> - And MacDonald, chuckling, went. - </p> - <p> - It was not until after supper that same evening, when Number One pulled - in, that Dutchy made any move toward retribution—then Dutchy cut - loose. It was Taggart who got it—little Shorty Taggart, the driver - of Number One, who was red-haired and an inveterate joker, and likewise a - great crony of Thornley’s. - </p> - <p> - The first intimation MacDonald had that anything was up was an enraged - howl that, rising above the tumult of the station, reached him where he - sat in the dispatcher’s office. There was no mistaking the voice—it - was Dutchy’s. MacDonald stuck his head hastily out of the window, while - Thornley, who was in the room, leaned over his shoulder. - </p> - <p> - Dutchy was bellowing like a mad bull. “Say it! Shusht say it. Oh! py - golly!” - </p> - <p> - Here followed a volcanic eruption of guttural German with one or two words - common to all languages intermingled. - </p> - <p> - Then, flying through the doorway of the lunchroom, dashing down the - platform, scattering loungers, passengers, and car-tinks in all - directions, in a mad rush for the engine end of the train, tore a short - figure in tight-fitting, bandy-legged overalls, whose flaming red hair - presented a shining mark for the plate that whizzed past his ear and - smashed into a hundred pieces against a baggage-truck. - </p> - <p> - And Dutchy, blowing hard, his sleeves rolled up over the fat of his arms, - waddled to the center of the platform and shook a frantic fist after the - retreating engineer. - </p> - <p> - “Ta fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he screamed, and, puffing his - cheeks in and out like a whezzy injector, he turned, reentered the - restaurant, and the door closed behind him with a resounding bang. - </p> - <p> - MacDonald drew in his head, and the tears were running down his cheeks as - he held his sides. - </p> - <p> - Thornley groped for a chair. - </p> - <p> - “Guess Taggart was asking for a rebate,” he gasped. “It was worth pay to - see him run.” - </p> - <p> - “You bet!” said MacDonald eloquently, when he could get his breath. - </p> - <p> - The door opened, and Brett, the super, came in. - </p> - <p> - “D’ye see Taggart and Dutchy, Brett?” cried Thornley. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Brett, laughing. Then, more seriously: “Look here, you’d - better patch it up with Dutchy. There’s no use rubbing it in too hard. - MacDonald, tell Blaney to put my car on Number Two when she comes in. I’m - going east to-night.” - </p> - <p> - The patching, however, was quite a different matter than talking about it. - </p> - <p> - The next morning the lunch-room door was ominously closed—and the - staff went breakfastless. By listening at the keyhole, and from an - occasional glimpse through the window, they knew that Dutchy was inside. - </p> - <p> - But to pleadings, threats, and door-kickings the occupant was, to all - intents and purposes, oblivious. Things began to look serious for the - staff and station hands who were wont to depend on Dutchy for their - grub-stakes. - </p> - <p> - Thornley whistled softly and pulled at his pipe, his feet on the - dispatcher’s desk. - </p> - <p> - “He’ll <i>have</i> to open up when Number Ninety-Seven pulls in,” Thornley - was saying, more by way of reassuring himself than of presenting any new - view of the case to MacDonald. “The company won’t stand for any - inconvenience to the passengers—that is” he hastened to amend, “not - of this kind. What? They’ve got a sort of lien on that joint, and if he - waits for them to get after him he’ll get into trouble. Wish Brett were - back—he’d make him open up quick, I guess. What’s the matter with - Number Ninety-Seven, anyhow? Thought you said she was on time?” - </p> - <p> - “So she is,” said MacDonald, grinning. “Hear her?” - </p> - <p> - From the eastward came the hoarse shriek from the whistle of a - five-hundred class. - </p> - <p> - “Guess I’ll go down,” said Thornley. “Coming?” - </p> - <p> - MacDonald nodded and got up from his chair. The two men reached the - platform in time to acknowledge a flirt of the hand from Sanders in the - cab as the big machine, wheel-tires sparking from the tight-set brakes, - rolled slowly past them, coming to a halt farther on. - </p> - <p> - Simultaneously the door of the lunch-room swung wide open, and on the - threshold, completely filling the opening with his bulk, stood Dutchy. In - his left hand he held his bell, which he began to ring clamorously; in his - right hand, almost but not quite concealed behind his apron, was no less a - weapon than a substantial-looking rolling-pin. A crowd of passengers began - to surge toward the restaurant, and among them mingled the hungry railroad - men of Dry Notch. - </p> - <p> - “Come on!” shouted Thornley exultantly. “I knew he’d have to open up. - Here’s where we feed—h’m?” - </p> - <p> - “Vait!” cried Dutchy imperiously, as the head of the column reached him. - “You, yess; you, no. Vat iss it?” He was sorting the sheep from the goats, - allowing the passengers to enter, pushing the railroaders ruthlessly to - one side. - </p> - <p> - “You, yess; you, no. You, yess; you—oh! py golly!” - </p> - <p> - He had caught sight of Thornley, and, swinging suddenly, struck out - viciously in that direction with the rolling-pin. Being obliged, however, - to maintain his position in the doorway, the strategic key to the - situation, the jab fell short by two or three inches, barely missing - Thornley’s nose. - </p> - <p> - Thornley fell back instinctively. - </p> - <p> - “Look here, you old ass!” he yelled angrily, “we’ve had about enough of - this. It’s past a joke. The company’s got a lien on that joint of yours, - and we’ll close it up so tight you’ll never open it again—d’ye - hear?” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy stopped short in the monotonous, “You, yess; you, no,” on which he - had recommenced, and his paunch began to shake. - </p> - <p> - “Yah!” he cried. “Dot iss a joke. Oh, py golly, <i>lean!</i> Dot iss ven - you ge-starving get, yah? Ho, ho! Ha, ha!” - </p> - <p> - In Dutch’s burst of merriment first one and then another joined, until - even Thornley, his good nature getting the better of him, roared with the - rest at his own expense. - </p> - <p> - But if this apparent return to good humor on Dutchy’s part inspired any - hope in the minds of the railroad men that he had relented and that former - friendly relations were to be resumed, they were doomed to disappointment, - for Dutchy stolidly continued to allow the passengers to go in and as - stolidly barred the entrance to the others. - </p> - <p> - Then they gave it up, and bought out the slender stock of canned goods and - biscuits from the shelves of the general store. - </p> - <p> - They messed in the baggage-room and they swallowed their scanty portions - to the tune of “Die Wacht am Rhein,” bellowed out by a strong and sonorous - voice, through the partition, on the other side of which, laid out in - tempting confusion, as they were painfully aware, was plenty. - </p> - <p> - What they had, however, did little more than whet their appetites, and by - three o’clock some of the men were talking of carrying the position by - storm, helping themselves, and doing a few fancy stunts with Dutchy. - </p> - <p> - “We can’t have any row,” said Thornley, pulling at his mustache and - staring at MacDonald. “What had we better do? The boys’ll be pulling the - old shack down around his ears. He’ll fight like blazes, and some one’ll - get hurt. And then the company’ll want to know what’s what. Say, the old - geeser has got us where he wants us, sure—eh, what?” - </p> - <p> - MacDonald nodded. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll tell you what it is,” Thornley went on impressively, “there’s some - one besides Dutchy in this. They’ve been giving him a steer, and <i>I</i>’d - give a few to know who it is. It’s mighty queer Dutchy would wake up so - suddenly to the fact that he was a joke. Then, there isn’t enough to that - rebate josh to make him so sore. Some one’s been stringing him good and - plenty. What had we better do?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know,” MacDonald answered. “Let’s go and see if we can’t talk him - over.” - </p> - <p> - At the sight of Thornley and the dispatcher heading for the lunch-room, - the trainmen and station-hands fell in behind them. - </p> - <p> - MacDonald halted a few paces from the door. - </p> - <p> - “You boys, stay here,” he directed. “Let me see what I can do.” - </p> - <p> - Thornley and the men halted obediently, while MacDonald went on and - knocked at the door. There was no response. - </p> - <p> - “Dut—Mr. Damrosch!” he called. “It’s MacDonald. I want to talk to - you.” - </p> - <p> - This time his knock was answered, and so suddenly as to cause him to jump - back in surprise. - </p> - <p> - “Veil, vat iss it?” demanded Dutchy, scowling belligerently. - </p> - <p> - “We’re—we’re—” stammered MacDonald, his confidence a little - shaken at the proprietor’s attitude. Then, desperately: “Oh, I say, - confound it all, Dutchy, we’re hungry.” - </p> - <p> - “So!” Dutchy’s exclamation was a world of innocent astonishment and kindly - interest. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” went on MacDonald, diplomatically. “You bet we are. It’s been a - good joke, but you’ve had the best end of it. Let’s call it quits, there’s - a good fellow, and—and give us all a handout.” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy listened attentively to the appeal. - </p> - <p> - “I, a fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he queried softly. - </p> - <p> - “You most decidedly are not,” MacDonald assured him. - </p> - <p> - “You vill for repates no longer ask, yet?” persisted Mr. Damrosch. - </p> - <p> - “Not on your life!” replied the dispatcher earnestly, beginning to see - daylight. “That’s all off. We’ll apologize, too, if you like. I promise - you, we are quite willing to apologize.” - </p> - <p> - “Veil, den,” announced Mr. Damrosch, “ve vill aggravate”—and he - slammed the door in MacDonald’s face. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, hold on, Dutchy!” cried MacDonald piteously, for he was very hungry. - “What did you say?” - </p> - <p> - “Vat I said iss dot ve vill aggravate!” shouted Dutchy from the other side - of the door. “Dot iss English, don’d it? Aggravate!” - </p> - <p> - “He means arbitrate,” prompted Thornley from the platform. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, all right!” said MacDonald. “We’ll agree to that, Dutchy. Come on——open - up!” - </p> - <p> - “I vill not mit you aggra—arra—<i>do it</i>—hang dot - vord!” Dutchy asserted decisively, but again opening the door. “But mit - Mister Brett I vill do it.” - </p> - <p> - “But Mr. Brett isn’t here, you know that,” retorted MacDonald, beginning - to get exasperated. “And, what’s more, he won’t be back until the day - after tomorrow. I guess you know that, too, don’t you?” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy smiled a patient, chiding smile. “Dot iss too bad,” he remarked - regretfully. “But dot Thornley a pig iss, und you—oh, py golly! you—I - could not you pelief. Ve vill vait for Mister Brett.” - </p> - <p> - He was closing the door again, when MacDonald put his foot against the - jamb and, leaning toward Dutchy, said quickly, in an undertone: - </p> - <p> - “Look here, Dutchy, you’re going too far. If I couldn’t see any farther - than you, I’d wear glasses. Now’s the time to make your deal. I’ll help - you—see? You can get anything out of the boys now, but you push them - too far and they’ll pull the whole outfit down over your ears. You say - what you want, and I’ll get it for you.” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy looked meditatively into MacDonald’s face, and shook his head with - a sad smile of wisdom. - </p> - <p> - “I could not you pelief,” he repeated. - </p> - <p> - “You don’t have to. You don’t have to believe anybody. Whatever you want - us to do we’ll do before you let us in to eat. You can’t lose. What do you - say?” - </p> - <p> - Mr. Damrosch scratched his head pensively, without taking his eyes off the - dispatcher. After a minute he tapped MacDonald on the shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “Veil,” he announced, “I vill tell you. Listen.” - </p> - <p> - MacDonald listened—incredulously. Then he whistled a low, - long-drawn-out note of consternation. - </p> - <p> - “Well, you’ve got a nerve!” he gasped. “What do you think, eh? The boys’ll - never—” He stopped suddenly, a smile came over his face, and he - chuckled softly to himself. “Dutchy, you’re great! It’ll be meat for the - boys to make Thornley stand for it. That’s what you want to do—make - Thornley stand for it. Will the boys make him? Oh, will they! Give them - the chance. That’s the way to handle it. I told you I’d help you. Now, - make your <i>spiel</i>” MacDonald turned to the group on the platform. - “Dutchy’ll arbitrate!” he cried. - </p> - <p> - At this the men began to push forward, but Dutchy stopped them. “Vait as - you iss! Ven der—der—hang dot word—iss, den iss it. - Vait!” - </p> - <p> - They waited, and Dutchy began to count on his fingers. “Dere iss sixteen - dot breakfasted didn’d,” he began. “Dot—iss—iss—” - </p> - <p> - “Average ‘em up at a quarter apiece,” prompted MacDonald in a whisper. - “That makes four dollars.” - </p> - <p> - “Iss four dollars—yess,” went on Dutchy. “Veil, I vant dot. Dere iss - der crews dot in-came und out-vent und didn’d eat ven der door vas closed. - Dot iss two dollars—yess? Veil, I vant dot.” - </p> - <p> - The men came to, and a roar of derision rent the air, in the face of which - even Dutchy was a little shaken. - </p> - <p> - “Stand pat,” encouraged MacDonald. “You’ve got them coming and going.” - </p> - <p> - Dutchy held up his hand for silence. “Dere iss der sixteen over again yet - dot dinnered didn’d. Dot iss four dollars—yess? Veil, I vant dot. - Dot iss four und two and four. Dot iss ten dollars—don’d it? Veil, I - vant dot, und den you come in—yess, one py one—for a quarter - py each.” - </p> - <p> - Then, amid the storm of abuse and jeers that greeted Dutchy’s ultimatum, - MacDonald, with a final injunction to the proprietor to stand by his guns, - turned and joined Thornley and the men. - </p> - <p> - “Veil, py golly!” screamed Dutchy above the din. “Vat iss it? Who was der - commencer of dot joke dot iss ten dollars to pay? It iss dot Thornley!” - </p> - <p> - “Why, you wretched old thief,” yelled Thornley, “Do you think we’re going - to pay you for grub we didn’t get, because you wouldn’t let us have it, - and then pay you for it again when you do dole it out? We’ll see you - further, first.” - </p> - <p> - “It vas agreed in front of der—hang dot word!—py der—” - </p> - <p> - “Agreed nothing!” snorted Thornley. - </p> - <p> - “Dot you vill for repates no longer ask, yet, don’d it? Veil, der price - ten dollars iss. Dere iss no repate. Oh, py golly, Mister Thornley, dot - vas an oxpensive joke—yess? Dot vas your joke, und I shusht thought - me dot I hope you will pay dot yourself.” - </p> - <p> - Thornley paid. With no good grace, but because, as MacDonald had said they - would, the men made him. Disgruntled and angry, he led the file into the - restaurant, placing ten dollars and twenty-five cents in Dutchy’s hand - before he crossed the threshold. - </p> - <p> - Behind him followed MacDonald and the grinning line of men, each - contributing their quarters—in advance—for the first square - meal they had had that day. - </p> - <p> - “Eat vat you like,” said Dutchy magnanimously. - </p> - <p> - Thornley glared. “Eat vat you like! Eat vat you like!” he mimicked - savagely. “I like your colossal generosity at my expense!” - </p> - <p> - For a long time there was no other noise save the rattle of dishes and the - busy clatter of knives, forks, and spoons. Then Thornley beckoned to - Dutchy. - </p> - <p> - “Veil, vat iss it?” inquired the proprietor from behind the counter. - </p> - <p> - “Who put you on to this?” demanded Thornley. “I’ve had to stand for it, - and I’d like to know. I would that!” - </p> - <p> - MacDonald, sitting beside Thornley, noticed, with some misgivings, a - peculiar expression sweep over Dutchy’s face, but to his relief the - proprietor’s only reply was a grunt, as he answered a call for more - coffee. - </p> - <p> - “By the hokey, I’ll bet it was that red-haired Taggart!” exclaimed - Thornley suddenly, turning to the dispatcher. - </p> - <p> - MacDonald buried his face in his cup, ostensibly to drain the last drop, - then he set it down quickly and jerked his watch from his pocket. - </p> - <p> - “Holy Moses!” he ejaculated, and fled from the room. - </p> - <p> - An hour later, as Thornley was again sitting with his feet on MacDonald’s - desk, Dutchy stuck his head into the room and beckoned to the dispatcher. - MacDonald walked across the floor and joined him. Dutchy pulled him out of - the room and closed the door. - </p> - <p> - “Dere iss one thing dot I forgotted did,” announced Mr. Damrosch. - </p> - <p> - “What’s that?” inquired MacDonald. - </p> - <p> - “Dere iss five doughnuts dot iss paid for not.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh!” said MacDonald. - </p> - <p> - “Dot vas der time you told dot it vas Thornley—yess? Dot vas von - dollar py each. Veil, I vant dot—yess?” - </p> - <p> - “Really!” laughed MacDonald. “Well, I guess <i>not!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “Dot—vas—der—time”—Dutchy was raising his voice, - each word growing louder and more distinct than the preceding one. - Thornley’s chair inside creaked ominously. MacDonald glanced furtively - toward the door, and his face grew red—“you—told—dot——” - </p> - <p> - With a hasty movement, MacDonald clapped one hand over Dutchy’s mouth, and - with the other thrust a five-dollar bill into his fingers. - </p> - <p> - “Get out!” he choked, and shoved Dutchy violently toward the stairs. - </p> - <p> - At the bottom, Dutchy halted, turned and looked up with a grin. - </p> - <p> - “Py golly,” said he, “I shusht thought me dot I like jokes pretty good, - and I hope dot——” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, shut up!” said MacDonald. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - XIV—SPECKLES - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>his happened at a - period in the history of the Hill Division when trade was very bad, and - the directors, scowling over the company’s annual report, threw up their - hands in holy horror; while from the sacred precincts of the board-room - there emanated the agonized cry: - </p> - <p> - “Economy!” - </p> - <p> - The general manager took up the slogan and dinned it into the ears of the - division superintendents. - </p> - <p> - “Operating expenses are too high,” he wrote. “They must be cut down.” And - the superintendents of divisions, painfully alive to the fact that the G. - M. was not dictating for the mere pleasure of it, intimated in - unmistakable language to the heads of departments under them that the next - quarterly reports were expected to show a marked improvement. - </p> - <p> - John Healy had charge of the roundhouse at Big Cloud, in those days, and - the morning after the lightning struck the system he came fuming back - across the yards from his interview with the superintendent, stuttering - angrily to himself. As he stamped into the running-shed his humor a shade - worse than usual the first object that caught his eye was Speckles, - squatted on the lee side of 483, dangling his legs in the pit. - </p> - <p> - That is, it would have been the lee side if Healy had come in the other - door. - </p> - <p> - “Cut down operatin’ expinses, is ut?” Healy muttered. “Begorra, I’ll begin - right now!” - </p> - <p> - And he fired Speckles on the spot. - </p> - <p> - Now, Speckles—whose name, by the way, was Dolivar Washington Babson—had - been fired on several occasions before, and if he swallowed a little more - tobacco-juice than was good for his physical comfort it was rather as a - gulp of startled surprise at Healy’s appearance than because of any - poignant regret at the misfortune that had overtaken him. Nevertheless, he - felt it incumbent on himself to expostulate. - </p> - <p> - “Git out an’ stay out!” said Healy, refusing to argue. - </p> - <p> - And Speckles got out. - </p> - <p> - For a day he kept away from the roundhouse, the length of time past - experience had taught him was required to cool the turner’s anger; then he - sauntered down again and came face to face with Healy on the turntable. - </p> - <p> - “I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” he began, - broaching the subject timidly. - </p> - <p> - “Phwat?” demanded Healy. - </p> - <p> - “I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” Speckles repeated - monotonously. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I heard you—I heard you,” said Healy, a little inconsistently. - “On ag’in, is ut? Ut’ll be a long toime, me son, mark that!” - </p> - <p> - This being quite different from Healy’s accustomed, “Well, git back to yer - job,” it began to filter vaguely through Speckles’ brain that his name was - no longer to adorn the company’s pay-sheets. - </p> - <p> - “Am I fired for good, Mr. Healy?” he faltered. - </p> - <p> - “You are!” said Healy. “Just that!” Then, relenting a little as Speckles’ - face fell: “If’twere not fer the big-bugs down yonder “—he jerked - his thumb in the general direction of the East—“I might—moind, - I don’t say I would, but I might—put you on ag’in. As ut is, we’ve - instructions to cut down the operatin’ expinses, an’ there’s an ind on - ut!” - </p> - <p> - Speckles stood for a moment in dismay as Healy went back into the - roundhouse; then he turned disconsolately away, crossed the tracks to the - platform of the station, and, seeking out a secluded corner of the - freight-house, sat down upon a packing-case to think it out. - </p> - <p> - To Speckles it was no mere matter of cutting down expenses. It was a - blasted career! - </p> - <p> - Whatever Speckles’ faults, and he was only a lad, he had one redeeming - quality, before which, in the eyes of the business he had elected to - follow, his strayings from the straight and narrow path dwindled into - insignificance—railroading was born in him. - </p> - <p> - At ten he had started in as caller for the night-crews, and, during the - five years the company had had the benefit of his valuable services in - that capacity, there was not a man on the division but sooner or later - came to know long-armed, bony, freckled-faced, red-haired Speckles—came - to know the little rascal, and like him, too. - </p> - <p> - Then Speckles had been promoted to the post of sweeper in the roundhouse, - and occasionally, under Healy’s critical inspection, to washing out - boiler-tubes. Fresh fuel thereby added to the fire of his ambition, he - began to figure how long it would be before he got to wiping, then to - firing, and after that—even Speckles’ boundless optimism did not - have the temerity to specify any particular date—the time when he - would attain his goal and get his engine. - </p> - <p> - Now, instead, at the age of sixteen, he found himself seated on a - cracker-box, his dreams for the future rudely shattered—thanks to - Healy, old Sour Face Healy! - </p> - <p> - So Speckles sighed, and as he sighed the shop whistle blew. It was noon, - and the men began to pour out of the big gates. Then Speckles, remembering - that the schools were also “letting out,” hurried down the platform and up - the main street. He would confide in Madge. Madge would understand. - </p> - <p> - Madge Bolton was the daughter of the ticket agent at the station, and - between Mr. Bolton and Speckles there existed a standing feud, the <i>casus - belli</i> being fifteen-year-old, blue-eyed Madge. Speckles kicked his - heels on the corner until she appeared; then he turned and fell into step - beside her, reaching a little awkwardly for her strap of books. - </p> - <p> - “Hallo, Dol!” was Madge’s greeting. She was the only person in Big Cloud - who did not call him Speckles. - </p> - <p> - “Hallo, Madge!” he returned. - </p> - <p> - Madge glanced at his face and hands. “Haven’t you been to work?” she - asked. - </p> - <p> - “Nope.” - </p> - <p> - “Why, Dol?” - </p> - <p> - “Fired,” said Speckles laconically. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, Dol, again!” she cried reproachfully. “What for?” - </p> - <p> - “‘Tain’t only the third time, and ‘twasn’t for nothin’,” said Speckles, a - bit sullenly. “I was only restin’.” - </p> - <p> - “Dolivar Babson,” she accused, “you were loafing. Oh, Dol, you’ll never - get to firing, and—and—” She hesitated and stopped, her cheeks - a little red with the hint of boy-and-girl castle-building that would have - increased her father’s ire against the luckless Speckles had he seen it. - </p> - <p> - Speckles, somewhat shamefaced, and having no excuse to offer, trudged on - in silence. - </p> - <p> - “Did you ask Mr. Healy to take you back?” she inquired, after a moment. - </p> - <p> - “He won’t,” said Speckles. - </p> - <p> - “What are you going to do, Dol?” - </p> - <p> - “I dunno.” - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said Madge, hopefully, “perhaps you could get a job in one of the - stores. I’ll ask Mr. Timmons, the grocer, if you like. I know him pretty - well.” - </p> - <p> - Speckles came to an abrupt and sudden halt, cast in Madge’s face one look - that carried with it a world of unutterable reproach, handed over her - books in silence—and fled. - </p> - <p> - He, a railroad man, go into a <i>store!</i> And this from Madge! Madge, - who, of all others—it was too much! Speckles ate his dinner, - dispirited and crushed. Everything and everybody was against him. - </p> - <p> - His mother’s curt inquiry as to when he was going back to work did not in - any way tend to mitigate his troubles—rather, on the contrary, to - accentuate them. - </p> - <p> - “Old Sour Face won’t put me back,” he jerked out, in response to his - mother’s repeated question. - </p> - <p> - “No wonder he won’t,” said his mother sharply, “if you’re as disrespectful - as that. I’m ashamed of you, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself.” - </p> - <p> - Speckles was too much depressed to offer any defense. He finished his meal - in silence, gulped down his cup of tea in two swallows, took his hat, and - started out. - </p> - <p> - Unconsciously he directed his steps toward the yards, and, some five - minutes later, arrived at the station. Here, about half-way down the - platform, he spotted Mat Bolton in the open doorway of the ticket office. - </p> - <p> - As he approached, the nonchalant air with which the other leaned with - folded arms against the jamb of the door aroused Speckles’ suspicions. To - reach the seat of his meditations—the cracker-box in the freight - shed which had now become his objective point—he would be obliged to - pass Mr. Bolton. He therefore began to incline his course toward the edge - of the platform nearest the rails, so that, when he came opposite the - office door, some fifteen feet were between him and his arch enemy. - </p> - <p> - Mr. Bolton awoke from his lethargy with surprising suddenness. - </p> - <p> - “You young rascal,” he shouted, “what you been doing to my girl? I’ll - teach you to make girls cry, you little speckled-face runt, you!” - </p> - <p> - He made a dash for Speckles, but by the time he had recovered his balance - and saved himself from toppling over the edge of the platform to the - tracks, Speckles had reached the safe retreat of the freight-shed door. - And as the irate parent, after shaking his fist impotently, walked back - and disappeared within his domain, Speckles indulged in a series of - pantomimes in which his fingers and his nose played an intimate and - comprehensive part. - </p> - <p> - Perched once more on the cracker-box, Speckles again resolved himself into - a committee on ways and means. His little skirmish with Madge’s father had - exhilarated him to such an extent that his heavy and oppressing sense of - despondency had vanished, and in its place came a renewed determination to - resume, somehow or other, the railroad career that Healy had so - emphatically interrupted. - </p> - <p> - He turned over in his mind the feasibility of applying to Regan, the - master mechanic, for a job in the shops, but dismissed the idea almost - immediately on the ground that shop men were not, strictly speaking, - railroaders. - </p> - <p> - He might start in switching and braking, and work up to conductor. That, - at least, was railroading—not to be compared with engine-driving, - not by long odds, but still it was railroading. His face brightened. He - would interview Farley, the trainmaster. - </p> - <p> - Farley was in his office. Speckles had not very far to go, only a few - steps down the platform. All the offices—and Big Cloud was division - headquarters—were under the same roof. - </p> - <p> - At Speckles’ request, Farley swung around in his swivel-chair with a - quizzical expression on his face. Then he grinned. - </p> - <p> - “Want to go on with the train-crews, eh? What do you think, kid, that I’m - running a kindergarten outfit, even if some of ‘em do act like it? How old - are you?” - </p> - <p> - “Sixteen,” said Speckles, with a sinking heart. - </p> - <p> - “Sixteen, eh? Well, come back in a couple of years, and——” - </p> - <p> - But, for the second time that day, Speckles fled. He was in no mood to - stand much chaffing, and Farley, as he well knew, had a leaning that way. - Speckles halted outside the door, undecided what move to make next, when - the clicking of the instruments in the dispatcher’s room overhead came to - his ears like an inspiration. - </p> - <p> - Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Spence, who had been on the night - trick most of the years that Speckles was caller, was now chief - dispatcher. If he had any friend anywhere, it was Spence, the man at whose - elbow he had sat through those long, dark hours of the night that beget - confidences, and into whose ears he had so often poured the tales of his - cherished aims and ambitions. - </p> - <p> - Speckles covered the stairs three steps at a time, in his new-found - exuberance. Spence looked up from his key and listened as Speckles told - his story. - </p> - <p> - “So you’re Healy’s contribution to economy, eh?” he said when Speckles had - finished. “And he won’t take you back?” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Speckles. - </p> - <p> - “Well, that’s pretty rough. But I don’t see how I can help you any, - Speckles. I haven’t any rights over Healy, you know.” - </p> - <p> - Speckles hesitated a moment and fidgeted nervously from one foot to the - other. “I know you ain’t,” he began, “but I thought maybe you’d put me on - here.” - </p> - <p> - “W-what!” ejaculated Spence. Then, smothering a laugh at the sight of - Speckles’ woebegone countenance, he demanded gravely “You mean - dispatching?” - </p> - <p> - Speckles nodded. - </p> - <p> - “No, no, Speckles, that would never do. You go back and see Healy. I’ll do - what I can for you with him.” - </p> - <p> - “‘Twon’t do no good,” said Speckles hopelessly. “I’ve asked him twice - already.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, ask him again. Look here, Speckles, it’s up to you to square - yourself with Healy, somehow or other. If you want your job very badly, - you ought to be sharp enough to find a way of getting it. Go on, now.” - </p> - <p> - So Speckles descended the stairs to the platform and irresolutely began to - cross the tracks in the direction of the running-shed. He reached the - roundhouse and skirmished cautiously along its front. No Healy was in - sight, so he dived in between two engines and made his way to the rear of - the shed. Here, by peering around the end of a tender, he could see - Healy’s cubby-hole—Healy called it an office—a bit of space - about four by six partitioned off from the back wall in the corner, with a - greasy book the engine-crews signed, and two or three others, equally - greasy, in which Healy kept tabs on things in general. - </p> - <p> - In spite of his trepidation, Speckles grinned. Healy was there, bending - over a very flimsy, spindle-legged table that he had wheedled out of the - claim-agent some months before. His brows were puckered into a ferocious - scowl, and he growled and muttered to himself, now laboring furiously with - a stubby pencil on the sheets of paper in front of him, now pausing to - bite that unoffending article almost in two in his desperation. - </p> - <p> - Healy was working on his invention. All the division knew about Healy’s - ideas on Westinghouse and “air,” and that these ideas, when perfected, - were to be patented. As to what the consensus of opinion of their value - was is neither here nor there, except that in Healy’s presence, when - referred to at all, the subject was treated with dignity and respect, for - Healy’s physical powers were beyond the ordinary, and dearest to Healy’s - heart and most sacred in his eyes was this creation of his brain, or, to - be more accurate, fancy. - </p> - <p> - Speckles sidled up to the cubby-hole, and, without any peroration, took - the plunge. - </p> - <p> - “I came to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,”—he spoke rapidly, - as though he feared his courage might ooze out before he could finish. - </p> - <p> - Healy wheeled round with a grunt. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, ut’s you, is ut?” he demanded grimly. - </p> - <p> - Speckles, ready to run at the first sign of violence, acknowledged the - impeachment by nodding his head affirmatively, and smiled sheepishly while - Healy scrutinized him with a long stare from head to foot. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said Healy, “you wait a minute an’ I’ll give you me answer.” - </p> - <p> - Speckles’ heart bounded in joyous hope. Healy very deliberately gathered - up his papers, folded them carefully, and opening the cupboard where his - coat hung—it was a hot day, and Healy was in his shirtsleeves—tucked - them into the inside pocket. Then, like a flash, he turned and reached for - the first thing in sight. It was a broom. - </p> - <p> - But, quick as he was, Speckles was quicker, and he led Healy by the length - of the pit as he dodged around the tail end of a tender and darted out of - the running-shed across the tracks to the freight-house. - </p> - <p> - Healy followed no farther than the turntable. There he halted, and - Speckles, from his retreat, saw him shake his fist and listened to the - threat that thundered across the yards: - </p> - <p> - “Show yer face around here ag’in, you young rascal, an’ I’ll bate the - loife out av you, so I will!” - </p> - <p> - Speckles betook himself to the cracker-box, and from his lips there flowed - a fluent and unrestrained expression of his opinion on things in general, - but more particularly of Healy, and more particularly still of Healy’s - invention. Then, his indignation subsiding, it was followed by a fit of - the blues; so that when, at the expiration of half an hour, Healy, still - in his shirt-sleeves, came out of the roundhouse and walked up the tracks - in the direction of the shops, Speckles, through the freight-house door, - remarked the incident in complete apathy and as one in which he had no - interest whatever. - </p> - <p> - Ten minutes later, however, his apathy vanished and he sprang to his feet - at the sound of the excited shouts of the men in the running-shed. Some - were hastily swinging the big engine doors wide open, others were setting - the table in position, while one started on a run in the direction Healy - had taken. - </p> - <p> - Another minute and the shop whistle had boomed out its warning, and as - Healy, with the man who had gone after him, came tearing down the track - like mad, Speckles saw the smoke beginning to curl up over the roof at the - back. The running-shed was afire. - </p> - <p> - With a whoop, Speckles traversed the platform, leaped to the rails, and - was hard on Healy’s heels by the time the turntable was crossed. Healy - paused but an instant. The thing to do was to get the engines out, and - Healy was the man to do it. - </p> - <p> - “Get tackle rigged on 463,” he ordered. “She’s cold, an’ we’ll have to - haul her out. Set the table fer 518; I’ll take her.” - </p> - <p> - Then he started on the jump for the cubby-hole and his precious papers. - </p> - <p> - Now, the tackle that Healy had referred to was stored in the rear of the - roundhouse in the same general direction as the cubby-hole, and as the - order had been given to no one in particular, Speckles, shouting “I’ll get - it,” started after Healy. - </p> - <p> - Some grease and waste had caught and was rolling up a nasty smoke. Through - it, even while he tugged manfully at the heavy tackle, Speckles saw Healy - run into his office, snatch his coat, rush out again, and dash for the cab - of 518, throwing the coat up on the tender. As he did so, something fell - from the pocket. - </p> - <p> - Speckles dropped the tackle and pounced upon it. It was the bundle of - papers he had seen Healy put in his coat-pocket a little while before. - </p> - <p> - It was Healy’s invention! - </p> - <p> - Speckles’ first impulse was to shout to Healy, but just then 518 glided - out of the shed, and the men in front of 463 were yelling in chorus for - the tackle, so Speckles put his tongue in his cheek and the papers in his - pocket. - </p> - <p> - It wasn’t much of a blaze, but it looked bad while it lasted. Even after - the shop-hands had got their hose-lengths connected and a stream playing - on the fire, and the engines were all in safety in the yard, the smoke - continued to roll out in clouds, with here and there a vicious tongue of - flame. - </p> - <p> - Then Healy, his duty done, bethought him of his coat on the tender of 518. - And Speckles, as he heard Healy’s gasp of dismay on discovering that his - papers were gone, had an inspiration. - </p> - <p> - “Me papers! Me papers!” wailed Healy. “Fer the love av Mike, I must av - dropped thim on the flure!” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll get them for you, Mr. Healy,” said Speckles, quick as a shot. - </p> - <p> - “You’ll not!” said Healy. “I’ll have no wan risk his life fer thim, bad as - I want thim. Hey, come back, you runt!” - </p> - <p> - But Speckles was gone. Headed straight for the big, yawning doors that - vomited their smoke and flames? Oh, no, not Speckles! Hardly! Speckles - would make his attempt from the rear! And around the end of the shed and - in behind he raced. - </p> - <p> - Some of the men were fighting the fire from that side, but they were too - busy to pay any attention to Speckles. A dab of soot and dirt on his face - which he obtained by rubbing his fingers along the blackened wall, an - artistic smudge of generous proportions on the outside of the papers, - which he took from his pocket, and Speckles’ make-up was complete and - convincing. - </p> - <p> - Now, Speckles had an eye for the dramatic and an appreciation of its - value. He peered in through one of the windows. It was not nearly as bad - inside as it had been, and he decided there would be no risk and very - little discomfort in carrying out the plan that had popped into his head. - </p> - <p> - So he climbed in through a window and dropped down to the floor on the - other side. The next minute he had dashed through the running-shed, and - emerged from a whirl of black smoke into the open in front of the - turntable, the papers waved aloft in his fist. - </p> - <p> - It was effective—decidedly effective! A cheer went up, and the men - crowded around, while Healy rushed forward and began to pump Speckles’ arm - up and down like an engine-piston. - </p> - <p> - “Ut’s a hero you are, me bright jool av a lad!” he cried in his delight. - “‘Tis mesilf, John Healy, that ses ut, an’ the bhoys are me witness. Come - back to yer job in the mornin’ an’, by my sowl, Speckles, I’ll niver fire - you ag’in, niver! An’ ut’s more I’ll do—I’ll promote you. Ut’s a - wiper you are from now on, me son, an’ to blazes wid cuttin’ down - operatin’ expinses! Where did you foind the papers?” - </p> - <p> - “On the floor,” said Speckles—and he told the truth. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - XV—MUNFORD - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>unford came to the - work before the gangs were deep enough into the hills to lose daily, or - rather nightly, touch with Big Cloud. And the way of his coming was this: - The town, springing up in a night, had its beginning in the wooden shanty - the engineers built as headquarters for the Hill Division that was to be. - Then, with mushroom growth, came shacks innumerable; and these shacks, for - the most part, were gambling hells and dives and saloons, and the - population was Indian, Chinese and bad American. To these places of lurid - entertainment flocked the toilers at night, loading down the construction - empties as they backed their way to the spurs and sidings that soon spread - out like a cobweb around headquarters. - </p> - <p> - Naturally, rows were of pretty frequent occurrence between the company’s - men and the leeches who bleed them with crooked games and stacked decks - over the roulette, faro and stud-poker tables. But of them all in the - delectable pursuit of separating the men and their pay-checks, Pete - McGonigle’s “Golden Luck” saloon was in the van, both as to size and - crookedness. And that high station of eminence it maintained until the - night a stranger wrecked it by no more delicate a method than that of - kicking over the roulette table, sending it and the attendant, who was - presiding over the little whirling ball in Pete’s interest, crashing to - the floor. That stranger was Munford. And that was how Munford came to - join the army of the Rockies. - </p> - <p> - A number of the company men were present and they sided in with Munford. - Before this amalgamation, Pete and his hangers-on went down to ignominious - defeat, and the “Golden Luck,” to utter demolishment and ruin. News of the - fracas spread rapidly to the other “joints.” The dive-keepers joined - forces, the company men did likewise, and that night became the wildest in - the history of Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - Munford took command of his new-found friends from the start. In the - street fight that followed he did wondrous things—and did them with - zest, delight and effectiveness. With his great bulk he towered above his - companions, and the sweep of his long arms as they rose and fell, the play - of his massive shoulders as he lunged forward to give impetus to his - blows, was a marvelous sight to see. But the details of that fight have no - place here. Its result, however, was that Munford, previously unknown and - unheard of, became thereafter, a marked man in Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - When the fight was over the company men, elated with victory though - somewhat the worse for wear, retired to the yard to wait for the - construction trains to take them up to their work. And while they waited - they spent the time gazing in admiration at Munford who sat on the edge of - a flat-car, his legs dangling over, blowing softly on his knuckles, a - smile of divine contentment on his face. - </p> - <p> - What was Munford going to do? demanded McGuire and the cronies of his - particular gang who had had the honor of being present at Pete’s when the - evening’s proceedings were instituted, and who therefore felt they had a - prior claim to the hero’s consideration over and above that of the men - from other sections of the work who had taken part in the fight. Munford - did not know. Would he go up the line with them and take a job with their - gang if they promised to get him one? Munford would. So he kept his seat - when the construction train pulled out just as the dawn was breaking, and - twenty miles up the road at Twin Bear Creek they tumbled him off and - introduced him to Alan Burton, foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3. - </p> - <p> - At the sight of his battered and jaded crew, who in no wise appeared fit - for the day’s work before them, Burton swore savagely and with great - bitterness of tongue bade them get to their work. Then he turned in his - ill-humor to Munford, who was still standing beside him. - </p> - <p> - “Who the devil are you? What you doin’ here? Where d’ye come from?” - </p> - <p> - The questions came quick and sharp like a volley of small arms. - </p> - <p> - Munford eyed the wiry little chunk of a man, scarcely up to his own - shoulders, in silence, taking him in from head to foot. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” snapped Burton, “speak up!” - </p> - <p> - “Munford’s my name,” said Munford, coolly. “I’m here for a job. Where I - come from ain’t none of your blamed business, is it?” - </p> - <p> - “Ain’t it?” said Burton. “Well, then, you can walk back there, my bucko!” - and he turned on his heel and followed the men to their work. - </p> - <p> - Munford sat down on the doorsill of the camp shanty and with a laugh - pulled out his pipe and began to smoke. He was still sitting there a - half-hour later when the foreman came back. - </p> - <p> - “If you’ve got far to go,” grinned Burton, “you’d better get started.” - </p> - <p> - “No hurry,” replied Munford, imperturbably. - </p> - <p> - “You’re a queer card,” said Burton, after a moment. “What’s this about the - trouble down at Big Cloud last night the boys are so full of they can’t do - anything besides talk?” - </p> - <p> - Munford chuckled quietly. “Nothin’ much,” said he. - </p> - <p> - “Nothing much, eh? They say you put the ‘Golden Luck’ and Pete McGonigle - to the bad, and then cleaned out every dive in town. You’re quite a - reformer, ain’t you? I’ll tell you this, though, it won’t be healthy for - you around these parts from now on.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t know,” said Munford. “Say, how about that job?” - </p> - <p> - Burton laughed. “You’ve got a sweet nerve to ask for a job, and you - responsible for a gang that won’t be able to do a day’s work among the lot - of them between now and night. Did up McGonigle’s, eh? Well, I don’t know, - I reckon in the long run that’ll be worth more to the company than the - day’s work. All right, sport, you can go to work—until Pete and his - crowd scare you out, which I predict won’t be long. And while you’re here, - if you get itchy for trouble don’t look for it among the men, come to <i>me.</i>” - </p> - <p> - “Well, I’ll—” gasped Munford. “Why, I could twist you like—” - Then he laughed in pure delight at Burton’s spunk “Oh, sure! <i>Sure</i>, - I will.” - </p> - <p> - It took Munford no longer than a day to get the hang of the work. He was - already more than a demigod in the eyes of Bridge Gang No. 3, and that - counted for much. They were eager and ready to show him what they knew - themselves, whereas the ignorance and rawness of any other newcomer would - have been turned to good account in the shape of gibes and jests at his - expense. In two days, from a natural adaptability coupled with his great - strength, that was the strength of two men, Munford had fitted into place - with the same nicety that one part of a well designed machine fits into - another. - </p> - <p> - To the crews of the construction trains bringing up the bridge material he - was pointed out with pride by his mates—though, indeed, that action - was superfluous—as “the boy who did the trick at Pete’s.” And from - these in turn Munford learned that down at Big Cloud, Pete and others of - his ilk had sworn that, sooner or later, they would fix him for it. At - this he only laughed and, doubling his great arm bared to the shoulders, - intimated that there could be no greater pleasure in life for him than to - have them try it. And that night sitting outside the camp after supper, - McGuire, as spokesman, alluding to the threat, proposed that under - Munford’s leadership they should make another raid on Big Cloud. - </p> - <p> - Burton, passing by, caught the gist of the conversation. “I want to see - you a minute, Munford,” he called, shortly. - </p> - <p> - Munford got up and followed to the foreman’s little shanty that stood a - few yards away from the main camp. Once inside, Burton shoved him into a - chair and shook his fist under Munford’s nose. - </p> - <p> - “Didn’t I tell you yesterday morning,” he spluttered angrily, “that if you - were looking for trouble to come to me and leave the gang alone? And here - you’re at it again, what? Go down to Big Cloud and raise hell, eh? You - great, big overgrown calf!” Munford blinked at the foreman, speechless. It - was a long time since he had taken words like these from any man, much - less a little spitfire like Burton. - </p> - <p> - “Trouble!” continued the irate Burton, hardly pausing for breath. “You - live on it, don’t you? Eat it, eh? Well, you’ll get a fill of it before - long that’ll give you the damnest indigestion you ever heard of. I promise - you that! But you keep your hands off my crew! Now you listen to what I’m - saying!” - </p> - <p> - “Aw, go hang!” said Munford, contemptuously. “I can’t help it, can I, if - they want to go down to Big Cloud? If you’re so blamed anxious about them, - it’s a wonder you don’t go around every night and tuck ‘em into their - bunks!” - </p> - <p> - For a moment Burton looked as though he were going to jump into Munford - and mix it then and there; but instead, with a short laugh, he turned and - walked to the other side of the room, sat down on the edge of his bunk and - pulled out his pipe. He cut some tobacco from his plug, rolled it between - his palms, packed his pipe slowly and lighted it. It was five minutes - before he broke the silence; Munford was beginning to feel uncomfortable. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t suppose throwing a few timbers across Twin Bear Creek means much - of anything to you, Munford, eh?” he asked quietly. - </p> - <p> - “Not so much,” replied Munford carelessly, a little puzzled at the - question. - </p> - <p> - “No? Well, it means a lot to me, a whole lot! Until that trestle is up, we - can’t shove material over to the other side, ties and rails and heavy - stuff. Progress on the Hill Division depends just at this minute on Bridge - Gang No. 3, and concretely on me. I don’t propose to have it interfered - with by the men going down to Big Cloud and getting their heads broke, - understand?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I guess we can take care of <i>our</i> heads, if that’s all that - bothers you,” drawled Munford. “And I furthermore guess your bloomin’ - little bridge you seem so stuck on won’t take any hurt by lettin’ the boys - have their fling. Anyway, whether it will or not, what’s the use of you - shootin’ off all your talk? You can’t stop ‘em! If they want to go, - they’ll go. And say, Burton”—an inspiration coming to Munford—“come - on down with us. I’ll promise you the time of your life.” - </p> - <p> - “I ought to have put it up to you differently, I guess, and saved my - breath,” said Burton in disgust. “You’re just a hulk of bone and muscle - and your head’s wood. You can lift a timber and swing a pick or axe - because you’ve got the strength. But that’s all you know, or all you’re - good for!” - </p> - <p> - The cool contempt in Burton’s voice stung Mun-ford more than the words - themselves. - </p> - <p> - “Is that so!” he snarled, resorting to his favorite habit of blowing on - his knuckles. “I’d show you fast enough what I’m good for, you runt, if - you was a little bigger!” - </p> - <p> - “Maybe you’ll find I’m big enough one of these days,” said Burton, - sharply. “Now I’ll put it to you straight so that you’ll understand. I’ll - show you whether I can stop the gang going to Big Cloud or not. No man - rides on the construction trains after to-day without a pass signed by me. - That’s orders! If the men don’t like it, you can tell them it’s your - fault. The next row in Big Cloud wouldn’t stop at fists. And as for you, - you wouldn’t come out of it alive.” - </p> - <p> - “You needn’t worry about me,” sneered Munford. “I’m——” - </p> - <p> - “You’re a fool! The thickest-headed, trouble-hunting fool it’s ever been - my cursed luck to run against!” exclaimed Burton angrily. - </p> - <p> - Munford brushed his great shock of hair out of his eyes with a nervous - sweep of his hand. “I ain’t ever before taken the back talk from any man - that I’ve taken from you—without hurtin’ him,” he said thickly, - rising from his chair. “And I’m goin’ to get out of here before I hurt <i>you!</i>” - He walked quickly across the shanty and swung around in the doorway. “By - God, I wish you was bigger!” he flung out. - </p> - <p> - Munford walked back to the men’s camp and listened to their conversation - awhile in sullen silence. They were still on the same topic and were - waxing more enthusiastic each minute. - </p> - <p> - “Aw, dry up!” said Munford, cutting in at last. “It’ll be a long time - before any of you see Big Cloud again.” - </p> - <p> - “Who says so?” demanded McGuire, aggressively. - </p> - <p> - Munford jerked his thumb in the direction of the foreman’s shanty. “Him,” - he said laconically. - </p> - <p> - “How’s he goin’ to stop it? What for? What’s the matter with him, anyway? - It’s none of his business!” the men were talking in chorus. - </p> - <p> - “He’s fussy about gettin’ his dinky little bridge through,” sneered - Munford. “He says he ain’t goin’ to have broken heads interferin’ with it, - either. From now on you’ve got to get a pass to ride on the construction - train. Likewise, he said if you didn’t like it I was to tell you”—here - Munford paused to glance around the circle—“that it’s my fault and - I’m the cause of all the trouble.” - </p> - <p> - “What did you tell him?” demanded the crew. - </p> - <p> - “I told him to go hang. What else would I tell him?” - </p> - <p> - “Bully for you!” shouted McGuire, slapping his leg in delight. “Did he - fire you?” - </p> - <p> - This was something Munford had not thought of. - </p> - <p> - “Fire me?” he repeated. Then slowly, pondering the idea: “No, he didn’t. - It’s funny he didn’t, though; I gave him back talk ‘enough.” - </p> - <p> - “Aw,” said McGuire, with a sneer, “that’s easy. He’d have fired you quick - enough if he dared.” - </p> - <p> - “Why,” said Munford innocently. “I wouldn’t have touched him if he had. - He’s too small to touch—I told him that, too.” - </p> - <p> - “‘Tain’t that,” McGuire returned. “He ain’t afraid of any man, big or - little. I’ll give him credit for that. It’s his bridge, and that means his - job, that he’s afraid of.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s my gettin’ fired got to do with the bridge?” demanded Munford, in - amazement. - </p> - <p> - “Aw, go on; you know what I mean. If Burton has trouble with us the bridge - work stops, don’t it? And the company’ll be askin’ Burton the reason why, - won’t they? Well, Burton knows there’s some things we won’t stand for, and - firin’ you after we brought you up here is one of them. And that’s right, - too, eh, mates?” - </p> - <p> - There was emphatic assent from the men. - </p> - <p> - Munford, a little flustered at this wholesale exhibition of homage, - fidgeted nervously. “Much obliged,” said he, clumsily. “Don’t put - yourselves out on my account. I——” - </p> - <p> - “That’s all right,” broke in McGuire. “Burton won’t try it; he knows - better. As for gettin’ a pass to get out of camp, I dunno about <i>that</i>.” - He got up, stretched himself and yawned. “The way I look at it, it’s more - up to Munford here than it is to Burton. I’m goin’ to turn in, but I’ll - say first that the night Munford says Big Cloud, then Big Cloud it is for - Bridge Gang No. 3. That’s the way we talked it before we knew about Burton - mixin’ in, and I reckon it stands just the same now.” - </p> - <p> - And the camp retired to their bunks and to sleep, voicing McGuire’s - sentiments and swearing a unanimous and enthusiastic allegiance to - Munford; all but Munford himself who did not sleep but lay awake tossing - restlessly though, withal, in a very self-satisfied frame of mind. - </p> - <p> - This outburst of popularity pleased Munford exceedingly. The more so that - it was directly traceable to his great strength and physical courage of - which he was inordinately vain. He began to regard Burton with contempt. - Burton was a man whose backbone wobbled when it came to a showdown! As - Munford turned the situation over in his mind his contempt grew stronger - until he came to decide that he despised the little foreman heartily. - Would he, he demanded of himself with a snort, have fired a man that had - talked to him as he had talked to Burton, had he been in Burton’s place? - He would! And the gang, bridge, job and everything else could go to - blazes! Munford sat up to emphasize his feelings on this point with a - crash of his fist on the side of the bunk. He thrilled with the fierce joy - of enacting just such a rôle as his imagination depicted, despising Burton - accordingly for lacking in what were, to him, the essentials of a man. He - decided, as he fell asleep, to make the foreman’s life a burden to him—and - he did. - </p> - <p> - No flagrant violation or disobedience of orders was there, instead the - inauguration of a petty little system of nagging that embraced every - indignity Munford could think of. And the range of his attack was from - profound and exaggerated attention and politeness to the utter and - complete ignoring of the very existence of such a person as Alan Burton, - foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3. While the gang, taking their cue from - Munford, would shift from one extreme to the other with a precision and - significance that cut deeper into a man of Burton’s high-strung, nervous - temperament than any other form of torture they could have devised. - </p> - <p> - Three times during three days Burton, who was afraid of no man or - aggregation of men, took the bull by the horns and struck Munford a - violent blow in an effort to bring matters to a head. On the first - occasion the gang watched the action with a gasp of mixed pity and - admiration—looking for Burton’s instant annihilation. But Munford, - with a bit of a laugh, only reached out and grasping Burton’s neck held - him wriggling, helplessly, impotently, at arm’s length. “You got to grow, - boy; just keep quiet now, I ain’t going to hurt you,” he taunted. And the - gang promptly lost their faint appreciation of Burton’s nerve in their - relish of the ridiculous figure cut by the white-faced, raging foreman. - </p> - <p> - It was dirty work, and deep down in his heart Munford knew it. But his - better nature no sooner manifested itself by sundry pricks of conscience - than it was smothered beneath the new sense of authority and command that - was now his for the first time in his experience; and which, catering as - it did to his peacock vanity, was paramount to all things else. The work - lagged sadly and fell behind. The daily reports Burton signed and sent - down to headquarters became worse and worse. - </p> - <p> - Each day, too, the feud between the dives at Big Cloud and Bridge Gang No. - 3, fanned by the crews of the construction trains, who taunted McGuire and - the men with cowardice, grew stronger. For the trainmen, having no idea of - disregarding Burton’s orders and allowing the bridge men to ride down on - the empties, rubbed it in until the gang writhed under their gibes. - </p> - <p> - Munford did not come in for much of this personally. The trainmen, none of - them, seemed to display any particular hankering for discussing the - question in his presence; but he got it second-hand from McGuire and the - gang. The outcome of it all was a decision one night after supper to board - the construction train the following evening, Burton, the train crew and - the company to the contrary, and go down to Big Cloud if they had to run - the train themselves. Munford concurred in the decision by blowing very - gently on his knuckles. It looked bad for the peace and quiet of Big - Cloud; and it looked bad for Burton’s standing with the company. - </p> - <p> - Munford, as commander-in-chief, and McGuire, as chief of staff, withdrew - from the circle and strolled off by themselves to perfect their plans for - the next day’s campaign, taking the trail in the direction of Big Cloud—a - trail still called, but now a passable road due to the traffic incident to - the building of the Hill Division, whose right of way it paralleled from - Big Cloud to the ford at Twin Bear Creek. At the end of a quarter of a - mile the two men sat down on a felled tree by the side of the trail to - talk. Some ten minutes had passed when McGuire, in the midst of a graphic - description of what they would do to Pete McGonigle and the rest, suddenly - stopped and gripped Munford tightly by the shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “Keep mum,” he cautioned. “There’s someone comin’!” - </p> - <p> - In the bright moonlight they could make out the figure of a man about a - hundred yards down the road coming toward them from the camp. - </p> - <p> - “He walks like Burton,” whispered McGuire. “What the devil is he followin’ - us for? Get back into the trees and let him pass.” - </p> - <p> - They moved noiselessly a little deeper into the wood that fringed the - road, and lying flat, watched the man who was approaching. - </p> - <p> - “It’s Burton,” McGuire announced at last. - </p> - <p> - Munford grunted assent. - </p> - <p> - “He’s been followin’ us all right, and now he’s goin’ to wait for us to - come back,” continued McGuire, as Burton halted within a few yards of them - and sat down to smoke. “Well, we’ll give him a run for his money. He can - wait a while, I’m thinkin’.” - </p> - <p> - Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed. McGuire began to tire of his - self-selected game of hide and seek, “Come on,” said he, “let’s go out and - see what he wants.” - </p> - <p> - “Wait,” Munford answered. “There’s someone comin’ from Big Cloud way. It’s - not us Burton’s after. Listen!” - </p> - <p> - There was the faint beat of horse’s hoofs gradually drawing nearer. Then - presently rider and horse loomed out of the shadows and Burton, getting - up, stepped out into the middle of the road. - </p> - <p> - The horseman drew up beside him. “That you, Burton?” he called softly. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said Burton, shortly. - </p> - <p> - “You got Pete’s letter, then,” the man went on, dismounting from his - horse. “I suppose it’s all right to talk here. No one around, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “As well here as anywhere. Only cut it short.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, there ain’t any hurry,” returned the man, with a laugh. “Wait till I - tie my horse, then we can sit down and chew it over comfortable.” - </p> - <p> - “Now,” he went on, that task performed, “what I came to see you about was - this fellow Munford.” - </p> - <p> - “Well,” demanded Burton, “what about him?” - </p> - <p> - “It looks to us down to Big Cloud, from the way the fellows on the - construction trains are talkin’, you ain’t got any cause to love him, eh? - So Pete figured you and him could deal. You want to get rid of him, don’t - you?” - </p> - <p> - “I wish to God I’d never seen his face!” exclaimed Burton, with great - bitterness. - </p> - <p> - “Sure! That’s the idea. You don’t want him; we do want him—bad! - There’s nothin’ against the rest of the men; we’ll forget all about that. - It’s just Munford we’re after.” - </p> - <p> - “Why don’t you get him, then?” said Burton curtly. - </p> - <p> - “We’re goin’ to,” the man replied, with a nasty laugh. “We’re goin’ to, - all right. It’s a fair deal. You’re on, eh? Pete said you’d jump at the - chance to sit in. We want you to fire him.” - </p> - <p> - “That all I’m to do?” asked Burton, quietly. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, that’s all there is to it—except this.” - </p> - <p> - Munford’s hand closed on his companion’s arm in a tight, spasmodic grip as - Pete’s emissary produced a wad of bills and began to peel off the outer - ones. - </p> - <p> - “Three hundred plunks,” said the man, extending the money he had - abstracted from the roll to Burton. “Pretty good for just firin’ a man - we’ve been lookin’ for you to fire for the last week, anyway. Besides, - there’s been some talk down at headquarters about you not bein’ able to - handle your men, and about them gettin’ someone that can. Pete says not to - bother about that, he’ll fix it for you. Here, take the money.” - </p> - <p> - “Suppose I fired him,” said Burton, slowly, “where’d he go?” - </p> - <p> - “What do you care where he goes, so long as you get rid of him?” - </p> - <p> - “He couldn’t go West,” went on Burton, paying no attention to the other’s - remark; “so he’d have to go East—that’s Big Cloud—and <i>murder!</i>” - He turned fiercely, savagely on the man. “You dirty, low-lived hound!” he - flashed. “You offer me three hundred dollars to murder a man, do you? You - wonder why I’ve stood for what I did, do you, you scrimp! Fire him, eh, to - get a cowardly knife or shot in his back! You think I didn’t know what - would happen if I let him out, eh? Get out of here, you cur! And get out - now—while you <i>can!</i>” Burton’s voice rasped, hoarse with - passion. He turned abruptly away and strode quickly in the direction of - the camp. - </p> - <p> - “Hold on, wait a minute, Burton,” cried the other, following him. “Don’t - get batty.” - </p> - <p> - Unconsciously Munford had tightened his grip on McGuire’s arm until the - latter whimpered with the pain, and now Munford lifted him bodily to his - feet making cautiously for the spot where the horse was standing. The two - figures were still discernible, and Burton’s angry voice continued to - reach the listeners, though the words were now indistinguishable. - </p> - <p> - Munford’s face in the moonlight was colorless, the muscles around his - mouth twitched convulsively. “D’ye hear what they said? D’ye hear what - they said? <i>My God!</i> d’ye hear it all?” he was mumbling incoherently - in McGuire’s ear, his eyes strained up the road. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I heard it. Let go of my arm, you’re breakin’ it!” - </p> - <p> - “He’s comin’ back,” said Munford, hoarsely. - </p> - <p> - Burton had disappeared around a turn in the road and the man, after - hesitating a moment, began to retrace his steps to his horse, muttering - fiercely to himself as he came along. As he reached for the bridle, - Munford leaped out and grasped him by the throat, choking back the man’s - cry of terror. - </p> - <p> - “You make a noise,” snarled Munford, “and I’ll finish you! Oh, it’s you, - eh? Look here, Mac, it’s the cuss that ran the roulette wheel that night - at Pete’s. So my price is three hundred, eh? Well, hand it out. <i>Quick!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Slowly the fellow put his hand in his pocket and for the second time that - night pulled out his roll. - </p> - <p> - Munford’s anger seemed to have vanished. He laughed softly as he took the - money. - </p> - <p> - “What are you going to do with me?” whined the gambler. - </p> - <p> - Munford made no answer. In the imperfect light, he was laboriously - counting the bills. McGuire watched the operation, at the same time - keeping an eye on their prisoner. - </p> - <p> - “Two sixty—eighty—three hundred,” said Munford at last, - cramming that amount into his pocket and handing back by far the larger - part of the roll to the man. “What am I goin’ to do with you? Nothin’! You - get on that horse and ride back to Pete. I want him to know this. Tell him - all about it. Tell him Munford told you to tell him. That’s worth more - than breakin’ your neck—and that’s all that saves you from gettin’ - it broke, savvy? You tell him <i>I’ve</i> got the three hundred, and I’ll - give him his chance at me for it one of these days.. And when I do—My - God, <i>you ride</i> before I begin with you!” - </p> - <p> - The fellow glanced fearfully from Munford to McGuire and back again to - Munford to assure himself that he was free to go. Then he clambered - frantically into the saddle and lashing his beast in a frenzy of terror - disappeared down the trail. - </p> - <p> - Munford, with swift revulsion of mood, threw himself down on the grass, - burying his face in his hands. Not a word from McGuire; he walked - awkwardly up and down, whistling under his breath. After a minute Munford - looked up. - </p> - <p> - “I got to square this with Burton,” he said brokenly. - </p> - <p> - McGuire nodded. - </p> - <p> - “He’s a better man than you and me and the whole gang put together”—Munford’s - tones were fiercely assertive. - </p> - <p> - “He is that,” assented McGuire, with conviction. - </p> - <p> - There was silence for a moment between them; then McGuire spoke: “Why - didn’t you take it all?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “Take it all!” flared Munford. “I’m no thief, am I? Well, then, what’s the - matter with you? That’s my price, ain’t it? Three hundred. That’s what - Pete offered for a chance to get his paws on me. Well, <i>I’ll</i> give - him his chance, you heard me promise, didn’t you? That’s right, eh? That’s - Pete’s proposition, and the money’s mine, ain’t it?” - </p> - <p> - “It is,” said McGuire. - </p> - <p> - “It is, and it ain’t,” said Munford. “Burton <i>could</i> have had it if - he’d sold me out, couldn’t he? Well, then, I’m goin’ to see he gets it - anyway.” - </p> - <p> - “He wouldn’t take it, not by any means, he wouldn’t,” objected McGuire. - </p> - <p> - “Not outright, he wouldn’t,” agreed Munford. “I know that well enough. We - got to fix it so he won’t know where it come from, and so it will square - me with him, and you fellows, too.” - </p> - <p> - “How you goin’ to do that?” demanded McGuire. “I dunno,” said Munford. - “We’ll talk it over with the boys. Come on back to camp.” - </p> - <p> - The next day and the day after, the gang worked like Trojans, and the lack - of any sneer or incivility on their part, coupled with a subdued, - expectant excitement that the men tried fruitlessly to hide, made Burton - more anxious and ill at ease than during the days that had gone before. It - looked like the lull before the storm; and he wondered bitterly what - culminating piece of deviltry they were hatching. - </p> - <p> - To the taunts of the train crews the gang grinned and said nothing. - </p> - <p> - On the second day a package, addressed to Munford, came up from the East, - and at noon hour the men handed it around from one to another in awestruck - wonder at the magnificence of the solid gold repeater that chimed the - quarters, halves and hours, and split the seconds into fractions. It was - indeed a beauty. Maybe the chain was a little massive, but the men opined - that it was therefore strong. They pried open the case to read the - inscription over whose wording they had wrestled most of a night. - </p> - <p> - “Nifty, ain’t it?” cried McGuire, admiringly; and he read it aloud: “‘This - is to certify that Alan Burton is as square as they make them, and Munford - and the gang are sorry. So help us!’” They delivered it solemnly to - Munford, who was to make the presentation, and started in a body for - Burton’s shanty. Burton met them at the door, his face hard and set. - </p> - <p> - “So it’s a showdown at last, eh, boys?” he laughed grimly. “Well, what is - it?” - </p> - <p> - The men shoved Munford bodily forward and he stood balancing himself - sheepishly, first on one foot and then on the other, as he faced Burton. - He cleared his throat painfully once or twice, then he found his voice. - From a point of oratory or rhetoric it was perhaps the lamest presentation - speech on record, for Munford suddenly thrust the watch and chain into the - astounded Burton’s hands. - </p> - <p> - “Here, take it,” he sputtered. “It’s all written out on the inside.” And - breaking through the men, he turned and fled incontinently. - </p> - <div style="height: 6em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's On The Iron At Big Cloud, by Frank L. 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- <head>
- <title>On The Iron At Big Cloud, by Frank L. Packard</title>
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-Title: On The Iron At Big Cloud
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-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD ***
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-Produced by David Widger from page images generously
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-</pre>
-
- <div style="height: 8em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h1>
- ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD
- </h1>
- <h2>
- By Frank L. Packard
- </h2>
- <h4>
- McClelland & Goodchild Limited
- </h4>
- <h4>
- Prospect Press, Printers New York, U.S.A.
- </h4>
- <h3>
- 1911
- </h3>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0001.jpg" alt="0001 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0001.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0007.jpg" alt="0007 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0007.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <h3>
- TO
- </h3>
- <h3>
- MY FATHER
- </h3>
- <h3>
- <i>LUCIUS HENRY PACKARD</i>
- </h3>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- <b>CONTENTS</b>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD</b> </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> I—RAFFERTY’S RULE </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> II—THE LITTLE SUPER </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> III—“IF A MAN DIE” </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> IV—SPITZER </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> V—SHANLEY’S LUCK </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> VI—THE BUILDER </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VII—THE GUARDIAN OF THE DEVIL’S SLIDE </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> VIII—THE BLOOD OF KINGS </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> IX—MARLEY </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> X—THE MAN! WHO DIDN’T COUNT </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> XI—“WHERE’S HAGGERTY?” </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> XII—McQUEEN’S HOBBY </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> XIII—THE REBATE </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> XIV—SPECKLES </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> XV—MUNFORD </a>
- </p>
-
- <p>
- <br /><br /> <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- ON THE IRON AT BIG CLOUD
- </h2>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- I—RAFFERTY’S RULE
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he General Manager
- of the Transcontinental System glared at the young man who stood facing
- him across the office desk. “Why, you wouldn’t last three months!” he
- snapped.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’d like to try, uncle.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Humph!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m qualified for the position,” young Holman went on. “I’ve done my
- stint with the construction gangs and I’ve spent four years in the Eastern
- shops. You promised me that if I’d stick I’d have my chance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if I did, I didn’t promise to put you in the way of making a fool
- of yourself and a laughing-stock of me, did I? You may be qualified
- technically, I don’t say you’re not. In fact, I’ve been rather pleased
- with you; that’s one reason why you’re not going out there to tackle
- something you can’t handle. If men like Rawson and Williams can’t hold
- down the job, what do you expect to do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No worse than they, at least,” Holman answered, quietly. “Look here,
- uncle, that’s just the point. There aren’t any of the men want the
- position, so I’m not jumping anybody to take it. I’ll not make any
- laughing-stock of you, either. I’m not going out as the Old Man’s nephew;
- just plain Dick Holman. If I don’t make good you can wash your hands of my
- railroad career.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Young man,” said the General Manager, severely, “don’t make rash
- statements.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He pushed the papers on his desk irritably to one side. Then he frowned.
- Two years ago, when the road had dug, blasted, burrowed, and trestled its
- right of way through the mountains, they had built the repair shops for
- the maintenance of the rolling stock, and from the moment the first brass
- time-check had been issued the locomotive-foremanship of the Hill Division
- was no subject to be introduced with temerity anywhere within the
- precincts of the executive offices. One man after another had gone out
- there, and one after another they had resigned. “Hard lot to handle,”
- Carleton, the division superintendent, had replied to the numerous
- requests for explanation that had been fired at him. And now Dick wanted
- to go. The general manager’s fingers beat a tattoo on the desk and his
- frown deepened into a scowl. “You’re a young fool,” he grunted at last.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Holman knew that he had gained his point “That’s very good of you,
- uncle,” he cried. “I knew you’d see it my way. When may I start?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess you’ll get there soon enough,” his uncle answered grimly. He rose
- from his chair and accompanied Holman to the door. “Well, go if you want
- to, but remember this, young man, you’re going on your own terms. When you
- resign from <i>that</i> position, you resign from the road, understand!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, uncle,” Holman laughed in reply. “It’s a bargain.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Three days later, as Number One pulled into Big Cloud, Holman swung
- himself to the platform. Up past the mail and baggage cars, the steam
- drumming at her safety, a big ten-wheeler was backing down to couple on
- for the run through the Rockies. There was the pride of proprietorship in
- his glance as his eyes swept the great mogul critically, for in his pocket
- was his official appointment as Locomotive Foreman of the Hill Division,
- vice Williams, resigned.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was not until the last of the Pullmans had rolled smoothly past him
- that he turned to take stock in his surroundings. The first impression was
- not prepossessing. Before him, just across the yard filled with strings of
- freight cars, were the low, rambling, smoke-begrimed shops and running
- shed, while beyond these again the town straggled out monotonously.
- </p>
- <p>
- To the westward, through the mountains, were the curves and grades that
- wrenched and racked and tore the equipment he would hereafter be
- accountable for. To the eastward—but “eastward” was only two hundred
- yards away, for there his eye caught the “Yard Limit” post, that likewise
- marked the end of the division.
- </p>
- <p>
- If after this cursory survey there still lingered any illusions of the
- picturesque in Holman’s mind, they were rudely dispelled by the interior
- of the barn-like structure at the side of the platform that did duty for
- station, division headquarters, general storeroom, and anything else that
- might seek the shelter of its protecting roof. The walls were adorned with
- such works of art as are afforded by the Sunday supplements, interspersed
- here and there with an occasional blue-print and time schedule. The
- furnishings bore unmistakable evidence of having seen service with the
- construction staff when the road was in the making. At the right of the
- door, as Holman entered, the despatcher was poring over the train sheet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure,” said he in answer to Holman’s inquiry, “that’s the super over
- there.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman crossed the room and proffered his credentials.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glad you’ve come,” was Carleton’s greeting, as he rose and extended his
- hand. “We’ve been expecting you. Williams went East this morning on Number
- Two. Sit down. That’s your desk there.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman glanced at the battered table toward which the other pointed, then
- back again to the four days’ growth on the super’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton grinned. “Fixings aren’t up to what you boiled-shirt fellows down
- East are used to. Out here on the firing line most anything goes. I’ve
- been requisitioning office fixtures for months. Ain’t seen any way-bill of
- them yet, Davis, have you?” he called across to the despatcher.
- </p>
- <p>
- Davis got up with a laugh and joined the other two. “No,” said he, shaking
- hands with Holman, “not yet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And not likely to, either,” continued the super. “It’s rough and ready
- out here, Holman. The staff quarters up there,” he jerked his thumb toward
- the ceiling, “are all-fired crude, and the Chinese cook is a gilt-edge
- thief and most persuasive liar; but we’ve got the finest division of the
- best railroad in the world, and we’re pushing stuff through the mountains
- on a schedule that makes Southern competition sick. We’re young here yet.
- Some day, when the roadbed’s shaken down to stay, we’ll build the extras.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The enthusiasm and bluff heartiness of the super was contagious. Holman
- put out his hand impulsively. “We’ve heard a lot of you fellows down
- East,” he said, “and I’m glad I’ve got a chance to chip in.” His eyes
- swept around the room and came back to meet the super’s smilingly. “Even
- if accommodations <i>are</i> below ‘Tourist Class,’” he added.
- </p>
- <p>
- So Holman came to the division and joined the staff. Spence, chief
- dispatcher, had shaken his head. “Twenty-eight and locomotive foreman of
- <i>this</i> division with the roughest, toughest bunch on the system’s
- pay-roll to handle! Hanged if he isn’t a decent sort, though, even if he
- will shave and wear collars. Imagine Williams with creased trousers! And
- say, his wardrobe—he’s actually got a dress suit with him! Wouldn’t
- that ground the wires! Who is he, Carleton? Got a pull with the Old Man?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Didn’t inquire,” returned Carleton bluntly. “Let him try out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- If the super waited before passing judgment on the latest addition to the
- staff of the Hill Division, the shop hands did likewise—but for
- another reason. They waited for Rafferty. Rafferty was boss. Who
- Rafferty’s boss was, was his affair, and it did not concern them. What
- Rafferty said—went. It was two weeks before he delivered his
- verdict.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A damned pink-faced dude!” he announced and terminated his remark with a
- stream of black-strap juice by way of an exclamation mark.
- </p>
- <p>
- The fiat had gone forth!
- </p>
- <p>
- Down in the pits, stripping the engines of their motion gear, the fitters
- passed resolutions of confidence in Rafferty’s judgment, and among the
- lathes and planers the machinists did likewise. The concurrence of the
- forge gang was expressed by a vicious wielding of the big sledges that
- sent showers of sparks flying from the spluttering metal whenever Holman
- was sighted coming down the shop on a tour of inspection—a
- significant intimation to him to keep his distance. And that the sentiment
- of the shops might not be lacking in unanimity, the boilermakers, should
- Holman have the temerity to pause for an instant before a shell on which
- they were at work, would send up a din from their clattering hammers
- intolerable to any but the men themselves whose ears were plugged with
- cotton waste.
- </p>
- <p>
- As for Holman, he might have been entirely unconscious of the hostility
- and ill-will of his subordinates for all the evidence he gave of being
- aware of it. He was busy mastering the routine and details of his new
- position. For a month he said nothing; then one morning over at
- headquarters he turned to Carle-ton, who was reading the train mail that
- had just come in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why did Williams resign?” he asked quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eh?” said Carleton, startled out of his calm by reason of the suddenness
- of the question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why did Williams resign?” Holman repeated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t know. Tired of the life out here, I guess,” Carleton evaded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Was it Rafferty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton turned sharply to scrutinize the other’s countenance. Holman was
- gazing out of the window.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It was Rafferty,” Carleton admitted after a moment.
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman’s gaze never shifted from the window. “Why wasn’t Rafferty fired?”
- he asked in the same quiet tones, but this time there was just the
- faintest tinge of accusation in his voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton’s face flushed. An instant’s hesitation, then he answered
- bluntly: “He weighed more, that’s why!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh!” said Holman significantly. “Then why didn’t you recommend Rafferty
- for the position long ago and save all the trouble?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I would have if he could do anything more than sign his name.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman turned angrily to face the super. “So,” he cried, “when a fellow
- comes out here he has to play a lone hand, eh? A show-down with Rafferty,
- shop hands, and the whole division drawing cards against him. You,
- Carleton, I didn’t put you down as a man with a pet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton got up and put his hand on Holman’s shoulder. “Don’t do it,
- either,” he said quietly. “Don’t run off your schedule that way, son. It
- has always been man to man, and I wasn’t appealed to. So far it has been
- all Rafferty. It’s easier to get a new foreman than a new shop crew, so I
- haven’t interfered.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t understand,” said Holman blankly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The super laughed shortly. “Rafferty has the men where he wants them. If
- he got on his ear he could tie us up so quick we wouldn’t know what
- happened. A nice thing for me to admit, isn’t it? But it’s so. I suppose I
- should have nipped the whole business in the bud, but I kept on hoping
- that each new man would beat Rafferty at his own game. Has he got you
- going, too?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman gathered up the repair reports from his desk and started for the
- door. “Game’s young yet,” he flung over his shoulder as he went out.
- </p>
- <p>
- From the office Holman walked up the yard to the spur tracks at the end of
- the shops where three or four engines were waiting their turn for an empty
- pit. He glanced at their numbers, comparing them with the papers he held
- in his hand, then turned and walked back, pausing on the way to inspect an
- engine, bright and clean as fresh paint and gold leaf would make her, that
- had been hauled out of the shops that morning. He passed in through the
- upper doors to the fitting-shop. Already another engine had been shunted
- in to replace the one that had gone out. Her guard-plates, links,
- cross-heads, main and connecting rods were lying on the floor beside her,
- and the labor gang were jacking and blocking her up preparatory to running
- the wheels out from underneath her.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a trace of heightened color in Holman’s face as he turned to
- look for Rafferty.
- </p>
- <p>
- The boss fitter was in his usual place. Down the shop, hands dug deep in
- his trousers pockets, legs spread wide apart, he swung slowly round and
- round on the little iron turntable that intersected the handcar tracks
- where they branched out in all directions through the shops. As Holman
- approached he stopped the motion indolently by allowing the toe of his
- boot to trail along the floor around the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman’s manner was quiet and his voice was soft, almost deferential, as
- he spoke: “I see you have 483 finished, Mr. Rafferty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Rafferty looked down from his superior two inches and said: “Yis.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And,” continued Holman, “you’ve run in 840 in her place?’
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yis,” said Rafferty again, this time even more indifferently than before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, now, really, Mr. Rafferty, I’d like to know why you did it? You
- know I told you yesterday to be particular to take 522 next.” Holman’s
- tones were more nearly those of apology than of expostulation.
- </p>
- <p>
- For answer Rafferty gave a little shove with his foot and the turntable
- began to revolve slowly. During the circuit Rafferty coolly gave some
- directions to the men nearest him, and then as he once more came round
- facing Holman he stopped. “Fwhat was ut you was sayin’, Mr. Holman?” he
- drawled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “This is the biggest division on the system, isn’t it?” Holman asked
- inconsequently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eh?” demanded Rafferty.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Longest division—most mileage—covers quite a stretch of
- country,” Holman amplified.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh!” returned the other with a grin. “Well, you’ll be thinkin’ so if you
- ever sthay long enough to git acquainted wid ut.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps that’s the reason I am beginning to feel cramped—I’ve only
- been here a month, you know,” Holman smiled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fwhat d’ye mean?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, curiously, it doesn’t seem big enough or wide enough or long enough
- for even <i>two</i> men.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman purred his words in soft, mild accents, and Rafferty,
- understanding, sneered in quick retort: “Was you thinkin’ av lavin’, Mr.
- Holman?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Holman, slowly, “I don’t know that I was. I thought perhaps the
- matter might be adjusted, and I’d like to ask your advice. Now, if you
- were locomotive foreman and you found that the foreman of this shop, in a
- dirty, low, underhanded fashion was discrediting you with the men, and
- furthermore flatly disobeyed your orders, what would you do, Mr.
- Rafferty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- By the time Holman had completed his arraignment, Rafferty was mad—fighting
- mad. “I’ll tell you fwhat I’d do,” he yelled, shaking a great horny fist
- under Holman’s nose. “I’d plug him good an’ hard, that’s fwhat I’d do!
- See!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Rather drastic,” Holman commented after a pause, during which Rafferty
- drew back and with hands on hips stood scowling belligerently. “But
- desperate cases sometimes require desperate remedies, and I don’t know—but—that—”
- his fist shot out and caught Rafferty fairly on the point of the jaw—“you’re
- right!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Rafferty, staggering back from the impact of the blow, set the table
- whirling. His feet went out from under him and he fell sprawling to the
- floor. As he picked himself up, Holman sprang toward him and swinging
- twice landed two vicious smashes on Rafferty’s face. Then, except for a
- confused recollection of a rush of men, that was all Holman remembered
- until he opened his eyes to find himself in his bunk at headquarters with
- Carleton bending over him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re a sight,” Carleton commented grimly. “What was the muss about?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman explained. “I took Rafferty’s advice and plugged him, you see, and
- after that———”
- </p>
- <p>
- “After that if it hadn’t been for old Joe, the turner, running over here
- to tell us, they’d have killed you. Don’t you know any better than to
- stack up against Rafferty like that, let alone the whole gang? Did you
- expect to do them all up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, not exactly. I expected there’d be something coming to me, but I had
- to do it. I’ll admit, Carleton, I was in a blue funk, but I just <i>had</i>
- to. Moral effect, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Carleton savagely, “the moral effect is great! It will be as
- much as your life is worth to put your head inside those shops again. You
- don’t know the men you’re dealing with out here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re wrong, dead wrong, Carleton, I do. You said it was man to man,
- didn’t you? Well, then, either I’m running the shops or Rafferty is.
- Rafferty has the men with him because he’s a bully and they’re afraid of
- him. It was mere force of habit made them pile on to me. You wait until
- they’re cooled off a bit and see.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Carleton shook his head. “You’re a bloomin’ fool,” he summed up
- judicially, “but here, shake! You’ve got your grit with you, if you did
- leave your sense behind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- For the rest of the morning Holman nursed his injuries, but at one o’clock
- he was at his desk again. Five minutes afterward Rafferty came in. He was
- not a pretty sight with his cut lip and battered eye as he limped past
- both Spence and Holman. With a vindictive glare at the latter he marched
- straight across the room to where Carleton sat. He leaned both hands on
- the super’s desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ut’ll be just a show-down, Mr. Carleton, that’s all there is to ut. Me or
- him, which?” he announced.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton tilted his chair back, put his feet up on the desk and his thumbs
- in the armholes of his vest. “State your case; Rafferty,” he said calmly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Case!” Rafferty spluttered. “Case is ut? I’m sick av bein’ bossed bye
- kids out av school that was buildin’ blocks whin I was buildin’ enjines. I
- quit or he does!” Rafferty jerked his thumb in Holman’s direction.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is that all you have to say, Rafferty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s about the size av ut.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, Rafferty, you can get your time,” said Carleton quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment Rafferty stared as though he had not heard aright, then he
- swung round on his heel only to turn again and face the super with a short
- laugh. “All right, Mr. Carleton, you’re the docthor. It’s satisfied I am.
- Whin I go out, every bloomin’ man in the shops ‘ull go out wid me!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton’s feet came off the desk like a shot, his chair came down to the
- floor with a bang, and the next instant he was standing in front of the
- boss fitter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here, Rafferty,” he blazed, “you know me—the men know me. While
- I’ve held the bank there’s been fifty-two cards in the case and every
- mother’s son of you has had a square deal. You know it, don’t you? No man
- on this division ever came to me with just cause for complaint but had a
- chance to state his grievance on a clear track and no limit on his permit
- either. Now, I’m entitled to the same line of treatment I hand out, and I
- won’t stand for threats!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Rafferty shifted uneasily and to hide his confusion reached for his
- “chewing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ve nothin’ agin you, Mr. Carleton, an’ I’m givin’ you fair warnin’,”
- he mumbled as his teeth met in the plug.
- </p>
- <p>
- “When you make trouble on this division you make trouble for me,” said
- Carleton bluntly. “As for warning, I give you warning now that if you
- start any disturbance in those shops it will be the worse for you. Now
- go!”
- </p>
- <p>
- They watched him through the windows as he crossed the tracks. Finally, as
- he disappeared inside the shops, Carleton turned with a grave face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid it’s going to be a bad business,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t mean to say,” Holman burst out, “that the men are fools enough
- to quit just because one man with a grouch says so, do you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told you that you didn’t know the class of men out here—they’re
- partisan to the core—it’s bred in them. I’m not blaming you, Holman—not
- for a minute! As I said this morning, I’ve seen it coming for a long while—long
- before Williams gave up the ghost. Now it’s here, we’ll face the music,
- what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s mighty good of you to say so, old man,” said Holman, slowly, “but
- I’ve put you in a bad hole, and it’s up to me to get you out of it. Inside
- of two weeks with the repair shops on strike our rolling stock won’t be
- able to handle the traffic.” He put on his hat and started for the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where are you going?” Carleton demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Rafferty’s not going to have this all his own way. The men have no
- grievance, and I don’t believe they’ll follow him out if they’re talked to
- right. I’m going over.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not if I know it, you’re not,” said Carleton grimly. “There may be a
- coroner’s inquest before this affair is settled, perhaps more than one if
- things get nasty, but I’m hanged if I propose starting in that way this
- afternoon.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s all right,” Holman replied doggedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just the same, I’m—Eh? What’s up, Carleton? What’s wrong?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spence had bent suddenly over the key, and Carleton, with a startled
- exclamation, was staring at the words the dispatcher was hastily
- scribbling on the pad. Holman leaned over the super’s shoulder and even as
- he saw Carleton reach to plug in the telephone connection with the
- roundhouse, he read the message: “Number Two wrecked Eagle Pass. Send
- wrecker and medical assistance at once.” The next instant he was flying
- across the yard to the shops.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he burst in through the door he was greeted with a snarl. The men were
- massed in a body around one of the locomotives in the fitting-shop, and
- Rafferty, from the cab, was talking in fierce, heated tones. At sight of
- the master mechanic he stopped short and with an oath leaped from his
- perch straight for Holman. The crowd divided, making a lane between the
- two men, then, with startling suddenness, breaking the ominous silence
- that had fallen, there came three short blasts from the shop whistle—the
- wrecker’s signal. It halted Rafferty when but an arm’s-length from the
- locomotive foreman. Then Holman spoke:
- </p>
- <p>
- “You hear that, men? Number Two has gone to glory up in Eagle Pass. You,
- Rafferty, get the wrecking crew together, <i>quick!</i> The rest of you
- get back to work.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re a liar!” Rafferty yelled. “A measly, putty-faced, starch-shirted
- liar, d’ye hear? Ut’s a plant! You can’t work any sharp trick loike that
- on me!”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a low, menacing growl from the men and they edged in close. But
- Holman gave them no heed; he took a step nearer Rafferty, looking straight
- into the other’s eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Rafferty,” he said quietly, “you’ve a wife and kids, haven’t you? And
- you’re a railroad man, aren’t you? Well, there’s wives and kids and mates
- up there in that wreck. The other affair can wait until we get back. Now,
- will you go?”
- </p>
- <p>
- And Rafferty went—at the head of the wreckers—out into the
- yard where the switching crew were working like beavers making up the
- relief train. Two passenger coaches to serve as ambulances, behind them a
- flat, then the wrecking crane, the tool car, and a caboose. As Rafferty
- was piling his men into the train, Holman raced across the tracks to the
- station. On the platform the doctors, hastily summoned, were crowded
- around Carleton. Holman stopped beside them. “We’re all ready, Carleton,”
- he announced; then to the others: “You fellows had better get aboard;
- we’ll be off as soon as we get the track.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Spence will have the line clear in a minute,” said Carleton, as the
- doctors started for the coaches. “I’m sending a dispatcher up with you; he
- can tap in on the wires. How many men did you scrape up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The regular crew.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And Rafferty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s going along.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know how you did it, and there’s no time for explanations now;
- but I think, Holman, you’d better leave Rafferty behind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And have the whole crew quit, too? It’s no use, Carleton, he’s got to go.
- That’s all there is to it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton shook his head doubtfully. “I don’t like the idea of you two
- getting up there together. There’s no need of you going, and you’d better
- not go. You don’t know the man; if you think he’ll forget——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re wrong, I do. I told you so before; anyway, it’s too late now—we’re
- off. Here’s Spence with the orders.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Before Carleton could reply, Holman had grabbed the tissue and was running
- for the train. As he swung himself into the cab of the engine and handed
- Hurley, the driver, his orders, Rafferty climbed in from the other side.
- </p>
- <p>
- At sight of Holman, Rafferty hesitated and half turned around in the
- gangway to go back to the caboose; but Holman reached out and caught his
- arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Stay where you are, Rafferty,” he said quietly. And during the
- nerve-racking thirty-mile run to Eagle Pass no other words passed between
- them. Sometimes in the mad slur of the locomotive as she hit the tangents
- their bodies touched; that was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman, by virtue of railroad etiquette, had climbed to the fireman’s seat
- and once or twice he had glanced around at the great bulk of the man
- behind him, at the grim, set features, at the eyes that would not meet
- his, and wondered at his own temerity in inviting a physical encounter.
- And what good had it done? Was Carleton right after all? Perhaps. And yet
- behind the stubbornness, the self-will, the purely physical, there must be
- the other side of the man. If he could only reach it—only touch it.
- He <i>had</i> touched it. His appeal for the injured.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hurley was eating up the miles as only a man at the throttle of a wrecker
- with clear rights could do it. A long scream from the whistle that echoed
- through the mountains above the pounding, deafening rush of the train
- brought Holman back to his immediate surroundings. Another minute and they
- had swung round the curve and thundered over the trestle that made the
- approach to the Pass.
- </p>
- <p>
- Half a mile ahead of them up the track they saw the horror. Hurley latched
- in his throttle and began to check. As the brake-shoes bit into the tires,
- Holman slipped off his seat and faced Rafferty. There was a curious look
- in the other’s eyes, and Holman understood. Understood that here Rafferty
- was his master—and knew it. So this was the meaning of it. This was
- how he had touched the other’s better nature! Rafferty had cunningly
- seized the opportunity of placing him at an even greater disadvantage than
- before. For an instant he hesitated as he bit his lip, then he canceled
- the personal equation. “Go ahead, Rafferty,” he said quietly, answering
- the unspoken challenge, “you’re better up in this sort of thing than I am.
- You’re in charge.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And Rafferty without a word swung himself from the cab.
- </p>
- <p>
- To Holman the first five minutes was unnerving. It was his first bad
- wreck. Down East it had never been his province to go out with the crew—nor
- was it here, he reflected grimly, and at that moment was grateful for the
- veteran Rafferty. It was like some hideous nightmare to him. All along the
- line of burning wreckage lay the dead, their silence the more awful by
- contrast with the shrieks and cries of the wounded still imprisoned in the
- wreck. And then the feeling passed and he worked—worked like a
- madman.
- </p>
- <p>
- Once a woman had caught his arm and, sobbing, dragged him toward the
- stateroom end of one of the Pullmans. Through the smoke and scorching heat
- of the flames he had fought his way in, then back with the child. The
- woman had thrown her arms hysterically around his neck.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was all a mad, furious turmoil, and he gloried in it. The crunch of the
- ax through glass and woodwork, the wild rush into the heart of things to
- stagger back blinded and choked with his helpless burden. The fierce joy
- if life still lingered; the tender reverence if life were gone.
- </p>
- <p>
- Up the track toward the engine there was a crash and a chorus of excited
- cries. He rushed in that direction. A half-dozen of the wrecking crew were
- grouped around the forward baggage-car. As Holman reached them,
- disheveled, clothes torn and scorched, face blackened with smoke and
- daubed with blood where glass and splinters had cut him, the men drew back
- aghast, staring white-faced.
- </p>
- <p>
- “By God!” one cried. “It’s <i>him!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course it’s me! Are you crazy? What’s the matter with you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The man pointed to the blazing car. “Some one said you was in there, and
- he went in after you just before she crumpled up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who?” Holman shouted.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Rafferty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman made a dash for the car. The men held him back. “Don’t try it, sir;
- it’s too late to do any good.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He shook them off, and with his arms crossed in front of his head to
- protect his face he half stumbled, half fell through the opening that had
- once been a door. The car was half over on its side. The trunks, dashed
- into a heap on top of each other when the car had left the track, were all
- that supported the burning roof timbers. Between the trunks and the edge
- of the car there was a little space with the floor at an angle of
- forty-five degrees, and along this, head down, Holman crawled blindly. The
- floor was already beginning to smolder, the metal-bound edges of the
- trunks blistered his hands as he touched them. His senses reeled, but on
- and on he crawled, and in his mind over and over again the one thought:
- “Rafferty! My God, Rafferty!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then his hands touched something soft, and slowly, painfully, inch by
- inch, he struggled back dragging Rafferty after him. Somehow he reached
- the door, then a confused jumble of noises and nothing more until he
- returned to consciousness, and to the knowledge that he was back in his
- room at Big Cloud with the almond-eyed factotum in attendance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Belly much better? Likee eat?” inquired that individual solicitously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Holman grinned in spite of the pain. “No,” he answered; then as he closed
- his eyes again he muttered: “Tell Carleton I was right.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And he was, for two days afterward Rafferty publicly abdicated. He
- gathered the men in the fitting-shop and mounted to the cab of an engine
- jacked halfway up to the ceiling as before, only on this occasion it was
- at noon hour and not in the company’s time. His words were few and to the
- point, delivered with a force and eloquence that was all his own:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I sed he was a damned pink-faced dude, so I did. Well, I take ut back,
- d’ye moind? An’ fwhat’s more, I’ll flatten the face av any man fwhat sez I
- iver sed ut!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- II—THE LITTLE SUPER
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>ommy Regan backed
- the big compound mogul down past the string of dark-green coaches that he
- had pulled for a hundred and fifty miles, took the table with a slight
- jolt, and came to a stop in the roundhouse. As he swung himself from the
- cab, Healy, the turner, came up to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a great lad, that av yours,” Healy began, with a shake of his head—“a
- great lad; but mind ye this, Tommy Regan, there’ll be trouble for me an’
- you an’ him an’ the whole av us, if you don’t watch him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter this time, John?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Matter,” said Healy, ruefully; “there’s matter enough. The little cuss
- come blame near running 429 into the pit a while back, so he did.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where is he now?” Regan asked, with a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Devil a bit I know. I chased him out, an’ he started for over by the
- shops. An’ about an hour ago your missus come down an’ said the bhoy was
- no-wheres to be found, an’ that you was to look for him.” Regan pulled out
- his watch. “Six-thirty. Well,” he said, “I’ll go over and see if Grumpy
- knows anything about him. Next time the kid shows up around here, John,
- you give him the soft side of a tommy-bar, and send him home.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Healy scratched his head. “I will,” he said; “I’ll do ut. He’s a foine
- lad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan crossed the yard to the gates of the big shops. They were still
- unlocked, and he went through into the storekeeper’s office. Grumpy was
- sorting the brass time-checks. He glanced up as Regan came in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose you’re lookin’ fer yer kid again,” he said sourly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what I am, Steve,” Regan returned, diplomatically dispensing with
- the other’s nickname.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, he ain’t here,” Grumpy announced, returning to his checks. “I’ve
- just been through the shops, an’ I’d seen him if he was.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The engineer’s face clouded. “He must be somewhere about, Steve. John said
- he saw him come over here, and the wife was down to the roundhouse looking
- for him, so he didn’t go home. Let’s go through the shops and see if we
- can’t find him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t get no overtime fer chasin’ lost kids,” growled Grumpy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Nevertheless, he got up and walked through the door leading into the
- forge-shop, which Regan held open for him. The place was gloomy and
- deserted. Here and there a forge-fire, dying, still glowed dully. At the
- end of the room the men stopped, and Grumpy, noting Regan’s growing
- anxiety, gave surly comfort.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wouldn’t likely be here, anyhow,” he said. “Fitting-shop fer him; but
- we’ll try the machine-shop first on the way through.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two men went forward, prying behind planers, drills, shapers, and
- lathes. The machines took grotesque shapes in the deepening twilight, and
- in the silence, so incongruous with the usual noisy clang and clash of his
- surroundings, Regan’s nervousness increased.
- </p>
- <p>
- He hurried forward to the fitting-shop. Engines on every hand were
- standing over their respective pits in all stages of demolition, some on
- wheels, some blocked high toward the rafters, some stripped to the bare
- boiler-shell. Regan climbed in and out of the cabs, while Grumpy peered
- into the pits.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw! he ain’t here,” said Grumpy in disgust, wiping his hands on a piece
- of waste. “I told you he wasn’t. He’s home, mabbe, by now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan shook his head. “Bunty! Ho, Bunt-<i>ee</i>” he called. And again:
- “Bun-<i>tee!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was no answer, and he turned to retrace his steps when Grumpy caught
- him by the shoulder. The big iron door of the engine before them swung
- slowly back on its hinges, and from the front end there emerged a
- diminutive pair of shoes, topped by little short socks that had once been
- white, but now hung in grimy folds over the tops of the boots. A pair of
- sturdy, but very dirty, bare legs came gradually into view as their owner
- propelled himself forward on his stomach. They dangled for a moment,
- seeking footing on the plate beneath; then a very small boy, aged four, in
- an erstwhile immaculate linen sailor suit, stood upright on the
- foot-plate. The yellow curls were tangled with engine grease and cemented
- with cinders and soot. Here and there in spots upon his face the skin
- still retained its natural color.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty paused for a moment after his exertions to regain his breath, then,
- still gripping a hammer in his small fist, he straddled the draw-bar, and
- slid down the pilot to the floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- Grumpy burst into a guffaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty blinked at him reprovingly, and turned to his father.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’s been fixin’ the ‘iger-’ed,” he announced gravely.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan surveyed his son grimly. “Fixing what?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The ‘iger-’ed,” Bunty repeated. Then reproachfully: “Don’t know w’at a
- ‘iger-’ed is?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh,” said Regan, “the nigger-head, eh? Well, I guess there’s another
- nigger-head will get some fixing when your mother sees you, son.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He picked the lad up in his arms, and Bunty nestled confidingly, with one
- arm around his father’s neck. His tired little head sank down on the
- paternal shoulder, and before they had reached the gates Bunty was sound
- asleep.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the days that followed, Bunty found it no easy matter to elude his
- mother’s vigilance; but that was only the beginning of his troubles. The
- shop gates were always shut, and the latch was beyond his reach. Once he
- had found them open, and had marched boldly through, to find his way
- barred by the only man of whom he stood in awe. Grumpy had curtly ordered
- him away, and Bunty had taken to his heels and run until his small body
- was breathless.
- </p>
- <p>
- The roundhouse was no better. Old John would have none of him, and Bunty
- marveled at the change.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was a railroad man, and the shops were his heritage. His soul protested
- vigorously at the outrage that was being heaped upon him.
- </p>
- <p>
- It took him some time to solve the problem, but at last he found the way.
- Each afternoon Bunty would trudge sturdily along the track for a quarter
- of a mile to the upper end of the shops, where the big, wide engine doors
- were always open. Here four spur-tracks ran into the erecting-shop, and
- Bunty found no difficulty in gaining admittance. Once safe among the
- fitting-gang, the little Super, as the men called him, would strut around
- with important air, inspecting the work with critical eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- One lesson Bunty learned. Remembering his last interview with his mother,
- he took good care not to be locked in the shops again. So each night when
- the whistle blew he fell into line with the men, and, secure in their
- protection, would file with them past Grumpy as they handed in their
- time-checks. And Grumpy, unmindful of the spur-tracks, wondered how he got
- there, and scowled savagely.
- </p>
- <p>
- When Bunty was six, his father was holding down the swivel-chair in the
- Master Mechanic’s office of the Hill Division, and Bunty’s allegiance to
- the shops wavered. Not from any sense of disloyalty; but with his father’s
- promotion a new world opened to Bunty, and fascinated him. It was now the
- yard-shunter and headquarters that engaged his attention. The years, too,
- brought other changes to Bunty. The curls had disappeared, and his hair
- was cut now like his father’s. Long stockings had replaced the socks, and
- he wore real trousers; short ones, it is true, but real trousers none the
- less, with pockets in them.
- </p>
- <p>
- When school was over, he would fly up and down the yard on the stubby
- little engine, and Healy, doing the shunting then and forgetting past
- grievances, would let Bunty sit on the driver’s seat. In time Bunty
- learned to pull the throttle, but the reversing-lever was too much for his
- small stature, and the intricacies of the “air” were still a little beyond
- him. But Healy swore he’d make a driver of him—and he did.
- </p>
- <p>
- The evenings at the office Bunty loved fully as well. Headquarters were
- not much to boast about in those days. That was before competition forced
- a doubletrack system, and the train-dispatcher, with his tissue sheets,
- still held undisputed sway. They called them “offices” at Big Cloud out of
- courtesy—just the attic floor over the station, with one room to it.
- The floor space each man’s desk occupied was his office.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here Bunty would sit curled up in his father’s chair and listen to the men
- as they talked. If it was anything about a locomotive, he understood; if
- it was traffic or bridges or road-bed or dispatching, he would pucker his
- brows perplexedly and ask innumerable questions. But most of all he held
- Spence, the chief dispatcher, in deep reverence.
- </p>
- <p>
- Once, to his huge delight, Spence, holding his hand, had let him tap out
- an order. It is true that with the O. K. came back an inquiry as to the
- brand the dispatcher had been indulging in; but the sarcasm was lost on
- Bunty, for when Spence with a chuckle read off the reply, Bunty gravely
- asked if there was any answer. Spence shook his head and laughed. “No,
- son; I guess not,” he said. “We’ve got to maintain our dignity, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- That winter, on top of the regular traffic, and that was not light, they
- began to push supplies from the East over the Hill Division, preparing to
- double track the road from the western side of the foothills as soon as
- spring opened up. And while the thermometer crept steadily to zero, the
- Hill Division sweltered.
- </p>
- <p>
- Everybody and everything got it, the shops and the road-beds, the train
- crews and the rolling-stock. What little sleep Carleton, the super, got,
- he spent in formulating dream plans to handle the business. Those that
- seemed good to him when he awoke were promptly vetoed by the barons of the
- General Office in the far-off East.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan got no sleep. He raced from one end of the division to the other,
- and he did his best. Engine crews had to tinker anything less than a major
- injury for themselves: there was no room in the shops for them.
- </p>
- <p>
- But the men on the keys got it most of all. As the days wore into months,
- Spence’s face grew careworn and haggard; and the irritability from
- overwork of the men about him added to his discomfort. Human nature needs
- a safety-valve, and one night near the end of January when Regan and
- Carleton and Spence were gathered at the office, with Bunty in his
- accustomed place in his father’s chair, the master mechanic cut loose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s up to you, Spence,” he cried savagely, bringing his fist down with a
- crash on the desk. “There ain’t a pair of wheels on the division fit to
- pull a hand-car. Every engine’s a cripple, and getting lamer every day.
- The engine ain’t built, nor never will be, that’ll stand the schedule
- you’re putting them on through the hills, especially through the Gap.
- That’s a three per cent, with the bed like an S. You can’t make time
- there; you’ve got to crawl. You’re pulling the stay-bolts out of my
- engines, that’s what you’re doing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, being in no angelic mood, and glad to vent his feelings, growled
- assent.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spence raised his head from the keys, a red tinge of resentment on his
- cheeks. He picked up his pipe, packing it slowly as he looked at Regan and
- the super. “I’m taking all they’re sending,” he said quietly. He reached
- over for the train-sheet and handed it to the super. “You and Regan here
- are growling about the schedule. It’s your division, Carleton; but I’m not
- sure <i>you</i> know just what we’re handling every twenty-four hours.
- It’s push them through on top of each other somehow, or tell them
- down-East we can’t handle them. Do you want to do that?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Carleton, “I don’t; and what’s more, I won’t.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spence nodded. “I rather figured that was your idea. Well, we’ve about all
- we can do without nagging one another. I’m near in now, and so are you and
- Regan here, both of you. I’ve got to make time, Gap or no Gap. There’s so
- much moving there isn’t siding enough to cross them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re right,” said Carleton; “we can’t afford to jump each other. We’re
- all doing our best, and each of us knows it. How’s Number One and Two
- tonight?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spence studied for a moment before he answered: “Number One is forty
- minutes off, and Number Two’s an hour to the bad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton groaned. The Imperial Limited West and East, officially known on
- the train-sheets as One and Two, carried both the transcontinental mail
- and the de-luxe passengers. Of late the East had been making pertinent
- suggestions to the Division Superintendent that it would be as well if
- those trains ran off the Hill Division with a little more regard for their
- established schedule. So Carleton groaned. He got up and put on his hat
- and coat preparatory to going home. “Look here,” he said from the doorway,
- “they’ll stand for ‘most anything if we don’t misuse One and Two. They’re
- getting mighty savage about that, and they’ll drop hard before long. You
- fellows have got to take care of those trains, if nothing else on the
- division moves. That’s orders. I’ll shoulder all kicks coming on the rest
- of the traffic. Good-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- When Bunty left the office that night and walked home with his father, he
- had learned that there was another side to railroading besides the
- building and repairing of engines, and the delivery of magic tissue sheets
- to train crews that told them when and where to stop, and how to thread
- their way through hills and plains on a single-track road, with heaps of
- other trains, some going one way, some another. He understood vaguely and
- in a hazy kind of way that somewhere, many, many miles away, were men who
- sat in judgment on the doings of his father and Spence and Carleton; that
- these men were to be obeyed, that their word was law, and that their names
- were President and Directors.
- </p>
- <p>
- So Bunty, trotting beside his father, pondered these things. Being too
- weighty for him, he appealed: “Daddy, what’s president and directors?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan’s temper being still ruffled, he answered shortly: “Fools, mostly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty nodded gravely, and his education as a railroad man was almost
- complete. The rest came quickly, and the Gap did it.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Gap! There was not a man on the division, from track-walker to
- superintendent, who would not jump like a nervous colt if you said “Gap!”
- to them offhand and short-like. A peaceful stretch of track it looked, a
- little crooked, as Regan said, hugging the side of the mountain at the
- highest point of the division. The surroundings were undeniably grand. A
- sheer drop of eighteen-hundred feet to the canon below, with the
- surrounding mountains rearing their snow-capped peaks skyward, completed a
- picture of which the road had electrotypes and which it used in their
- magazine-advertising. What the picture did not show was the two-mile drop,
- where the road-bed took a straight three per cent and sometimes better, to
- the lower levels. So when Carleton or Spence or Regan, reading their
- magazines, saw the picture, they shuddered, and, remembering past history
- and fearful of the future, turned the page hurriedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- But to Bunty the Gap possessed the fascination of the unknown. He was
- wakened early the next morning by his father’s voice talking excitedly
- over the special wire with headquarters about the Gap and a wreck. He sat
- bolt upright, and listened with all his might; then he crawled noiselessly
- out of bed, and began to dress hastily. He heard his father speaking to
- his mother, and presently the front door banged. Bunty was dressed by that
- time and he crept downstairs and opened the door softly.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was just turning daylight as he started on a run for the yard. It was
- not far to the office,—a hundred yards or so,—and Bunty
- reached there in record time. Across the tracks by the roundhouse they
- were coupling on to the wrecker; and answering hasty summons, men, running
- from all directions, were quickly gathering.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty hesitated a minute on the platform, then he entered the station and
- tiptoed softly up the stairs. The office door was open, and from the top
- stair Bunty could see into the room. The night lamp was still burning on
- the dispatcher’s desk, and Spence was sitting there, working with frantic
- haste to clear the line. In the center of the room, the super, his father,
- and Flannagan, the wrecking boss, were standing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a freight smash,” Carleton was saying to Flannagan—“east edge
- of the Gap. You’ll have rights through, and no limit on your permit. Tell
- Emmons if he doesn’t make it in better than ninety minutes he’ll talk to
- me afterward. By the time you get there, Number Two will be crawling up
- the grade. She’s pulling the Old Man’s car, and that means get her through
- somehow if you have to drop the wreck, over the cliff. You can back down
- to Riley’s to let her pass. We’ll do the patching up afterward.
- Understand?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Flannagan nodded, and glanced impatiently at Spence.
- </p>
- <p>
- The super opened and shut his watch. “Ready, Spence?” he asked shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just a minute,” Spence answered quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty waited to hear no more. He turned and ran down the stairs and across
- the tracks as fast as his legs would carry him. He scrambled breathlessly
- up the steps of the tool-car and edged his way in among the men grouped
- near the door. He was fairly inside before they noticed him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hello,” cried Allan, Bunty’s bosom friend of the fitting-gang days,
- “here’s the little Super! What you doin’ here, kid?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m going up to the wreck,” Bunty announced sturdily.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men laughed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I guess <i>not</i> much, you’re not,” said Allan. “What do you
- think your father would say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nothing,” said Bunty, airily. “I just comed from the office,” he added
- artfully, “and I’ll tell you about the wreck if you like.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The men grouped around him in a circle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s at the Gap,” Bunty began, sparring for time as through the window he
- saw Flannagan coming from the office at a run. “And it’s a freight train,
- and—and it’s all smashed up, and——”
- </p>
- <p>
- The train started with a jerk that nearly took the men off their feet. At
- the same time Flannagan’s face appeared at the car door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All here, boys?” he called. Then he announced cheerfully: “The devil’s to
- pay up the line!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Meanwhile, Bunty, taking advantage of the interruption, had squirmed his
- way through the men to the far end of the car, and the train had bumped
- over the switches on to the main line before they remembered him. Then it
- was too late. They hauled him out from behind a rampart of tools, where he
- had intrenched himself, and Flannagan shook his fist, half-angrily,
- half-playfully, in Bunty’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You little devil, what are you doing here, eh?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty answered as before: “I’m going up to the wreck.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Humph!” said Flannagan, with a grin. “Well, I guess you are, and I guess
- you’ll be sorry, too, when you get back and your dad gets hold of you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Bunty was safe now, and he only laughed.
- </p>
- <p>
- Breakfastless, he shared the men’s grub and listened wide-eyed as they
- talked of wrecks in times gone by; but most of all he listened to the
- story of how his father, when he was pulling Number One, had saved the
- Limited by sticking to his post almost in the face of certain death.
- Bunty’s father was his hero, and his small soul glowed with happiness at
- the tale. He begged so hard for the story over again that Allan told it,
- and when he had finished, he slapped Bunty on the back. “And I guess
- you’re a chip of the old block,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty was very proud, squaring his shoulders, and planting his feet
- firmly to swing with the motion of the car.
- </p>
- <p>
- The speed of the train slackened as they struck the grade leading up the
- eastern side of the Gap. Flannagan set the men busily at work overhauling
- the kit. He paused an instant before Bunty. “Look here, kid,” he said,
- shaking a warning finger, “you keep out of the way, and don’t get into
- trouble.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It would have taken more than words from Flanna-gan to have curbed Bunty’s
- eagerness; so when the train came to a stop and the men tumbled out of the
- car with a rush, he followed. What he saw caused him to purse his lips and
- cry excitedly, “Gee!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Right in front of him a big mogul had turned turtle. Ditched by a spread
- rail, she had pulled three boxcars with her, and piled them up, mostly in
- splinters, on the tender. They had taken fire, and were burning furiously.
- Behind these were eight or ten cars still on the road-bed, but badly
- demolished from bumping over the ties when they had left the rails. Still
- farther down the track in the rear were the rest of the string, apparently
- uninjured. The snow was knee-deep at the side of the track, but Bunty
- plowed manfully through it, climbing up the embankment to a place of
- vantage.
- </p>
- <p>
- His eyes blazed with excitement as he watched the scene before him and
- listened to the hoarse shouts of the men, the crash of pick and ax, and,
- above it all, the sharp crackle of the fire as the flames, growing in
- volume, bit deeper and deeper into the wreck. Fiercely as the men fought,
- the fire, with its long start, kept them from making any headway against
- it. Already it had reached some of the cars standing on the track.
- </p>
- <p>
- From where Bunty stood he could see the track dipping away in a long grade
- to the valley below. They called that grade the Devil’s Slide, and the
- wreck was on the edge of it, with the caboose and some half-dozen cars
- still resting on the incline. As he looked, far below him he saw a trail
- of smoke. It was Number Two climbing the grade. By this time the
- excitement of his surroundings had worn off a little, and the arrival of
- the Limited offered a new attraction.
- </p>
- <p>
- He clambered down from his perch and began to pick his way past the wreck.
- Flannagan, begrimed and dirty, was talking to Emmons. “I don’t like to do
- it,” Bunty heard Flannagan say, “but we’ll have to blow up that box-car if
- we can’t stop the fire any other way, or we’ll have a blaze down the whole
- line. The train crew says there’s turpentine—two cars of it—next
- the flat there, and if that catches—Hi, there, kid,” he broke off to
- yell, as he caught sight of Bunty, “you get back to the tool-car, and stay
- there!”
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty ran—in the other direction. He knew Number Two would stop
- a little the other side of the wreck, and that there would be a great big
- ten-wheeler pulling her, all as bright as a new dollar and glistening in
- paint and gold-leaf. When he pulled up breathless and happy by the side of
- Number Two, Masters, the engineer, was giving Engine 901 an oil round,
- touching the journals critically with the back of his hand as he moved
- along.
- </p>
- <p>
- At sight of Bunty, the engineer laid his oil-can on the slide-bars and
- grinned as he extended his hand. “How are you, Bunty?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty, accepting the proffered hand, replied gravely: “I’m pretty
- well, Mr. Masters, thank you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glad to hear it, Bunty. How did you get here?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I comed up with the wrecker-train. It’s a’ awful smash.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it, now! Think they’ll have the line cleared soon?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, no,” Bunty replied, eyeing the cab of the big engine wistfully. “Not
- for ever and ever so long.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Masters’ eyes followed Bunty’s glance. “Want to get up in the cab, Bunty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, please!” Bunty cried breathlessly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” said Masters, boosting the lad through the gangway. Then
- warningly: “Don’t touch anything.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty promised.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was only four hundred yards up to the wreck; but that was enough.
- Masters and his firemen left their train and went to get a view at close
- quarters. When it was all over, it was up to the wrecking boss and the
- engine crew of Number Two. Flannagan swore he blocked the trucks of the
- cars on the incline; but Flannagan lied, and he got clear. Masters and his
- mate had no chance to lie, for they broke rules, and they got their time.
- </p>
- <p>
- Be that as it may, Bunty sat on the driver’s seat of the Imperial Limited
- and watched the engineer and fireman start up the track. He lost sight of
- the men long before they reached the wreck. They were still in view, but
- he was very busy: he was playing “pretend.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty’s imagination was vivid enough to make the game a fascinating one
- whenever he indulged in it, and that was often. But now it was almost
- reality, and his fancy was little taxed to supply what was lacking. He was
- engineer of the Limited, and they had just stopped at a station. He leaned
- out of the cab window to get the “go-ahead” signal. Then his hand went
- through the motion of throwing over the reversing-lever and opening the
- throttle. And now he was off; faster and faster. He rocked his body to and
- fro to supply the motion of the cab. He sat very grim and determined,
- peering straight ahead. He was booming along now at full speed. They were
- coming to a crossing. “<i>Too-oo-o, toot, toot!</i>” cried Bunty at the
- top of his shrill treble, for the rules said you must whistle at every
- crossing, and Bunty knew the rules. Now they were coming to the next
- station, and he began to slow up. “<i>Ding-dong, ding—</i>”
- </p>
- <h3>
- <i>BANG!</i>
- </h3>
- <p>
- Bunty nearly fell from his seat with fright. Ahead of him, up the track,
- there was a column of smoke as a mass of wreckage rose in the air, and
- then a crash. Flannagan had blown up a car. Bunty stared, fascinated, not
- at the explosion, but at the rear end of the wreck on the grade. He rubbed
- his eyes in bewilderment, then he scrambled over the side of the seat. He
- paused half-way off, looking again through the front window to make sure.
- There was no doubt of it: the cars were beginning to roll down the track
- toward him. He waited for no more, but rushed to the gangway to jump off.
- Then he stopped as the story Allan had told about his father came back to
- him. Bunty’s heart thumped wildly as he turned white-faced and determined.
- No truly engineer would leave his train; his father had not, and Bunty did
- not.
- </p>
- <p>
- The reversing-lever was in the back notch where Masters had left it when
- he stopped the train. It was Bunty’s task to reach and open the throttle.
- He climbed up on the seat and stood on tiptoe. Leaning over, he grasped
- the lever with both hands and pulled it open. What little science of
- engine-driving Bunty possessed, was lost in the terror that gripped him.
- The runaway cars were only a couple of hundred yards away now, and,
- gaining speed with every rail they traveled, spelt death and’ destruction
- to the Imperial Limited, if they ever reached her. The men at the top of
- the grade were yelling their lungs out and waving their arms in frantic
- warning.
- </p>
- <p>
- The train started with a jolt that threw Bunty back on the seat. For an
- instant the big drivers raced like pin-wheels, then they bit into the
- rails, and aided by the grade, Number Two began to back slowly down the
- hill.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty picked himself up, his little frame shaking with dry sobs. The
- freight-cars had gained on him in the last minute, and had nearly reached
- him. Again he leaned over for the throttle, and hanging grimly to it,
- pulled it open another notch, and then another, and then wide open. 901
- took it like a frightened thoroughbred. Rearing herself from the track
- under her two hundred and ten pounds of steam, she jumped into the cars
- behind her for a starter with a shock that played havoc with the
- passengers’ nerves. Then she settled down to travel. The Devil’s Slide is
- two miles long, and some pretty fair running has been made on it in times
- of stress; but Bunty holds the record,—it’s good yet,—and
- Bunty was only an amateur!
- </p>
- <p>
- It was neck and neck for a while, and there was almost a pile-up on the
- nose of 901’s pilot before she began to hold her own. Gradually she began
- to pull away, and by the time they were half-way down the hill the
- distance between her and the truant freight-cars was widening. The speed
- was terrific.
- </p>
- <p>
- Pale and terror-stricken, Bunty now crouched on the driver’s seat. Time
- and again the engineer’s whistle in the cab over his head signaled, now
- entreatingly, now with frantic insistence. But Bunty gave it no heed; his
- only thought was for those cars in front of him that were always there. He
- cried to himself with little moans.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a sickening slur as they flew round a curve. 901 heeled to the
- tangent, one set of drivers fairly lifted from the track. When she found
- her wheel base again, Bunty, shaken from his hold, was clinging to the
- reversing-lever. He shut his eyes as he pulled himself back to his seat.
- When he looked again, he saw the freight-cars hit the curve above him,
- then slew as they jumped the track and, with a crash that reached him
- above the roar and rattle of the train, the booming whir of the great
- drivers beneath him, go pitching headlong down the embankment.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty rose to his knees, and for the first time looked out of the side
- window, to find a new terror there as the rocks and trees and poles
- flashed dizzily by him. He turned and looked behind. A man was clinging to
- the hand-rail of the mail-car, and another, lying flat, was crawling over
- the coal heaped high on the tender. Bunty dashed the tears from his eyes;
- he was no “fraidy” kid. He stood up, and holding on to the frame of the
- window, staggered toward the throttle. As he reached for it, 901 lurched
- madly, and Bunty lost his balance and fell headlong upon the iron floor
- plate of the cab. Then it was all dark.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">N</span>umber Two pulled
- into Big Cloud that night ten hours late, and it brought Bunty. His father
- and Carleton and Spence and the shop-hands were on the platform. From the
- private car, which carried the tail-lights, an elderly gentleman got off
- with Bunty in his arms. The men cheered, and while the master mechanic
- rushed forward to take his son, the super and Spence drew back
- respectfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mr. Regan,” said the old gentleman, with tears in his eyes, “you ought to
- be pretty proud of this little lad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan tried to speak, but the words choked somehow.
- </p>
- <p>
- The old gentleman swung himself back upon the car. “Good-by, Bunty!” he
- called.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Bunty, from the depths of the blanket they had wrapped around him,
- called back, “Good-by, sir!” When Bunty was propped up in bed, his father
- told him how the express messenger had stopped the train and carried him
- back into the Pullmans.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bunty listened gravely. “Yes,” he said, nodding his head; “they was awful
- good to me, and the man that tooked me off the train told me stories, and
- then I told him some, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What did you tell him?” Regan asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, ’bout trains and shops and presidents and directors and—and lots
- of things.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Presidents and directors!” said Regan, in surprise. “What did you tell
- him about them?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told him what you said—that they was fools, and you knew, ’cause
- you’d seen them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan whistled softly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And,” continued Bunty, “he laughed, and when I asked him what he was
- laughing at, he gived me a piece of paper and told me to give it to you,
- and you’d tell me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan groaned. “Guess it’s my time all right,” he muttered. “Where’s the
- paper, Bunty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He putted it in my pocket.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan drew the chair with Bunty’s clothing on it toward him, and began a
- hurried search. He fished out a narrow slip of paper and unfolded it on
- his knee. It was a check for one thousand dollars payable to Master Bunty
- Regan, and signed by the President of the road.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- III—“IF A MAN DIE”
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">E</span>ast and West now,
- the Transcontinental is doubletracked, all except the Hill Division—and
- that, in the nature of things, probably never will be. If you know the
- mountains, you know the Hill Division. From the divisional point, Big
- Cloud, that snuggles at the eastern foothills, the right of way, like the
- trail of a great sinewy serpent, twists and curves through the mountains,
- through the Rockies, through the Sierras, and finally emerges to link its
- steel with a sister division, that stretches onward to the great blue of
- the Pacific Ocean.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is a stupendous piece of track. It has cost fabulous sums, and the
- lives of many men; it has made the fame of some, and been the graveyard of
- more. The history of the world, in big things, in little things, in
- battles, in strife, in suddenf death, in peace, in progress, and in
- achievement, has its counterpart, in miniature, in the history of the Hill
- Division. There is a page in that history that belongs to “Angel” Breen.
- This is Breen’s story.
- </p>
- <p>
- It has been written much, and said oftener, that men in every walk of
- life, save one, may make mistakes and live them down, but that the
- dispatcher who falls once is damned forever. And it is true. I am a
- dispatcher. I know.
- </p>
- <p>
- Where he got the nickname “Angel” from, is more than I can tell you, and
- I’ve wondered at it often enough myself. Contrast, I guess it was.
- Contrast with the boisterous, rough and ready men around him, for this
- happened back in the early days when men were what a life of hardship and
- no comfort made them. No, Breen wasn’t soft—far from it. He was just
- quiet and mild-mannered. It must have been that—contrast. Anyway, he
- was “Angel” when I first knew him, and you can draw your own conclusions
- as to what he is now—I’m not saying anything at all about that.
- </p>
- <p>
- Where did he come from? What was he before he came here? I don’t know. I
- don’t believe anybody knew, or ever gave the matter a thought. That sort
- of question was never asked—it was too delicate and pointed in the
- majority of cases. A man was what he was out here, not what he had been;
- he made good, or he didn’t. Not that I mean to imply that there was
- anything crooked or anything wrong with Breen’s past, I’m sure there
- wasn’t for that matter, but I’m just trying to make you understand that
- when I say Breen had the night trick in the dispatcher’s office here in
- Big Cloud, I’m beginning at the beginning.
- </p>
- <p>
- Breen wasn’t popular. He wasn’t a good enough mixer for that. Personally,
- it isn’t anything I’d hold up against him, or any other man. Popularity is
- too often cheap, and being a “good fellow” isn’t always a license for a
- man to puff out his chest—though most of them do it, and that’s the
- high sign that what I say is right. No, I’m not moralizing, I’m telling a
- story, you’ll see what I mean before I get through. I say Breen wasn’t
- popular. He got the reputation of thinking himself a little above the rank
- and file of those around him, stuck-up, to put it in cold English, and
- that’s where they did him an injustice. It was the man’s nature,
- unobtrusive, retiring—different from theirs, if you get my point,
- and they couldn’t understand just because it was different. The
- limitations weren’t all up to Breen.
- </p>
- <p>
- If they had known, or taken the trouble to know, as much about him as they
- could have known before passing judgment on him, perhaps things might have
- been a little different; perhaps not, I won’t say, for it’s pretty
- generally accepted in railroad law that a dispatcher’s slip is a capital
- offense, and there’s no court of appeal, no stay of execution, no
- anything, and to all intents and purposes he’s dead from the moment that
- slip is made. There have been lots of cases like that, lots of them, and
- there’s no class of men I pity more—a slip, and damned for the rest
- of their lives! I don’t say that because I’m a dispatcher myself. We’re
- only human, aren’t we? Mistakes like that, God knows, aren’t made
- intentionally. Sometimes a man is overworked, sometimes queer brain kinks
- happen to him just as they do to every other man. We’re ranked as human in
- everything but our work. I’m not saying it’s not right. In the last
- analysis I suppose it has to be that way. It’s part of the game, and we
- know the rules when we “sit in.” We’ve no reason to complain, only I get a
- shiver every time I read a newspaper headline that I know, besides being a
- death-warrant, is tearing the heart out of some poor devil. You’ve seen
- the kind I mean, read scores of them—“Dispatcher’s Blunder Costs
- Many Lives”—or something to the same effect. Maybe you’ll think it
- queer, but for days afterward I can’t handle an order book or a train
- sheet when I’m on duty without my heart being in my mouth half the time.
- </p>
- <p>
- What’s this got to do with Breen? Well, in one way, it hasn’t anything to
- do with him; and, then again, in another way, it has. I want you to know
- that a blunder means something to a dispatcher besides the loss of his
- job. Do you think they’re a coldblooded, calloused lot? I want you to know
- that they care. Oh, yes, they’re human. They’ve got a heart and they’ve
- got a soul; the one to break, the other to sear. My God! think of it—a
- slip. That’s the ghastly horror of it all—a <i>slip!</i> don’t you
- think they can <i>feel?</i> don’t you think their own agony of mind is
- punishment enough without the added reproach, and worse, of their fellows?
- But let it go, it’s the Law of the Game.
- </p>
- <p>
- I said they didn’t know much about Breen out here then except that he was
- a pretty good dispatcher, but as far as that goes it didn’t help him any,
- rather the reverse, when the smash came. The better the man the harder the
- fall, what? It’s generally that way, isn’t it? Perhaps you’re wondering
- what I know about him. I’ll tell you. If any one knew Breen, I knew him. I
- was only a kid then, I’m a man now. I hadn’t even a coat—Breen gave
- me one. I’m a dispatcher—Breen taught me, and no better man on the
- “key” than Breen ever lived, a better man than I could ever hope to be,
- yet he slipped. Do you wonder I shiver when I read those things? I’m not a
- religious man, but I’ve asked God on my bended knees, over and over again,
- to keep me from the horror, the suffering, the blasted life that came to
- Breen and many another man—through a slip. Yes, if any one knew
- Breen, I did. All I know, all I’ve got, everything in this whole wide
- world, I owe to Breen—“Angel” Breen.
- </p>
- <p>
- You probably read of the Elktail wreck at the time it happened, but you’ve
- forgotten about it by now. Those things don’t live long in the mind unless
- they come pretty close home to you; there’s too many other things
- happening every hour in this big pulsing world to make it anything more
- than the sensation of the moment. But out here the details have cause
- enough to be fixed in the minds of most of us, not only of the wreck
- itself, but of what happened afterward as well—and I don’t know
- which of the two was the worse. You can judge for yourself I’m not going
- into technicalities. You’ll understand better if I don’t. You’ll remember
- I said that the Hill Division is only single-tracked. That means, I don’t
- need to tell you, that it’s up to the dispatcher every second, and all
- that stands between the trains and eternity is the bit of tissue tucked in
- the engineer’s blouse and its duplicate crammed in the conductor’s side
- pocket. Orders, meeting points, single track, you understand? The
- dispatcher holds them all, every last one of them, for life or death, men,
- women and children, train crews and company property, all—and Breen
- slipped!
- </p>
- <p>
- No one knows to this day how it happened. I daresay some eminent authority
- on psychology might explain it, but the explanation would be too
- high-browed and too far over my head to understand it even if he did. I
- only know the facts and the result. Breen sent out a lap order on Number
- One, the Imperial Limited, westbound, and Number Eighty-Two, a fast
- freight, perishable, streaking east. Both were off schedule, and he was
- nursing them along for every second he could squeeze. Back through the
- mountains, both ways, all through the night, he’d given them the best of
- everything—the Imperial clear rights, and Eighty-Two pretty nearly,
- if not quite, as good. Then he fixed the meeting point for the two trains.
- </p>
- <p>
- I read a story once where the dispatcher sent out a lap order on two
- trains and his mistake was staring at him all the time from his order
- book. I guess that was a slip of the pen, and he never noticed it. That
- was queer enough, but what Breen did was queerer still. His order book
- showed straight as a string. The freight was to hold at Muddy Lake, ten
- miles west of Elktail, for Number One. Number One, of course, as I told
- you, running free. Somehow, I don’t know how, it’s one of those things you
- can’t explain, a subconscious break between the mind and the mechanical,
- physical action, you’ve noticed it in little things you’ve done yourself,
- Breen wired the word “Elktail” instead of “Muddy Lake”—and never
- knew it—never had a hint that anything was wrong—never caught
- it on the repeat, and gave back his O. K. The order, the written order in
- the book, was exactly as it should be. It read Muddy Lake—that was
- right, Muddy Lake. You see what happened? There wasn’t time for the
- freight to make Elktail, but she got within three miles of it—and
- that’s as far as she ever got! In a nasty piece of track, full of trestles
- and gorges, where the right of way bends worse than the letter S, they
- met, the two of them, head on—Number One and Number Eighty-Two!
- </p>
- <p>
- And Breen didn’t know what he had done even after the details began to
- pour in. How could he know? What was Eighty-Two doing east of Muddy Lake?
- She should have been waiting there for Number One to pass her. The order
- book showed that plain enough. And all through the rest of that night,
- while he worked like a madman clearing the line, getting up hospital
- relief, and wrecking trains—with Carle-ton, he was super then,
- gray-faced and haggard, like the master of a storm-tossed liner on his
- bridge giving orders, pacing the room, cursing at times at his own
- impotency—Breen didn’t know, neither of them knew, where the blame
- lay. But the horror of the thing had Breen in its grip even then. I was
- there that night, and I can see him now bent over under the green-shaded
- lamp—I can see Carleton’s face, and it wasn’t a pleasant face to
- see. One thing I remember Breen said. Once, as the sounder pitilessly
- clicked a message more ghastly than any that had gone before, adding to
- the number of those whose lives had gone out forever, adding to the tale
- of the wounded, to the wild, mad story of chaos and ruin, Breen lifted his
- head from the key for a moment, pushed his hair out of his eyes with a
- nervous, shaky sweep of his hand, and looked at Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s horrible, horrible,” he whispered; “<i>but think of the man who did
- it</i>. Death would be easy compared to what he must feel. It makes me as
- weak as a kitten to think of it, Carleton. My God, man, don’t you see! I,
- or any other dispatcher, might do this same thing to-morrow, the next day,
- or the day after. Tell me again, Carleton, tell me again, that order’s
- straight.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t lose your nerve,” Carleton answered sharply. “Whoever has
- blundered, it’s not you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Irony? No. It’s beyond all that, isn’t it? It’s getting about as near to
- the tragedy of a man’s life as you can get. It’s getting as deep and
- tapping as near bed-rock as we’ll ever do this side of the Great Divide.
- Think of it! Think of Breen that night—it’s too big to get, isn’t
- it? God pity him! Those words of his have rung in my ears all these years,
- and that scene I can see over again in every detail every time I close my
- eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the few hours left before dawn that morning, there wasn’t time to give
- much attention to the cause. There was enough else to think of, enough to
- give every last man on the division from car tink to superintendent all,
- and more, than they could handle—the investigation could come later.
- But it never came.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was no need for one. How did they find out? It came like the crack
- of doom, and Breen got it—got it—and it seemed to burst the
- floodgates of his memory open, seemed to touch that dormant chord, and he
- knew, knew as he knew that he had a God, what he had done.
- </p>
- <p>
- They found the order that made the meeting point Elktail tucked in
- Mooney’s jumper when, after they got the crane at work, they hauled him
- out from under his engine. Who was Mooney? Engineer of the freight. They
- found him before they did any of his train crew, or his fireman either,
- for that matter. Dead? Yes. I’m a dispatcher, look at it from the other
- side if you want to, it’s only fair. That bit of tissue cleared Mooney, of
- course—but it sent him to his death. Yes, I know, good God, don’t
- you think I <i>know</i> what it means—to slip?
- </p>
- <p>
- It was just before Davis, Breen’s relief, came on for the morning trick,
- in fact Davis was in the room, when Breen got the report. He scribbled it
- on a pad, word by word as it came in, for Carleton to see. For a minute it
- didn’t seem to mean anything to him, and then, as I say, he got it. I
- never saw such a look on a man’s face before, and I pray God I never may
- again. He seemed to wither up, blasted as the oak is blasted by a
- lightning stroke. The horror, the despair, the agony in his eyes are
- beyond any words of mine to describe, and you wouldn’t want to hear it if
- I could tell you. He held out his arms pitifully like a pleading child.
- His lips moved, but he had to try over and over again before any sound
- came from them. There was no thought of throwing the blame on anybody
- else. Breen wasn’t that kind. Oh, yes, he could have done it. He could
- have put the blunder on the night man at the Gap where Mooney received his
- Elktail holding order, and Breen’s order book would have left it an open
- question as to which of the two had made the mistake—would probably
- have let him out and damned the other. You say from the way he acted he
- didn’t think of that and therefore the temptation didn’t come to him. Yes,
- I know what you mean. Not so much to Breen’s credit, what? Well, I don’t
- know, it depends on the way you look at it. I’d rather believe the thought
- didn’t come because the man’s soul was too <i>clean</i>. It was clean them—no
- matter what he did afterward.
- </p>
- <p>
- There have been death scenes of dispatchers before, many of them—there
- will be others in the days to come, many of them. So long as there are
- railroads and so long as men are frail as men, lacking the infallibility
- of a higher power, just so long will they be inevitable. But no death
- scene of a dispatcher’s career was ever as this one was. Breen was his own
- judge, his own jury, his own executioner. Do you think I could ever forget
- his words? He pointed his hand toward the window that faced the western
- stretch of track, toward the foothills, toward the mighty peaks of the
- Rockies that towered beyond them, and the life, the being of the man was
- in his voice. They came slowly, those words, wrenched from a broken heart,
- torn from a shuddering soul.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wish to God that it were me in their stead. Christ be merciful! I did
- it, Carleton. I don’t know how. I did it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- No one answered him. No one spoke. For a moment that seemed like all
- eternity there was silence, then Breen, his arms still held out before
- him, walked across the room as a blind man walks in his own utter
- darkness, walked to the door and passed out—alone. Those few steps
- across the room—alone! I’ve thought of that pretty often since—they
- seemed so horribly, grimly, significantly in keeping with what there was
- of life left for the stricken man—<i>alone</i>. It’s a pretty hard
- word, that, sometimes, and sometimes it brings the tears.
- </p>
- <p>
- I don’t know how I let him go like that. I was too stunned to move I
- guess, but I reached him at the foot of the stairs as he stepped out onto
- the platform. There wasn’t anything I could say, was there? What would you
- have said?
- </p>
- <p>
- No man knew better than Breen himself what this would mean to him. He was
- wrecked, wrecked worse than that other wreck, for his was a living death.
- There weren’t any grand jurys or things of that kind out here then, not
- that it would have made any difference to Breen if there had been. You
- can’t put any more water in a pail when it’s already full, can you? You
- can’t add to the maximum, can you? don’t you think Breen’s punishment was
- beyond the reach of man or men to add to, or, for that matter, to abate by
- so much as the smallest fraction? It was, God knows it was—all
- except one final twinge, that I believe now settled him, though I’ll say
- here that whatever it did to Breen it’s not for me to judge her. Who am I,
- that I should? It is between her and her Maker. I’ll come to that in a
- minute.
- </p>
- <p>
- Yes, Breen knew well enough what it meant to him, but his thoughts that
- morning as we walked up the street weren’t, I know right well, on himself—he
- was thinking of those others. And I, well, I was thinking of Breen.
- Wouldn’t you? I told you I owed Breen everything I had in the world.
- Neither of us said a word all the way up to his boarding-house. It was
- almost as though I wasn’t with him for all the attention he paid to me.
- But he knew I was there just the same. I like to think of that. I wasn’t
- very old then—I’m not offering that as an excuse, for I’m not
- ashamed to admit that I was near to tears—if I’d been older perhaps
- I could have said or done something to help. As it was, all I could do was
- to turn that one black thought over and over and over again in my mind.
- Breen’s living death, death, death, death. That’s the way it hit me, the
- way it caught me, and the word clung and repeated itself as I kept step
- beside him.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was dead, dead to hope, ambition, future, everything, as dead as though
- he lay outstretched before me in his coffin. It seemed as if I could see
- him that way. And then, don’t ask me why, I don’t know, I only know such
- things happen, come upon you unconsciously, suddenly, there flashed into
- my mind that bit of verse from the Bible, you know it—“if a man die,
- shall he live again?” I must have said it out loud without knowing it, for
- he whirled upon me quick as lightning, placed his two hands upon my
- shoulders, and stared with a startled gaze into my eyes. I say startled.
- It was, but there was more. There seemed for a second a gleam of hope
- awakened, hungry, oh, how hungry, pitiful in its yearning, and then the
- uselessness, the futility of that hope crushed it back, stamped it out,
- and the light in his eyes grew dull and died away.
- </p>
- <p>
- We had halted at the door of his boarding-house and I made as though to go
- upstairs with him to his room, but he stopped me.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not now, Charlie, boy,” he said, shaking his head and trying to smile;
- “not now. I want to be alone.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And so I left him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Alone! <i>He wanted to be alone</i>. Were ever words more full of cruel
- mockery! It seems hard to understand sometimes, doesn’t it? And we get to
- questioning things we’d far better leave alone. I know at first I used to
- wonder why Almighty God ever let Breen make that slip. He could have
- stopped it, couldn’t He? But that’s riot right. We’re running on train
- orders from the Great Dispatcher, and the finite can’t span the infinite.
- </p>
- <p>
- Maybe you’ll think it queer that I left Breen like that, let him go to his
- room alone. You’re thinking that in his condition he might do himself harm—end
- it all, to put it bluntly. Well, that thought didn’t come to me then, it
- did afterward, but not then. Why? It must have been just the innate
- consciousness that he wouldn’t do that sort of thing. Some men face things
- one way, some face them another. It’s a question of individuality and
- temperament. I don’t think Breen could have done anything like that, I
- know he seemed so far apart from it in my mind that, as I say, the thought
- didn’t come to me. He was too big a man, big enough to have faced what was
- before him, faced conditions, faced the men, though God knows they treated
- him like skulking coyote, if it had not been for her. I want to stand
- right on this. Breen would never have done what he did if she had $cted
- differently. That much I know. But, I want to say it again, I’ve no right
- to judge her.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perhaps you’ve read that story of Kipling’s about the Black Tyrone
- Regiment that saw their dead? Well, Breen, as I told you, at the
- beginning, wasn’t popular, and the boys had seen their dead. Do you
- understand? Pariah, outcast, what you like, they made him, all except pity
- they gave him, and I say he would have taken it all, accepted it all, only
- there are some things too heavy for a man to bear, aren’t there? Load
- limit, the engineers call it when they build their bridge. Well, there’s a
- load limit on the heart and brain and soul of a man just as there is on a
- bridge; and while one, strained beyond the breaking point, goes crashing
- in a horrid mass of twisted wreckage to the bottom of the canon, to the
- bottom of the gorge, into the rushing, boiling waters of the river
- beneath, the other crashes, a damned soul, to the bottom of hell. Kitty
- Mooney had seen her dead. Kitty Mooney, the engineer’s sister! And Breen
- loved her, was going to marry her. That’s all.
- </p>
- <p>
- How do I know? How do you know? Perhaps it was grief, perhaps it was
- hysteria, perhaps it was according to the light God gave her and she
- couldn’t understand, perhaps it was only wild, unreasoning, frantic
- passion. I don’t know. I only know she called him—a <i>murderer</i>.
- She couldn’t have loved him, you say. Perhaps no, perhaps yes. Does it
- make any difference? Breen thought she did, and Breen loved <i>her</i>. I
- don’t know. I only know that where he looked for a ray of mercy, <i>her</i>
- mercy, to light the blackened depths, for the touch, <i>her</i> touch,
- that would have held him back from the brink, for the word of comfort, <i>her</i>
- word, that would have bid him stand like a gallant soldier facing untold
- odds, he received, instead, a condemnation more terrible than any that had
- gone before, and a bleeding heart dried bitter as gall, a patient,
- grief-stricken man became a vicious snapping wolf, and “Angel” Breen—a
- devil.
- </p>
- <p>
- Would I have been a stronger man than Breen? Would you? Would I have done
- differently than Kitty Mooney did if I had been in her place? Would you?
- We don’t know, do we? No one knows. God keep us from ever knowing. The
- poor devil in the gutters, the wretched, ruined lives of women who have
- lost their grip and drunk the dregs, the human, stranded, battered wrecks
- we see around us, were once like you and me. We don’t know, do we? God
- pity them! God keep us from the sneer! Our strength has never been
- measured. It may be no greater than theirs. To-morrow it may be you or I.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was pretty lawless out here in those days. We had the riff-raff of the
- East, and worse; and there was nothing to restrain them, nothing much to
- keep them in check, and they did about as they liked. They brought the
- touch into the picture of the West that the West hasn’t lived down yet,
- and I’m not sure ever will. The brawling, gambling, gun-handling type, the
- thief, the desperado, the bad man, rotten bad, bad to the core. They’ve
- been stamped out now most of them, but it was different then. <i>They</i>
- didn’t turn a cold shoulder to Breen. Why should they? They were outcasts
- and pariahs, too, weren’t they? And Breen, well, I guess you understand as
- well as I do, and you know as I know that when a man like that goes he
- goes the limit. There’s no middle course for some men, they’re not made
- that way.
- </p>
- <p>
- Whatever holds them for good, or whatever holds them for bad, it holds
- them all, either way, all, body, mind and spirit, all. And that is true in
- spite of the fact that, often enough, there’s some one thing, it may be a
- little thing, it may be a big thing, but some one thing that the worst of
- us balk at, can’t do. It’s not morality, it’s not conscience, a man gets
- way beyond all that; it’s a memory of the past perhaps, a something bred
- in him from babyhood. I don’t know. You can’t treat human nature like a
- specimen on the glass slide under a microscope. There is no specimen. As
- there are millions of people, so is each one in some way different from
- the other. You can’t classify, you can’t tabulate the different kinks into
- a list and learn it by heart, can you? The man who says he knows human
- nature says he is as wise as the God who made him, and that man is a poor
- fool. That’s right, isn’t it? And so I say that, strange as it may seem,
- in the worst of us, fall as low as we will, there’s generally some one
- thing our soul, what’s left of it, revolts at doing. Breen was a railroad
- man. Railroading was in his blood. I want you to get that. It was part of
- him. Any man that’s worth his salt in this business is that way. It’s in
- the blood or it isn’t; you’re a railroad man or you’re not.
- </p>
- <p>
- Breen disappeared from Big Cloud and I didn’t see him from the day Kitty
- Mooney turned him from her door until the night—but I’m coming to
- that—that’s the end. There’s a word or two that goes before—so
- that you’ll understand. He disappeared from Big Cloud, but he didn’t leave
- the mountains. Maybe back of it all, an almost impossible theory if you
- like, but I can understand it, a something in him wouldn’t let him run
- away. He did run away, you say. Yes, but there’s the queer brain kink
- again. Perhaps he temporized. You temporize. I temporize. We try to fool
- and delude sometimes, snatch at loopholes, snatch at straws, to bolster up
- our self-respect, don’t we? That’s what I mean when I say it’s possible he
- couldn’t run away. He clung to the straw, the loophole, that running away
- was measured in <i>miles</i>. I don’t say that was it, for I don’t know.
- It’s possible. We heard of him from time to time as the months went by,
- and the things we heard weren’t pleasant things to hear. He drifted from
- bad to worse, until that something that he couldn’t do brought him to a
- halt—brought the end.
- </p>
- <p>
- Don’t ask me when Breen threw in his lot with Black Dempsey and the band
- of fiends that called him leader—the ugliest, soul-blackened set of
- fiends that ever polluted the West, and that’s using pretty strong
- language. Don’t ask me how Breen got to Big Cloud that night away from the
- others waiting to begin their hellish work. Don’t ask me. I don’t know. <i>Why</i>
- he did it—is different. That, I can tell you. What they wanted him
- to do, to have a part in, was that one thing I was speaking about, the one
- thing he couldn’t do. Breen was a railroad man, railroading was in his
- blood, that’s all—but it’s everything—railroading was in his
- blood. As for the rest, maybe he didn’t know what they were really up to
- until the last moment, and then stole away from them. Maybe they found it
- out, suspected him, and some of them followed him, tried to stop him,
- tried to keep him from reaching here. But what’s the use of speculating? I
- never knew, I never will know. Breen can’t tell me, can he? And all that I
- can tell you is what I saw and heard that night.
- </p>
- <p>
- I had the night trick then—Breen’s job—they gave me Breen’s
- job. It seemed somehow at first like sacrilege to take it—as though
- I was robbing him of it, taking it away from him, wronging, stripping,
- impoverishing the man to whom I owed even the knowledge that made me fit,
- that made it possible, to hold down a key—his key. Of course, that
- was only sensitiveness, but you understand, don’t you? It caught me hard
- when I first “sat in,” but gradually the feeling wore off; not that I ever
- forgot, I haven’t yet for that matter, only time blunts the sharp edges,
- and routine, habit, and custom do the rest. I don’t need to tell you that
- I remember that night. Remember it!
- </p>
- <p>
- That was before this station was built, and in those days we had an old
- wooden shack here that did duty for freight house, station, division
- headquarters, and everything else all rolled into one. The dispatcher’s
- room was upstairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- Things were moving slick as a whistle that night. No extra traffic, no
- road troubles, in—out, in—out, all along the line the trains
- were running like clockwork from one end of the division to the other. If
- there was anything on my mind at all it was the Limited, Number Two,
- eastbound. We were handling a good deal of gold in those days, there was a
- lot of it being shipped East then—is still, from the Klondyke now,
- you know—and we were getting a fair share of the business away from
- the southern competition. We hadn’t had any trouble, weren’t looking for
- any, but it was pretty generally understood that all shipments of that
- kind were to get special attention. Number Two was carrying an extra
- express car with a consignment for the mint that night, so, naturally, I
- had kept my eye on her more closely than usual all the way through the
- mountains from the time I got her from the Pacific Division. At the time
- I’m speaking about, four o’clock in the morning, I was almost clear of
- her, for she wasn’t much west of Coyote Bend, fifteen miles from here, and
- she had rights all the way in. Half an hour more at the most, and she
- would be off my hands and up to the dispatchers of the Prairie Division.
- She had held her schedule to the tick every foot of the way, and all I was
- waiting for was the call from Coyote Bend that would report her in and out
- again into the clear for Big Cloud. Coyote Bend is the first station west
- of here, you understand? There’s nothing between. She was due at Coyote at
- 4.05, and I want you to remember this—I said it before, but I want
- to repeat it. I want you to get it <i>hard</i>—she had run to the
- second all through the night.
- </p>
- <p>
- My watch was open on the table before me, and I watched the minute hand
- creep round the dial. 4.03, 4.04, 4.05, 4.06, 4.07, 4.08. I was alone in
- the office. The night caller had gone out perhaps ten minutes before to
- call the train crew of the five o’clock local. There wasn’t anything to be
- nervous about. I don’t put it down to that. Three minutes wasn’t anything.
- Perhaps it was just impatience, fretfulness. You know how it is when
- you’re waiting for something to happen, and I was expecting the sounder to
- break every second with that report from Coyote Bend, Anyway, put it down
- to what you like, though I didn’t want a drink particularly I pushed back
- my chair, got up, and walked over to the water cooler. The dispatcher’s
- table was on the east side of the room, the door opened on the south side,
- and the water cooler was over in the opposite corner. I’m explaining this
- so that you’ll understand that the door was <i>between</i> the water
- cooler and the table. That old shack was rough and ready, and I’ve
- wondered more than once what ever kept it from falling to pieces. It
- didn’t take more than a breath of wind to set every window-sash in the
- outfit rattling like a corps of snare drums. That’s why, I guess, I didn’t
- hear any one coming up the stairs. It was blowing pretty hard that night.
- But I heard the door open. I thought it was the caller back again, and I
- wondered how he’d made his rounds in such quick time. With the tumbler
- half up to my lips I turned around—then the glass slipped from my
- fingers and crashed into slivers on the floor. My mouth went dry, my heart
- seemed to stop. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. It was Breen—“Angel”
- Breen!
- </p>
- <p>
- I saw him start at the noise of the splintering glass, but he didn’t look
- at me. He clung swaying to the door jamb for an instant, his face chalky
- white, then he reeled across the room—<i>and dropped into his old
- chair</i>. I saw him glance at my watch and his face seemed to go whiter
- than before, then he snatched at the train sheet and a smile—no, it
- wasn’t exactly a smile, you couldn’t call it that, his whole face seemed
- to change, light up, and his lips moved—I know now in a prayer of
- gratitude. You understand, don’t you? He knew the time-card, knew that
- Number Two, after he had seen my watch, should have been <i>out</i> of
- Coyote Bend four, perhaps five, minutes before, but the train sheet showed
- her: still unreported. His fingers closed on the key and he began to make
- the Coyote Bend call. Over and over, quick, sharp, clear, incisive, with
- all the old masterful touch of his sending Breen was rattling the call—cc,cx—cc,cx—cc,cx—cc,cx.
- </p>
- <p>
- And then I found my voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God in Heaven, Breen!” I stammered, and started toward him. “You! What———”
- </p>
- <p>
- The sounder broke. Coyote Bend answered. And on the instant Breen flashed
- this order over the wire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hold Number Two. Hold Number Two”—twice the sender spelled out the
- words.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Coyote Bend repeated the order, and Breen gave back the O. K.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Breen!” I shouted. “What are you doing? Are you crazy! What are you doing
- here? Speak, man, what——”
- </p>
- <p>
- He had straightened in his chair, and a sort of low, catchy gasp came from
- his lips. It seemed as though it took all his power, all his strength, to
- lift his eyes to mine. I sprang for the key, but he jerked himself
- suddenly forward and pushed me desperately away. And then he called me by
- the old name, not much above a whisper, I could hardly catch the words,
- and I didn’t understand, didn’t know, that the man before me was a
- wounded, <i>dying man</i>. My brain was whirling, full of that other
- night, full of the days and months that had followed. I couldn’t think. I——
- </p>
- <p>
- “Charlie—boy, it’s all right. Black Dempsey in the Cut. I was afraid
- I was too late—too late. They shot—me—here”—he was
- tearing with his fingers at his waistcoat.
- </p>
- <p>
- And then I understood—too late. As I reached for him, he swayed
- forward and toppled over, a huddled heap, over the key, over the order
- book, over the train sheet that once had taken his life and now had given
- it back to him—dead.
- </p>
- <p>
- What is there to say? Whatever he may have done, however far he may have
- fallen, back of it all, through it all, bigger than himself, stronger than
- any other bond was the railroading that was in his blood. Breen was a
- railroad man.
- </p>
- <p>
- I don’t know why, do I? You don’t know why, after Number Two had run to
- schedule all that night, it happened just when it did. It might have
- happened at some other time—but it didn’t. Luck or chance if you
- like, more than that if you’d rather think of it in another way, but just
- a few miles west of Coyote Bend something went wrong in the cab of Number
- Two. Nothing much, I don’t remember now what it was, don’t know that I
- ever knew, nothing much. Just enough to hold her back a few minutes, the
- few minutes that let Breen sit in again on the night dispatcher’s trick,
- sit in again at the key, hold down his old job once more before he quit
- railroading forever with the order that he gave his life to send, to keep
- Number Two from rushing to death and destruction against the rocks and
- boulders Black Dempsey and his gang had piled across the track in the Cut
- five miles east of Coyote Bend.
- </p>
- <p>
- I don’t know. “If a man die, shall he live again?” I leave it to you. I
- only know that they think a lot of him out here, think a lot of Breen,
- “Angel” Breen—now.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- IV—SPITZER
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>pitzer was just
- naturally born diffident. Sometimes that sort of thing wears off as one
- grows older, sometimes it doesn’t. When it doesn’t, it is worse than the
- most virulent disease—it had been virulent with Spitzer for all of
- his twenty-two years.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer wasn’t much to look at, neither was he of much account on the Hill
- Division. Some men rise to occasions, others don’t; as for Spitzer—well,
- he was a snubby-nosed, peaked-faced, touzled-haired little fellow with
- washed-out blue eyes that always seemed to carry around an apology in
- their depths that their owner existed, and this idea was backed up a good
- bit by Spitzer’s voice. Spitzer had a weak voice and that militated
- against him. The ordinary voice of the ordinary man on the Hill Division
- was not weak—it was assertive. Spitzer suffered thereby because
- everybody crawled over him. Nobody thought anything of Spitzer. They all
- knew him, of course, that is, those whose duties brought them within the
- zone of Spitzer’s orbit, which was restricted to Big Cloud or, rather, to
- the roundhouse at Big Cloud. Nobody ever gave him credit for courage
- enough to call his soul his own. Even when it came to pay day he took his
- check as though it was a mistake and that it really wasn’t meant for him.
- He just dubbed along, doing his work day after day like a faithful dog,
- only he was a hanged sight less obtrusive. Summed up in a word, Spitzer
- ranked as a nonentity, physically, mentally, professionally.
- </p>
- <p>
- Of course he never got ahead. He just kept on sweeping out the roundhouse
- and puttering around playing bell-boy to every Tom, Dick and Harry that
- lifted a finger at him. Year in, year out, he swept and wiped in the
- roundhouse. As far as seniority went he was it, but when it came to
- promotion he wasn’t. Promotion and Spitzer were so obviously, so
- ostentatiously at variance with each other that no one ever thought of
- such a thing. When there was a vacancy others got it. Spitzer saw them
- move along, firing, driving spare, up to full-fledged regulars on the
- right-hand side of the cabs, men that had started after he did; but
- Spitzer still wiped and swept out the roundhouse.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, the super, called him a landmark, and that hit the bull’s-eye.
- Summer, winter, fall, spring, good weather, bad weather,
- five-foot-five-with-his-boots-on Spitzer, lugging a little tin
- dinner-pail, trudged down Main Street in Big Cloud as regular as
- clockwork, and reported at the roundhouse at precisely the same hour every
- morning—five minutes of seven. Never a miss, never a slip—five
- minutes of seven. The train crews got to setting their watches by him, and
- the dispatchers wired the meteorological observatory every time their
- chronometors didn’t tally—that is, tally with Spitzer—and the
- meteorological crowd put Spitzer first across the tape every shot.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was just the same at night, only then Spitzer went by the six o’clock
- whistle. Ten hours a day, Sundays off—sometimes—wiping,
- sweeping, sweeping, wiping, from his boarding-house to the roundhouse in
- the morning, from the roundhouse to his boarding-house at night—that
- was Spitzer, self-effaced, self-obliterated, innocuous, modest Spitzer.
- </p>
- <p>
- Night times? Spitzer didn’t exist, there was no Spitzer—it wasn’t
- expected of him! If any one had been asked they would have looked their
- amazement, but then no one ever was asked—or asked, which is the
- same thing the other way. Spitzer was like a tool laid away after the
- day’s work and forgotten absolutely and profoundly until the following
- morning. No one knew anything about Spitzer after the six o’clock whistle
- blew, no one knew and cared less—that is, none of the railroad crowd
- knew, and they, when all is said and done, were Big Cloud, they owned it,
- ran it, absorbed it, and properly so, since Big Cloud was the divisional
- point on the Hill Division.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the ineffable perversity of things is the spice and variety of life.
- Tommy Regan, the master mechanic, was a man not easily jolted, not easily
- disturbed. He was very short, very broad, with little black eyes, and a
- long, scraggly, drooping-at-the-corners, brown mustache. Also, he was
- blessed with a well-defined, well-nourished paunch—which is a sign
- irrefutable of contentment, a calm and placid outlook upon life in general
- and particular, and a freedom from the ills of haste and worry. A man with
- a paunch is a man apart and greatly to be envied, even when that paunch,
- as was the case with Regan, is of Irish extraction, for then the
- accompanying touch of Celtic temper makes him more like an ordinary,
- cross-grained, irritable, everyday mortal and less of a temperamental
- curiosity. Regan was justly proud of both—his paunch and his
- nationality. Regan put it the other way—his nationality and his
- paunch. That, however, is a matter for individual decision and the
- relative importance of things is as one sees it; the main thing is that
- one permitted him to use fiery words on occasion, and the other enabled
- him to preserve, ordinarily, a much to be commended state of equanimity.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perversity of perversities! It was Spitzer that jolted Regan—not
- once, more than once. And before he got through, jolted him so hard that
- Regan hasn’t got over the wonder of it yet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Think of it,” he’ll say, when the subject is brought up. “Think of it!
- You know Spitzer, h’m? Well, <i>think</i> of it! SPITZER!” And if it’s
- summer he’ll mop his beady brow, and if it’s winter he’ll twiddle his
- thumbs with his fingers laced over his <i>embonpoint</i>, which is to say
- over the lower button of his waistcoat.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan’s first jolt came to him one morning as, after a critical inspection
- of his pets in the roundhouse—big six- and eight-wheeled mountain
- engines—-he strolled out and leaned against the push-bar on the
- turntable, mentally debating the respective merits of a rust-joint and a
- straight patch as specifically applied to number 583 that had been run
- into the shops the day before for repairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- A figure emerged from the engine doors at the far end of the roundhouse
- and came toward him. Regan’s eyes, attracted, barely glanced in that
- direction, and then went down again in meditation, as he kicked a little
- hole in the cinders with the toe of his boot—it was only Spitzer.
- </p>
- <p>
- When he looked up again Spitzer was nearer, quite near. Spitzer had halted
- before him and was standing there patiently, an embarrassed flush on his
- cheeks, wiping his hands nervously on an exceedingly dirty piece of
- packing which in his abstraction, for Spitzer was plainly abstracted, he
- had picked up for a piece of waste.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Huh!” said Regan, staring at Spitzer’s hands, “what you trying to do?
- Black up for a minstrel show?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer dropped the packing as though it had been a handful of thistles,
- and rubbed his hands up and down the legs of his overalls.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well?” Regan invited.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer began to talk, rapidly, hurriedly—that is, his lips moved
- rapidly, hurriedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan listened attentively and with a strained and hopeless expression, as
- he strove to catch a word and hence the drift of Spitzer’s remarks.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How?” he demanded, when he saw Spitzer was at an end. “Speak out, man.
- You won’t wake the baby up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer began all over again. This time he did a little better.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A dollar twenty-five,” repeated the master mechanic numbly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer brightened visibly, and nodded.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan stared, bewildered and dumfounded. Gradually, impossible,
- incomprehensible, incongruous as it appeared, it dawned on him that
- Spitzer, even Spitzer, <i>Spitzer</i> was asking for a <i>raise!</i>
- </p>
- <p>
- “A dollar twenty-five.” was all Regan could repeat over again, and the
- words came away with a gasp.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer, misinterpreting the tone, his face grew rueful and full of
- trouble. He was appalled at his own temerity in broaching the subject in
- the first place, but now he had overstepped the bounds—he had asked
- for too much!
- </p>
- <p>
- “A dollar twenty,” he ventured, in timid compromise—Spitzer was
- getting a dollar fifteen.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How long you been working here?” inquired Regan, recovering a little and
- beginning to get a grip on himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Four years,” said Spitzer faintly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord!” mumbled Regan. “Four years. A dollar twenty-five, h’m? Well,
- I dunno, I guess we can manage that.” And then, as a new thought suddenly
- struck him: “What the blazes would <i>you</i> do with more money, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Spitzer only grinned sheepishly as, after murmuring his thanks, he
- walked back and disappeared in the roundhouse.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord!” muttered Regan, looking after him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Four years, and a dollar and a quarter, <i>and</i> Spitzer! Good Lord!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan went around more or less dazed all that day. He ordered the patch on
- 583 when he had definitely decided on the rust-joint as the best tonic for
- the engine’s complaint, and he figured out how much one dollar and fifteen
- cents a day came to for a year barring Sundays, then he did the same with
- a dollar twenty-five as the multiplicand and compared the results.
- Spitzer’s demand was not exorbitant, and it wasn’t much to upset any man—that
- was just it—it was Spitzer, and Spitzer wasn’t much. Effect,
- psychological or otherwise, is by no manner of means to be measured by the
- mere magnitude of the cause, it is the phenomenal and unusual that is to
- be treated with wholesome respect, and for safe handling requires a
- double-tracked, block system with the cautionary signals up from start to
- finish—the master mechanic found it that way anyhow, and he ought to
- know.
- </p>
- <p>
- He unburdened himself that night after supper to Carleton and a few of the
- others over at division headquarters, which had been moved upstairs over
- the station, where the chiefs used to meet regularly each evening for a
- pipe, with a round of pedro thrown in to liven things up a bit—Big
- Cloud not being blessed with many attractions in the amusement line.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton grinned.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bad company,” he suggested. “Hard lot, that of yours over in the
- roundhouse, Tommy. They’re spoiling his manners. Been a long time in
- coming, but you know the old story of the water and the stone. What?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What in blazes would <i>he</i> do with more money?” inquired Spence, the
- chief dispatcher, in unfeigned astonishment.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan glared disdainfully. He had put precisely the same question to
- Spitzer himself, but since then he had been brushing up his mathematics.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do with it!” he choked. “Thirty dollars and eighty cents—<i>a year</i>.
- Hell of a problem, ain’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, you needn’t run off your schedule,” said Spence, a little tartly.
- “You’re the one that’s making most of the fuss over it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tell you what, Tommy,” remarked Carleton, still grinning, “you want to
- look out for Spitzer from now on. I guess his emancipation has begun—nothing
- like a start. Before you know it he’ll be running roughshod over the
- motive power department, including the master mechanic.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I give him the raise,” said Regan, more to himself than aloud. “‘Twas
- coming to him, what? Four years, and the first time I ever heard a yip out
- of him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ll hear more,” prophesied Carleton; “even if he doesn’t talk very
- loud.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Think so?” said Regan, puckering up his eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I do,” said Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Regan did.
- </p>
- <p>
- Not at once, not for several weeks. But in the meantime a change came over
- Spitzer. He swept and wiped and reported at five minutes of seven every
- morning and kept himself just as much in the background, just as much out
- of everybody’s way, just as unobtrusive as he had before, but Spitzer was
- none the less changed.
- </p>
- <p>
- It began the day after he got his raise. It was an indefinite, elusive,
- negative sort of a change, not the kind you could lay your hand on and
- describe in so many words. Regan tried to, and gave it up. The nearest he
- came to anything concrete was one day when he came around the tail-end of
- a tender and, unexpectedly, upon Spitzer. Spitzer was sweeping as usual,
- but Spitzer was also whistling—which was not usual. Regan, it is
- true, couldn’t puzzle very much out of that, but then Regan had his
- limitations.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mindful of Carleton’s words, Regan kept his eye in a mildly curious kind
- of a way on the little faded, blueeyed drudge, and as he noticed the first
- change without being able to define it, he now, after a week or so,
- noticed a second, with the difference that this time the diagnosis was
- painfully obvious—Spitzer’s return to Spitzer’s normal self. Spitzer
- stopped whistling.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan began to catch Spitzer’s eyes fixed on him with a hesitating,
- irresolute, anxious gaze about every time he entered the roundhouse. And
- though he didn’t quite grasp it, something of the truth came to him.
- Spitzer was screwing up his courage to the sticking point preparatory to
- another step onward in his belated march toward emancipation.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a month to the day from the first interview when Spitzer tackled
- the master mechanic again, and as before, out by the turntable in front of
- the roundhouse, and, if anything, in a manner even more nervous and ill at
- ease than on the former occasion. He stammered once or twice in an effort
- to begin—and his effort was utter failure.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan eyed him in profound distrust. Once in four years wasn’t so much,
- and after all, even Spitzer, now that the shock was over, might be
- expected to do that. But again in a month—and from Spitzer!
- Something was wrong—perhaps Carleton was right.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” he snapped, “you got your raise. Ain’t you satisfied?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer nodded dumbly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, what’s the matter with you if you’re satisfied?” exploded the
- master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to get———” the last word trailed off into
- tremulous, quavering incoherency.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You want to get what?” growled Regan. “Don’t sputter as though you’d
- swallowed your teeth. What is it you want to get?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Firing,” blurted Spitzer after a desperate struggle.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan gasped for his breath. Spitzer! SPITZER—in a cab! He couldn’t
- have heard straight.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say it again,” whispered the master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Firing,” repeated Spitzer, with more confidence now that the plunge was
- taken.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Regan weakly to himself. “That’s it. I got it right—firing!
- He wants to get <i>firing!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—I can do it,” faltered Spitzer. “I got to.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eh? What’s that?” said Regan. “You got to? Say, you, Spitzer, what the
- devil’s the matter with you anyway?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer wriggled like a worm on a hook, and his face went the color of a
- semaphore arm—a deep red one. Spitzer was suffering acutely.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, well,” prodded Regan. “Release the air! Take the brakes off!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m,” began Spitzer shamefacedly, “I’m———” He gulped
- down his Adam’s apple hard, twice, and then it came away with a rush: “I’m
- going to get married to Merla Swenson.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan’s jaw sagged like the broken limb of a tree, and his eyes fairly
- popped out and hung down over the roll of his cheeks. Then gradually, very
- gradually, he began to double up and unhandsome contortions afflicted his
- facial muscles. Spitzer! Spitzer was enough! But Spitzer <i>and</i> Merla
- Swenson! Six-foot-heavy-boned-long-armed Swedish-maiden Merla! Oh,
- contrariety, variety, perversity of life!
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haw!” he roared suddenly. “Haw, haw! Haw, haw, haw!” And again—only
- louder. The turner and a helper or two poked their noses out of the
- roundhouse doors to get a line on the disturbance.
- </p>
- <p>
- Can a stone float? Can a feather sink? Astonishing, bewildering,
- dumfounding, impossible, oh, yes; but it was also very funny. It was the
- funniest thing that Regan had ever heard in his life.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haw, haw!” he screamed. “Ho, ho! Haw, haw!”
- </p>
- <p>
- His paunch shook like jelly, and he held both hands to his sides to ease
- the pain. He straightened up preparatory to going off into another burst
- of guffaws, and then, with his mouth already opened to begin, he stopped
- as though he had been stunned. Spitzer was still standing before him, and
- Spitzer’s head was turned away, but Regan caught it, caught the two big
- tears that rolled slowly down the grimy cheeks. And in that moment he
- realized what neither he nor any other man on the Hill Division had ever
- realized before—that Spitzer, too, was <i>human</i>.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan coughed, choked, and cleared his throat. Here was Spitzer in a new
- light, but the Spitzer of years was not so readily to be consigned to the
- background of oblivion. Spitzer in a cab was as much an anomaly as ever,
- conjugal aspirations to the contrary.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Firing?” said he, with grave consideration that he meant, by contrast,
- should serve as palliation for the sting of his mirth. “Firing? I’m afraid
- not. You’re not fit for it. You’re not big enough.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer dashed his hands across his eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I <i>can</i> fire,” he announced with a surprising show of spirit, “an’ I
- <i>got</i> to. There’s smaller ones than me doing it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you mean by ‘got to’?” demanded the master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer shifted uneasily and kicked at the ground.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Merla an’ me’s been making up for quite a while,” he stammered: “but she
- wouldn’t say nothing one way or the other till I got a raise.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, you got it,” said Regan.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer nodded miserably.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, an’ now she says ‘tain’t enough to get married on, an’—an’
- we’ll have to wait till I get firing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good Lord!” murmured Regan, and he mopped his brow in deep perplexity.
- The destiny of mortals was in his hands—but so was the motive power
- department of the Hill Division. He could no more see Spitzer in a cab
- than he could see the time-honored camel passing through the eye of a
- needle. Then inspiration came to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here, Spitzer,” said he, soothingly. “There ain’t any use talking
- about firing, and I ain’t going to let you build up any false hopes. But
- I’ll tell you what, you don’t need to feel glum about it. She loves you,
- don’t she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer’s lips moved.
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m?” inquired Regan solicitously, bending forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes; she says she does,” repeated Spitzer in thin tones.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes; well then, when you know women, and as much about ‘em as I do,
- you’ll know that nothing else counts—nothing but the love, I mean.
- It’s their nature, and they’re all alike. That’s the way it is with all of
- ‘em”—Regan waved his hand expansively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’ll be all right. You’ll see. She won’t hold out on that line.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Some men profit much by little experience, others profit little by much
- experience. Spitzer, possibly, had had little, very little, but the
- dejected droop of his shoulders, as he started back for the roundhouse,
- intimated that in the matter of knowledge as applied to the eternal
- feminine he was perhaps, in so far as it lay between himself and the
- master mechanic, the better qualified of the two to speak. And that,
- certainly, when concretely applied, which is to say applied to Merla
- Swenson.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan couldn’t have kept the story back to save his life, and it didn’t
- take long for the division to get it. They all got it—train crews
- and engine crews on way freights, stray freights, locals, extras and
- regulars, the staff, the shop hands, the track-walkers and the section
- gangs down to the last car-tink. At first the division looked incredulous,
- then it grinned, and then it howled, and its howl was the one word
- “Spitzer!” with seventeen exclamation points after it to make the tempo
- and rhythm hang out in a manner befitting and commensurate with the
- occasion.
- </p>
- <p>
- It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good. Dutchy Damrosch did the business
- of his life—he did more business than he had ever dreamed of doing
- in his wildest flights of imagination, for Dutchy had the lunch counter
- rights at Big Cloud. What’s that got to do with Spitzer and his marital
- ambition? Well, a whole lot! Merla Swenson was second girl in Dutchy’s
- establishment, and Merla was the “fee-ancy” of Spitzer—which was a
- rotten bad pun of Spider Kelly’s, the conductor, and due more to the
- brogue-like twist of his tongue than to any malice aforethought.
- </p>
- <p>
- To see any girl that was in love with Spitzer was worth the price of
- coffee and sinkers any old time. The lunch counter took on the air of a
- dime museum, and the visitors questioned Merla anxiously, a little
- suspicious that after all there might be a nigger in the woodpile
- somewhere in the shape of a “frame-up” with the hoax on themselves.
- </p>
- <p>
- Merla settled all doubts on that score. Unruffled, calmly, stoically,
- dispassionately she answered the same question fifty times a day, and each
- time in the same way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yah, I ban love Spitzer,” was her infallible reply, in a tone that made
- the bare possibility that she could have done anything else seem the very
- acme of absurdity. Merla’s inflexion struck deep at the root of things
- inevitable.
- </p>
- <p>
- After that there was nothing to be said. A few, very few, and as the days
- went by their numbers thinned with amazing rapidity, had the temerity to
- snicker audibly. They only did it once, as with arms akimbo and hands on
- hips Merla advanced to the edge of the counter with a look in her
- steadfast, blue eyes, that was far from inviting, and inquired: “Him ban
- goot mans, I tank?”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was put in the form of a question, it is true, but the “put” was of
- such cold uncompromise that the result was always the same. The offender
- hastily buried his nose in his coffee-cup, dug for a dime to square his
- account—with Dutchy—and made for the platform.
- </p>
- <p>
- This was all very well, but unless Regan died and some one with a little
- less—or a little more, depending on how you look at it—imagination
- took his place, Spitzer’s chances of getting into a cab were as good as
- ever, which is to say that they were about as good as the goodness of a
- plugged nickel. And the trouble was that, as far as Spitzer could see, the
- master mechanic wasn’t sprouting out with any visible signs of premature
- decay. Furthermore, as he had suspicioned and now discovered, Regan <i>wasn’t</i>
- the last word on women; not, perhaps, that Merla put firing before love,
- only she was uncommonly strong on firing. Spitzer was unhappy.
- </p>
- <p>
- All things come to those who wait, they say. So they do, perhaps; but the
- way of their coming is sometimes not to be understood or fathomed. The
- story of a man who fell from the eighteenth story window of an office
- building, and, incidentally, broke his neck has no place here except in a
- general way. A friend who took a passing interest in the event was curious
- enough to investigate the cause, and he traced it back step by step,
- logically, surely, inevitably, beyond the possibility of refutation, to
- the fact that the second hook from the top on the back of the man’s wife’s
- dress—not the man’s dress, the dress of the man’s wife—was
- missing on the morning of the day of his untimely decease. The man—not
- the man’s friend—was an inventor. But no matter. It just shows.
- Regan being still alive, the chances are better than a thousand to one
- that Spitzer would have known a cold and forlorn old age, as Robert Louis
- puts it, and Merla would never have had a second edition of herself if it
- hadn’t been for a few measly, unripe crab-apples. What? Yes, that’s it—crab-apples.
- That’s the way Spitzer got where he is to-day—just crab-apples.
- Funny how things happen sometimes when you come to think of it, isn’t it?
- Spitzer and the man who broke his neck aren’t the only ones who’ve had
- their ups and downs that way, not by several. There isn’t any moral to
- this except that here and there you’ll find a man who isn’t as, modest
- about his own ability as he ought to be!
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer’s nocturnal habits, that were a matter of so much unconcern and of
- which the railroad crowd at Big Cloud were so densely in ignorance, have a
- part in this. The truth is that between the lunch-counter and the station
- is the baggage and freight-shed, and behind the freight-shed it is very
- dark; and also, not less pertinent, is the fact that Merla was possessed
- of no other quarters than those shared by her sister-inarms in Dutchy’s
- employ—which were neither propitious nor commodious. Hence—but
- the connection is obvious.
- </p>
- <p>
- On Merla’s night off at eight o’clock, Spitzer sneaked down through the
- fields and across the platform, weather permitting, and on those nights
- Merla donned her bonnet “for a walk”—at the same hour. When the
- station-clock struck ten and, coincidentally, Number One’s mellow chime
- sounded down the gorge, Merla retraced her steps to the upstairs rear of
- the lunch-counter, and Spitzer retraced his across the platform to the
- fields in the direction of the town and his boarding-house; only, of late,
- Spitzer had taken to lingering on the platform way up at the far end where
- it was also very dark and equally as deserted.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here he would gaze wistfully at the big mogul with valves popping and the
- steam drumming at her gauges, as she waited on the siding just in front of
- him—‘Big Cloud being a divisional point where the engines were
- changed—to back down onto Number One for the first stretch of the
- mountain run—Burke’s run with 503, and big Jim MacAloon looking
- after the shovel end of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- There wasn’t anything novel in the sight, but it didn’t seem to strike
- Spitzer as monotonous although, when it was all over and he watched the
- vanishing tail lights, he always sighed. It was just the same performance
- each time. Ten minutes or so before Number One, westbound, was due,
- MacAloon would run 503 out of the roundhouse, over the turntable, up the
- line, and back onto the siding. Then Burke would appear on the scene,
- light a torch, and poke around with a long-spouted oil can.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer would usually reach his position up the platform in time to see
- the engineer’s final jab with the torch between the drivers or into the
- link-motion before swinging himself through the gangway into the cab, as
- the Limited with snapping trucks and screeching brake-shoes rolled into
- the station; but one night it fell out a little differently. The station
- clock had struck ten, Merla had hastened to her domicile, and Spitzer to
- the far end of the platform as usual, but Number One was late.
- </p>
- <p>
- Suddenly Spitzer jumped and his heart seemed to shoot into his mouth.
- There was a wild, piercing scream of agony. It came again. The blood left
- Spitzer’s cheeks. He saw Burke fly around the end of the pilot, the torch
- dancing in his hand, and make for the cab. Spitzer involuntarily leaped
- from the platform to the track and ran in the same direction, then the
- safety-valve popped with a terrific roar, drowning out all other sounds.
- He clambered cautiously into the cab. On the floor MacAloon was going
- through a performance that would have beggared the efforts of a writhing
- python, and the while he groaned and yelled.
- </p>
- <p>
- As Spitzer watched, Burke, who was bending over MacAloon with an anxious
- face, suddenly reached forward and picked up a little round object that
- rolled from the pocket of the fireman’s jumper, then another and another.
- Spitzer instinctively craned forward, and in so doing attracted Burke’s
- notice for the first time. Burke’s look of anxiety gave way to a grin and
- he held out the objects to Spitzer, just as if it wasn’t Spitzer at all
- but an ordinary man—humor, like death, is a great leveler, but no
- matter, let that go. Burke held them out to Spitzer, Spitzer took them,
- and even Spitzer grinned. It didn’t need any doctor to diagnose MacAloon’s
- complaint—and the complaint wasn’t poetic! Cramps, old-fashioned,
- unadulterated cramps—just plain cramps and green crab-apples! Some
- things lay a man out worse perhaps—but there aren’t many.
- </p>
- <p>
- Burke’s grin didn’t last long, for at that moment came Number One’s long,
- clear siren note, and back over the tender a streak of light shot out in a
- wide circle from around a butte and then danced along the rails and began
- to light up the platform, as the Limited thundered, five minutes late,
- into the straight stretch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy fishplates!” yelled Burke. “I’ve got to get a man to fire. Spitzer,
- you run like hell to the roundhouse and——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Burke stopped. Spitzer stopped him. There are moments in everybody’s life
- when they rise above themselves, above habit, above environment, above
- everything, if even for only a brief instant. A chance like this would
- never come again. If he could fire one trip maybe Regan would change his
- mind. Spitzer grasped at it frantically, despairingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Burke, I <i>can</i> fire,” he fairly screamed. “Give me a chance, Burke.
- I’ll never get one if you don’t.” Burke gasped for a moment like a man
- with his breath knocked out of him, then something like a dry chuckle
- sounded in his throat. No one knows but Burke what decided him. It might
- have been either of two things, or a combination of them both—Spitzer’s
- pleading face, or the desire to take a rise out of Regan—Burke and
- Regan not having been on the best of terms since the last general
- elections. Be that as it may, Burke pointed at the squirming fireman.
- “Take his feet,” he grunted.
- </p>
- <p>
- Together they lifted and dragged the stricken Mac-Aloon out of the cab and
- to the ground. 1108, pulling Number One, had come to a stop abreast of
- them by now, and Burke shouted at the engine crew.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here!” he bawled. “Lend a hand!”
- </p>
- <p>
- And as both men stuck their heads out of the gangway, he and Spitzer
- boosted the fireman up to them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Got cramps,” explained Burke tersely. “You’ll be able to fix him up in
- the roundhouse. Five minutes late, h’m? Well, hurry, you’re clear. There’s
- your ‘go-ahead.’ Pull out and let me get hold.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Burke turned to Spitzer, as 1108 slipped away from the baggage-car and
- moved up the track, and pointed to the gangway of his own engine.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get in,” he said grimly. “You’ll get a chance to fire, and, take it from
- me, you’ll never get a chance to do that or anything else again this side
- of the happy hunting-grounds, my bucko, if you throw me down.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And while Regan quarreled amiably over a game of pedro upstairs in the
- station with Carleton, 503, with Spitzer, touzled-haired, mild-eyed,
- heart-beating-like-a-trip-hammer Spitzer, in the cab, backed down on the
- Imperial Limited and coupled on for the mountain run. There was a quick
- testing of the “air,” a hurried running up and down the platform, and then
- Burke, leaning from the window with his arms stretched out inside the cab
- and fingers on the throttle, opened a notch, and the platform began to
- slide past them.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer wrinkled his face and stared at the gauge needle—two hundred
- and ten pounds, all the way, all the time—two hundred and ten
- pounds. It was up to him. With a jerk of the chain, he swung the furnace
- door wide and a shovelful of coal shot, neatly scattered, over the grate.
- </p>
- <p>
- There is art in all things; there is the quintessence of art in the
- prosaic and laborious task of firing an engine. Spitzer was not without
- art, for in a way he had had years of experience; but banking a fire in
- the roundhouse, and nursing a roaring pit of flame to its highest degree
- of efficiency in a swaying, lurching cab, are two different and distinct
- operations that are in no way to be confounded. 503 began to lurch and
- sway. Notch by notch Burke was opening her out, and the bark of her
- exhaust was coming like the quick crackle of a gatling. Five minutes late
- in the mountains on a time schedule already marked up to a dizzy height
- that called for more chances than the passengers paid for is—well,
- it’s five minutes, just <i>five minutes</i>, that’s all. Some men would
- have left it for the Pacific Division crowd the next day on a level track
- and a straight sweep—but not Burke.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer’s initiation was in ample form and he got the full benefit of all
- the rites and ceremonies with every detail of the ritual worked in—and
- no favors shown. So far all was well, the rough country was all in front
- of the pilot, and Spitzer was all business. His pulse was beating in tune
- to only one thing—the dancing needle on the gauge. Again he swung
- the door open, and the red flare lighted up the heavens and played on
- features that Regan would never have known for Spitzer’s—they were
- set, grim and determined, covered with little sweat beads that glistened
- like diamonds. The singing sweep of the wind was in his ears as he poised
- his shovel. There was a sickening slur. 503 shot round a tangent—and
- the shovelful of coal shot like bullets all over the cab, and, including
- Burke, hit about everything in sight but the objective point aimed at.
- Simultaneously, Spitzer promptly performed a gyration that resembled
- something like a back hand-spring and landed well up on the tender, to
- roll back to the floor of the cab again with an accompanying avalanche of
- coal.
- </p>
- <p>
- He picked himself up and glanced apprehensively at the engineer. There was
- not a scowl, not even a grin on Burke’s face, just an encouraging flirt of
- the hand—but the flirt was momentous. Wise and full of guile was
- Burke, for with that little act Spitzer, biblically speaking, girded up
- his loins and got his second wind.
- </p>
- <p>
- They were well into the foothills now, and the right of way was an amazing
- wonder. Diving, twisting, curving, it circled and bored and trestled its
- way, and buttes, canons, gorges and coulees roared past like flights of
- fancy.
- </p>
- <p>
- The speed was terrific. To Spitzer it was all a wild, mad medley of things
- he had never known before, of things that had neither beginning nor end.
- The giddy slew as the big mountain racer hit the curves, the crunching
- grind of the flanges as for an instant she lifted from her wheel-base, the
- pitch, the roll, the staggering reel, the gasp for breath, the beat of the
- trucks, the whir of the racing drivers, the rush of the wind, the echoing
- thunder of the flying coaches behind—it was all there, all separate,
- all welded into one, a creation, new, vernal, life, the life of the rail,
- that beat at his eardrums and quickened the pounding throb of his heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- At first, from time to time, Burke leaned over his levers to glance at the
- pressure gauge, but after a bit he crouched a little further forward in
- his seat and his eyes held on the track ahead where the beam of the
- electric headlight flooded the glittering ribbons of steel. He was getting
- what MacAloon or no other man had ever given him before—two hundred
- and ten pounds <i>all</i> the way. SPITZER was firing Number One, the
- Imperial Limited, westbound, on the mountain run, <i>three</i> minutes
- late!
- </p>
- <p>
- The sweat was rolling in streams from the little fellow now, and he clung
- in the gangway for a moment’s breathing spell, leaning out, staring ahead
- at a few shining lights in the distance. Came the hoarse scream of the
- whistle, the clattering crash as they shattered the yard switches, a
- blurred vision of dark outlines dotted with tiny scintillating points, and
- station, yard, lights, switches and all were behind him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spitzer drew his sleeve across his forehead, and turned again to his work
- as they thundered over a long steel trestle—Thief Creek. Spitzer
- knew the road well enough at second hand, if not from personal experience.
- Just ahead was The Pass—Sucker Pass—straight enough for its
- quarter-mile stretch, but where the rock walls rose up on either side so
- close as to almost scratch the paint off the rolling stock. Eased for a
- moment in scant deference to switches and trestle just passed, Spitzer
- felt the forward leap of the racer as Burke threw her wide open again. He
- bent for his shovel—and then, quick as the winking of an eye, sudden
- as doom, came a tearing, rending crash, a scream from Burke, and the
- right-hand side of the cab seemed literally torn in two.
- </p>
- <p>
- A flying piece of woodwork that struck him across the eyes, a terrific
- jolt as the engine lifted and fell back, sent Spitzer headlong to the
- floor of the cab. Dazed, half mad with the pain, the blood streaming from
- his forehead, he staggered to his feet. Burke lay coiled in an inert heap
- just in front of him by the furnace door. A whizzing piece of steel rose
- up, crunched, slithered, gashed a track of ruin for itself, and was gone.
- It had missed Burke only by a hair’s-breadth—next time there might
- not be even that limit of safety. With a cry, Spitzer leaped forward and
- dragged the unconscious engineer across the cab. Again the jolt, the slur,
- the stagger, the desperate wrench. It seemed like years, like eternity to
- Spitzer. He was living a lifetime in the passing of a second—it had
- been no more than that, no more than two or three at most.
- </p>
- <p>
- There are some things worse, much worse, in railroading than a broken
- crank-pin and a rod amuck, but not when it comes in The Pass, where
- derailment at their racing speed spelt death, quick and sudden. There was
- just one chance for the trailing string of coaches, just one for every
- last soul aboard—Spitzer. But between Spitzer and the throttle and
- the air-latch was a thing of steel that rose and fell, now swinging a
- splintering, murderous arc through the shattered side of the cab, now
- grinding into the ties land roadbed, threatening with every revolution to
- pitch 503 and the train behind her headlong from the rails to crumple like
- flimsy egg-shells against the narrow rocky walls that lined The Pass. Just
- one chance for the train crew and passengers—<i>just one in a
- thousand for Spitzer</i>. And little five-foot-five Spitzer, diffident,
- retiring, self-effaced, unobtrusive Spitzer, with a dry, choking sob in
- his throat, flung himself forward to stop the train. His hands clutched
- desperately at the levers, there was a hiss, the vicious eventualities,
- and that’s the way it was with about nine hundred and ninety-nine out of
- every thousand colonists. The company, of course, did take <i>some</i>
- risk—they took a chance on the one-thousandth man. The company had
- sporting blood.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- V—SHANLEY’S LUCK
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>f Shanley had only
- known what was going to happen, he could have saved some of his money on
- that ticket. As it stands now, he has still got transportation coming to
- him from Little Dance on the Hill Division to Bubble Creek, B. C. That may
- be an asset, or it may not—Shanley never asked for it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Third class, colonist, no stop over allowed, redhaired, freckle-faced, an
- uptilt to the nose, a jaw as square as the side of a house, shoulders like
- a bull’s, and a fist that would fell an ox—that was Shanley. That
- was Shanley until the sprung rail that ditched the train at Little Dance
- caused him the loss of two things—his erstwhile status in the
- general passenger agent’s department, and a well-beloved and reeking
- brier.
- </p>
- <p>
- Both were lost forever—his status partly on account of the reasons
- before mentioned, and partly because Shanley wasn’t particularly
- interested in Bubble Creek; his brier because it became a part, an
- integral part, of that memorable wreck, as Shanley, who was peacefully
- smoking in the front-end compartment of the colonist coach when the
- trouble happened, left the pipe behind while he catapulted through the
- open door—it was summer and sizzling hot—and landed, a very
- much dazed, bewildered, but not otherwise hurt Shanley, halfway up the
- embankment on the off side of a scene of most amazing disorder.
- </p>
- <p>
- The potentialties that lie in a sprung rail are something to marvel at. Up
- ahead, the engine had promptly turned turtle, and, as promptly giving vent
- to its displeasure at the indignity heaped upon it, had incased itself in
- an angry, hissing cloud of steam; behind, the baggage and mail cars seemed
- to have vied with each other in affectionate regard for the tender. Only
- the brass-polished, nickel-plated Pullmans at the rear still held the
- rails; the rest was just a crazy, slewed-edge-ways, up-canted,
- toppled-over string of cars, already beginning to smoke as the flames
- licked into them.
- </p>
- <p>
- The shouts of those who had made their escape, the screams of those still
- imprisoned within the wreckage, the sight of others crawling through the
- doors and windows brought Shanley back to his senses. He rose to his feet,
- blinked furiously, as was his habit on all untoward occasions, and the
- next instant he was down the embankment and into the game—to begin
- his career as a railroad man. That’s where he started—in the wreck
- at Little Dance.
- </p>
- <p>
- In and out of the blazing pyre, after a woman or a child; the crash of his
- ax through splintering woodwork; the scorching heat; prying away some poor
- devil wedged down beneath the débris; tinkling glass as the heat cracked
- the windows or he beat through a pane with his fist—it was all hazy,
- all a dream to Shanley as, hours afterward, a grim, gaunt figure with
- blackened, bleeding face, his clothes hanging in ribbons, he rode into the
- Big Cloud yards on the derrick car.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some men would have hit up the claim agent for a stake; Shanley hit up
- Carleton for a job. But for modesty’s sake, previous to presenting himself
- before the superintendent’s desk, he borrowed from one of the wrecking
- crew the only available article of wearing apparel at hand—a very
- dirty and disreputable pair of overalls. Dirty and disreputable, but—whole.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want a job, Mr. Carleton,” said he bluntly, when he had gained
- admittance to the super.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You do, eh?” replied Carleton, looking him up and down. “You do, eh?
- You’re a pretty hard-looking nut, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley blinked, but, being painfully aware that he undoubtedly did look
- all if not more than that, and being, too, not quite sure what to make of
- the super, he contented himself with the remark:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I ain’t a picture, I suppose.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m!” said Carleton. “Been up at the wreck, I hear—what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Shanley shortly. No long story, no tale of what he’d done, no
- anything—just “Yes,” and that was what caught Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What can you do?” demanded the super.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Anything. I’m not fussy,” replied Chanley.
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m!” said Carleton. “You don’t look it.” And he favored Shanley with
- another prolonged stare.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley, at first uncomfortable, shifted nervously from one foot to the
- other; then, as the stare continued, he began to get irritated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here,” he flung out suddenly. “I ain’t on exhibition. I come for a
- job. I ain’t got any letters of recommendation from pastors of churches in
- the East. I ain’t got anything. My name’s Shanley, an’ I haven’t even got
- anything to prove <i>that</i>.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ve got your nerve,” said Carleton, leaning back in his swivel chair
- and tucking a thumb in the armhole of his vest. “Ever worked on a
- railroad?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” answered Shanley, a little less assertively, as he saw his chances
- of a job vanishing into thin air, and already regretting his hasty speech—a
- few odd nickels wasn’t a very big stake for a man starting out in a new
- country, and that represented the sum total of Shanley’s worldly wealth.
- “No, I never worked on a railroad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m,” continued Carleton. “Well, my friend, you can report to the
- trainmaster in the morning and tell him I said to put you on breaking. Get
- out!”
- </p>
- <p>
- It came so suddenly and unexpectedly that it took Shanley’s breath.
- Carleton’s ways were not Shanley’s ways, or ways that Shanley by any
- peradventure had been accustomed to. A moment before he wouldn’t have
- exchanged one of his nickels for his chances of a job, therefore his reply
- resolved itself into a sheepish grin; moreover—but of this hereafter—Shanley
- back East was decidedly more in the habit of having his applications
- refused with scant ceremony than he was to receiving favorable
- consideration, which was another reason for his failure to rise to the
- occasion with appropriate words of thanks.
- </p>
- <p>
- Incidentally, Shanley, like a select few of his fellow creatures, had his
- failings; concretely, his particular strayings from the straight and
- narrow way, not having been hidden under a bushel, were responsible, with
- the advice and assistance of a distant relative or two—advice being
- always cheap, and assistance, in this case, a marked-down bargain—for
- his migration to the West, as far West as the funds in hand would take him—Bubble
- Creek, B. C, the distant relatives saw to that. They bought the ticket.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley, still smiling sheepishly and in obedience to the super’s
- instruction to “get out,” was halfway to the door when Carleton halted
- him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Shanley!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, sir?” said Shanley, finding his voice and swinging around.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Got any money?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley’s hand mechanically dove through the overalls and rummaged in the
- pocket of his torn and ribboned trousers—the pocket had not been
- spared—the nickels, every last one of them, were gone. The look on
- his face evidently needed no interpretation.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton was holding out two bills—two tens.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cleaned out, eh? Well, I wouldn’t blame any one if they asked you for
- your board bill in advance. Here, I guess you’ll need this. You can pay it
- back later on. There’s a fellow keeps a clothing store up the street that
- it wouldn’t do you any harm to visit—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- With gratitude in his heart and the best of resolutions exuding from every
- pore—he was always long on resolutions—Shanley being
- embarrassed, and therefore awkward, made a somewhat ungraceful exit from
- the super’s presence.
- </p>
- <p>
- But neither gratitude nor resolutions, even of steelplate, double-riveted
- variety, are of much avail against circumstances and conditions over which
- one has absolutely, undeniably, and emphatically no control. If
- Dinkelman’s clothing emporium had occupied a site between the station and
- MacGuire’s Blazing Star saloon, instead of the said Blazing Star saloon
- occupying that altogether inappropriate position itself, and if Spider
- Kelly, the conductor of the wrecked train, had not run into Shanley before
- he had fairly got ten yards from the super’s office, things undoubtedly
- would have been very different. Shanley took that view of it afterward,
- and certainly he was justified. It is on record that he had no hand in the
- laying out of Big Cloud nor in the control of its real estate, rentals, or
- leases.
- </p>
- <p>
- Railroad men are by no stretch of the imagination to be regarded as hero
- worshipers, but if a man does a decent thing they are not averse to
- telling him so. Shanley had done several very decent things at the wreck.
- Spider Kelly invited him into the Blazing Star.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley demurred. “I’ve got to get some clothes,” he explained.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get ‘em afterward,” said Kelly; “plenty of time. Come on; it’s just
- supper-time, and there’ll be a lot of the boys in there. They’ll be glad
- to meet you. If you’re hungry you’ll find the best free layout on the
- division. There’s nothing small about MacGuire.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley hesitated, and, proverbially, was lost.
- </p>
- <p>
- An intimate and particular description of the events of that night are on
- no account to be written. They would not have shocked, surprised, or
- astonished Shanley’s distant relatives—but everybody is not a
- distant relative. Shanley remembered it in spots—only in spots. He
- fought and whipped Spider Kelly, who was a much bigger man than himself,
- and thereby cemented an undying friendship; he partook of the hospitality
- showered upon him and returned it with a lavish hand—as long as
- Carleton’s twenty lasted; he made speeches, many of them, touching wrecks
- and the nature of wrecks and his own particular participation therein—which
- was seemly, since at the end, about three o’clock in the morning, he slid
- with some dignity under the table, and, with the fond belief that he was
- once more clutching an ax and doing heroic and noble service, wound his
- arms grimly, remorselessly, tenaciously, like an octopus, around the table
- leg—and slept.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacGuire before bolting the front door studied the situation carefully,
- and left him there—for the sake of the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- The sunlight next morning was not charitable to Shanley. Where yesterday
- he had borne the marks of one wreck, he now bore the marks of two—his
- own on top of the company’s. Up the street Dinkelman’s clothing emporium
- flaunted a canvas sign announcing unusual bargains in men’s apparel. This
- seemed to Shanley an unkindly act that could be expressed in no better
- terms than “rubbing it in.” He gazed at the sign with an aggrieved
- expression on his face, blinked furiously, and started, with a step that
- lacked something of assurance, for the railroad yards and the
- trainmaster’s office.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was by no means confident of the reception that awaited him. If there
- is one characteristic over and above any other that is common to human
- nature, it is the faculty, though that’s rather an imposing word, of
- worrying like sin over something that <i>may</i> happen—but never
- does. Shanley might just as well have saved himself the mental worry anent
- the trainmaster’s possible attitude. He did not report to the trainmaster
- that morning, never saw that gentleman until long, very long afterward.
- Instead, he reported to Carleton—at the latter’s urgent solicitation
- in the shape of a grinning call-boy, who intercepted his march of progress
- toward the station.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hi, you, there, cherub face!” bawled the urchin politely. “The super
- wants you—on the hop!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley stopped short, and, resorting to his favorite habit, blinked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Carleton. Get it? Carleton,” repeated the messenger, evidently by no
- means sure that he was thoroughly understood; and then, for a parting shot
- as he sailed gayly up the street: “Gee, but you’re pretty!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton! Shanley had forgotten all about Carleton for the moment. His
- hand instinctively went into his pocket—and then he groaned. He
- remembered Carleton. But worst of all, he remembered Carleton’s twenty.
- </p>
- <p>
- There were two courses open to him. He could sneak out of town with all
- possible modesty and dispatch, or he could face the music. Not that
- Shanley debated the question—the occasion had never yet arisen when
- he hadn’t faced the music—he simply experienced the temptation to
- “crawl,” that was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It looks to me,” he ruminated ruefully, “as though I was up against it
- for fair. Just my luck, just my blasted luck, always the same kind of
- luck, that’s what. ‘Tain’t my fault neither, is it? I ain’t responsible
- for that darned wreck—if ‘twasn’t for that I wouldn’t be here. An’
- Kelly, Spider he said his name was, if ‘twasn’t for him I wouldn’t be here
- neither. What the blazes did <i>I</i> have to do with it? I always have to
- stand for the other cuss. That’s me every time, I guess. An’ that’s
- logic.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was. Neither was there any flaw in it as at first sight might appear,
- for the last test of logic is its power of conviction. Shanley, from being
- a man with some reasonable cause for qualms of conscience, became, in his
- own mind, one deeply sinned against, one injured and crushed down by the
- load of others he was forced to bear.
- </p>
- <p>
- He explained this to Carleton while the thought of his burning wrongs was
- still at white heat, and before the super had a chance to get in a word.
- He began as he opened the office door, continued as he crossed the room,
- and finished as he stood before the super’s desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- The scowl that had settled on Carleton’s face, as he looked up at the
- other’s entrance, gradually gave way to a hint of humor lurking around the
- corners of his mouth, and he leaned back in his chair and listened with an
- exaggerated air of profound attention.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just so, just so,” said he, when Shanley finally came to a breathless
- halt. “Now perhaps you will allow <i>me</i> to say a word. It may not have
- occurred to you that I sent for you in order that <i>I</i> might do the
- talking—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- This really seemed to require no answer, so Shanley made none.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yesterday,” went on Carleton, “you came to me for a job, and I gave you
- one, didn’t I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” admitted Shanley, licking his lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just so,” said Carleton mildly. “I hired you then. I fire you now. Pretty
- quick work, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re the doctor,” said Shanley evenly enough. He had, for all his
- logic, expected no more nor less—he was too firm a believer in his
- own particular and exclusive brand of luck. “You’re the doctor,” he
- repeated. “There’s a matter of twenty bucks———
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was coming to that,” interrupted Carleton; “but I’m glad <i>you</i>
- mentioned it. I’ll be honest enough to admit that I hardly expected you
- would. A man who acts as you’ve acted doesn’t generally—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told you ‘twasn’t my fault,” said Shanley stubbornly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton reached for his pipe, and struck a match, surveying Shanley the
- while with a gaze that was half perplexed, half quizzical.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re a queer card,” he remarked at last. “Why don’t you cut out the
- booze?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Twasn’t my fault, I tell you,” persisted Shanley. “You’re a pretty good
- hand with your fists, what?” said Carleton irrelevantly. “Kelly’s no
- slouch himself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley blinked. It appeared that the super was as intimately posted on
- the events of the preceding evening as he was himself. The remark
- suggested an inspection of the fists in question. They were grimy and
- dirty, and most of the knuckles were barked; closed, they resembled a pair
- of miniature battering-rams.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pretty good,” he admitted modestly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m! About that twenty. You intend to pay it back, don’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m not a thief, whatever else I am,” snapped Shanley. “Of course, I’ll
- pay it back. You needn’t worry.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “When?” insisted Carleton coolly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “When I get a job.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll give you one,” said Carleton—“Royal” Carle-ton the boys called
- him, the squarest man that ever held down a division. “I’ll give you one
- where your fists will be kept out of mischief, and where you can’t hit the
- high joints quite as hard as you did last night. But I want you to
- understand this, Shanley, and understand it good and plenty and once for
- all, it’s your last chance. You made a fool of yourself last night, but
- you acted like a man yesterday—that’s why you’re getting a new deal.
- You’re going up to Glacier Canon with McCann on the construction work. You
- won’t find it anyways luxurious, and maybe you’ll like McCann and maybe
- you won’t—he’s been squealing for a white man to live with. You can
- help him boss Italians at one seventy-five a day, and you can go up on
- Twenty-nine this morning, that’ll take care of your transportation. What
- do you say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley couldn’t say anything. He looked at the super and blinked; then he
- looked at his fists speculatively—and blinked.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton was scribbling on a piece of paper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, h’m?” he said, looking up and handing over the paper. “There’s
- an order on Dinkelman, only get some one else to show you the way this
- time, and take the other side of the street going up. Understand?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mr. Carleton,” Shanley blurted out, “if ever I get full again, you——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I will!” said Carleton grimly. “I’ll fire you so hard and fast you’ll be
- out of breath for a month. Don’t make any mistake about that. No man gets
- more than two chances with me. The next time you get drunk will finish
- your railroad career for keeps, I promise you that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Shanley humbly; and then, after a moment’s nervous hesitation:
- “About Kelly, Mr. Carleton. I don’t want to get him in bad on this. You
- see, it was this way. He left early—that’s what started the fight. I
- called him a—a—quitter—or something like that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m, yes; or something like that,” repeated Carleton dryly. “So I
- believe. I’ve had a talk with Kelly. You needn’t let the incomprehensible
- workings of that conscience of yours prick you any on his account. Kelly
- knows when to stop. His record is O. K. in this office. Kelly doesn’t get
- drunk. If he did, he’d be fired just as fast as you will be if it ever
- happens again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If I’m never fired for anything but that,” exclaimed Shanley in a burst
- of fervent emotion, “I’ve got a job for life. I’ll prove it to you, Mr.
- Carleton. I’m going to make good. You see if I don’t.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well,” said Carleton. “I hope you will. That’s all, Shanley. I’ll
- let McCann know you’re coming.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley’s second exit from the super’s presence was different from the
- first. He walked out with a firm tread and squared shoulders. He was
- rejuvenated and buoyant. He was on his mettle—quite another matter,
- entirely another matter, and distinctly apart from the paltry
- consideration of a mere job. He had told Carleton that he would make good.
- Well, he would—and he did. Carleton himself said so, and Carleton
- wasn’t in the habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a man—not
- many. He did sometimes, but not often.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley did not take the other side of the street on the way to
- Dinkelman’s—by no means. He deliberately passed as close to the
- Blazing Star saloon as he could, passed with contemptuous disregard,
- passed boastfully in the knowledge of his own strength. A sixteen-hundred
- class engine with her four pairs of forty-six-inch drivers can pull
- countless cars up a mountain grade steep enough to make one dizzy, but
- Shanley would have backed himself to win against her in a tug of war over
- the scant few inches that separated him from MacGuire’s dispensary as he
- brushed by. None of MacGuire’s for him. Not at all. Red-headed,
- freckle-faced, barked-knuckled,
- bulwarked-and-armor-cased-against-temptation Shanley dealt that morning
- with Mr. Dinkelman, purveyor of bargains in men’s apparel.
- </p>
- <p>
- The dealings were liberal—on the part of both men. On Shanley’s part
- because he needed much; on Mr. Dinkelman’s part because it was Mr.
- Dinkelman’s business, and his nature, to sell much—if he could—safely.
- This was eminently safe. Carleton’s name in the mountains stood higher
- than guaranteed, gilt-edged gold bonds any time.
- </p>
- <p>
- The business finally concluded, Shanley boarded Twenty-nine, local
- freight, west, and in due time, well on in the afternoon, righteously
- sober, straight as a string, cleaned, groomed, and resplendent in a new
- suit, swung off from the caboose at Glacier Canon as the train
- considerately slackened speed enough to give him a fighting chance for
- life and limb.
- </p>
- <p>
- He landed safely, however, in the midst of a jabbering Italian labor gang,
- who received his sudden advent with patience and some awe. A short,
- squintfaced man greeted him with a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Me name’s McCann,” said he of the squint face. “This is Glacier Canon,
- fwhat yez see av ut. Them’s the Eyetalians. Yon’s fwhere I roost an’ by
- the same token, fwhere yez’ll roost, too, from now on. Above is the shack
- av the men. Are yez plased wid yer introduction? ‘Tis wan hell av a hole
- ye’ve come to. Shanley’s the name, eh? A good wan, an’ I’m proud to make
- the acquaintance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley blinked as he stretched out his hand and made friends with his
- superior, and blinked again as he looked first one way and then another in
- an effort to follow and absorb the other’s graphic description of the
- surroundings.
- </p>
- <p>
- The road foreman’s summary was beyond dispute. Glacier Canon was as wild a
- piece of track as the Hill Division boasted, which was going some. The
- right of way hugged the bald gray rock of the mountains that rose up at
- one side in a sheer sweep, and the trains crawled along for all the world
- like huge flies at the base of a wall. On the other side was the Glacier
- River with its treacherous sandy bed that had been the subject of more
- reports and engineers’ gray hairs than all the rest of the system put
- together. The construction camp lay just to the east of the Canon, and at
- the foot of a long, stiff, two-mile, four-per-cent grade. That was the
- reason the camp was there—that grade.
- </p>
- <p>
- Locking the stable door when the horse is gone is a procedure that is very
- old. It did not originate with the directors of the Transcontinental—they
- never claimed it did. But their fixed policy, if properly presented before
- a court of arbitration, would have gone a long way toward establishing a
- clear title to it. If they had built a switchback at the foot of the grade
- in the first place, Extra Number Eighty-three, when she lost control of
- herself near the bottom coming down, would have demonstrated just as
- clearly the necessity for one being there as she demonstrated most
- forcibly what would happen when there wasn’t. All of which is by way of
- saying that rock or no rock, expense or no expense, the door was now to be
- locked, and McCann and his men were there to lock it.
- </p>
- <p>
- McCann explained this to Shanley as he walked him around, up the track to
- the men’s shanties, over the work, and back again down the track to
- inspect the interior of the dwelling they were to share in common—a
- relic of deceased Extra Number Eighty-three in the shape of a truckless
- box-car with dinted and bulging sides—dinted one side and bulged the
- other, that is.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But,” said Shanley, “I dunno what a switchback is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who expected it av ye?” inquired McCann. “An’ fwhat difference does ut
- make? Carleton sint word ye were green. Ye’ve no need to know. So’s ye can
- do as yez are told an’ make them geesers do as they are told, <i>an’’</i>
- can play forty-foive at night—that’s the point, the main point wid
- me, an’ it’s me yez av to get along wid——‘twill be all right.
- Since Meegan, him that was helpin’ me, tuk sick a week back, I’ve been
- alone. Begad, playin’ solytare is——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can play forty-five,” said Shanley.
- </p>
- <p>
- McCann’s face brightened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The powers be praised!” he exclaimed. “I’ll enlighten ye, then, on the
- matter av switchbacks, me son, so as ye’ll have an intilligent conception
- av the work. A switchback is a bit av a spur track that sticks out loike
- the quills av a porkypine at intervuls on a bad grade such as the wan
- forninst ye. ‘Tis run off the main line, d’ye mind, an’ up contrariwise to
- the dip av the grade. Whin a train comin’ down gets beyond control an’ so
- expresses herself by means av her whistle, she’s switched off an’ given a
- chance to run uphill by way av variety until she stops. An’ the same holds
- true if she breaks loose goin’ up. Is ut clear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is,” said Shanley. “When do I begin work?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “In the mornin.’ ‘Tis near six now, an’ the bhoys’ll be quittin’ for the
- night. Forty-foive is a grand game. We’ll play ut to-night to our better
- acquaintance. I contind ‘tis the national game av the ould sod.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Whether McCann’s contention is borne out by fact, or by the even more
- weighty consideration of public opinion, is of little importance. Shanley
- played forty-five with McCann that night and for many nights thereafter.
- He lost a figure or two off the pay check that was to come, but he won the
- golden opinion of the little road boss, which ethically, and in this case
- practically, was of far greater value.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a bright jool av a lad,” wrote McCann across the foot of a weekly
- report.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Carleton, seeing it, was much gratified, for Carleton wasn’t in the
- habit of making many breaks when it came to sizing up a man—not
- many. He did sometimes, but not often. Shanley was making good. Carleton
- was much gratified.
- </p>
- <p>
- Of the three weeks that followed Shanley’s advent to Glacier Canon, this
- story has little to do in a detailed way; but, as a whole, those three
- weeks are pointed, eloquent, and important—very important.
- </p>
- <p>
- Italian laborers have many failings, but likewise they have many virtues.
- They are simple, demonstrative, and their capacity for adoration—of
- both men and things—is very great.
- </p>
- <p>
- From Jacko, the water boy, to Pietro Maraschino, the padrone, they adored
- Shanley, and enthroned him as an idol in their hearts, for the very simple
- reason that Shanley, not being a professional slave-driver by trade,
- established new and heretofore undreamed-of relations with them. Shanley
- was very green, very ignorant, very inexperienced—he treated them
- like human beings. That was the long and short of it. Shanley became
- popular beyond the popularity of any man, before or since, who was ever
- called upon to handle the “foreign element” on the Hill Division.
- </p>
- <p>
- And the work progressed. Day by day the cut bored deeper into the stubborn
- mountain-side; day by day the Glacier River gurgled peacefully along over
- its treacherous sandy bed, one of the prettiest scenic effects on the
- system, so pretty that the company used it in the magazines; day by day
- regulars and extras, freights and passengers, east and west, snorted up
- and down the grade, the only visitations from the outside world; night
- after night Shanley played forty-five with McCann in the smoky, truckless
- box-car.
- </p>
- <p>
- Also the camp was dry, very dry, dryer than a sanatorium—that is,
- than <i>some</i> sanatoriums. Carle-ton had been quite right. There was no
- opportunity for Shanley to hit the high joints quite as hard as he had
- that night in Big Cloud—there was no opportunity for him to hit the
- high joints <i>at all</i>. Shanley had not seen a bottle for three weeks.
- Therefore Shanley felt virtuous, which was proper.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some events follow others as the natural, logical outcome and conclusion
- of preceding ones; others, again, are apparently irrelevant, and the
- connection is not to be explained either by logic, conclusion, or
- otherwise. Rain, McCann’s departure for Big Cloud, and Pietro Maraschino’s
- birthday are an example of this.
- </p>
- <p>
- When it settles down for a storm in the mountains, it is, if the elements
- are really in earnest, torrential, and prolonged, and has the effect of
- tying up construction work tighter than a supreme court injunction could
- come anywhere near doing it.
- </p>
- <p>
- McCann had business in Big Cloud, whether personal or pertaining to the
- company is of no consequence, and the day the storm set in—the
- morning having demonstrated that its classification was not to be
- considered as transient—he seized the opportunity to flag the
- afternoon freight eastbound. This was natural and logical, and an
- opportunity not to be neglected.
- </p>
- <p>
- That this day, however, should be the anniversary of the day the padrone’s
- mother of blessed memory had given birth to Pietro Maraschino in sunny
- Naples fifty-three years before is, though apparently irrelevant, far from
- being so; and since its peculiar and coincident happening cannot be laid
- at the door of either logical, natural, scientific, or philosophical
- conclusions, and since it demands an explanation of some sort, it must,
- perforce, be attributed to the metaphysical—which is a name given to
- all things about which nobody knows anything.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yez are in charge,” said McCann grandiloquently, waving his hand to
- Shanley as he swung into the caboose. “Yez are in charge av the work, me
- son. See to ut. I trust ye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As the work at the moment was entirely at a standstill and bid fair to
- remain so until McCann’s return on the morrow, this was very good of
- McCann. But all men like words of appreciation, most of them whether they
- deserve them or not, so Shanley went back into the box-car out of the rain
- to ponder over the tribute McCann had paid him, and to ponder, too, over
- the new responsibility that had fallen to his lot.
- </p>
- <p>
- He did not ponder very long; indeed, the freight that was transporting
- McCann could hardly have been out of sight over the summit of the grade,
- when a knock at the door was followed by the entrance of the dripping
- figure of the padrone.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley looked up anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hello, Pietro,” he said nervously, for the weather wasn’t the kind that
- would bring a man out for nothing, and he was keenly alive to that new
- responsibility. “Hello, Pietro,” he repeated. “Anything wrong?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Pietro grinned amiably, shook his head, unbuttoned his coat, and held out—a
- bottle.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley stared in amazement, and then began to blink furiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here!” said he. “What’s this?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Chianti,” said Pietro, grinning harder than ever.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Key-aunty.” Shanley screwed up his face. “What the devil is key-aunty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ver’ good wine from Italia,” said the beaming padrone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is, is it? Well, it’s against the rules,” asserted Shanley with
- conviction. “It’s against the rules. McCann’u’d skin you alive. He would.
- Where’d you get it? What’s up, eh? It’s against the rules. I’m in charge.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Pietro explained. It was his birthday. It was very bad weather. For the
- rest of the afternoon there would be no work. They would celebrate the
- birthday, Meester McCann had taken the train. As for the wine—Pietro
- shrugged his shoulders—his people adored wine. Unless they were very
- poor his people would have a little wine in their packs, perhaps. He was
- not quite sure where they had got it, but it was very thoughtful of them
- to remember his birthday. Each had presented him with a little wine. This
- bottle was an expression of their very great good estime of Meester
- Shanley. Perhaps, later, Meester Shanley would come himself to the shack.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s against the rules,” blinked Shanley. “McCann ‘u’d skin you alive.
- Maybe I’ll drop in by and by. You can leave the bottle.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Pietro bobbed, grinned delightedly, handed over the bottle, and backed out
- into the storm.
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley, still blinking, placed the bottle on the table, and gazed at it
- thoughtfully for a few minutes—and his thoughts were of Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If ‘twere whisky,” said he, “I’d have no part of it, not a drop, not even
- a smell. I would not. I would not touch it. But as it is——”
- Shanley uncorked the bottle.
- </p>
- <p>
- Not at all. One does <i>not</i> get drunk on a bottle of Chianti wine. A
- single bottle of Chianti wine is very little. That is the trouble—it
- is <i>very</i> little. After three weeks of abstinence it is very little
- indeed—so little that it is positively tantalizing.
- </p>
- <p>
- The afternoon waned rapidly—and so did the Chianti. Outside, the
- storm instead of abating grew worse—the thunder racketing through
- the mountains, the lightning cutting jagged streaks in the black sky, the
- rain coming down in sheets that set the culverts and sluiceways running
- full. It was settling down for a bad night in the mountains, which, in the
- Rockies, is not a thing to be ignored. “’tis no wonder McCann found it
- lonely,” muttered Shanley, as he squeezed the last drop from the bottle.
- “‘Tis very lonely, indeed”—he held the bottle upside down to make
- sure that it was thoroughly drained—“most uncommon lonely. It is
- that. Maybe those Eyetalians ‘ll be thinkin’ I’m stuck up, perhaps—which
- I am not. It’s a queer name the stuff has, though it’s against the rules,
- an’ I can’t get my tongue around it, but I’ve tasted worse. For the sake
- of courtesy I’ll look in on the birthday party.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He incased himself in a pair of McCann’s rubber boots, put on McCann’s
- rubber coat, and started out.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ to think,” said he, as he sloshed and buffeted his way up the two
- hundred yards of track to the construction shanties, “to think that Pietro
- came out in cruel bad weather like this all for to present his compliments
- an’ ask me over! ‘Twould be ungracious to refuse the invitation; besides
- my presence will keep them in due bounds an’ restraint. I’ve heard that
- Eyetalians, being foreigners, do not practice restraint—but, being
- foreigners, ‘tis not to be held against them. I’m in charge, an’ I’ll see
- to it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They greeted him in the largest of the three bunk-houses. They greeted him
- heartily, sincerely, uproariously, and with fervor. They were unfeignedly
- glad to see him, and if he had not been by nature a modest man he would
- have understood that his popularity was above the popularity ever before
- accorded to a boss. Likewise, their hospitality was without stint. If
- there was any shortage of stock—which is a matter decidedly open to
- question—they denied themselves that Shanley might not feel the
- pinch. Shanley was lifted from the mere plane of man—he became a
- king.
- </p>
- <p>
- A little Chianti is a little; much Chianti is to be reckoned with and on
- no account to be despised. Shanley not only became a king, he became
- regally, imperially, royally, and majestically drunk. Also there came at
- last an end to the Chianti, at which stage of the proceedings Shanley,
- with extravagant dignity and appropriate words—an exhortation on
- restraint—waddled to the door to take his departure.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was very dark outside, very dark, except when an intermittent flash of
- lightning made momentary daylight. Pietro Maraschino offered Shanley one
- of the many lanterns that, in honor of the festive occasion, they had
- commandeered, without regard to color, from the tool boxes, and had strung
- around the shack. Further, he offered to see Shanley on his way.
- </p>
- <p>
- The offer of assistance touched Shanley—it touched him wrong. It
- implied a more or less acute condition of disability, which he repudiated
- with a hurt expression on his face and forceful words on his tongue. He
- refused it; and being aggrieved, refused also the lantern Pietro held out
- to him. He chose one for himself instead—the one nearest to his
- hand. That this was red made no difference. Blue, white, red, green, or
- purple, it was all one to Shanley. His fuddled brain did not
- differentiate. A light was a light, that was all there was to that.
- </p>
- <p>
- The short distance from the shanty door to the right of way Shanley
- negotiated with finesse and aplomb, and then he started down the track.
- This, however, was another matter.
- </p>
- <p>
- Railroad ties, at best, do not make the smoothest walking in the world,
- and to accomplish the feat under some conditions is decidedly worthy of
- note. Shanley’s performance beggars the English language—there is no
- metaphor. For every ten feet he moved forward he covered twenty in
- laterals, and, considering that the laterals were limited to the paltry
- four, feet, eight and one-half inches that made the gauge of the rails,
- the feat was incontestably more than worthy of mere note—it was
- something to wonder at. He clung grimly to the lantern, with the result
- that the gyrations of that little red light in the darkness would have put
- to shame an expert’s exhibition with a luminous dumb-bell. The while
- Shanley spoke earnestly to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Queshun is am I drunk—thash’s the queshun. If I’m drunk—lose
- my job. Thash what Carleton said—lose my job. If I’m not drunk—s’all
- right. Wish I knew wesser I’m drunk or not.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He relapsed into silent communion and debate. This lasted for a very long
- period, during which, marvelous to relate, he had not only reached a point
- opposite his box-car domicile, but, being oblivious of that fact, had kept
- on along the track. Progress, however, was becoming more and more
- difficult. Shanley was assuming a position that might be likened somewhat
- to the letter C, owing to the fact that the force of gravity seemed to be
- exerting an undue influence on his head. Shanley was coming to earth.
- </p>
- <p>
- As a result of his communion with himself he began to talk again, and his
- words suggested that he had suspicions of the truth.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Jus’ my luck,” said he bitterly. “Jus’ my luck. Allus same kind of luck.
- What’d I have to do wis Peto Mara—Mars—Marscheeno’s birthday?
- Nothing. Nothing ‘tall. ‘Twasn’t my fault. Jus’ my luck. Jus’ my——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Shanley came to earth. Also his head came into contact with the unyielding
- steel of the left-hand rail, and as a result he sprawled inertly full
- across the right of way, not ten yards west of where the Glacier River
- swings in to crowd the track close up against the mountain base.
- </p>
- <p>
- Providence sometimes looks after those who are unable to look after
- themselves. By the law of probabilities the lantern should have met
- disaster quick and absolute; but, instead, when it fell from Shanley’s
- hand, it landed right side up just outside the rail between two ties, and,
- apart from a momentary and hesitant flicker incident to the jolt, burned
- on serenely. And it was still burning when, five minutes later, above the
- swish of leaping waters from the Glacier River now a chattering, angry
- stream with swollen banks, above the moan of the wind and the roll of the
- thunder through the mountains, above the pelting splash of the steady
- rain, came the hoarse scream of Number One’s whistle on the grade.
- </p>
- <p>
- Sanderson, in the cab, caught the red against him on the right of way
- ahead, and whistled insistently for the track. This having no effect, he
- grunted, latched in the throttle, and applied the “air.” The ray of the
- headlight crept along between the rails, hovered over a black object
- beside the lantern, passed on again and held, not on the glistening
- rain-wet rails—<i>they</i> had disappeared—but on a crumbling
- road-bed and a dark blotch of waters, as with a final screech from the
- grinding brake-shoes Number One came to a standstill.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy MacCheesar!” exclaimed Sanderson, as he swung from the cab.
- </p>
- <p>
- He made his way along past the drivers to where the pilot’s nose was
- inquisitively poked against the lantern, picked up the lantern, and bent
- over Shanley.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy MacCheesar!” he exclaimed again, straightening up after a moment’s
- examination. “Holy MacCheesar!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s wrong, Sandy?” snapped a voice behind him, the voice of Kelly,
- Spider Kelly, the conductor, who had hurried forward to investigate the
- unscheduled stop.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Search me,” replied Sanderson. “Looks like the Glacier was up to her old
- tricks. There’s a washout ahead, and a bad one, I guess. But the meaning
- of this here is one beyond me. The fellow was curled up on the track just
- as you see him with the light burning alongside, that’s what saved us, but
- he’s as drunk as a lord.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As Kelly bent over the prostrate form, others of the train crew appeared
- on the scene. One glance he gave at Shanley’s
- never-under-any-circumstances-to-be-for-gotten homely countenance, and
- hastily ordered the men to go forward and investigate the washout ahead.
- Then he turned to the engineer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The man is not drunk, Sandy,” said he.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is gloriously and magnificently drunk, Kelly,” replied the engineer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What would he be doing here, then? He is not drunk.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sleeping it off. He is disgracefully drunk.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can ye not see the bash on his head where he must have stumbled in the
- dark trying to save the train and struck against the rail? He is not
- drunk.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can ye not smell?” retorted Sanderson. “He is dead drunk!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have fought with him and he licked me. He is a man and a friend of
- mine”—Kelly shoved his lantern into Sanderson’s face. “<i>He is not
- drunk</i>.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is <i>not</i> drunk,” said Sanderson. “He is a hero. What will we do
- with him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ll carry him, you and me, over to the construction shanty, it’s only a
- few yards, and put him in his bunk. He works here, you know. McCann’s in
- Big Cloud, for I saw him there. After that we’ll run back to the Bend for
- orders and make our report.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hurry, then,” said the engineer. “Take his legs. What are you laughing
- at?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was thinking of Carleton,” said Kelly. “Carleton? What’s Carleton got
- to do with it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll tell you later when we get to the Bend. Come on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m,” said Sanderson, as they staggered with their burden over to the
- box-car shack. “I’ve an idea that bash on the head is more dirt than hurt.
- He’s making a speech, ain’t he?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Jus’ my luck,” mumbled the reviving Shanley dolefully. “Jus’ my luck.
- Alius same kind of luck.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Possibly,” said Kelly. “Set him down and slide back the door. That’s
- right. In with him now. We haven’t got time to make him very comfortable,
- but I guess he’ll do. I can fix him up better at the Bend than I can
- here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “At the Bend? What d’ye mean?” demanded Sanderson.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ll see,” replied Kelly, with a grin. “You’ll see.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And Sanderson saw. So did Carleton—in a way. Kelly’s report, when
- they got to the Bend, was a work of art. He disposed of the nature and
- extent of the washout in ten brief, well-chosen words, but the operator
- got a cramp before Kelly was through covering Shanley with glory. The
- passengers, packed in the little waiting-room clamoring for details,
- yelled deliriously as he read the message aloud—and promptly took up
- a collection, a very generous collection, because all collections are
- generous at psychological moments—that is to say, if not delayed too
- long to allow a recovery from hysteria.
- </p>
- <p>
- At Big Cloud, the dispatcher, because the washout was a serious matter
- that not only threatened to tie up traffic, but was tying it up, sent a
- hurry call to Carleton’s house that brought the super on the run to the
- office. By this time the collection had been counted, and the total wired
- in, as an additional detail—one hundred and forty dollars and
- thirty-three cents. The odd change being a contribution from a Swede in
- the colonist coach who could not speak English, and who paid because a man
- in uniform, a brakeman acting as canvasser, made the request. A Swede has
- a great respect for a uniform.
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m,” said Carleton, when he had read it all. “I know a man when I see
- one. Tell Shanley to report here. I guess we can find something better for
- him to do than bossing laborers. What? Yes, send the letter up on the
- construction train. One hundred and forty, thirty-three, h’m? Tell him
- that, too. He’ll feel good when he sees it in the morning.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Shanley did not feel good when he saw it in the morning, for he was
- nursing a very bad headache and a stomach that had a tendency to
- squeamishness. The letter was lying on the floor, where some one had
- considerately chucked it in without disturbing him. His eyes fell on it as
- he struggled out of his bunk. He picked it up, opened it, read it—and
- blinked. His face set with a very blank and bewildered expression. He read
- it again, and again once more. Then he went to the door and looked out.
- </p>
- <p>
- A construction train was on the line a little below him, and a gang of
- men, not his nor Pietro Maraschino’s men, were busily at work. As he
- gazed, his face puckered. The problem that had so obsessed him on his
- return journey from the birthday celebration the night before was a
- problem no longer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I <i>was</i> drunk,” said he, with conviction. “I <i>must</i> have been.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He went back to the letter and studied it again, scratching his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Something,” he muttered, “has happened. What it is, I dunno. I was drunk,
- an’ I’m not fired. I was drunk, an’ I’m promoted. I was drunk, an’ I’m
- paid well for it, very well. I was drunk—an’ I’ll keep my mouth
- shut.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Which was exactly the advice Kelly took pains to give him half an hour
- later, when Number One crawled down to the Canon and halted for a few
- minutes opposite the dismantled box-car, while the construction train put
- the last few touches to its work.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- VI—THE BUILDER
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here are two sides
- to every story—which is a proverb so old that it is in the running
- with Father Time himself. It is repeated here because there must be <i>some</i>
- truth in it—anything that can stand the wear and tear of the ages,
- and the cynics, and the wise old philosophical owls without getting any
- knock-out dints punched in its vital spots must have some sort of merit
- fundamentally, what? Anyway, the company had their side, and the men’s
- version differed—of course. Maybe each, in a way, was more or less
- right, and, equally, in a way, more or less wrong. Maybe, too, both sides
- lost their tempers and got their crown-sheets burned out before the
- arbitration pow-wow had a chance to get the line clear and give anybody
- rights, schedule or otherwise. However, be that as it may, whoever was
- right or whoever was wrong, one or the other, or both, it is the strike,
- not the ethics of it, that has to do with—but just a moment, we’re
- over-running our holding orders.
- </p>
- <p>
- From the time the last rail was spiked home and bridging the Rockies was a
- reality, not a dream—from then to the present day, there isn’t any
- very much better way of describing the Hill Division than to call it rough
- and ready. Coming right down to cases, the history of that piece of track,
- the history of the men who gave the last that was in them to make it, and
- the history of those who have operated it since isn’t far from being a
- pretty typical and comprehensive example of the pulsing, dominating,
- dogged, go-forward spirit of a continent whose strides and progress are
- the marvel of the world; and, withal, it is an example so compact and
- concrete that through it one may see and view the larger picture in all
- its angles and in all its shades. Heroism and fame and death and failure—it
- has known them all—but ever, and above all else, it has known the
- indomitable patience, the indomitable perseverance, the indomitable
- determination against which no times, nor conditions, nor manners, nor
- customs, nor obstacles can stand—the spirit of the New Race and the
- Great New Land, the essence and the germ of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Building a road through the Rockies and tapping the Sierras to give zest
- to the finish wasn’t an infant’s performance; and operating it,
- single-track, on crazy-wild cuts and fills and tangents and curves and
- tunnels and trestles with nature to battle and fight against, isn’t any
- infant’s performance, either. The Hill Division was rough and ready. It
- always was, and it is now—just naturally so. And Big Cloud, the
- divisional point, snuggling amongst the buttes in the eastern foothills,
- is even more so. It boasts about every nationality classified in certain
- erudite editions of small books with big names, and, to top that, has an
- extra anomaly or two left over and up its sleeve for good measure; but,
- mostly, it is, or rather was—it has changed some with the years—composed
- of Indians, bad Americans, a scattering of Chinese, and an indescribable
- medley of humans from the four quarters of Europe, the Cockney, the
- Polack, the Swede, the Russian and the Italian—laborers on the
- construction gangs. Big Cloud was a little more than rough and ready—it
- wasn’t exactly what you’d call a health resort for finnicky nerves.
- </p>
- <p>
- So, take it by and large, the Hill Division, from one end to the other,
- wasn’t the quietest or most peaceful locality on the map even before the
- trouble came. After that—well, mention the Big Strike to any of the
- old-timers and they’ll talk fast enough and hard enough and say enough in
- a minute to set you wondering if the biographers hadn’t got mixed on dates
- and if Dante hadn’t got his material for that little hair-stiffener of his
- no further away than the Rockies, and no longer back than a few years ago.
- But no matter——
- </p>
- <p>
- The story opens on the strike—<i>not</i> the ethics of it. There’s
- some hard feeling yet—too much of it to take sides one way or the
- other. But then, apart from that, this is not the story of a strike, it is
- the story of men—a story that the boys tell at night in the darkened
- roundhouses in the shadow of the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the
- steam purrs softly at the gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a
- catchy sob. They tell it, too, across the tracks at headquarters, or on
- the road and in construction camps; but they tell it better, somehow, in
- the roundhouse, though it is not an engineer’s tale—and Clarihue,
- the night turner, tells it best of all. Set forth as it is here it takes
- no rank with him,—but all are not so fortunate as to have listened
- while Clarihue talked.
- </p>
- <p>
- Just one word more to make sure that the red isn’t against us anywhere and
- we’ll get to Keating and Spirlaw—just a word to say that Carleton,
- “Royal” Carle-ton, was superintendent then, and Regan was master mechanic,
- Harvey was division engineer, Spence was chief dispatcher, and Riley was
- trainmaster. Pretty good men that little group, pretty good railroaders—there
- have never been better. Some of them are bigger now in the world’s eyes,
- heads of systems instead of departments—and some of them will never
- railroad any more. However———
- </p>
- <p>
- If you haven’t forgotten Shanley you will recall the Glacier Canon, and,
- most of all, you will recall the Glacier River with its treacherous sandy
- bed that snuggled close to the right of way and forced the track hard
- against the rocky walls of the mountain’s base. The havoc the Glacier
- played with the operating department on the night of Shanley’s memorable
- heroism was not the first time it had misbehaved itself, nor was it the
- last—that was the trouble. It washed out the road-bed with such
- consistent persistency, on so little provocation, and did it so
- effectually as to stir at last to resentment even the torpid blood of the
- directors down East. So they voted the sum, though it hurt, and solaced
- themselves with the thought that after all it was economy—which was
- true.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was only one thing to do against that overhospitable and
- affectionate little stream, and that was to get away from it; but, before
- proceeding to do so—in order to get elbow room to work so that the
- flyers and the fast mails and the traffic generally wouldn’t be hung up
- every time a Polack swung a pick—they pushed the track out over the
- chattering river on a long, temporary, hybrid trestle of wood and steel.
- That done, the rest was up to Spirlaw—up to Spirlaw and Keating.
- </p>
- <p>
- The plans called for the shaving down of the mountain-side, the barbering,
- mostly, to be done with dynamite, for the beard of the Rockies is not the
- down of a youth. So, when the trestle was finished, Spirlaw with a gang of
- some thirty Polacks moved into construction camp, promptly tore up the old
- track, and set themselves to the task in hand. A little later, Keating
- joined them.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw was a road boss, and the roughest of his kind. Physically he was a
- giant; and which of the three was the hardest, his face, his fist, or his
- tongue, would afford the sporting element a most excellent opportunity to
- indulge in a little book-making with the odds about even all round. His
- hair was a coarse mop of tawny brown that straggled over his eyes; and his
- eyes were all black, every bit of them—there didn’t seem to be any
- pupil at all, which gave them a glint that was harder than a cold chisel.
- Take him summed up, Spirlaw looked a pretty tough proposition, and in some
- ways, most ways perhaps, he was—he never denied it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What the blue blinding blazes, d’ye think, h’m?” he would remark,
- reaching into his hip pocket for his “chewing,” as he swept the other arm
- comprehensively over the particular crowd of sweating foreigners that
- happened to be under his particular jurisdiction at the time. “What d’ye
- think! You can’t run cuts an’ fills with an outfit like this on soft soap
- an’ candy sticks, can you? Well then—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- That last “h’m” was more or less conclusive—very few cared to pursue
- the argument any further. At a safe distance, the Big Fellows on the
- division, as a salve to their consciences when humanitarian ideas were in
- the ascendancy, would bombard Spirlaw with telegrams which were forceful
- in tone and direful in threat—but that’s all it ever amounted to.
- Spirlaw’s work report for a day on anything, from bridging a canon to
- punching a hole in the bitter hard rock of the mountain-side, was a report
- that no one else on the division had ever approached, let alone duplicated—and
- figures count perhaps just a little bit more in the operating department
- of a railroad than they do anywhere else in the world. Spirlaw used the
- telegrams as spills to light a pipe as hard-looking as himself, whose bowl
- was down at the heels on one side from much scraping, and on such
- occasions it was more than ordinarily unfortunate for the sour-visaged
- Polack who should chance to arouse his ire.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some men possess the love of a fight and their natures are tempestuous by
- virtue of their nationality, because some nationalities are addicted that
- way. This may have been the case with Spirlaw—or it may not. There’s
- no saying, for Spirlaw’s nationality was a question mark. He never
- delivered himself on the subject, and, certainly, there was no figuring it
- out from the derivation of his name—<i>that</i> could have been most
- anything, and could have come from most anywhere.
- </p>
- <p>
- To say that “opposites attract” isn’t any more original, any less
- gray-bearded, than the words at the head of these pages. Generally, that
- sort of thing is figured in the worn-out, stale,
- familiarity-breeds-con-tempt realm of platitude, and at its unctuous
- repetition one comes to turn up his nose; but, once in a while, life has a
- habit of getting in a kink or a twist that gives you a jolt and a
- different side-light, and then, somehow, a thing like that rings as fresh
- and virile as though you had just heard it for the first time. As far as
- any one ever knew, Keating was the only one that ever got inside of
- Spirlaw’s shell, the only one that the road boss ever showed the slightest
- symptoms of caring a hang about—and yet, on the surface, between the
- two there was nothing in common. Where one was polished the other was
- rough; where one was weak the other was strong. Keating was small, thin,
- pale-faced, and he had a cough—a cough that had sent him West in a
- hurry without waiting for the other year that would have given him his
- engineer’s diploma from the college in the East.
- </p>
- <p>
- When the boy, he wasn’t much more than a boy, dropped off at Big Cloud,
- and Carleton read the letter he brought from one of the big Eastern
- operators, the super raised his eyebrows a little, looked him over and
- sent him out to Spirlaw. Afterwards, he spoke to Regan about him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I didn’t know what to do with him, Tommy; but I had to do something,
- what? Any one with half an eye could tell that he had to be kept out of
- doors. Thought he might be able to help Spirlaw out a little as assistant,
- h’m? Guess he’ll pick up the work quick enough. He don’t look strong.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mabbe it’s just as well,” grinned the master mechanic. “He won’t be able
- to batter the gang any. One man doing that is enough—when it’s
- Spirlaw.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw heard about it before he saw Keating, and he swore fervently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What the hell!” he growled. “Think I’m runnin’ a nursery or an outdoor
- sanatorium? I guess I’ve got enough to do without lookin’ after sick kids,
- I guess I have. Fat lot of help he’ll be—help my eye! I don’t need
- no help.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But for all that, somehow, from the first minute when Keating got off the
- local freight, that stopped for him at the camp, and shoved out his hand
- to Spirlaw it was different—after that it was <i>all</i> Keating as
- far as the road boss was concerned.
- </p>
- <p>
- Queer the way things go. Keating looked about the last man on earth you
- would expect to find rubbing elbows with an iron-fisted foreman whose
- tongue was rougher than a barbed-wire fence; the last man to hold his own
- with a slave-driven gang of ugly Polacks. He seemed too quiet, too shy,
- too utterly unfit, physically, for that sort of thing. The blood was all
- out of the boy—he got rid of it faster than he could make it. But
- his training stood him in good stead, and, within his limitations, he took
- hold like an old hand. That was what caught Spirlaw. He did what he was
- told, and he did what he could—did a little more than he could at
- times, which would lay him up for a bad two or three days of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good man,” Spirlaw scribbled across the bottom of a report one day—a
- day that was about equally divided between barking his knuckles on a
- Polack’s head and feeding cracked ice to Keating in his bunk. Cracked ice?
- No, it wasn’t on the regular camp bill of fare—but the company
- supplied it for all that. Spirlaw, with supreme contempt for the
- dispatchers and their schedules and their train sheets, held up Number
- Twelve and the porter of the Pullman for a goodly share of the commodity
- possessed by that colored gentleman. That’s what Spirlaw thought of
- Keating.
- </p>
- <p>
- For the first few weeks after he struck the camp Keating didn’t have very
- much to say about himself, or anything else for that matter; but after he
- got a little nearer to Spirlaw and the mutual liking grew stronger, he
- began to open up at nights when he and the road boss sat outside the door
- of the construction shanty and watched the sun lose itself behind the
- mighty peaks, creep again with a wondrous golden-tinted glow between a
- rift in the range, and finally sink with ensuing twilight out of sight.
- Keating could talk then.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t see what you ever took up engineerin’ for,” remarked Spirlaw one
- evening. “It’s about the roughest kind of a life I know of, an’ you———”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I know, I know,” Keating smiled. “You think I’m not strong enough for it.
- Why, another year out here in the West and I’ll be like a horse.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, you will,” agreed Spirlaw, hastily. “I didn’t mean just that.” Then
- he sucked his briar hard.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw wasn’t much up on therapeutics, he knew more about blasting rock,
- but down in his heart there wasn’t much doubt about another year in the
- West for the boy, and another and another, <i>all of them</i>—only
- they would be over the Great Divide that one only crosses once when it is
- crossed forever. Six months, four, three,—just months, not years,
- was what he read in Keating’s face. “What I meant,” he amended, “was that
- you don’t have to. From what you’ve said, I figur’ your folks back there
- would be willin’ to stake you in most any line you picked out, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I don’t have to,” Keating answered, and his face lighted up as he
- leaned over and touched the road boss on the sleeve. “But, Spirlaw, it’s
- the greatest thing in all the world. Don’t you see? A man does something.
- <i>He builds</i>. I’m going to be a builder—a builder of bridges and
- roads and things like that. I want to do something some day—something
- that will be worth while. That’s why I’m going to be an engineer; because,
- all over the world from the beginning, the engineers have led the way and—and
- they’ve left something behind them. I think that’s the biggest thing they
- can say of any man when he dies—that he was a builder, that he left
- something behind him. I’d like to have them say that about me. Well, after
- I put in another year out here—I’m a heap better even now than when
- I came—I’m going back to finish my course, and then—well, you
- understand what I want to do, don’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- There were lots of talks like that, evening after evening, and they all of
- them ended in the same way—-
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw would knock out his pipe against a stone or his boot heel, and
- “figur’ he’d stroll up the camp a bit an’ make sure all was right for the
- night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- A pretty hard man Spirlaw was, but under the rough and the brutal, the
- horny, thick-shelled exterior was another self, a strange side of self
- that he had never known until he had known Keating. It got into him pretty
- deep and pretty hard, the boy and his ambitions; and the irony of it, grim
- and bitter, deepened his pity and roused, too, a sense of fierce, hot
- resentment against the fate that mocked in its pitiless might so
- defenseless and puny a victim. To himself he came to call Keating “The
- Builder,” and one day when Harvey came down on an inspection trip, he told
- the division engineer about it—that’s how it got around.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, when he heard it, didn’t say anything—just crammed the
- dottle in his pipe down with his forefinger and stared out at the switches
- in the yards. They were used to seeing the surface of things plowed up and
- the corners turned back in the mountains, there weren’t many days went by
- when something that showed the raw didn’t happen in one way or another,
- but it never brought callousness or indifference, only, perhaps, a truer
- sense of values.
- </p>
- <p>
- They had been blasting in the Canon for a matter of two months when the
- first signs of trouble began to show themselves, and the beginning was
- when the shop hands at Big Cloud went out—the boiler-makers and the
- blacksmiths, the painters, the carpenters and the fitters. The
- construction camp, that is Spirlaw, didn’t worry very much about this for
- the very simple reason that there didn’t appear to be any reason why it,
- or he, should—that was Regan’s hunt. But when the train crews
- followed suit and stray rumors of a fight or two at Big Cloud began to
- come in, with the likelihood of more hard on the heels of the first, it
- put a different complexion on things; for the rioting, what there had been
- of it, lay, not at the door of the railroad boys, but with the town’s
- loafers and hangers-on, these and the foreign element—particularly
- the foreign element—the brothers and the cousins of the Polacks who
- were swinging the picks and the shovels under the iron hand of Spirlaw,
- their temporary lord and master—the Polacks, gently ungentle, when
- amuck, as starved pumas.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the Brotherhood said “quit,” and the engine crews followed the
- trainmen. Things began to look black, and headquarters began to find it
- pretty hard to move anything. The train schedule past the Canon was cut
- better than in half, and the faces of the men in the cabs and the cabooses
- were new faces to those in camp—the faces of the men the company
- were bringing in on hurry calls from wherever they could get them, from
- the plains East or the coast West.
- </p>
- <p>
- Every day brought reports of trouble from one end of the line to the
- other, more rioting, more disorder at Big Cloud; and, in an effort to nip
- as much of it in the bud as possible, Carleton issued orders to stop all
- construction work—all except the work in Glacier Canon, for there
- the temporary trestle lay uneasy on his mind.
- </p>
- <p>
- The day the stop orders went out elsewhere a letter went out to Spirlaw.
- Spirlaw read it and his face set like a thunder cloud. He handed it to
- Keating.
- </p>
- <p>
- Keating read it—and looked serious.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess things aren’t any too rosy down there,” he commented; then
- slowly: “I’ve noticed our men seemed a bit sullen lately. They don’t care
- anything much about the strike, it must be a sort of sympathetic movement
- with the rest of their crowd that’s running wild at Big Cloud—only I
- don’t just figure how they can know very much about what’s going on. We
- don’t ourselves, for that matter.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw smiled grimly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll tell you how,” he said. “I caught a Polack in the camp last night
- that didn’t belong here—and I broke his head for the second time,
- see? He used to work’ for me about a year ago—that’s when I broke it
- the first time. He’s one of their influential citizens—name’s
- Kuryla. Sneaked in here to stir up trouble—guess he’s sorry for it,
- I guess he is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s the first I’ve heard of it,” said Keating, his eyes opening a
- little wider in surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You was asleep,” explained Spirlaw tersely.
- </p>
- <p>
- Keating stared curiously at the road boss for a minute, then he glanced
- again at the super’s letter which he still held in his hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Carleton says he is depending on you to put this work through if it’s a
- possible thing. You don’t really think we’ll have any serious trouble here
- though, do you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw bit deeply into his plug before he answered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, son; I do,” he said at last, “And there’s a good many reasons why we
- will, too. Once start ‘em goin’ an’ there’s no worse hellions on earth
- than the breed we’re livin’ next door to. Furthermore they don’t <i>love</i>
- me—they’re just afraid of me as, by the holy razoo, I mean ‘em to
- be. Let ‘em once get a smell of the upper hand an’ it would be all day <i>an</i>’
- good-by. Let ‘em get goin’ good at Big Cloud an’ they’ll get goin’ good
- here—they’ll kind of figur’ then that there ain’t any law to bother
- ‘em—an’, unless I miss my guess, Big Cloud’s in for the hottest
- celebration in its history, which will be goin’ some for it’s had a few
- before that weren’t tame by a damn sight.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” inquired Keating, “what do you intend to do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m-m,” drawled Spirlaw reflectively, and there was a speculative look in
- his eyes as they roved over his assistant. “That’s what I’ve been chewin’
- over since I caught that skunk Kuryla last night. As far as I can figur’
- it the chance of trouble here depends on how far those cusses go at Big
- Cloud. If I knew that, I’d know what to expect, h’m? I thought I’d send
- you up to headquarters for a day. You could have a talk with the super,
- tell him just where we stand here, an’ size things up there generally.
- What do you say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, of course. All right, if you want me to,” agreed Keating readily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s the boy,” said Spirlaw, heartily. “Number Twelve will be along in
- half an hour. I’ll flag her, an’ you can go an’ get ready now. I’ll give
- you a letter to take along to Carleton.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As Keating, with a nod of assent, turned briskly away, Spirlaw watched him
- out of sight—and the hint of a smile played over the lips of the
- road boss. He pulled a report sheet from his pocket, and on the back of it
- scrawled laboriously a letter to the superintendent of the Hill Division.
- It wasn’t a very long letter even with the P. S. included. His smile
- hardened as he read it over.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Supt., Big Cloud,” it ran. “Dear Sir:—Replying to yours 8th inst.,
- please send a couple of good.45s, and <i>plenty of stuffing</i>. (‘Plenty
- of stuffing’ was heavily underscored.) Yrs. Resp., H. Spirlaw. P.S. <i>Keep
- the boy up there out of this</i>.” (The P. S. was even more heavily
- underscored than the other.)
- </p>
- <p>
- Wise and learned in the ways of men—and Polacks—was Spirlaw.
- Spirlaw was not dealing with the <i>possibility</i> of trouble—it
- was simply a question of how long it would be before it started. He folded
- the letter, sealed it in one of the company’s manilas, and, as he watched
- Number Twelve disappear around the bend steaming east for Big Cloud with
- Keating aboard her and the epistle reposing in Keating’s pocket, he
- stretched out his arms that were big as derrick booms and drew in a long
- breath like a man from whose shoulders has dropped a heavy load.
- </p>
- <p>
- That day Spirlaw talked from his heart to the men, and they listened in
- sullen, stupid silence, leaning on their picks and shovels.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You know me,” he snapped, and his eyes starting at the right of the group
- rested for a bare second on each individual face as they swept down the
- line. “You know <i>me</i>. You’ve been actin’ like sulky dogs lately—don’t
- think I haven’t spotted it. You saw what happened to that coyote friend of
- yours that sneaked in here last night. I meant it as a lesson for the
- bunch of you as well as him. The yarns he was fillin’ you full of are
- mostly lies, an’ if they ain’t it’s none of your business, anyhow. It
- won’t pay you to look for trouble, I promise you that. You can take it
- from me that I’ll bash the first man to powder that tries it. Get that?
- Well then, wiggle them picks a bit an’ get busy!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The man that hits first,” said Spirlaw to himself, as he walked away, “is
- the man that usually comes out on top. I guess them there few kind words
- of mine ‘ll give ‘em a little something to chew on till Carle-ton sends
- that hardware down, I guess they will, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The camp was pretty quiet that night—quieter than usual. The
- cook-house and the three bunk-houses, that lay a few hundred yards east of
- the trestle, might have been occupied by dead men for all the sounds that
- came from them. Occasionally, Spirlaw, sitting out as usual in front of
- his own shanty, that was between the trestle and the gang’s quarters, saw
- a Polack or two skulk from one of the bunk-houses to the other—and
- he scowled savagely as he divided his glances between them and the sky. It
- looked like a storm in the mountains, and a storm in the mountains is
- never by any possibility to be desired—least of all was it to be
- desired just then. The men at work was one thing; the men cooped up for a
- day, or two days, of enforced idleness with the temper they were in was
- another—
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw turned in that night with the low, ominous roll of distant thunder
- for a lullaby.
- </p>
- <p>
- Once in the night he woke suddenly at the sound of a splitting crash, and
- once, twice, and again, like a fierce, winking stream of flame, the
- lightning filled the shack bright as day, while on the roof the rain beat
- steadily like the tattoo of a corps of snare drums. Spirlaw smiled grimly
- as the darkness shut down on him again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Got the little builder out just about the right time, h’m?” he remarked
- to himself; and, turning over in his bunk, went to sleep again—but
- even in his sleep the grim smile lingered on his lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- The morning broke with the steady downpour unabated. Everything ran water,
- and the rock cut was filled with it. Work was out of the question. Spirlaw
- ate his breakfast, that the dripping camp cook brought him, and then,
- putting on his rubber boots and coat, started over for the track. Number
- Eleven was due at the Canon at seven-thirty, and she would have the
- package of “hardware” he had asked Carleton for.
- </p>
- <p>
- But though seven-thirty came, Number Eleven did not—neither did any
- other train, east or west. The hours passed from a long morning to drag
- through a longer afternoon. Something was wrong somewhere—and badly
- wrong at that. Spirlaw’s face was blacker than the storm. Twice, once in
- the morning and once in the afternoon, he started down the track in the
- direction of Keefer’s Siding, which was just what its name proclaimed it
- to be—a siding, no more, no less, only there was an operator there.
- Each time, however, he changed his mind after getting no further than a
- few yards. The Polacks could be no less alive to the fact than himself
- that something out of the ordinary was in the air, and second
- considerations swung strongly to the advisability of sticking close to the
- camp, so that his presence might have the effect of dampening the ardor of
- any mischief that might be brewing.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was not until well on toward eight o’clock in the evening and the last
- of the twilight that the hoarse screech of a whistle sounded down the
- canon grade—a long blast and three short ones. It was belated Number
- Eleven whistling for the camp—she wouldn’t stop, just slow down to
- transact her business. Spirlaw, who was in his shanty at the time,
- snatched up his hat, dashed out of the door, and headed for the bend of
- the track. As he did so, out of the tail of his eye, he caught sight of
- the Polacks clustered with out-poked heads from the open doors of the
- bunk-houses.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he reached the line, Number Eleven came round the curve, and the door
- of the express car swung back. The messenger dropped a package into his
- hand that the road boss received with a grim smile, and a word into his
- ear that caused Spirlaw’s jaw to drop—nor was that all that dropped,
- for, from the rear end, as the train rolled by—dropped Keating.
- </p>
- <p>
- White-faced and shaky the boy looked—more so than usual. Spirlaw
- stared as though he had seen an apparition, stared for a minute in silence
- before he could lay tongue to words—then they came like the
- out-spout of a volcano.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What the hell’s the meanin’ of this?” he roared.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who in the double-blanked blazes let you out of Big Cloud, h’m? I’ll have
- some——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Let’s get in out of the wet,” broke in Keating, smiling through a spell
- of coughing that racked him at that moment. “You can growl your head off
- then, if you like”—and he started on a run for the shack.
- </p>
- <p>
- Once inside, Spirlaw rounded on the boy again, and he stopped only when he
- was out of breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Didn’t Carleton tell you to stay where you was?” he finished bitterly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh yes,” said Keating, “that’s about the first thing he <i>did</i> say
- after he had read your letter, when I gave it to him yesterday. Then I
- tumbled to why you had sent me out of camp. You’re about as square as they
- make them, Spirlaw. You needn’t blame Carle-ton, <i>he</i> had about all
- he could do without paying any attention to me or any one else. Had any
- wires or news in here?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; but I knew something was up, because Number Eleven is the first train
- in or out to-day. The express messenger just said they’d cut loose in Big
- Cloud and wrecked about everything in sight, but I guess he was puttin’ it
- on a bit.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He didn’t put on anything,” said Keating slowly. “My God, Spirlaw, it was
- an awful night! The freight-house and the shops and the roundhouse, what’s
- left of them, are ashes. They cut all the wires and then they cut loose
- themselves—the Polacks and that crowd, you know. Yes, they wrecked
- everything in sight, and there’s a dozen lives gone to pay for it.”
- Keating stopped suddenly, and again began to cough.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw looked at the boy uneasily, and mechanically fumbled with the
- cords of the package he had laid upon the table. By the time he had
- removed the wrappers and disclosed two ugly, businesslike looking.45s and
- a half-dozen boxes of cartridges, Keating’s paroxysm had passed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess it was exciting enough for <i>me</i>, anyhow”—Keating tried
- hard to make his laugh ring true. “I’m a little weak from it yet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you weren’t sick,” Spirlaw burst out, “I’d make you sick for comin’
- back here. You know well enough we’ll get it next—you knew so well
- you came back to help——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told Carleton he ought to send some help down here,” Keating
- interrupted hastily; “and he just looked at me like a crazy man—he
- was half mad anyhow with the ruin of things. ‘Help!’ he flung out at me.
- ‘Where’s it coming from? Let Spirlaw yank up his stakes and pull out if
- things get looking bad!’”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pull out!” shouted Spirlaw, in a sudden roar. “Pull out! <i>Me!</i> Not
- for all the cross-eyed, hamstrung Polacks on the system!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think you’d better,” said Keating quietly. “After what I saw last
- night, I think you’d better. There was no holding them—they were
- like savages, and the further they went the worse they got. They were
- backed up by whisky and the worst element in town. I was in the station
- with Carleton, Regan, Harvey, Riley and Spence and some of the other
- dispatchers. It was a regular pitched battle, and in spite of their
- revolvers the station would have gone with the rest if, along toward
- morning, the striking trainmen and the Brotherhood hadn’t taken a hand and
- helped us out. I don’t know that it’s over yet, that it won’t break out
- again to-night; though I heard Carleton say there’d be a detachment of the
- police in town by four o’clock. I wish you would pull out, Spirlaw. You
- said yourself that all these fellows here needed to start them sticking
- their claws into you was a little encouragement from the other end.
- They’ve been afraid of you, but they hate you like poison. Once started,
- they’ll be worse than the crowd at Big Cloud for hate is a harder driver
- than whisky. Then besides, I really think you’d be of more use in Big
- Cloud. You could do some good there no matter what the end was, while here
- you’re alone and you stand to lose everything and gain nothing. I wish you
- would pull out, Spirlaw, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw reached out his hand and laid it on Keating’s shoulder, as he
- shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve got a whole <i>lot</i> to lose,” he answered, his hard face
- softening a little. “A whole lot. I can’t say things the way you do, but I
- guess you’ll understand. You got something that means a whole lot to you,
- that you’d risk anything for—what you want to do and what you want
- to leave behind you when it comes along time to cash in. Well, I guess
- most of us have in one way or another, though mabbe it don’t rank
- anywheres up to that. I reckon, too, a whole lot of us don’t never think
- to put it in words, an’ a whole lot of us couldn’t if we tried to, but
- it’s there with any man that’s any good. I’d rather go out for keeps than
- pull out—I’d rather they’d plant me. D’ye think I’d want to live an’
- have to cross the street because I couldn’t look <i>even a Polack</i> in
- the eyes—a man would be better dead, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment Keating did not answer, he seemed to be weighing the
- possibility of still shaking the determination of the road boss before
- accepting it as irrevocable: then, evidently coming to the conclusion that
- it was useless to argue further, he pointed to the revolvers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then the sooner you load those the better,” he jerked out.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw looked at him curiously, questioningly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Because,” went on Keating, answering the unspoken interrogation, “when I
- dropped off the train I saw that fellow Kuryla—he was pointed out to
- me in Big Cloud yesterday—and three or four more drop off on the
- other side. I didn’t know they were on the train until then, of course, or
- I would have had them put off. There isn’t much doubt about what they are
- here for, is there?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So that’s it, is it?” Spirlaw ripped out with an oath. “No, there ain’t
- much doubt!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He snatched up a cartridge-box, slit the paper band with his thumb nail,
- and, breaking the revolvers, began to cram the cartridges into the
- cylinders. His face was twitching and the red that flushed it shaded to a
- deep purple. Not another word came from him—just a deadly quiet. He
- thrust the weapons into his pockets, strode to the door, opened it,
- stepped over the threshold—and stopped. An instant he hung there in
- indecision, then he came back, shut the door behind him, sat down on the
- edge of his bunk, and looked at Keating grimly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s been one train along, there’ll be another,” he snapped. “An’ the
- first one that comes you’ll get aboard of. I hate to keep those whinin’
- coyotes waitin’, but——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll take no train,” Keating cut in coolly; “but I’ll take a revolver.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw growled and shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why didn’t you tell me about Kuryla at first?” he demanded abruptly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You know why as well as I do,” smiled Keating. “I wanted to get you away
- from here if I could. There wouldn’t have been any use trying at all if
- I’d begun by telling you that. Wild horses wouldn’t have budged you then.
- As for a train, what’s the use of talking about it, there probably won’t
- be another one along under an hour. In the meantime, give me one of the
- guns.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not m——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw’s refusal died half uttered on his lips, as he sprang suddenly to
- his feet; then he whipped out the revolvers and shoved one quickly into
- Keating’s hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carried down with the sweep of the wind came the sound of many voices
- raised in shouts and discordant song. It grew louder, swelled, and broke
- into a high-pitched, defiant yell.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Whisky!” gritted Spirlaw between his teeth.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That devil Kuryla and the coyotes that came with him knew the best an’
- quickest way to start the ball rollin’. Well, son, I reckon we’re in for
- it. The only thing I’m sorry about is that you’re here; but that can’t be
- helped now. You were white clean through to come—Holy Mother, listen
- to that!”—another yell broke louder, fiercer than before over the
- roar of the storm.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw stepped to the door and peered out. It was already getting dark.
- The rain still poured in sheets, and the wind howled down the gorge in
- wild, furious, spasmodic gusts. Thin streaks of light strayed out from the
- doors of the bunk-houses, and around the doors were gathered shadowy
- groups. A moment more and the shadowy groups welded into a single dark
- mass. Came a mad, exultant yell from a single throat. It was caught up,
- flung back, echoed and reechoed by a score of voices—and the dark
- mass began to move.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess you’d better put out that light, son,” said Spirlaw coolly.
- “There’s no use makin’ targets of our——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Before he ended, before Keating had more than taken a step forward, a lump
- of rock shivered the little window and crashed into the lamp—it was
- out for keeps. A howl followed this exhibition of marksmanship, and,
- following that, a volley of stones smashed against the side of the shack
- thick and fast as hail—then the onrush of feet.
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw’s revolver cut the black with a long, blinding flash, then
- another, and another. Screams and shrieks answered him, but it did not
- halt the Polacks. In a mob they rushed the door. Spirlaw sprang back,
- trying to close it after him; instead, a dozen hands grasped and half
- wrenched it from its hinges.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Lie down on the floor, Spirlaw, <i>quick!</i>”—it was Keating’s
- voice, punctuated with a cough. The next instant his gun barked, playing
- through the doorway like a gatling.
- </p>
- <p>
- From the floor the road boss joined in. The mob wavered, pitched swaying
- this way and that, then broke and ran, struggling with each other to get
- out of the line of fire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hurrah!” cried Keating. “I guess that will hold them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Tain’t begun,” was Spirlaw’s grim response. “Where’s them cartridges?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “On the table—got them?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Spirlaw, after a minute’s groping. “Here, put a box in your
- pocket.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are they up to now?” asked Keating as, in the silence that had
- fallen, they reloaded and listened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God knows,” growled Spirlaw; “but I guess we’ll find out quick enough.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As he spoke, from a little distance away, came the splintering crash of
- woodwork—then silence again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s the storehouse,” Spirlaw snarled. “They’re after the bars an’
- anything else they can lay their hands on. Guess they weren’t countin’ on
- our havin’ anything more than our fists to fight with, guess they
- weren’t.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Keating’s only reply was a cough.
- </p>
- <p>
- The minutes passed, two, three, five of them. Once outside sounded what
- might have been the stealthy scuffle of feet or only a storm-sound so
- construed by the imagination. Then, from the direction of the riverbed,
- sudden, sharp, came a terrific roar.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My God!” yelled Spirlaw. “There’s the trestle gone—they’ve blown it
- up! They’re sure to have laid a fuse here, too. Get out of here quick!
- Fool that I was, I might have known it was the <i>dynamite</i> they were
- after.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Both men were scrambling for the door as he spoke. They reached it not an
- instant too soon. The ground behind them lifted, heaved; the walls, the
- roof of the shack rose, cracked like eggshells, and scattered in flying
- pieces—and the mighty, deafening detonation of the explosion echoed
- up and down the gorge, echoed again—and died away.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mob caught sight of them as they ran and, foiled for the moment, sent
- up a yell of rage—then started in pursuit.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Make for the cut,” shouted Spirlaw. “We can hold them off there behind
- the rocks.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Keating had no breath for words. Panting, sick, his head swimming, a fleck
- of blood upon his lips, he struggled after the giant form of the road
- boss; while, behind, coming ever closer, ringing in his ears, were the
- wild cries of the maddened Polacks. The splash of water revived him a
- little as they plunged along the old right of way where the river, flooded
- by the storm, had again claimed its own. The worst of it was up to his
- armpits. A grip on his shoulder and a pull from Spirlaw helped him over.
- They gained the other side with a bare two yards separating them from the
- mob behind, went on again—and then Spirlaw caught his foot, tripped
- and pitched headlong, causing Keating, at his heels, to stumble and fall
- over him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Like wild beasts the Polacks surged upon them. Keating tried to regain his
- feet—but he got no further than his knees as a swinging blow from a
- pick-handle caught him on his head. Half-stunned, he sank back and, as
- consciousness left him, he heard Spirlaw’s great voice roar out like the
- maddened bellow of a bull, saw the giant form rise with, it seemed, a
- dozen Polacks clinging to neck and shoulders, legs and body, saw him shake
- them off and the massive arms rise and fall—and all was a blur, all
- darkness.
- </p>
- <p>
- The road boss lay stretched out a yard away from him when he opened his
- eyes. He was very weak. He raised himself on his elbow. From the camp down
- the line he could see the lights in the bunk-houses, hear drunken,
- chorused shouts. He crept to Spirlaw, called him, shook him—the big
- road boss never moved. The Polacks had evidently left both of them for
- dead—and one, it seemed, was. He slid his hand inside the other’s
- vest for the heart beat. So faint it was at first he could not feel it,
- then he got it, and, realizing that Spirlaw was still alive he
- straightened up and looked helplessly around—and, in a flash, like
- the knell of doom, Spirlaw’s words came back to him: “<i>There’s the
- trestle gone!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Sick the boy was with his clotting lungs, deathly sick, weak from the blow
- on his head, dizzy, and his brain swam. <i>There’s the trestle gone!</i>”—he
- coughed it out between blue lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>There’s the trestle gone!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Keefer’s Siding was a mile away. Somehow he must reach it, must get the
- word along the line that the <i>trestle was out</i>, get the word along
- before the stalled traffic moved, before the first train east or west
- crashed through to death, before more wreck and ruin was added to the tale
- that had gone before. He bent to Spirlaw’s ear and three times called him
- frantically: “Spirlaw! Spirlaw! <i>Spirlaw!</i>” There was no response. He
- tried to lift him, tried to drag him—the great bulk was far beyond
- his strength. And the minutes were flying by, each marking the one perhaps
- when it would be too late, too late to warn any one that the trestle was
- out.
- </p>
- <p>
- Just up past the rock cut, a bare twenty yards away where the leads to the
- temporary track swung into the straight of the main line, was the platform
- handcar they had used for carrying tools and the odds and ends of supplies
- between the storehouse and the work—if he could only get Spirlaw
- there!
- </p>
- <p>
- He called him again, shook him, breathing a prayer for help. The road boss
- stirred, raised himself a little, and sank down again with a moan.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Spirlaw, <i>Spirlaw</i>, for God’s sake, man, try to get up! I’ll help
- you. You must, do you hear, <i>you must!</i>”—he was dragging at the
- road boss’s collar.
- </p>
- <p>
- Keating’s voice seemed to reach the other’s consciousness, for, weakly,
- dazed, without sense, blindly, Spirlaw got upon his knees, then to his
- feet, and, staggering, reeling like a drunken man, his arm around
- Keating’s neck, his weight almost crushing to the ground the one sicker
- than himself, the two stumbled, pitched, and, at the end, <i>crawled</i>
- those twenty yards.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The handcar, Spirlaw, the handcar!” gasped Keating. “Get on it. You must!
- Try! Try!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Spirlaw straightened, lurched forward, and fell half across the car with
- out-flung arms—unconscious again.
- </p>
- <p>
- The rest Keating managed somehow, enough so that the dangling legs freed
- the ground by a few inches; then, with bursting lungs, far spent, he
- unblocked the wheels, pushed the car down the little spur, swung the
- switch, dragged himself aboard, and began to pump his way west toward
- Keefer’s Siding.
- </p>
- <p>
- No man may tell the details of that mile, every inch of which was wrung
- from blood that oozed from parted, quivering lips; no man may question
- from Whom came the strength to the frail body, where strength was not; the
- reprieve to the broken lungs, that long since should have done their worst—only
- Keating knew that the years were ended forever, that with every stroke of
- the pump-handle the time was shorter. The few minutes to win through—that
- was the last stake!
- </p>
- <p>
- At the end he choked—fighting for his consciousness, as, like
- dancing points, switch lights swam before him. He checked with the brake,
- reeled from the car, fell, tried to rise and fell back again. Then, on his
- hands and knees, he crept toward the station door. It had come at last.
- The hemorrhage that he had fought back with all his strength was upon him.
- He beat upon the door. It opened, a lantern was flashed upon him, and he
- fell inside.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The trestle’s out at the Glacier—hold trains both ways—Polacks—Spirlaw
- on—handcar—I———”
- </p>
- <p>
- That was all. Keating never spoke again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I dunno as you’d call him a builder,” says Clarihue, the night turner,
- when <i>he</i> tells the story in the darkened roundhouse in the shadow of
- the big ten-wheelers on the pits, while the steam purrs softly at the
- gauges and sometimes a pop-valve lifts with a catchy sob, “I dunno as you
- would. It depends on the way you look at it. Accordin’ to him, he was. He
- left something behind him, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- VII—THE GUARDIAN OF THE DEVIL’S SLIDE
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here is one bad
- piece of track on the Hill Division, particularly bad, which is the same
- as saying that it is the worst piece of track, bar none, on the American
- Continent. Not that the engineers were to blame—they weren’t. It was
- Dame Nature in the shape of the Rockies—Dame Nature and the
- directors.
- </p>
- <p>
- Sir Ivers Clayborn, gray-haired and grizzled, a man schooled in the
- practical school of many lands and many years, who was chief consulting
- engineer when the road was building, advised a double-looped tunnel that,
- according to his sketch, looked something like the figure 8 canted over
- sideways. The directors poised their glasses and examined the sketch with
- interest until they caught sight of the penciled estimate in the corner.
- That settled it. They did not even take the trouble to vote. They asked
- for an alternative—and they got it. They got the Devil’s Slide.
- </p>
- <p>
- First and last, it has euchred more money out of the treasury of the
- Transcontinental than it would have taken to build things Sir Ivers’ way
- to begin with; and it has taken some years, a good many of them, for the
- directors to learn their lesson. The old board never did, for that matter;
- but, thanks perhaps to younger blood, they’ve begun now to build as they
- should have built in the first place. It isn’t finished yet, that
- double-looped tunnel, it won’t be for years, but, no matter, it’s begun,
- and some day a good many more than a few men will sleep the easier because
- of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- From Carleton, the super, to the last section hand and track-walker, the
- Devil’s Slide was a nightmare. The dispatchers, under their green-shaded
- lamps, cursed it in the gray hours of dawn; the traffic department cursed
- it spasmodically, but at such times so whole-heartedly and with such
- genuine fervor and abandon that its occasional lapses into silence were
- overlooked; the motive power department in the shape of Regan, the master
- mechanic, cursed it all the time, and did it breathlessly. It had only one
- friend—the passenger agent’s department. The passenger agent’s
- department swore <i>by</i> it—on account of the scenery.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Scenery!” gulped the dispatchers, and the white showed under their nail
- tips as their fingers tightened on their keys.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Scenery!” howled the traffic department, and reached for the claim file.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Scenery!”—Regan didn’t say it—he choked. Just choked, and
- spat the exclamation point in a stream of black-strap.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Scenery!” murmured Mr. General Passenger Agent esthetically, waving a
- soft and diamond bedecked hand from the platform of Carleton’s private
- car. “Wonderful! Grand! Magnificent! We’ve got them all beaten into a
- coma. No other road has anything like it anywhere in the world.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They have not,” agreed Carleton, and the bitterness of his soul was in
- his words.
- </p>
- <p>
- Everybody was right.
- </p>
- <p>
- The general passenger agent was right—the scenic grandeur was beyond
- compare, and he made the most of it in booklets, in leaflets, in
- pamphlets, and in a score of pages in a score of different magazines.
- </p>
- <p>
- The others were right—the Devil’s Slide was everything that the
- ethics of engineering said it shouldn’t be. It was neither level nor
- straight. In its marvelous two miles from the summit of the pass to the
- canon below, its nearest approach to the ethical was three percent drop.
- There wasn’t much of that—most of it was a straight five! It
- twisted, it turned, it slid, it slithered, and it dove around projecting
- mountain-sides at scandalous tangents and with indecent abruptness.
- </p>
- <p>
- Chick Coogan swore, with a grin, that he could see his own headlight
- coming at him about half the time every trip he made up or down. That, of
- course, is exaggerating a little—but not much! Coogan sized up the
- Devil’s Slide pretty well when he said that, all things considered, pretty
- well—there wasn’t much chance to mistake what he meant, or what the
- Devil’s Slide was, or what he thought of it. Anyway, be that as it may,
- Coogan’s description gave the division the only chance they ever had to
- crack a smile when the Devil’s Slide was in question.
- </p>
- <p>
- They smiled then, those railroaders of the Rockies, but they’ll look at
- you queerly now if you mention the two together—Coogan and the
- Devil’s Slide. Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes.
- </p>
- <p>
- Any one on the Hill Division can tell you the story—they’ve reason
- to know it, and they do—to the last man. If you’d rather get it
- first hand in a roundhouse, or between trains from the operator at some
- lone station that’s no more than a siding, or in the caboose of a way
- freight—if you are a big enough man to ride there, and that means
- being bigger than most men—or anywhere your choice or circumstance
- leads you from the super’s office to a track-walker’s shanty, if you’d
- rather get it that way, and you’ll get it better, far better, than you
- will here, don’t try any jolly business to make the boys talk—just
- say a good word for Coogan, Chick Coogan. That’s the “open sesame”—and
- the only one.
- </p>
- <p>
- There’s no use talking about the logical or the illogical, the rational or
- the irrational, when it comes to Coo-gan’s story. Coogan’s story is just
- Coogan’s story, that’s all there is to it. What one man does another
- doesn’t. You can’t cancel the human equation because there’s nothing to
- cancel it with; it’s there all the time swaying, compelling, dominating
- every act in a man’s life. The higher branches of mathematics go far, and
- to some men three dimensions are but elemental, but there is one problem
- even they have never solved and never will solve—the human equation.
- What Coogan did, you might not do—or you might.
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan didn’t come to the Transcontinental a fullblown engineer from some
- other road as a good many of the boys have, though that’s nothing against
- them; Coogan was a product of the Hill Division pure and simple. He began
- as a kid almost before the steel was spiked home, and certainly before the
- right of way was shaken down enough to begin to look like business. He
- started at the bottom and he went up. Call-boy, sweeper, wiper, fireman—one
- after the other. Promotion came fast in the early days, for, the Rockies
- once bridged, business came fast, too; and Coogan had his engine at
- twenty-one, and at twenty-four he was pulling the Imperial Limited.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good goods,” said Regan. “That’s what he is. The best ever.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Nobody questioned that, not only because there was no one on the division
- who could put anything over Coogan in a cab, but also because, and perhaps
- even more pertinent a reason, every one liked Coogan—some of them
- did more than that.
- </p>
- <p>
- Straight as a string, clean as a whistle was Coogan, six feet in his
- stockings with a body that played up to every inch of his height, black
- hair, jet black, black eyes that laughed with you, never <i>at</i> you, a
- smile and a cheery nod always—the kind of a man that makes you feel
- every time you see them that the world isn’t such an eternal dismal grind
- after all. That was Chick Coogan—all except his heart. Coogan had a
- heart like a woman’s, and a hard luck story from a ‘bo stealing a ride, a
- railroad man, or any one else for that matter, never failed to make him
- poorer by a generous percentage of what happened to be in his pocket at
- the time. Who wouldn’t like him! Queer how things happen.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was the day Coogan got married that Regan gave him 505 and the Limited
- run as a sort of wedding present; and that night Big Cloud turned itself
- completely inside out doing honor and justice to the occasion.
- </p>
- <p>
- Big Cloud has had other celebrations, before and since, but none quite so
- unanimous as that one. Restraint never did run an overwhelmingly strong
- favorite with the town, but that night it was hung up higher than the arms
- on the telegraph poles. Men that the community used to hide behind and
- push forward as hostages of righteousness, when it was on its good
- behavior and wanted to put on a front, cut loose and outshone the best—or
- the worst, if you like that better—-of the crowd that never made any
- bones about being on the other side of the fence. They burned red flares,
- very many of them, that Carleton neglected to imagine had any connection
- with the storekeeper and the supply account; they committed indiscretions,
- mostly of a liquid nature, that any one but the trainmaster, who was
- temporarily blind in both eyes, could have seen; and, as a result, the
- Hill Division the next day was an eminently paralytic and feeble affair.
- This is a very general description of the event, because sometimes it is
- not wise to particularize—this is a case in point.
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan’s send-off was a send-off no other man, be he king, prince,
- president, sho-gun, or high mucky-muck of whatever degree, could have got—except
- Coogan. Coogan got it because he was Coogan, just Coogan—and the
- night was a night to wonder at.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan summarized it the next evening over the usual game of pedro with
- Carleton, upstairs over the station in the superb office.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Apart from Coogan and me,” said the master mechanic, in a voice that was
- still suspiciously husky, “apart from Coogan and me and <i>mabbe</i> the
- minister—” the rest was a wave of his hand. Regan could wave his
- hand with a wealth of eloquence that was astounding. .
- </p>
- <p>
- “Quite so,” agreed Carleton, with a grin. “Too bad to drag <i>them</i>
- into it, though. Both ‘peds’ to me, Tommy. It’s a good thing for the
- discipline of the division that bigamy is against the law, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They’ll be talking of it,” said Regan reminiscently, “when you and me are
- on the scrap heap, Carleton.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess that’s right,” admitted the super. “Play on, Tommy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But it wasn’t. They only talked of Coogan’s wedding for about a year—no,
- they don’t talk about it now. We’ll get to that presently.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Imperial Limited was the star run on the division—Regan gave
- Coogan the thirty-third degree when he gave him that—that and 505,
- which was the last word in machine design. And Coogan took them, took them
- and the schedule rights that pertained thereto, which were a clear and a
- clean-swept track, and day after day, up hill and down, Number One or
- Number Two, as the case might be, pulled into division on the dot.
- Coogan’s stock soared—if that were possible; but not Coogan. The
- youngest engineer on the road and top of them all, would have been excuse
- enough for him to show his oats and, within decent limits, no one would
- have thought the worse of him for it—Coogan never turned a hair. He
- was still the friend of the ‘bo and the man in trouble, still the Coogan
- that had been a wiper in the roundhouse; and yet, perhaps, not quite the
- same, for two new loves had come into his life—his love for Annie
- Coogan, and his love, the love of the master craftsman, for 505. In the
- little house at home he talked to Annie of the big mountain racer and
- Annie, being an engineer’s daughter as well as an engineer’s wife,
- listened with understanding and a smile, and in the smile was pride and
- love; in the cab Coogan talked of Annie, always Annie, and one day he told
- his fireman a secret that made big Jim Dahleen grin sheepishly and stick
- out a grimy paw.
- </p>
- <p>
- Fate is a pretty grim player sometimes—and always, it seems, the
- cards are stacked.
- </p>
- <p>
- The days and the weeks and the months went by, and then there came a
- morning when a sober-, serious-faced group of men stood gathered in the
- super’s office, as Number Two’s whistle, in from the Eastbound run,
- sounded down the gorge. They looked at Regan. Slowly, the master mechanic
- turned, went out of the room and down the stairs to the platform, as 505
- shot round the bend and rolled into the station. For a moment Regan stood
- irresolute, then he started for the front-end. He went no further than the
- colonist coach, that was coupled behind the mail car. Here he stopped,
- made a step forward, changed his mind, climbed over the colonist’s
- platform, dropped down on the other side of the track, and began to walk
- toward the roundhouse—they changed engines at Big Cloud and 505,
- already uncoupled, was scooting up for the spur to back down for
- the’table.
- </p>
- <p>
- The soles of Regan’s boots seemed like plates of lead as he went along,
- and he mopped his forehead nervously. There was a general air of desertion
- about the roundhouse. The’table was set and ready for 505, but there
- wasn’t a soul in sight. Regan nodded to himself in sympathetic
- understanding. He crossed the turntable, walked around the half circle,
- and entered the roundhouse through the engine doors by the far pit—the
- one next to that which belonged to 505. Here, just inside, he waited, as
- the big mogul came slowly down the track, took the’table with a slight
- jolt, and stopped. He saw Coogan, big, brawny, swing out of the cab like
- an athlete, and then he heard the engineer speak to his fireman.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Looks like a graveyard around here, Jim. Wonder where the boys are. I
- won’t wait to swing the’table, they’ll be around in a minute, I guess. I
- want to get up to the little woman.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” Dahleen answered. “Leave her to me, I’ll run her in. Good
- luck to you, Chick.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan was starting across the yards with a stride that was almost a run.
- Regan opened his mouth to shout—and swallowed a lump in his throat
- instead. Twice he made as though to follow the engineer, and twice
- something stronger than himself held him back; and then, as though he had
- been a thief, the master mechanic stole out from behind the doors, went
- back across the tracks, climbed the stairs to Carleton’s room with lagging
- steps, and entered.
- </p>
- <p>
- The rest were still there: Carleton in his swivel chair, Harvey, the
- division engineer, Spence, the chief dispatcher, and Riley, the
- trainmaster. Regan shook his head and dropped into a seat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I couldn’t,” he said in a husky voice. “My God, I <i>couldn’t</i>” he
- repeated, and swept out his arms.
- </p>
- <p>
- A bitter oath sprang from Carleton’s lips, lips that were not often
- profane, and his teeth snapped through the amber of his briar. The others
- just looked out of the window.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacVicar, a spare man, took the Limited out that night, and it was three
- days before Coogan reported again. Maybe it was the fit of the black
- store-clothes and perhaps the coat didn’t hang just right, but as he
- entered the roundhouse he didn’t look as straight as he used to look and
- there was a queer inward slope to his shoulders and he walked like a man
- who didn’t see anything. The springy swing through the gangway was gone.
- He climbed to the cab as an old man climbs—painfully. The boys hung
- back and didn’t say anything, just swore under their breaths with full
- hearts as men do. There wasn’t anything <i>to</i> say—nothing that
- would do any good.
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan took 505 and the Limited out that night, took it out the night
- after and the nights that followed, only he didn’t talk any more, and the
- slope of the shoulders got a little more pronounced, a little more
- noticeable, a little beyond the cut of any coat. And on the afternoons of
- the lay-overs at Big Cloud, Coogan walked out behind the town to where on
- the slope of the butte were two fresh mounds—one larger than the
- other. That was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan, short, paunchy, big-hearted Regan, tackled Jim Dahleen, Coogan’s
- fireman.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s he say on the run, Jim, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He ain’t talkative,” Dahleen answered shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What the hell,” growled the master mechanic deep in his throat, to
- conceal his emotion. “‘Tain’t doing him any good going up there
- afternoons. God knows it’s natural enough, but ‘tain’t doing him any good,
- not a mite—nor them either, as far as I can see, h’m? You got to <i>make</i>
- him talk, Jim. Wake him up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why don’t <i>you</i> talk to him?” demanded the fireman.
- </p>
- <p>
- “H’m, yes. So I will. I sure will,” Regan answered.
- </p>
- <p>
- And he meant to, meant to, honestly. But, somehow, Coogan’s eyes and
- Coogan’s face said “no” to him as they did to every other man, and as the
- days passed, almost a month of them, Regan shook his head, perplexed and
- troubled, for he was fond of Coogan.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then, one night, it happened.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan and Carleton were alone over their pedro at headquarters, except for
- Spence, the dispatcher, in the next room. It was getting close on to
- eleven-thirty. The Imperial Limited, West-bound, with Coogan in the cab,
- had pulled out on time an hour and a half before. The game was lagging,
- and, as usual, the conversation had got around to the engineer,
- introduced, as it always was, by the master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I sure don’t know what to do for the boy,” said he. “I’d like to do
- something. Talking don’t amount to anything, does it, h’m?—even if
- you <i>can</i> talk. I can’t talk to him, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “A man’s got to work a thing like that out for himself, Tommy,” Carleton
- answered, “and it takes time. That’s the only thing that will ever help
- him—time. I know you’re pretty fond of Coogan, even more than the
- rest of us and that’s saying a good deal, but you’re thinking too much
- about it yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t help it, Carleton. It’s got <i>me</i>. Time, and that sort of
- thing, may be all right, but it ain’t very promising when a man broods the
- way he does. I ain’t superstitious or anything like that, but I’ve a
- feeling I can’t just explain that somehow something’s going to break. Kind
- of premonition. Ever have anything like that? It gets on your mind and you
- can’t shake it off. It’s on me to-night worse than it’s ever been.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nonsense,” Carleton laughed. “Premonitions are out of date, because
- they’ve been traced back to their origin. Out here, I should say it was a
- case of too much of Dutchy’s lunch-counter pie. You ought to diet anyway,
- Tommy, you’re getting too fat. Hand over that fine-cut of yours, I———”
- </p>
- <p>
- He stopped as a sharp cry came from the dispatcher’s room, followed by an
- instant’s silence, then the crash of a chair sounded as, hastily pushed
- back, it fell to the floor. Quick steps echoed across the room, and the
- next moment Spence, with a white face and holding a sheet of tissue in his
- hand, burst in upon them.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton sprang to his feet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter, Spence?” he demanded sharply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Number One,” the dispatcher jerked out, and extended the sheet on which
- he had scribbled the message as it came in off the sounder.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton snatched the paper, and Regan, leaping from his chair, looked
- over his shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Number One, engine 505, jumped track east of switch-back number two in
- Devil’s Slide. Report three known to be killed, others missing. Engineer
- Coogan and fireman Dahleen both hurt,” they read.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton was ever the man of action, and his voice rang hard as chilled
- steel.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clear the line, Spence. Get your relief and wrecker out at once. Wire
- Dreamer Butte for their wrecker as well, so they can work from both ends.
- Now then, Tommy—my God, what’s the matter with you, are you crazy?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan was leaning over the back of his chair, his face strained, his arm
- outstretched, finger pointing to the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I knew it,” he muttered hoarsely. “I knew it. That’s what it is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton’s eyes traveled from the master mechanic to the wall and back
- again in amazed bewilderment, then he shook Regan by the shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what, what is?” he questioned brusquely. “Are you mad, man?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The date,” whispered Regan, still pointing to where a large single-day
- calendar with big figures on it hung behind the super’s desk. “It’s the
- twenty-eighth.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know what you mean, Tommy,”—Carleton’s voice was quiet,
- restrained.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mean!” Regan burst out, with a hard laugh. “I don’t mean anything, do I?
- ‘tain’t anything to do with it, it’s just coincidence, mabbe, and mabbe
- it’s not. <i>It’s a year ago to-night Coogan was married.</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment Carleton did not speak; like Regan, he stared at the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You think that——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I don’t”—Regan caught him up roughly—“I don’t think
- anything at all. I only know it’s queer, ghastly queer.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton nodded his head slowly. Steps were coming up the stairs. The
- voice of Flannagan, the wrecking boss, reached them, other voices excited
- and loud joined in. He slapped the master mechanic on the back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t wonder it caught you, Tommy,” he said. “It’s almost creepy. But
- there’s no time for that now. Come on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan laughed, the same hard laugh, as he followed the chief into the
- dispatcher’s room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “East of number two switch-back, eh?” he swore. “If there’s any choice for
- hellishness anywhere on that cursed stretch of track, that’s it. My God,
- it’s come, and it’s come good and hard—good and hard.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It had. It was a bad mess, a nasty mess—but, like everything else,
- it might have been worse. Instead of plunging to the right and dropping to
- the canon eighteen hundred feet below, 505 chose the inward side and
- rammed her nose into the gray mass of rock that made the mountain wall.
- The wreckers from Dreamer Butte and the wreckers from Big Cloud tell of it
- to this day. For twenty-four hours they worked and then they dropped—and
- fresh men took their places. There was no room to work—just the
- narrow ledge of the right of way on a circular sweep with the jutting
- cliff of Old Piebald Mountain sticking in between, hiding one of the gangs
- from the other, and around which the big wrecking cranes groped dangling
- arms and chains like fishers angling for a bite. It was a mauled and
- tangled snarl, and the worst of it went over the canon’s edge in pieces,
- as axes, sledges, wedges, bars and cranes ripped and tore their way to the
- heart of it. And as they worked, those hard-faced, grimy, sweating men of
- the wrecking crews, they wondered—wondered that any one had come out
- of it alive.
- </p>
- <p>
- Back at headquarters in Big Cloud they wondered at it, too—and they
- wondered also at the cause. Every one that by any possible chance could
- throw any light upon it went on the carpet in the super’s office.
- Everybody testified—everybody except Dahleen, the fireman, and
- Coogan, the engineer; and they didn’t testify because they couldn’t.
- Coogan was in the hospital with queer, inconsequent words upon his tongue
- and a welt across his forehead that had laid bare the bone from eye to the
- hair-line of his skull; and Dahleen was there also, not so bad, just
- generally jellied up, but still too bad to talk. And the testimony was of
- little use.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tender of switch-back number one reported that the Limited had passed
- him at perhaps a little greater speed than usual—which was the speed
- of a man’s walk, for trains crawl down the Devil’s Slide with fear and
- caution—but not fast enough to cause him to think anything about it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hardy, the conductor, testified. Hardy said it was the “air;” that the
- train began to slide faster and faster after the first switch-back was
- passed and that her speed kept on increasing up to the moment that the
- crash came. He figured that it couldn’t be anything else—just the
- “air”—it wouldn’t work and the control of the train was lost. That
- was all he knew.
- </p>
- <p>
- And while Regan swore and fumed, Carleton’s face set grim and hard—and
- he waited for Dahleen.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a week before the fireman faced Carleton across the super’s desk,
- but when that time came Carle-ton opened on him straight from the
- shoulder, not even a word of sympathy, not so much as “glad to see you’re
- out again,” just straight to the point, hard and quick.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dahleen,” he snapped, “I want to know what happened in the cab that
- night, and I want a straight story. No other kind of talking will do you
- any good.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen’s face, white with the pallor of his illness, flushed suddenly
- red.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re jumping a man pretty hard, aren’t you, Mr. Carleton?” he said
- resentfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Maybe I’ve reason to,” replied Carleton. “Well, I’m waiting for that
- story.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is no story that I know of,” said Dahleen evenly. “After we passed
- switch-back number one we lost control of the train—the ‘air’
- wouldn’t work.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you expect me to believe that?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t seem to,” retorted Dahleen, with a set jaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What did you do to stop her?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What I could,” said Dahleen, with terse finality.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton sprang to his feet, and his fist crashed down upon the desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are lying!” he thundered. “That wreck and the lives that are lost are
- at your door, and if I could prove it!”—he shook his fist at the
- fireman. “As it is I can only fire you for violation of the rules. I
- thought at first it was Coogan and that he’d gone off his head a bit, and
- you are cur enough to let the blame go there if you could, to let me and
- every other man think so!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen’s fists clenched, and he took a step forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s enough!” he cried hoarsely. “Enough from you or any other man!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton rounded on him more furiously than before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve given you a chance to tell a straight story and you wouldn’t. God
- knows what you did that night. I believe you were fighting drunk. I
- believe that gash in Coogan’s head wasn’t from the wreck. If I knew I’d
- fix you.” He wrenched open a drawer of his desk, whipped out a metal
- whisky flask, and shook it before Dahleen’s eyes. “<i>When you were picked
- up this was in the pocket of your jumper!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- The color fled from Dahleen’s face leaving it whiter than when he had
- entered the room. He wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. All the
- bluster, all the fight was gone. He stared mutely, a startled, frightened
- look in his eyes, at the damning evidence in the super’s hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Forgotten about it, had you?” Carleton flung out grimly. “Well, have you
- anything to say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ain’t anything to say, is there?”—his voice was low with just a
- hint of the former defiance. “It’s mine, but you can’t <i>prove</i>
- anything. You can’t prove I drank it. D’ye think I’d be fool enough to do
- anything but keep my mouth shut?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; I can’t <i>prove</i> it”—Carleton’s voice was deadly cold.
- “You’re out! I’ll give you twelve hours to get out of the mountains. The
- boys, for Coogan’s sake alone if for no other, would tear you to pieces if
- they knew the story. No one knows it yet but the man who found this in
- your pocket and myself. I’m not going to tell you again what I think of
- you—<i>get out!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen, without a word, swung slowly on his heel and started for the
- door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wait!” said Carleton suddenly. “Here’s a pass East for you. I don’t want
- your blood on my hands, as I would have if Coogan’s friends, and that’s
- every last soul out here, got hold of you. You’ve got twelve hours—after
- that they’ll know—to set Coogan straight.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen hesitated, came back, took the slip of paper with a mirthless,
- half-choked laugh, turned again, and the door closed behind him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen was out.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton kept his word—twelve hours—and then from the division
- rose a cry like the cry of savage beasts; but Regan was like a madman.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Curse him!” he swore bitterly, breaking into a seething torrent of oaths.
- “What did you let him go for, Carleton? You’d no business to. You should
- have held him until Coogan could talk, and then we’d have had him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tommy”—Carleton laid his hand quietly on the master mechanic’s
- shoulder—“we’re too young out in this country for much law. I don’t
- think Coogan knows or ever will know again what happened in the cab that
- night. The doctors don’t seem quite able to call the turn on him
- themselves, so they’ve said to you and said to me. But whether he does or
- not, it doesn’t make any difference as far as Dahleen goes. It would have
- been murder to keep him here. And if Coogan ever can talk he’ll never put
- a mate in bad no matter what the consequences to himself. There’s nothing
- against Dahleen except that he had liquor in his possession while on duty.
- That’s what I fired him for—that’s the only story that’s gone out of
- this office. You and I and the rest are free to put the construction on it
- that suits us best, and there it ends. If I was wrong to let him go, I was
- wrong. I did what I thought was right—that’s all I can ever do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mabbe,” growled Regan, “mabbe; but, damn him, he <i>ought</i> to be
- murdered. I’d like to have had ‘em done it! It’s that smash on the head
- put Coogan to the bad. You’re right about one thing, I guess, he’ll never
- be the same Coogan again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And in a way this was so; in another it wasn’t. It was not the wound that
- was to blame, the doctors were positive about that; but Coogan, it was
- pitifully evident, was not the same. Physically, at the end of a month, he
- left the hospital apparently as well as he had ever been in his life; but
- mentally, somewhere, a cog had slipped. His brain seemed warped and
- weakened, simple as a child’s in its workings; his memory fogged and
- dazed, full of indefinite, intangible snatches, vague, indeterminate
- glimpses of his life before. One thing seemed to cling to him, to
- predominate, to sway him—the Devil’s Slide.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan and Carleton talked to him, trying to guide his thoughts and
- stimulate his memory.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You remember you used to drive an engine, don’t you, Chick?” asked
- Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Engine?” Coogan nodded. “Yes; in the Devil’s Slide.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “505,” said Regan quickly. “You know old 505.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton tried another tack.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You were in a bad accident, Coogan, one night. You were in the cab of the
- engine when she went to smash. Do you remember that?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The smash was on the Devil’s Slide,” said Coogan.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s it,” cried Carleton. “I knew you’d remember.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They’re always there,” said Coogan simply, “always there. It is a bad
- track. I’m a railroad man and I know. It’s not properly guarded. I’m going
- to work there and take care of it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Work there?” said Regan, the tears almost in his eyes. “What kind of
- work? What do you want to do, Chick?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just work there,” said Coogan. “Take care of the Devil’s Slide.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The super and the master mechanic looked at each other—and averted
- their eyes. Then they took Coogan up to his boarding-house, where he had
- moved after Annie and the little one died.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’ll never put his finger on a throttle again,” said Regan with a choke
- in his voice, as they came out. “The best man that ever pulled a latch,
- the best man that ever drew a pay-check on the Hill Division. It’s hell,
- Carleton, that’s what it is. I don’t think he really knew you or me. He
- don’t seem to remember much of anything, though he’s natural enough and
- able enough to take care of himself in all other ways. Just kind of
- simple-like. It’s queer the way that Devil’s Slide has got him, what? We
- can’t let him go out there.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wonder if he remembers Annie,” said Carleton. “I was afraid to ask him.
- I didn’t know what effect it might have. No; we can’t let him go out on
- the Devil’s Slide.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But the doctors said yes. They went further and said it was about the only
- chance he had. The thing was on his mind. It was better to humor him, and
- that, with the outdoor mountain life, in time might bring him around
- again.
- </p>
- <p>
- And so, while Regan growled and swore, and Carleton knitted his brows in
- perplexed protest, the doctors had their way—and Coogan, Chick
- Coogan, went to the Devil’s Slide. Officially, he was on the pay-roll as a
- section hand; but Millrae, the section boss, had his own orders.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Let Coogan alone. Let him do what he likes, only see that he doesn’t come
- to any harm,” wired the super.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Coogan, when Millrae asked him what he wanted to do, answered simply:
- “I’m going to take care of the Devil’s Slide.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, Chick,” the section boss agreed cheerily. “It’s up to you.
- Fire ahead.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At first no one understood, perhaps even at the end no one quite
- understood—possibly Coogan least of all. He may have done some good—or
- he may not. In time they came to call him the Guardian of the Devil’s
- Slide—not slightingly, but as strong men talk, defiant of ridicule,
- with a gruff ring of assertion in their tones that brooked no question.
- </p>
- <p>
- Up and down, down and up, two miles east, two miles west, Coogan patroled
- the Devil’s Slide, and never a weakened rail, a sunken tie, a loosened
- spike escaped him—he may have done some good, or he may not.
- </p>
- <p>
- He slept here and there in one of the switch-back tender’s shanties, moved
- and governed by no other consideration than fatigue—day and night
- were as things apart. He ate with them, too; and scrupulously he paid his
- footing. Twenty-five cents for a meal, twenty-five cents for a bunk, or a
- blanket on the floor. They took his money because he forced it upon them,
- furiously angry at a hint of refusal; but mostly the coin would be slipped
- back unnoticed into the pocket of Coogan’s coat—poor men and rough
- they were, nothing of veneer, nothing of polish, grimy, overalled,
- horny-fisted toilers, their hearts were big if their purses weren’t.
- </p>
- <p>
- At all hours, in the early dawn, at midday or late afternoon, the train
- crews and the engine crews on passengers, specials and freights, passed
- Coogan up and down, always walking with his head bent forward, his eyes
- fastened on the right of way—passed with a cheery hail and the flirt
- of a hand from cab, caboose, or the ornate tail of a garish Pullman. And
- to the tourists he came to be more of an attraction than the scenic
- grandeur of the Rockies themselves; they stared from the observation car
- and listened, with a running fire of wondering comment, as the
- brass-buttoned, swelled-with-importance, colored porters told the story,
- until at last to have done the Rockies and have missed the Guardian of the
- Devil’s Slide was to have done them not at all. It was natural enough,
- anything out of the ordinary ministers to and arouses the public’s
- curiosity. Not very nice perhaps, no—but natural. The railroad men
- didn’t like it, and that was natural, too; but their feelings or opinions,
- in the very nature of things, had little effect one way or the other.
- </p>
- <p>
- Coogan grew neither better nor worse. The months passed, and he grew
- neither better nor worse. Winter came, and, with the trestle that went out
- in the big storm that year, Coogan went into Division for the last time,
- went over the Great Divide, the same simple, broken-minded Coogan that had
- begun his self-appointed task in the spring—he may have done some
- good, or he may not. They found him after two or three days, and sent him
- back to Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’d have chosen that himself if he could have chosen,” said Carleton
- soberly. “God knows what the end would have been. The years would have
- been all alike, he’d never have got his mind back. It’s all for the best,
- what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan did not answer. Philosophy and the master mechanic’s heart did not
- always measure things alike.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Brotherhood took charge of the arrangements, and Coogan’s funeral was
- the biggest funeral Big Cloud ever had. Everybody wanted to march, so they
- held the service late in the afternoon and closed down the shops at
- half-past four: and the shop hands, from the boss fitter to the water boy,
- turned out to the last man—and so did every one else in town.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was getting dark and already supper time when it was over, but
- Carleton, who had left some unfinished work on his desk, went back to his
- office instead of going home. He lighted the lamp, put on the chimney, but
- the match was still burning between his fingers when the door opened and a
- man, with his hat pulled far down over his face, stepped in and closed it
- behind him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton whirled around, the match dropped to the floor, and he leaned
- forward over his desk, a hard look settling on his face. The man had
- pushed back his hat. It was Dahleen, Coogan’s fireman, Jim Dahleen.
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment neither man spoke. Bitter words rose to Carleton’s tongue,
- but something in the other’s face checked and held them back. It was
- Dahleen who spoke first.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I heard about Chick—that he’d gone out,” he said quietly. “I don’t
- suppose it did him any good, but I kind of had to chip in on the good-by—Chick
- and me used to be pretty thick. I saw you come down here and I followed
- you. Don’t stare at me like that, you’d have done the same. Have you got
- that flask yet?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” Carleton answered mechanically, and as mechanically produced it
- from the drawer of his desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ever examine it particularly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Examine it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess that answers my question. I was afraid you might, and I wanted to
- ask you for it that day, only I thought you’d think it mighty funny,
- refuse, and well—well, get to looking it over on your own hook. Will
- you give it here for a minute?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton handed it over silently.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen took it, pulled off the lower half that served as drinking cup,
- laid his finger on the inside rim, and returned it to the super.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton moved nearer to the light—then his face paled. <i>It was
- Coogan’s flask!</i> The inscription, a little dulled, in fine engraving,
- was still plain enough. “To Chick from Jim, on the occasion of his
- wedding.” Carleton’s hand was trembling as he set it down.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My God!” he said hoarsely. “It was Coogan who was drunk that night—not
- you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I figured that’s the way you’d read it, you or any other railroad man,”
- said Dahleen. “It was him or me and one of us drunk, in the eyes of any of
- the boys on the road, from the minute that flask showed up. There was only
- one thing would have made you believe different, and I couldn’t tell you—then.
- I’d have taken the same stand you did. But you’re wrong.. Coogan wasn’t
- drunk that night—he never touched a drop. I wouldn’t be telling you
- this now, if he had, would I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sit down,” said Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen took the chair beside the desk, and resting his feet on the
- window-sill stared out at the lights twinkling below him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I gave him the flask,” he said slowly, as though picking up the
- thread of a story, “for a wedding present. The day he came back to his run
- after the little woman and the baby died he had it in his pocket, and he
- handed it to me. ‘<i>I’m afraid of it, Jimmy</i>,’ he said. That was all,
- just that—only he <i>looked</i> at me. Then he got down out of the
- cab to oil round, me still holding it in my hand for the words kind of hit
- me—they meant a whole lot. Well, before he came back, I lifted up my
- seat and chucked it down in the box underneath. I don’t want to make a
- long story of this. You know how he took to brooding. Sometimes he
- wouldn’t say a word from one end of the run to the other. And once in a
- while he seemed to act a little queer. I didn’t think much of it and I
- didn’t say anything to anybody, figuring it would wear off. When we pulled
- out of Big Cloud the night of the wreck I didn’t see anything out of the
- ordinary about him, I’d kind of got used to him by then and if there was
- any difference I didn’t notice it. He never said a word all the way out
- until we hit the summit of the Devil’s Slide and started down. I had the
- fire-box door open and was throwing coal when he says so sudden as almost
- to make me drop my shovel:
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Jimmy, do you know what night this is?’”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Sure,’ says I, never thinking, ‘it’s Thursday.’
- </p>
- <p>
- “He laughed kind of softlike to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘It’s my wedding night, Jimmy,’ he says. ‘My wedding night, and we’re
- going to celebrate.’
- </p>
- <p>
- “The light from the fire-box was full on his face, and he had the queerest
- look you ever saw on a man. He was white and his eyes were staring and he
- was pushing his hand through his hair and rocking in his seat. I was
- scart. I thought for a minute he was going to faint, then I remembered
- that whisky and jumped for my side of the cab, opened the seat and
- snatched it up. I went back to him with it in my hand. I don’t think he
- ever saw it—I know he didn’t. He was laughing that soft laugh again,
- kind of as though he was crooning, and he reached out his hand and pushed
- me away.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘We’re going to celebrate, Jimmy,’ says he again. ‘We’re going to
- celebrate. It’s my wedding night.’
- </p>
- <p>
- “I felt the speed quicken a bit, we were on the Slide then, you know, and
- I saw his fingers tightening on the throttle. Then it got me, and my heart
- went into my mouth—Chick was clean off his head. I slipped the flask
- into my pocket, and tried to coax his hands away from the throttle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Let me take her a spell, Chick,’ says I, thinking my best chance was to
- humor him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He threw me off like I was a plaything. Then I tried to pull him away and
- he smashed me one between the eyes and sent me to the floor. All the time
- we was going faster and faster. I tackled him again, but I might as well
- have been a baby, and then—then—well, that wound in his head
- came from a long-handled union-wrench I grabbed out of the tool box. He
- went down like a felled ox—but it was too late. Before I could reach
- a lever we were in splinters.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen stopped. Carleton never stirred, he was leaning forward, his
- elbows on his desk, his chin in his hands, his face strained, eyes
- intently fastened on the other.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen fumbled a second with his watch chain, twisting it around his
- fingers, then he went on:
- </p>
- <p>
- “While I laid in the hospital I turned the thing over in my mind pretty
- often, long before the doctors thought I knew my own name again, and I
- figured that, if it was ever known, old Coogan was down and out for fair
- even if when he got better his head turned out all right again, because he
- wouldn’t be ever trusted in a cab under any circumstances, you understand?
- If he didn’t come out straight why that ended it, of course; but I had it
- in my mind that it was only what they call a temporary aberration. I
- couldn’t queer him if that was all, could I? So I said to myself, ‘Jimmy,
- all you know is that the “air” wouldn’t work.’ That’s what I told you that
- day; and then you sprang that flask on me. You were right, I <i>had</i>
- forgotten it. Whisky in the cab on the night of an accident is pretty near
- an open and shut game. It was him or me, and I couldn’t tell you the story
- then without doing Coogan cold, but Coogan’s gone now and it can’t hurt
- him. That’s all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The tick of the clock on the wall, the click of the sounder from the
- dispatcher’s room next door were the only sounds for a long minute, then
- Carleton’s chair scraped and he stood up and put out his hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dahleen,” he said huskily, “I’d give a good deal to be as white a man as
- you are.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dahleen shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Any one would have done it for Coogan,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- VIII—THE BLOOD OF KINGS
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here never was,
- and there isn’t now, anything elusive about the Hill Division, unless you
- get to talking about the mileage—when you strike the mileage you
- strike deep water, and the way of it is this. Most things that are big and
- vital and enduring develop with the years to their own maturity, and with
- maturity comes perfection—as nearly as anything is perfect. When the
- last rail that proclaimed man’s mastery of the Rockies and the Sierras an
- accomplished fact was spiked to the ties with much ceremony and more
- eclat, to say nothing of the somewhat wobbly and uncertain blows with
- which the silk-hatted, very-important-national-personage performed this
- crowning act, while the rough-and-readys whose toil and sweat and grime
- and blood had bought the miles the orators were eulogizing, being no
- longer of the elect, looked on from a respectful distance—when all
- this was done the Hill Division, even then, was no more than the rough
- draft of a masterpiece.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the years that followed came the pruning and the changes, the smoothing
- and the toning down—tunnels bored through the mountain-sides
- lessened the grades and lopped off winding miles around projecting spurs;
- trestles with long embankment approaches added their quota to this
- much-to-be-desired result; while in the foothills, instead of circling
- around and around, to the right and the left and the left and the right of
- an endless procession of buttes, the buttes themselves came to be bisected
- with mathematical precision. All told, many miles, very many miles, have
- been wiped out in this fashion—the elusive part of it is that,
- measured in the dollars and cents paid by the tourists for transportation
- and the shippers and consignees for freight hauls, the line is just as
- long as ever it was! And it would appear that a good deal of money had
- been spent with nothing to show for it; but then against this is the fact
- that the directors down East were never rated as imminent or near-imminent
- subjects for a lunacy commission. The mileage is elusive—let it go
- at that.
- </p>
- <p>
- For the rest, the right of way from Big Cloud, the divisional point, just
- East of the mighty blue-blurred, snow-capped range that towers to the
- skyline North and South—from there to the rolling, undulating
- country that reaches West from the base of the Sierras, the Hill Division
- is, without question, the most marvelous piece of track ever conceived by
- man, and it stands a perpetual and enduring monument to the brains and the
- genius, ay, and the manhood, too, of those who built it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Such is the Hill Division. You who know the Rockies know it for the
- grandeur of its scenery, know it for the glory of its conquest over
- obstacles seemingly insurmountable; but there is another side that you may
- not know, a side that the maps and plans and blueprints and the railroad
- folders and the windows of the observation cars, big as they are, do not
- show—and that side is the human side. It is full of tears and
- laughter, full of sorrow and joy, of dangers and death and mistakes and
- triumph—its history would fill many pages, but it is a history that
- will never be written, for the generals and the rank and file of its army
- have fought their battles without the blare of trumpets, have done their
- work and their duty as they saw it, simply and with few words, without
- thought of personal profit and, much less, of fame. They tell their own
- stories amongst themselves, and they hold in honor those entitled thereto—which
- is a meed beyond any recognition of governments or kings or
- principalities, because it is the tribute of man to man, without glamor
- and without pretense. If you are a man as they measure men, they will tell
- you the stories, too; and, if you care to smoke, they will offer you their
- black plugs with the heart-shaped tin tags that their favorite
- manufacturer imbeds therein and, further, they will hand you their clasp
- knives with which to slice it. If you are wise you will understand that
- you are honored above most men, and you will be becomingly humble and will
- listen. But if this, through circumstance and misfortune, has never been
- your lot, then, here and there, inadequately and meagerly, you may run
- across, in print, a stray breath from the Hill Division—this is a
- case in print—the story of “King” Gilleen.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen was a man you would never pass in a crowd without turning your
- head to look at him a second time, not even in a big crowd, for nature had
- dealt with Gilleen generously—or otherwise—whichever way it
- pleases you best to consider it. He had red hair of a shade that might be
- classified as brilliant, but which Regan, the master mechanic, described
- in metaphor. Said Regan: “You could see that head a mile away on the other
- side of a curve in a blizzard at night when he pokes it out of the cab
- window. You’ll never get Gilleen on the carpet because his headlight’s
- out, what?” Certainly, at any rate, Gilleen’s hair was undeniably red. He
- had blue eyes, and a very small nose which, for all that, was, next to his
- hair, the most prominent feature he possessed—small noses with a
- slight up-cant to the tip <i>are</i> pronounced, mere size to the
- contrary. His face was freckled and so were his hands; also, he was no
- small chunk of a man, not so very tall, but the shoulders on him were
- something to envy if you were friendly with him, or to respect if you were
- not. That was Gilleen, all except the fact that he admitted with emphasis
- to the blood of some wild Irish race of kings coursing through his veins.
- This last point was never established—every one took Gilleen’s word
- for it, that is every one but Regan, who was Irish himself and, more
- pertinent still, Gilleen’s direct superior. On this point Regan, who was
- never averse to doing it, could get a rise out of Gilleen quicker than the
- bite of a hungry trout.
- </p>
- <p>
- “By Christmas,” Gilleen would sputter on such occasions, “I’ll have you
- know I’m no liar, an’ if ‘twere not for the missus an’ the six kids”—here
- Gilleen would always stop to count, owing to a possible arrival since the
- last clash, realizing that any slip would be instantly and mercilessly
- turned against him by the grinning master mechanic—“if’twere not for
- them, Regan, you listen to me, I’d bash your face an’ then ram the measly
- job you give me down your throat, I would that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” Regan would return, “when you get to sitting on a dinky, gilded
- throne, sunk to the crown-sheet in the bogs though it will be, I’d ask no
- more nor as much from your hands as you get from mine—which is more
- than your deserts. Who but me would do as much for you? You ought to be
- back wiping. I’ve thought some seriously of it, h’m? Six, is it now?—well,
- it’s a grand race!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Whereupon Gilleen would say hot words and say them fervently, while he
- shook his fist at the master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll show you some day, Regan,” was his final word. “I’ll show you what
- kind of a race it is, an’ don’t you forget it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- All of which is neither very interesting nor in any degree witty—it
- simply shows where Gilleen’s nickname came from. Everybody on the division
- called him “King”—not to his face, they do now, but they didn’t
- then. Queer the way a little thing like that acts on a man sometimes.
- Gilleen was well enough liked in a way, but no one ever really took him
- seriously in anything. Associate a man with a joke and henceforward and
- forever after, usually, the two are inseparable. He may have aspirations,
- ambitions, what you will, but he is given no credit for having them—with
- Gilleen it was that way. Just Gilleen, “King” Gilleen—and a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Lord only knows what possessed Gilleen to adhere with such
- stout-hearted loyalty to his ancestors—you may put an interrogation
- mark after that last word, if you like—it began with perhaps no more
- than a boyish boast when his official connection with the system was no
- further advanced than to the degree of holding down the job of assistant
- boiler-washer in the roundhouse. The more they guyed him the more
- stubbornly he stuck—it was a matter worth fighting for, and Gilleen
- fought. He threw pounds, reach, and other advantages to the winds and took
- on anybody and everybody. By the time he had moved up to firing he had
- fought all who cared to fight, who were not a few; and when, following
- that in the due course of promotion, he got his engine, he had by blows,
- not argument, established his assertion outwardly at least. At a safe
- distance the division, remembering broken noses and missing teeth and no
- longer denying him his royal blood, gave him his way, smiled tolerantly in
- self-solace and called him “nutty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan, of course, still guyed—but Regan was master mechanic. Not
- that he did it by virtue of the immunity his official position afforded
- him, he never gave that a thought. He did it because he was Regan, and
- Regan was built that way. He could no more forego the chance of a laugh or
- an inward chuckle than he could forego the act of breathing—and
- live. A joke was a joke, just fun with him, that was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- But with Gilleen it was different. Being unable to use his fists as was
- his wont, and being possessed of no other safety-valve, the pressure
- mounted steadily until it registered a point on his mental gauge that
- spoke eloquently of trouble to come.
- </p>
- <p>
- And so matters stood when, following a rather dull summer, the fall
- business opened with a rush and a roar. Things moved with a jump, and the
- rails hummed under a constant stream of traffic east and west. Here, at
- least, was no joke—a rush on the Hill Division, single-track,
- through the mountains, never was. A month of it, and every one from
- car-tink to superintendent began to show the effects of the strain. It was
- double up everywhere, extra duty, extra tricks. The dispatchers caught
- their share of it and their eyes grew red and heavy under the lamps at
- night, and the heads of the day-men ached as they figured a series of
- meeting points that had no beginning and no end; but, bad as it was for
- the men on the keys, it was worse for some of those in the cabs.
- Schedulers went to smash. Perishables and flyers were given the best of it—the
- rights of the rest were the sidings. It was a case of crawl along, sneak
- from one to the other, with layout after layout, until the ordinary length
- of a day’s duty lapped over into fifteen-hour stretches and sometimes to
- twenty-four. Sleep, what they could get of it, the engine crews snatched
- bolt upright in their seats while they waited for Number One’s headlight
- to shoot streaming out of the East, or nodded until roused by the roar and
- thunder of a flying freight, cars and cars of it crammed with first-class
- ratings, streaking East, as it hurtled by with insolent disregard for
- every mortal thing on earth.
- </p>
- <p>
- Maybe Gilleen got a little more of it than any one else on the throttles,
- maybe he did—or maybe he didn’t. Gilleen thought he did anyhow, and
- naturally he put it down to Regan’s account. Regan was head of the motive
- power department of the Hill Division—there was no one else <i>to</i>
- put it down to. It was Regan or imagination. Gilleen, not being strong on
- imagination, did not debate the question—he let it go at Regan.
- </p>
- <p>
- In from one run, shot out on another—that was Gilleen’s schedule.
- The little woman in the little house uptown off Main street got to be
- mostly a memory to Gilleen, and as for the six brick-headed scions of his
- kingly race he came to wonder if they really existed at all.
- </p>
- <p>
- Things boomed and hummed on the Hill Division, and while everybody on it
- snarled and swore and nagged at each other, as weary, worn-out,
- dropping-with-fatigue men will do, the smiles broadened on the lips and
- spread over the faces of the directors down East, as they rubbed their
- palms beneficently, expectantly, scenting extra dividends and soaring
- stock.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was noon one day when Gilleen, with a trailing string of slewing
- freights behind him, pulled into the Big Cloud yards, uncoupled, backed
- down the spur, crossed the’table, and ran into the roundhouse. As he swung
- from the gangway, Regan came hurrying in through the engine doors of
- Gilleen’s pit from the direction of headquarters, and walked up to the
- engineer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gilleen,” said he briskly, “you’ll have to take out Special Eighty-three.
- 1603’s ready with a full head on pit two.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that?” snapped Gilleen. “Take out a special <i>now?</i> You know
- damn well I’m just in from a run. I’m tired. You’ll rub it in once too
- often, Regan.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’re all tired, aren’t we?” returned the master mechanic tartly. “Do you
- think you’re the only one? As for rubbing it in, you’d better draw your
- fire, my bucko. There’s no rubbing in being done except in your eye!
- Anyhow, that’s enough talk. Special Eighty-three’s carded on rush orders
- from down East, and she’s been in here an hour now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, why didn’t you let the crew that brought her in keep goin’ then?”
- snarled Gilleen. It was a fool question and he knew it; but, as he had
- said, he was tired, and his temper, never angelic, was now pretty well on
- edge.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan glared at him a moment angrily. Regan, too, was tired and irritable,
- harassed beyond the limit that most men are harassed. The demand upon the
- motive power department for men and engines had kept him up more than one
- night trying to figure out a problem that was well-nigh impossible.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Let ‘em go on!” he snorted. “You know well enough I haven’t anything on
- the Prairie Division men. You know that—what d’ye say it for, h’m?
- You’re the first man in—and you go out first.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It strikes me I’m <i>generally</i> the first man in these days,” retorted
- Gilleen angrily; “an’ I’m sick of gettin’ the short end of it. I guess I
- won’t go out this time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It took a breathing spell before the master mechanic could explode
- adequately.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You call yourself a railroad man!” he flung out furiously. “What are you
- whining about? Every man’s got his shoulder to the wheel and pushing
- without talk. We haven’t got any room here for quitters. I guess that
- blood of yours you’re so pinhead-brained proud——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan did not finish. With a bellow of rage the red-haired engineer went
- at the other like a charging bull, and the master mechanic promptly
- measured his length on the roundhouse floor from a wallop on the head that
- made him see stars.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan scrambled to his feet. His heart was the heart of a fighter, even if
- his build was not. Straight at Gilleen he flew, and the passes and lunges
- and jabs he made—while the engineer played on the master mechanic’s
- paunch like a kettle-drum and delivered a second wallop on the head as a
- plaster for the first—are historic only for their infinitesimal
- coefficient of effectiveness. It is unquestionably certain that the master
- mechanic then and there would have proceeded to make up for some of his
- lost sleep, at least, if Gilleen’s fireman and a wiper or two hadn’t got
- in between the two men just when they did.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen was boiling mad.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” he bawled, “got anything more to say about quittin’ or that other
- thing? I guess I won’t go out this time, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan was equally mad. And as he felt tenderly of his forehead, where a
- lump was rapidly approximating the formation of a goose egg, he grew
- madder still.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You won’t go out, won’t you?” he roared. “Well <i>I</i> guess you will;
- and, what’s more, you’ll go out <i>now</i>—and get your time! I fire
- you, understand?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You bet!’” said “King” Gilleen—and that’s all he said. He looked at
- the master mechanic for a minute, but didn’t <i>say</i> anything more—just
- laughed and walked out of the roundhouse.
- </p>
- <p>
- Naturally enough, the story got up and down the division, and everybody
- talked about it. With their rough and impartial justice they put both men
- in the wrong, but mostly Gilleen for insubordination. The affront Gilleen
- had suffered was not so big and momentous, a long way from being the vital
- thing in their eyes that it was in his. Gilleen was just nutty on that
- point, that was all there was to that. Regan’s judgment had been bad and
- the moment he had seized for his thrust and fling was by no manner of
- means a psychological one; but, for all that, Gilleen had no business to
- strike the master mechanic. He had got what was coming to him—that
- was the verdict. He was out and out for good. It was pretty generally
- conceded that it would be a long while before he pulled a throttle on the
- Hill Division again.
- </p>
- <p>
- What sympathy the engineer got, for he got some, wasn’t on his own
- account. It was on account of his family—not the ancestral end of
- it, however. Six kids and a wife do not leave much change out of a
- paycheck even when it’s padded by overtime; six kids and a wife with no
- pay-check is pretty stiff running.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen was too hot under the collar to give a thought to that when he
- marched out of the roundhouse that noon; but it wasn’t many hours, after
- he had put in a few to make up for the sleep he hadn’t had during the
- preceding weeks, that the problem was up to him for consideration with a
- vote for adjournment for once ruled out as not in order.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Gilleen may or may not have shared her spouse’s opinions on the
- subject of his illustrious descent—if she did she never put on any
- “airs” about it. Washing and dressing and cooking was about all one woman
- could manage for a household as big as hers. That’s what she said anyway,
- whenever any one asked her about it. And one glance at the red-headed
- brood that filled the front yard and swung on the front gate, whose hinges
- creaked in loud and bitter protest, was enough to preclude any dispute on
- that score. Just a little bit of a woman she was physically; but bigger
- practically than the whole corps of leading lights in social and domestic
- economy—which, come to think of it, is damning Mrs. Gilleen with
- faint praise, whereas too much couldn’t be said for her. However, let that
- go. Mrs. Gilleen <i>was</i> practical, and she had the matter up to the
- engineer almost before he had the sleep washed out of his eyes. No
- nagging, no reproach, nothing of that kind—Mrs. Gilleen wasn’t that
- sort of a woman. “King,” or not, Gilleen might have been, Katie Gilleen
- was a <i>queen</i>, not in looks perhaps, but a queen—that’s flat. A
- fine woman is the finest thing in the world, and if that were said a
- little more often than it is maybe things generally wouldn’t be any the
- worse for it—which is not a plank in the platform of the
- Suffragettes, though it may sound like it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Michael,” said she, “you rowed with Mr. Regan, and he fired you. Will he
- take you back?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen lowered the towel to his chin to catch the dripping water from his
- hair—he had just buried his head in the washbowl the minute before—and
- looked at his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wouldn’t <i>ask</i> him, Kate,” he said shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Gilleen was proud, too—but for all that she sighed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What will you do, then, Michael?” she asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I dunno yet, little woman. Some of the others will give me a job, I
- guess. Mabbe I’ll try the train crews. I’ll hit ‘em up for something,
- anyway.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But there’s ever so much less money in that”—Mrs. Gilleen’s tones
- were judicial, not plaintive.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I know it,” returned Gilleen; “but it’ll tide us over an’ keep the steam
- up till we get a chance to pull out for somewheres where a man can get an
- engine without a grinning fool of a master mechanic to doublecross him
- with the worst of it every chance he gets.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope it will all come out right,” said Mrs. Gilleen, a little
- wistfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It will,” Gilleen assured her. “Don’t you worry. I’ll get after a job
- right away as soon as I’ve had a bite.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It came easier even than Gilleen had figured it would—such as it was—and
- it was about the last job Gilleen had thought of as a possibility. Things
- have a peculiar way of working themselves out sometimes, and, curiously
- enough, by means which, on the surface, are, more often than not,
- apparently trivial and inconsequent. Certainly, if Gilleen, on his way to
- the station that morning, had not run into Gleason, the yard-master, why
- then—but he did.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Call-boys kind of scarce around your diggin’s since yesterday, ain’t
- they, Gilleen?” was Gleason’s greeting.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Gilleen. “I’m out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “See you’re headin’ for the station,” remarked Gleason tentatively. “Goin’
- down to patch it up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No!” answered Gilleen with a hard ring in his voice—the “no” was
- emphatic.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gleason stared at the engineer for a minute, then took a bite from his
- plug, and the motion of his head might have been a nod of understanding or
- merely a wrench or two to free his teeth from the black-strap in which
- they were imbedded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Gilleen again; “I’m not. I’m goin’ down for another job.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What kind of a job?” inquired Gleason.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Any kind from any one that will put me on—except Regan.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gleason thought of his choked yards—the rush had in no way
- overlooked him. Men, men that knew a draw-bar and a switch-handle from a
- hunk of cheese, were as scarce in his department as they were in any of
- the others.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yards?” he queried—and blinked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “D’ye mean it?” demanded Gilleen, taking him up short.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, I mean it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re on,” said Gilleen. “Night switchman,” amplified the yard-master.
- “You can begin to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, I’ll be on deck,” agreed Gilleen; “an’ thanks, Gleason. I’m
- much obliged to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Humph!” grunted Gleason. “‘Tain’t much of a stake compared with an
- engine, but it’s yours, an’ welcome.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was quite true. Comparatively, it wasn’t much of a stake, and even the
- first night of it was enough to throw the comparison into strong and
- bitter relief. If anything would have put a finishing touch on Gilleen’s
- feelings anent the master mechanic it was that first night on yard
- switching, that and, of course, the nights that followed. It wasn’t so
- much the work, though that was hard enough, and, being green, the engineer
- made about twice as much for himself as there was any need of, it was a
- not-to-be-denied tendency of his eyes to stray toward the roundhouse every
- time a gleaming headlight showed on the turn-table. If Gilleen had never
- known before how much he loved an engine he knew it in those dark hours
- while he swung a lantern from the roofs of a freight string, or hopped the
- foot-board of the switcher. Up and down the yards from dusk till dawn, to
- the accompaniment of the wheezing, grunting, coughing, foreshortened
- apology for a shunter, the clash of brake-beams, the bump and rattle,
- staccato, diminuendo, as a line of box-cars grumbled into motion, didn’t
- take on any roseate hues from the angle Gilleen looked at it; nor did an
- occasional ten-wheeler, out or in, sailing grandly past him with impudent
- airs help any, either. Gilleen’s language became as freckled as his face
- and hands and as fiery as his head. Even that grand old Irish race from
- which he sprang, that wild and untamed breed of kingly sires paled into
- insignificance—Gilleen was more occupied with Regan. What he thought
- he said, and said it aloud without making any bones about it—said it
- through his teeth, with his fists clenched.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perhaps it was just as well Gilleen was on nights, for, ordinarily, the
- master mechanic had nothing to bring him around the yards, shops or
- roundhouse after sundown—Regan’s evenings being spent with
- Carle-ton, the super, a pipe and a game of pedro upstairs over the station
- in the superintendent’s office next door to the dispatcher’s room—just
- as well for both their sakes; for Regan’s physically; for Gilleen’s
- because, little fond of his job as he was, there, were certain necessities
- that even little Mrs. Gilleen with all her practicability and economy
- could not supply without money. Anyway, the days went by and the two men
- did not meet, though Gilleen’s orations got around to Regan’s ears fast
- enough. The master mechanic only laughed when he heard them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gilleen,” said he, “is like the parrot that said ‘sic ‘em!’ and said it
- once too often. He talks too much. If he’d kept his mouth shut I’d have
- given him his run back, after a lay off to teach him manners. As it is, if
- he likes switching let him keep at it. Mabbe by the time he’s tired the
- throne of his ancestors ‘ll be ready for him, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- All this was enough to spell ructions in the air, and, ordinarily, the
- division to a man would have hung mildly expectant on the result of the
- final showdown. But the Hill Division just then wasn’t hankering for
- anything more to liven it up—it was getting all of that sort of
- thing it wanted and a little besides. Attending strictly to business was
- about all it could do, a trifle beyond what it could do, and everything
- else was apart—the boom showed more signs of increasing than it did
- of being on the wane. There wasn’t any let-up anywhere—things
- sizzled.
- </p>
- <p>
- It never rains but it pours, they say; and that’s one adage, at least,
- that the railroad men of Big Cloud, and the town itself for that matter,
- will swear by to this day. There are a few things that Big Cloud remembers
- vividly and with astounding minuteness for detail, but the night the shops
- went up tops them all.
- </p>
- <p>
- When it was all over they decided that a slumbering forge-fire in the
- blacksmith shop was at the bottom of it—not that any one really
- knew, or knows now, but they put it down to that because it sounded
- reasonable and because there wasn’t anything else <i>to</i> put it down
- to. However, whether that was the cause or whether it wasn’t, on one point
- there was no possible opening for an argument—and that was the
- effect and the result.
- </p>
- <p>
- If you knew Big Cloud in the old days, you know where the shops were and
- what they looked like; if you didn’t, it won’t take a minute to tell you.
- You could see them from the station platform across the tracks far up at
- the west end of the yards; and they looked more like a succession of barns
- nailed on to each other than anything else, except for the roofs which
- were low and flat—the buildings being all one-storied. What with the
- quarters of the boiler-makers, the carpenters, the machinists and the
- fitters, the old shops straggled out over a goodly length of ground, and a
- grimy, ramshackle, dirty, blackened, Godforsaken looking structure it was.
- To-day, thanks to that fire and the Big Strike when it came along, there’s
- a modern affair of structural steel—and the rest is but a memory.
- However——
- </p>
- <p>
- Night in the mountains in the Fall comes early, and by nine o’clock on the
- night the fire broke out it had shut down pitch dark. Nothing showed in
- the yards but the twinkling switch lights, the waving lamps of the men,
- and an occasional gleam from the shunter’s headlight when it shot away
- from the end of a boxcar. Across the tracks the station lights were like
- fireflies, and there was a glimmer or two showing from the roundhouse.
- Apart from the fact that a pretty strong west wind was brushing the yards,
- if you could count that as anything apart, there was nothing out of the
- ordinary, everything was going on as usual, when, suddenly without
- warning, a wicked fang of flame shot skyward, then another higher than the
- first. It was answered by a yell from the yardmen, caught up in the
- roundhouse, and then the switcher’s whistle shrieked the alarm. A minute
- more, and everything with steam enough to lift a valve joined in. Dark
- forms began to run in the direction of the shops, and then the bell in the
- little English chapel uptown took a hand in the clamor. The alarm was
- unanimous enough and general enough when it came, there was never any
- doubt about that, but the fire must have got a pretty stiff start before
- it broke through the windows to fling its first challenge at the railroad
- men.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen and the rest of the yard crew were on the run for the scene when
- Gleason’s voice, bawling over the din, halted them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Clean out three, four an’ five, an’ get ‘em down to the bottom of the
- yards, an’ look lively!” he yelled. “Leave that string of gondolas on six
- till the last. Jump now, boys! Eat ‘em up!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Oil-spattered floors and oil-smeared walls are a feeding ground for a fire
- than which there is no better. The flame tongues leaped higher and higher
- throwing a lurid glare down the yards, and throwing, too, as the wind
- caught them up and whirled them in gusts, a driving rain of sparks that
- threatened the long, dark lines of rolling stock, for the most part choked
- to the doors with freight—freight enough to total a sum in
- claim-checks that would blanch the cheeks of the most florid director on
- the board of the Transcontinental.
- </p>
- <p>
- With Gleason in command, Gilleen and his mates went at their work heads
- down. There wasn’t anything fancy or artistic about the way they banged
- those cars to safety—there wasn’t time to be fussy. Behind them the
- south end of the shops was already a blazing mass. The little switcher
- took hold of first one string then another, shook it angrily for a minute
- as her exhaust roared into a quick crackle of reports and the drivers spun
- around like pin-wheels making the steel fly fire, then with a cough and a
- grunt and a final push she would snap the cars away from her, and the
- string would go sailing down the yard to bump and pound to a stop, with an
- echoing crash, into whatever might be at the other end. There was a car or
- two the next morning with front-ends and rear-ends and both ends at once,
- that looked as though they had been in a cyclone; and there was a
- claim-voucher or two put through for a consignment of nursing bottles and
- a sewing machine—not that the two necessarily go together, but no
- matter, they did then. Anyway, the record the yardmen made that night is
- the record today, and in no more than ten minutes there wasn’t a car
- within three hundred yards of the shops.
- </p>
- <p>
- But while the yard crew worked others were not idle. Regan and Carleton,
- both of them, had caught the first flash from the windows of the super’s
- room, and they were down the stairs, across the yards and into the game
- from the start. Joined by the nightmen and the hostlers and the wide-eyed
- call-boys they tackled the blaze. By the time they had dragged and coupled
- the fifty-foot hose lengths, it took five lengths, along the tracks from
- the roundhouse, the needle on the stationary’s gauge, luckily not yet
- quite dead from the day’s work and whose fire-box Clarihue, the turner,
- now crammed with oil-soaked packing, began to climb, and they got an
- uncertain, weakly stream playing—uncertain, but a stream. After
- that, things went with a rush—both ways—the fire and the
- fight.
- </p>
- <p>
- From the gambling hells and the saloons, from the streets and their homes
- came the population of Big Cloud, the Polacks, the Russians, the railroad
- men, the good and the bad whites, the half-breeds—and the local fire
- brigade. Two more streams they ran from the roundhouse and that was the
- limit—the rest of the hose was liquid rubber somewhere under the
- blaze.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan, with a bitter, hard look on his face for the shops were Regan’s,
- was everywhere at once, and what man could do he did; but, inch by inch,
- the flames were getting the better of him. The yards were as bright as day
- now, and the heat was driving the circle of fighters back, stubbornly as
- they fought to hold their ground. It looked like a grand slam for the fire
- with the four aces in one hand. Twice Regan had been on the point of
- ordering the men to the roof, and twice he held back—once he had
- even ordered a ladder planted, only to order it away again. The building
- was only wood, and old, and the roof was none too strong at best; but now,
- under and supported by the roof of the fitting-shop, put in a month before
- in lieu of the old system of jacking and blocking by hand, making the risk
- a hundredfold greater, were the heavy steel girders and hydraulic
- traveling cranes that whipped the big moguls like jack-straws from their
- wheels preparatory to stripping them to their bare boiler-shells. Regan
- shook his head—it was asking a man to take his life in his hands.
- For the moment he stood a little apart in front of the crowd and just
- behind the nozzle end of one of the streams. Again he measured the
- chances, and again he shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can’t ask a man to do it,” he muttered; “but we ought to have a stream
- up there, it’s——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?”—the words came sharp
- and quick from his elbow, stinging hot like the cut of a whip-lash. It was
- “King” Gilleen, red-haired, blue-blooded, freckled-skinned Gilleen.
- </p>
- <p>
- The master mechanic whirled like a shot, and for a minute the two men
- stared into each other’s eyes, stared as the leaping flames sent
- flickering shadows across the grim, set features of them both, stared at
- each other face to face for the first time since that noon in the
- roundhouse days before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why don’t you take it there yourself, then?” said Gilleen again, and his
- laugh rang hard and cold. “<i>You</i> ain’t a quitter, are you? There’s
- nothin’ wrong with <i>your</i> blood, is there? If you’re not afraid—come
- on!”—as he spoke he stepped forward, pushed the men from the nozzle—and
- looked back at the master mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan’s lips were like a thin, white line.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen laughed out again, and it carried over the roar and the crackle of
- the flames, the snapping timbers, the hiss and spit of the water, the
- voices of the crowd.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Put up the ladder!”—it was Regan’s voice, deadly cold. “Lash a
- short end around that nozzle, an’ stand by to pass it up”—he was at
- the foot of the ladder almost before they got it in position, and the next
- instant began to climb.
- </p>
- <p>
- Like a flash, Gilleen, surrendering the fire-hose temporarily, sprang
- after him—and up.
- </p>
- <p>
- It wasn’t far—the shops were low, just one story high—and both
- men were on the roof in a minute. Gilleen caught the coiled rope they
- slung him from below, and together he and the master mechanic hauled up
- the writhing, spluttering hose.
- </p>
- <p>
- A shower of sparks and a swirling cloud of smoke enveloped them as they
- stood upright and began to advance. It cleared away leaving them
- silhouetted against the leaping wall of flame a few yards in front of them—and
- a cheer went up from the throats of the crowd below.
- </p>
- <p>
- Not a word passed between the two men. Foot by foot they moved forward,
- laying the hose in a line behind them to lessen the weight and the
- side-pull, that at first had called forth all their strength to direct the
- play of the stream; foot by foot they went forward, closer and closer,
- perilously close, to the blistering, scorching, seething mass—for
- neither of them would be the first to hold back.
- </p>
- <p>
- High into the heavens streamed the great yellow-red forks of angry flame,
- and over all, like a gigantic canopy, rolled dense volumes of gray-black
- smoke. Came at the two men spurting, fiery tongues, stabbing at them,
- robbing them of their breath, mocking at their puny might.
- </p>
- <p>
- Another step forward and Regan reeled back, one hand went to his face—and
- the nozzle almost wrenched itself from the engineer’s grasp.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a grand race!” laughed Gilleen, but the laugh was more of a gasping
- cough, and the cough came from cracked and swollen lips. “It’s a grand
- race, Regan; an’ the blood——”
- </p>
- <p>
- With a choking sob, Regan steadied himself and seized hold of the nozzle
- again.
- </p>
- <p>
- They held where they were now—it was the fire, not they, that was
- creeping forward, pitilessly, inevitably, licking greedily at the tarred
- roof until it grew soft beneath their feet and the bubbles puffed up and
- formed and broke.
- </p>
- <p>
- A cry of warning came from below, and with it came the ominous rending
- groan of yielding timbers. It came again, the cry, and rang in Gilleen’s
- ears almost without sense. He could scarcely see, his eyes were scorched
- and blinded, his lungs were full of the stinging smoke, choking full.
- Beside him Regan hung, dropping weak. “Get back, for God’s sake, get back!
- “—it was Carleton’s voice. “Do you hear!” shouted the super
- frantically. “Get back! The roof is sagging! Run for——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Like the roar of a giant blast, as a park of artillery belches forth in
- deafening thunder, there came a terrific crash and, fearful in its echo, a
- cry of horror rose from those below. Where there had been roof a foot in
- front of the men was now—nothingness.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen, with a shout, as he felt the edge crumple under him, flung
- himself backward and as he leaped he snatched at Regan. His fingers
- brushed the master mechanic’s sleeve, hooked, slipped—and he struck
- on his back a full yard away. He reeled to his feet like a drunken man,
- and dug at his eyes with his fists. Over the broken edge of the shattered
- roof, hanging into the black below, was the dangling hose—but Regan
- was gone. Weak, spent, exhausted, the master mechanic, unequal to the
- exertion of Gilleen’s leap, had pitched downward, clutching desperately,
- feebly, vainly, as he went. Regan was gone, and twenty feet, somewhere,
- below—he lay.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gilleen staggered forward. It was the far end of the beams that had given
- away and the six or seven yards of the roof that had fallen still
- separated him from the heart of the blaze. The advancing flames lighted up
- a scene of wreck and ruin below in the fitting-shop—girders and
- steel Ts and cranes and tackles, splotches of roofing, shattered timbers,
- lay aver the black looming shapes of the monster engine-shells blocked on
- the pit.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Regan!” he called; and again: “Regan! <i>Regan!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Above the roaring crackle of the fire, above the surging, pounding noises
- that beat mercilessly at his eardrums, faint, so faint it seemed like
- fancy, a low moan answered him. Once more it came and upon Gilleen surged
- new-born strength and life. He began to drag at the hose with all his
- might, dropping it foot by fool over the jagged edge of the roof until it
- reached well down to the snarled and tangled wreckage below. And then a
- mighty yell went up from a hundred throats—and again and again:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gilleen! King Gilleen! King! <i>King!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was no gibe now—just a bursting cheer from the full hearts of
- men. “King!” they roared, and the shout swelled, but Gilleen never heard
- them as they crowned him. King he was at last in the eyes of all men, a
- king that knows no blood nor race nor throne nor retinue—Gilleen was
- lowering himself down the hose.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a question of minutes. The fire was sweeping in a mad wave across
- the intervening space. The engineer’s feet touched something solid and he
- let go his hold of the hose—and stumbled, lost his balance, and
- pitched forward striking on his head with a blow that dazed and stunned
- him. Mechanically he understood that what he had taken for flooring was a
- workbench. He got to his feet again, the blood streaming from his
- forehead, and shouted. This time there was no answer. Staggering, falling,
- tripping, stumbling, he began to search frantically amid the debris. The
- air was thick with the smothering smoke, hot, stifling, drying up his
- lungs. He began to moan, crying the name of the master mechanic over and
- over again, crying it as a man cries out in delirium. Bits of oil-soaked
- waste and wads of packing, catching from the glowing cinders, were blazing
- around his feet, the onrush of the flames swept a blighting wave upon him
- that sent him reeling back, scorching, blistering the naked skin of his
- face and hands. Again he fell. A great sheet of fire leapt high behind
- him, held for an instant, and then the dull red glow settled around him
- again—but in that instant, just a little to the right, pinned under
- a scanling, half hidden by a snarled knot of roof and girders, was the
- master mechanic’s form.
- </p>
- <p>
- On his knees, groping with his hands, Gilleen reached him, and began to
- tear furiously, savagely, madly, at the timber that lay across Regan’s
- chest. He moved it little by little, every inch tasking his weakening
- muscles to the utmost. Blackness was before him, he could no longer see,
- he could no longer breathe, hot, nauseating fumes strangled him and sent
- the blood bursting from his nostrils. He tried to lift Regan’s shoulders—and
- sank down beside the master mechanic instead. Feebly he raised his head—there
- came the splintering crash of glass, a rushing stream tore through a
- window, hissed against the boiler-shell above him, and, glancing off,
- lashed a cold spray of water into his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- The window! Three yards to the window! He was up again, and pulling at the
- dead weight of the master mechanic. Just three yards! He cried like a
- child as he struggled, and the tears ran down his cheeks in streams. A
- foot, two feet, three—<i>two more yards to go</i>. Axes were
- swinging now in front of him, shouts reached him. Half the distance was
- covered—but he had gone to his knees. Everything around was hot, it
- was all fire and hell and madness. A yard and a half—only a yard and
- a half. Alone he could make it easily enough and maybe Regan was dead
- anyhow, alone and there was safety and life, alone—then he laughed.
- “It’s a grand race, Regan, a grand race,” he sobbed hysterically, and his
- grip tightened on the master mechanic, and he won another foot and another
- and another. A black form wavered before him, he felt an arm reach out and
- grasp him—then he tottered, swayed, and dropped inert, unconscious.
- </p>
- <p>
- They got him out, and they got Regan out, and they got the fire out by the
- time there wasn’t much left to burn; and, after a week or two, both men
- got out of the hospital. That’s about all there is to it, except that
- Gilleen’s red head now decorates the swellest cab on the division, and
- that he never fought for his title after that night—he never had to;
- though, if you feel like questioning it, you can still get plenty of
- fight, for all that—any of the boys will accommodate you any time.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan isn’t an artist as a pugilist, but even so it is unwise to take
- risks—unscientific men by lucky flukes have handed knockouts to
- their betters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If Gilleen says so that’s enough, whether it’s so or not, what?” Regan
- will fling at you. “It’s pretty <i>good</i> blood, ain’t it, no matter
- what kind it is? Well then—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- IX—MARLEY
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here are some men
- they remember on the Hill Division—Marley is one of them; and his
- story goes back to the days before the fire wiped out what the strike had
- left of the old rambling shops at the western end of the Big Cloud yards,
- back to the time when “Royal” Carleton was young in the superintendency of
- the division, when Tommy Regan, squat, fat and paunchy was master
- mechanic, and Harvey, was division engineer, and Spence was chief
- dispatcher, when the Big Fellows, as they were called, wrestled with the
- rough of it, shaking the steel down into a permanent right of way,
- shackling the Rockies, welding the West and the East.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley was not a “Big Fellow” in either sense of the word.
- </p>
- <p>
- Officially, when he started in, he wasn’t anything—that is, anything
- in particular. Sort of general assistant, assistant section hand,
- assistant boiler washer, assistant anything you like to everybody—Marley’s
- duties, if nothing else, were multifarious.
- </p>
- <p>
- Physically, he was a queer card. He was built on plans that gave you the
- impression Dame Nature had been doing a little something herself along the
- lines of original research and experimentation—and wasn’t well
- enough satisfied with the result to duplicate it! Anyway, as far as any
- one ever knew, there wasn’t but one Marley produced. Maybe nature, even,
- isn’t infallible; maybe she made a mistake, maybe she didn’t. You couldn’t
- call him deformed—and yet you could! That’s Marley exactly—when
- you get to describing him you get contradictory. It must have been his
- neck. That lopped off two or three inches from his stature—because
- he hadn’t any! But if that shortened him down to, say, five feet five,
- which isn’t so short after all—there’s the contradiction again, you
- see—the length of his arms at least was something to marvel at, they
- made up for the neck. Regan used to say Marley could stand on the floor of
- the roundhouse and clean out an engine pit without leaning over. The
- master mechanic was more or less gifted with imagination, but he wasn’t so
- far out, not more than a couple of feet or so, at that. Marley’s hair,
- more than anything else that comes handy by way of comparison, was like
- the stuff, in color and texture, the fellows on the stage light and put in
- their mouths so as to blow out smoke like a belching stack under forced
- draft—tow, they call it. Eyes—no woman ever had any like them—big
- and round and wide, with a peculiar violet tinge to them, and lids that
- had a trick of closing down with a little hesitating flutter like a girl
- trying to flirt with you.
- </p>
- <p>
- But what’s the use! Marley, piecemeal, would never look like the
- short-stepping, springy-walked, foreshortened, arms-flopping Marley with
- the greasy black peaked cap pulled over his forehead, the greasy jumper
- tucked into greasier overalls who sold his hybrid services to the
- Transcontinental for the munificent sum of a dollar ten a day.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley’s arrival and introduction to Big Cloud was, like Marley himself,
- decidedly out of the ordinary and by no manner of means commonplace.
- Marley arrived “‘boing it” in a refrigerator car.
- </p>
- <p>
- They ice the cars at Big Cloud and, luckily for Marley, the particular one
- he had, in some unexplained way, managed to appropriate required a little
- something more than icing. They pulled him out in about as flabby a
- condition as a sack of flour. He didn’t say anything for himself mainly
- because he was pretty nearly past ever saying anything for himself or
- anybody else. The boys who found him cursed fluently because he wasn’t a
- pleasant sight, and then carried him up Main Street on the door of a
- box-car with the hazy notion that MacGuire’s Blazing Star Saloon was the
- most fitting Mecca available.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley continued to play in luck. Mrs. Coogan, the mother of Chick Coogan,
- that is, who went out in the Fall blizzard on the Devil’s Slide some years
- before, spotted the procession as it passed her little shack, halted it,
- made a hasty, but none the less comprehensive, examination, amplified it
- by a few scathing remarks on discovering the proposed destination,
- peremptorily ordered them into her bit of a cottage and installed Marley
- therein.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was pretty far gone, pretty far—and he hung on the ragged edge
- for weeks. Nobody knows what Mrs. Coogan did for him except Marley
- himself; but it was generally conceded that she did more than she could
- afford for anybody, let alone doing it for a stray hobo.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley got well in time, of course, for, than old, motherly Mrs. Coogan
- there was no better nurse, even if she had few comforts and dainties and
- less money to buy them with; and then Marley got a job—or rather
- Mrs. Coogan got one for him.
- </p>
- <p>
- There wasn’t anything Mrs. Coogan could have asked for and not got that
- was within their power to give her—she was Chick’s mother, and with
- Carleton or Regan or any of the rest of them that was enough. But Mrs.
- Coogan never asked anything for herself—she had the Coogan pride.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The good Lord be praised,” she would say—Mrs. Coogan was sincerely
- devout. “I’m able to worrk, so I am, an’ fwhy should I?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Why should she? They smiled at her as men smile when something touches
- them under the vest, and they want to say the proper thing—and
- can’t. They smiled—and gave her their washing.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Coogan tackled Regan on Marley’s behalf.
- </p>
- <p>
- The master mechanic scratched his head in perplexity, but his reply was
- prompt and hearty enough.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure. Sure thing, Mrs. Coogan,” he said. “Send him down to me. I’ll find
- him something to do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- To Marley he talked a little differently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I ain’t quite sure I like the looks of you,” he flung out bluntly enough,
- taking in the new man from head to toe. “There’s no job for you, but I’ll
- give you a chance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley’s eyes came down in a flutter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thanks, sir,” he mumbled nervously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Tommy Regan wasn’t used to being “sir” ed—the Hill Division did its
- business with few handles and it wasn’t long on the amenities.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Humph!” he ejaculated with a snort, and a stream of black-strap laid the
- dust on a good few inches of engine cinders. “You can hand any thanks
- you’ve got coming over to Mother Coogan. And say”—the master
- mechanic wriggled his fat forefinger under Marley’s nose—“thanks are
- all right as far as they go, but I figure you owe her something over and
- above that, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- A faint flush came into Marley’s cheeks and he darted a quick look at
- Regan. His eyes were on the ground and his hands had suddenly disappeared
- in his pockets before he answered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m going to board with her a spell,” he said in a slow way, as though he
- was measuring every word before it was uttered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are, eh?” grunted Regan, but the grunt carried a grudging note of
- approval. “Well, maybe that’ll help some. You can report at noon, Marley,
- and make yourself generally handy around. I reckon you’ll find enough to
- do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thanks, sir,” said Marley again, as he turned away.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan, leaning on the turntable push-bar in front of the roundhouse,
- followed with his eyes as the other crossed the tracks in the direction of
- the town, then he spat profoundly again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Queerest looking specimen that ever blew into the mountains, and we’ve
- had some before that were in a whole class by themselves at that,” he
- remarked, screwing up his eyebrows. “Makes you think of a blasted gorilla
- the way he’s laid out, what? Well, we’ll give him a try anyway,” and, with
- a final glance in the direction of the retreating figure, the master
- mechanic went into the roundhouse for his morning inspection of the big
- moguls on the pits.
- </p>
- <p>
- It took the division and Big Cloud some time to size up the new man, and
- then just about when they thought they had they found they hadn’t.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley, if he was nothing else, was a contradictory specimen.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Coogan said it was like the good Lord was kind of paying her special
- attention, kind of giving her another son—“so quiet an’
- accommodatin’ an’ handy to have around. A good bhoy was Marley—a
- foine lad.” One hand would rest on her hip, and the other would smooth the
- thin white hair over her ear with quick, nervous, little pats as she
- talked, and the gray Irish eyes, a little dim now, would light up happily.
- “Yes, ut’s more than I deserve; but I always knew the Lord wud
- provide.‘tain’t so easy to move the tubs around as it uster be. I guess I
- knew it, but I wasn’t willin’ to admit it till I had somebody to do it for
- me. Sivinty-wan I was last birthday.‘tain’t old for a man, but a woman—indade
- he’s a foine lad, an’ ‘tis myself that ses ut.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Down at headquarters Mrs. Coogan’s praise went a long way, and after
- Carleton and Regan and the others in the office got accustomed to seeing
- him around they came to accept him in a passive, indifferent sort of a
- way. He was a curious case, if you like, but inoffensive—they let it
- go at that.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men had their view-point. Marley didn’t talk much, didn’t draw out the
- way a new hand was expected to in order to establish his footing with the
- fraternity. Least of all did he make any overtures tending to anything
- like an intimate relationship with any of his new associates. Marley was
- never one of the group behind the storekeeper’s office that had stolen out
- from the shops for a drag at their pipes and a breath of air; never on the
- platform to exchange a word of banter with the crews of the incoming
- trains; never amongst the wipers and hostlers in the roundhouse who
- lounged in idle moments in the lee of a ten-wheeler with an eye out across
- the yards against the possible intrusion of Regan or some other embodiment
- of authority. He was civil enough and quick enough to answer when he was
- spoken to, but his words were few—no more than a simple negative or
- affirmative if he could help it. And when he himself was in question there
- was not even that—Marley became dumb.
- </p>
- <p>
- All this did not help him any—he wasn’t what you’d call exactly
- popular! So, if he had little to say for himself, the men had plenty, and
- the general opinion was that he was a surly brute that by no possible
- chance was any credit to the Hill Division and by no manner of means an
- acquisition to Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- A few, very few, took a more charitable view, basing it on the shy, slow
- flutter of Marley’s eyelids—they charged it up to an acute
- sensitiveness of his grotesque and abnormal appearance. That isn’t the way
- they put it, though.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Looks like hell, an’ he knows it,” said they judicially. “Let the beggar
- alone.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was good advice, whether their analysis was or wasn’t—Pete
- Boileau, the baggage master, can vouch for that. As the time-worn saying
- has it, it came like a bolt from the blue, and—but just a minute,
- we’re overrunning our targets and that means trouble.
- </p>
- <p>
- Things had gone along, as far as Marley was concerned, without anything
- very startling or out of the way happening for quite a spell, and Regan,
- who had stood closer to Chick Coogan than any other man on the division
- before the young engineer died, had begun to look on Marley with a little
- more interest—as a sort of <i>deus ex machina</i> for Mrs. Coogan.
- It seemed to afford the big-hearted master mechanic a good deal of relief.
- He got to talking about it to Carleton one morning about a month after
- Marley’s advent to the Hill Division.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, of course, I don’t know anything about him,” he said. “Nobody does, I
- guess they don’t. But he minds his own business and does what he has to do
- well enough, h’m? The old lady’s been getting a little feeble lately—kind
- of wearing out, I guess she is. I was thinking Marley was worth a little
- more than a dollar ten a day, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- They were sitting in the super’s office, and Carle-ton’s glance, straying
- out through the window from where he sat at his desk, fastened on Marley’s
- clumsy, ungainly figure hopping across the yard tracks from the roundhouse
- toward the station platform. He smiled a little and looked back at Regan.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess so, Tommy—if it will do her any good. I wouldn’t bank on
- it, though. He’s a queer card. Impresses you with the feeling that there’s
- something you ought to know about him—and don’t. I’ve a notion,
- somehow, I’ve seen him before.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Have you?” said Regan. “That’s funny. I’ve thought I had myself once or
- twice, but I guess it’s imagination more than anything else. Anyway, he
- seems to remember what Mrs. Coogan did for him. I dunno what she’d do even
- now without the board money, little as it is, to help out. There’s no use
- borrowing trouble I suppose, but later on I dunno what on earth she’ll do.
- She’s prouder than a sceptered queen—and she won’t be able to wash
- much longer, nor take a boarder either, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton sucked at his briar for a moment in silence. “We’ve all got to
- face the possibility of the scrap heap some day, Tommy,” he said soberly.
- “But it’s harder for a woman, I’ll admit—bitter hard. Sometimes
- things don’t seem just right. If you want to give Marley a small raise, go
- ahead.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The master mechanic nodded his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think I will,” he announced. “He’s queer if you like, but that’s his
- own business. Never a word out of him nor a bit of trouble since——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan’s words stopped as though they had been chopped off with a knife.
- Both men, as though actuated by a single impulse, had leaped to their
- feet. Behind them their chairs toppled unheeded with a crash to the floor,
- and for an instant, as their eyes met each other’s, the color faded in
- their cheeks. It had come and gone like a flash—a wild, hoarse
- scream of rage, a brute scream, horrid, blood curdling, like the jungle
- howl of some maddened beast plunged in a savage, blind, all-possessing
- paroxysm of fury.
- </p>
- <p>
- Themselves again in a second, the master mechanic and superintendent
- sprang to the window.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the platform, up at the far end, the great form of Pete Boileau rocked
- and swayed like a drunken man, and clinging to him, his legs twined around
- the other’s knees, his arms locked around the baggage-master’s body just
- above the elbows—was Marley!
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan and Carleton gazed spellbound. There was something uncanny, inhuman
- about the scene—like a rabid dog that had leaped, snarling, for the
- throat hold.
- </p>
- <p>
- Suddenly, Marley’s legs with a quick, wriggling slide, released their
- hold, his whole form appeared to shrink, grow smaller, he seemed to crouch
- on his knees at the other’s feet, then his body jerked itself erect to its
- full stature with a movement swift as a loosed bowstring, his arms flew up
- carrying a great burden, and over his shoulders, over his head, a
- sprawling form hurtled through the air.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Merciful God! He’s killed him!” gasped Carleton, dashing for the door.
- “Come on, Tommy <i>Quick!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Both men were down the stairs in a space of time that Regan, at least,
- chunky and fat, has never duplicated before or since. Carleton, hard-faced
- and tightlipped, led the way, with the picture beating into his brain of
- Boileau’s senseless form on the ground and the other above tearing like a
- beast at its prey. He wrenched the door of the station open, sprang out on
- to the platform, stopped involuntarily, and then ran forward again.
- </p>
- <p>
- The baggage-master’s form was on the ground lying in a curled-up, huddled
- heap, and he was senseless all right—if he wasn’t something more
- than that. But the rest of Carleton’s mental picture was wrong, dead
- wrong. Right beside where the fight, if fight it could be called, had
- taken place was a baggage truck, and over this, his head down, his two
- great arms wound round his face, shoulders heaving in convulsive sobs,
- Marley was crying like a broken-hearted child.
- </p>
- <p>
- Take him any way you like, look at him any way you like, Marley, whatever
- else he was, was a contradictory specimen.
- </p>
- <p>
- Any other man with a skull a shade less tender than Boileau’s—it
- must have been made of boiler plate—would never have drawn another
- pay check. And even granting the boiler plate part of it, it was something
- to wonder at. He had gone through the air like a rocket, and his head had
- caught the full of it when he landed. How far? Carleton never said. He
- measured it—twice. But he never gave out the figures of Boileau’s
- aerial flight. Pete was a big man, six feet something, and heavy for his
- height. The strength of four ordinary men concentrated in one pair of arms
- might have done it perhaps; mathematically it wouldn’t figure out any
- other way. Carleton never said. But what’s the use! The division did some
- tall thinking over it—and Marley cried!
- </p>
- <p>
- They picked up Pete Boileau and carried him into the station, and the
- contents of a fire bucket over his head opened his eyes. But it was a good
- fifteen minutes before he could talk, and by that time when they got over
- their scare and thought of Marley the baggage truck was deserted.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What started it!” growled Boileau, repeating Carleton’s inquiry. “I’m
- hanged if I know. I was jossing him a little—nothing to make anybody
- sore. I was only funning anyhow, and laughing when I said it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Said what?” demanded Regan, cutting in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, nothing much. He looked so queer hopping across the tracks like a
- monkey on a stick that I just asked him why he didn’t cut out railroading
- and hit up a museum for a job, and then before I knew it he let out a
- screech and was on me like a blasted catamount.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Serves you right,” said the master mechanic gruffly. “I guess you won’t
- nag him again, I guess you won’t. And none of the other men won’t neither
- if they’ve had any notion that way.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a wicked little devil,” snarled Boileau. “And the strength of him”—the
- baggage-master shivered—“he ain’t human. He’ll kill somebody yet,
- that’s what he’ll do!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Pete’s summing up was a popular one—the men promptly ticketed and
- carded Marley as per Boileau’s bill of lading. There wasn’t any more doubt
- about him, no discussions, no anything. They knew Marley at last, and they
- liked him less than ever; but, also, they imbibed a very wholesome respect
- for the welfare of their own skins. A man with arms whose strength is the
- strength of derrick booms is to be approached with some degree of caution.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley himself said nothing. Carleton and Regan got him on the carpet and
- tried to get his version of the story, but for all they got out of him
- they might as well have saved their time.
- </p>
- <p>
- A pathetic enough looking figure, in a way, he was, as he stood in the
- superb office the afternoon of the fight. The shoulders were drooping
- giving the arms an even longer appearance than usual, no color in his
- face, the violet eyes almost black, with a dead, hunted look in them.
- Sorrow, remorse, dread—neither Regan nor Carleton knew. They
- couldn’t understand him—then. Marley offered no explanation,
- volunteered nothing. Boileau’s story was right—that was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You might have killed the man,” said Carleton sternly, at the end of an
- unsatisfactory twenty minutes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can thank your Maker you haven’t his blood on your hands—it’s a
- miracle you haven’t. Don’t you know your own strength? We can’t have that
- sort of thing around here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley’s face seemed to grow even whiter than before and he shivered a
- little, though the afternoon was dripping wet with the heat and the
- thermometer was sizzling well up in the nineties—he shivered but his
- lips were hard shut and he didn’t say a word.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, for once in his life when it came to handling men, didn’t seem
- to be altogether sure of himself. An ordinary fight was one thing, and,
- generally speaking, strictly the men’s own business; but everything about
- Marley, from his arrival at Big Cloud to the sudden beastlike ferocity he
- had displayed that morning, put a little different complexion on the
- matter. A puzzled look settled on the super’s face as he glanced from
- Marley to the master mechanic, while his fingers drummed a tattoo on the
- edge of his desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You had some provocation, Marley,” he said slowly, “I don’t want you to
- think I’m not taking that into consideration—but not enough to work
- up any such deviltry as you exhibited. You’ll never get on with the men
- here after this. They’ll make things pretty hard for you. I think you’d
- better go—for your own sake.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was dead silence in the super’s room for a half minute, then Regan,
- who had been sitting with his chair tilted back and his feet up on the
- window-sill, dropped the chair legs to the floor and swung around.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I put Logan up firing yesterday,” said he. “There’s a night job wiping in
- the roundhouse. What do you say about it, Carleton?”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was Marley who answered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>Yes!</i>” he said fiercely.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton jabbed at the bowl of his pipe with his forefinger and his
- eyebrows went up at Marley’s sudden animation. Marley’s eyes met his with
- a single quick glance, and then the eyelids fluttered down covering them.
- There was something in the look that caught the super, something he
- couldn’t define. There was a plea, but there was something more—like
- a pledge, almost, it seemed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” he said shortly; then, nodding at Mar-ley in dismissal: “I
- hope you will remember what I’ve said. You may go.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley hesitated as though about to speak and changed his mind, evidently,
- for he turned, walked straight to the door and out, then his boots creaked
- down the stairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’ll be away from the men there, all except a few,” said the master
- mechanic, as though picking up the thread of a discussion. “And as for
- them, I’ll see there’s no trouble. There’s Mrs. Coogan now that——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, Tommy”—Carleton smiled a little—“I didn’t put your
- interest all down to love for Marley.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What gets me,” muttered Regan screwing up his eyes, as his teeth met in
- the plug he had dragged with some labor from his hip pocket, “what gets me
- is the way he went to crying afterward. Like a kid, he was. It was the
- blamedest thing I ever saw, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t think he’s responsible for himself when he gets like that,”
- replied Carleton. “That’s exactly what I am afraid of. It comes over him
- in a flash, making a very demon of him, and then the relaxation the other
- way is just as uncontrollable. I don’t suppose he can help it, he’s made
- that way. It wouldn’t make so much difference in an ordinary man, but with
- strength like his”—Carleton blew a ring of smoke ceilingwards—“you
- saw what he did to Boileau.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I ain’t likely to forget it,” said Regan. “But if he’s left alone I guess
- he’ll be all right. Any man that’s fool enough to do anything else now
- will do it with his eyes open, and it’s his own funeral.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Those of the night crew in the roundhouse were evidently of the same mind.
- They received him, it is true, with little evidence of cordiality, but
- their aloofness was decidedly pronounced, and they looked askance at the
- queer figure as it dodged in and out of the shadows cast by the big
- mountain racers, or, at times, stood silently by one of the engine doors
- under the dim light of an oil lamp staring out across the black of the
- turntable to the twinkling switch lights in the yard. They didn’t like
- him, but they had learned their lesson well; and, as the weeks slipped
- away, they practised it—he was to be left alone.
- </p>
- <p>
- One thing they grudgingly admitted—Marley could work, and did.
- Clarihue, the night turner, was man enough to give another his due any
- time, no matter what his own personal feelings might be, and there was
- some talk, after a bit, between him and the master mechanic about Marley
- getting the next spare run firing.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clarihue even went so far as to hint at it as a possibility to Marley, and
- for his pains got a surprise—he wasn’t used to seeing the chance of
- promotion turned down. Marley had shaken his head and would have none of
- it. He was satisfied where he was. That was all there was to that.
- Clarihue drew back into his shell after that. Marley could wipe till his
- hair was gray for all he cared.
- </p>
- <p>
- So Marley wiped; but at Mrs. Coogan’s cottage, as the summer waned, there
- wasn’t as much washing done as there had been, and the company doctor got
- to dropping in too frequently to put his visits down to the old-time
- occasional friendly calls for an afternoon chat. And then, one day in the
- early fall, the washing stopped altogether, and the doctor’s face was
- puckered and serious as he left the cottage and headed down Main Street to
- the station. He entered Carleton’s office and, after a few words between
- them, the super sent for Regan.
- </p>
- <p>
- That evening Carleton’s private car was waiting on the siding when Number
- Two, the Eastbound Limited, Chick Coogan’s old train, pulled in.
- </p>
- <p>
- As the little yard switcher importantly coughed the super’s car on to the
- rear Pullman, Regan, in his Sunday best, a store suit of black twill, with
- boiled shirt and stiff collar, came out of the station with Mrs. Coogan on
- his arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- An incongruous pair they looked. The little old lady’s walk was in painful
- contrast to the burly master mechanic’s stride—her short steps had a
- painful, hesitating, uncertain waver to them. One hand gripped tenaciously
- at Regan’s coat-sleeve, while the other held the faded, old-fashioned
- shawl close about her thin, bent shoulders. She carried her head drooped
- forward a little, hiding the face under the quaint poke bonnet.
- </p>
- <p>
- A moment later Carleton, too, emerged from the station and joined them.
- </p>
- <p>
- The station hands and the loungers eyed the trio with curiosity, and then
- stared in amazement as the two officials helped the old lady up the steps
- of the private car—Mrs. Coogan was getting the best of it, whatever
- it meant.
- </p>
- <p>
- The three disappeared inside, but presently Regan and Carleton came out
- again, and the super dropped to the station platform. He held out his hand
- to the master mechanic as Frank Knowles, the conductor, lifted his finger
- to Burke in the cab.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good-by, Tommy; and good luck,” he called, as the train began to move
- out. “Don’t hurry, take all the time you need.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” Regan shouted back. “Good-by.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton stood for a moment watching the tail lights grow dimmer until,
- finally, they shot suddenly out of sight with the curve of the track, then
- he turned to walk back along the platform—and stopped.
- </p>
- <p>
- Crouched back against the wall of the freight house, deep in the shadows,
- was Marley.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here you, Marley,” Carleton called.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley, evidently believing himself to have been unobserved, started
- violently, and then came slowly forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are you hiding there for?” demanded the super.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wanted to see Mrs. Coogan off,” Marley answered a little defiantly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tone of the other’s voice did not please Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ve a queer way of doing it then,” he snapped shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley was twisting his hands, staring down the track.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I said good-by before I came down to work,”—he spoke as though
- talking to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh!” said Carleton, and looked at Marley sharply, “I suppose you know
- what she went East for?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Marley gruffly. That was all—just “yes.” And with that
- he turned abruptly and started across the tracks for the roundhouse.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, taken aback, watched him in angry amazement, then the scowl that
- had settled on his face broke in a smile, and he shrugged his shoulders.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess Tommy is right,” he muttered, as he went on toward the office.
- “Marley’s all in a class by himself. We’ve never had anything like him in
- the mountains before.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was four days before Mrs. Coogan and the master mechanic came back.
- Days during which Marley slipped into Dutchy’s lunch counter at deserted
- moments for his meals, and, if that were possible, drew into himself
- closer than ever.
- </p>
- <p>
- The boys were curious about Mrs. Coogan, naturally; curious enough even to
- question Marley. He had one answer, only one. “She’s sick, I guess,” he
- said. They got nothing more out of him than that.
- </p>
- <p>
- One thing Marley did, though, that Clarihue, while he thought nothing of
- it at the time, remembered well enough afterwards. He asked the turner to
- give him a sheet of railroad paper and a manila, and in his spare moments
- the night before Mrs. Coogan came back he labored, bent over the little
- desk where the engine crews signed on and off, scratching painstakingly
- with a pen. Clarihue caught a glimpse of the sheet in passing before
- Marley hastily covered it up—just a glimpse, not enough to read a
- single word, just enough to marvel a little at the wiper’s hand. Marley
- was a pretty good penman.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley, of course, being on night duty slept daytimes, but the afternoon
- Regan brought Mrs. Coogan back to the cottage he must have heard them
- coming, for he was standing in the little sitting-room when they came in.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Coogan kind of hesitated on the threshold, then she called out
- quickly in a faltering way:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Marley, Marley, is that you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley was twisting his hands nervously. His eyes shot a rapid glance from
- the old lady to the master mechanic, and then the eyelids fluttered down.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure,” he said, “it’s me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She stumbled toward him and burst into tears, crying as though her heart
- would break.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Marley, Marley,” she sobbed, “Don’t lave them do ut. Don’t lave them do
- ut, there’s a good bhoy, Marley.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley never moved, just licked his lips with his tongue and his face grew
- whiter. Queer, the way he acted? Well, perhaps. Never a move to catch the
- frail, tottering figure, never a word to soothe the pitiful grief. He
- stood like a man listening as a judge pronounces his doom. Oh, yes, queer,
- if you like. Marley, whatever else he was, was a contradictory specimen.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was Regan who caught the old lady in his arms, and led her gently into
- her bedroom off the parlor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You mustn’t give way like that, Mrs. Coogan,” he said kindly. “Just lie
- down for a spell and you’ll feel better. I’ll ask Mrs. Dahleen, next door,
- to come in.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It took the master mechanic several minutes to quiet her and persuade her
- to do as he asked, but when he came out again Marley was still standing,
- exactly as before, in the centre of the room. With a black scowl on his
- face, Regan motioned the other outside, and, once on the street, he laid
- the wiper low. Hard tongued was Regan when his temper was aroused and he
- did not choose his words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What d’ye mean by treating her like that, you scrapings from the junk
- heap, you!” he exploded. “You know well enough what she went away for, and
- if you’ve any brains in that ugly head of yours you know well enough what
- she’s come back to, without any printed instructions to help you out. What
- are you playing at, eh? What do you mean? You’re not fit to associate with
- a dog! And she the woman that spent about her all to save your miserable
- carcass, you.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’d better stop!”—the words came like the warning hiss of a
- serpent before it strikes. Marley’s face was livid, and his great gnarled
- hands were creeping slowly upward above his waist line.
- </p>
- <p>
- With a startled oath, Regan leaped quickly back: and then, separated by a
- yard, the men stood eying each other in silence.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was gone in a flash as it had come, for Marley, with a shudder, dropped
- his hands limply to his sides, and the color crept slowly back into his
- cheeks.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is no chance for her?”—no trace of the passionate outburst of
- an instant before remained. The question came low, hesitating—more
- like an assertion combined with a wistful appeal for contradiction.
- </p>
- <p>
- It took Regan longer to recover himself, and it was a minute before he
- answered. Then he shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’ll be stone blind in a month,” he said gruffly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley’s eyes came up to the master mechanic’s—and dropped instantly
- with their habitual little flutter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ain’t no doubt, no chance of a mistake?” he ventured.
- </p>
- <p>
- Again Regan shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not a chance. The best man we could find East made the examination. We’re
- arranging to get her into an institute—a home for the blind
- somewhere.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought you would”—Marley’s voice was monotonous. “That’s what
- she was talking about, wasn’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Regan.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley wagged his head with a judicial air.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’ll kill her,” he remarked, as though stating a self-evident, but
- commonplace, fact. “That’ll kill her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid it will,” the master mechanic admitted gravely. “But there’s
- nothing else to do. It’s impossible for her to stay here. She’s got to
- have some one to look after her, and she has no money. God knows I wish we
- could, but we can’t see any other way than put her in some place like
- that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought you would if it turned out bad,” said Marley again, in dead
- tones. “I figured it out that way when you were gone.” His hands were
- traveling in an aimless fashion in and out of his pockets. Suddenly he
- half pulled out an envelope, started, hastily shoved it back, and looked
- at Regan. “I—I got a letter to post,” he muttered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, supposing you have,” said Regan a little savagely—Regan
- wasn’t interested in letters just then,—“supposing you have, you
- needn’t——”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Marley was well across the street.
- </p>
- <p>
- The master mechanic gasped angrily, choked—and went into Mrs.
- Dahleen’s cottage on his errand. It was wasted breath to talk to Marley
- anyhow.
- </p>
- <p>
- It didn’t take long for the news to spread around Big Cloud, and for three
- days they talked about Mrs. Coogan pretty constantly—after that they
- talked about Marley.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Westbound Limited schedules Big Cloud for 2: 05 in the afternoon, and
- on the third day after Mrs. Coogan’s return Marley came down the street
- about half-past one, and crossed the tracks to the shops. Regan was in the
- fitting-shop when Marley walked in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’d like to speak to you,” said Marley, going straight up to the master
- mechanic.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well?” grunted Regan, none too cordially.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’d like you to come over to Mr. Carleton’s office with me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was something in Marley’s voice, feverish, impelling, something in
- his face, that stopped the impatient question that sprang to Regan’s lips.
- He looked at the ungainly, grotesque figure of the wiper for an instant
- curiously, then without a word led the way out of the shops.
- </p>
- <p>
- They traversed the yard in silence, climbed the stairs in the station, and
- entered the super’s room. Marley closed the door and stood with his back
- against it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, at his desk, looked from one to the other in surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hello,” said he. “What’s up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The master mechanic jerked his thumb at Marley, and appropriated a chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He wanted me to come over. I don’t know what for.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton turned inquiringly to the wiper.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is it?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- Marley walked slowly across the room until he reached the super’s desk.
- His face was drawn, and he wet his lips with the tip of his tongue.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s about Mrs. Coogan,” he said jerkily. “Five thousand would be enough,
- wouldn’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton stared at the man as though he were mad, and Regan hitched his
- chair suddenly forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Will you swear to give it to her if I get it for you?”—Marley’s
- hand, clenched, was on the desk, and he leaned his body far forward toward
- the super. There was no flutter of the eyelids now, and his eyes stared
- into Carleton’s without a flicker. “<i>Swear it!</i>” he cried fiercely.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton drew back involuntarily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Marley,” he said soothingly, “you’re not yourself, you——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I’m not mad,” Marley broke in passionately. “I know what I’m talking
- about. I know she’d die in one of them charity places. It’s up to me. She
- treated me white—the only soul on God’s earth that ever did. And
- maybe, maybe too, it’ll help square accounts. You’ll play fair and swear
- she gets the money, won’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t understand,” said Carleton slowly; “but I’ll swear to give her
- anything you have to give.” Marley nodded quickly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s all I want,” he said. “There ain’t much to understand.” He fumbled
- in his pocket and brought out a newspaper clipping, a column long, which
- he laid on the desk. “I guess you’ll get it all there.” The heavy “set” of
- the heading leaped up at Carleton. “$5,000 REWARD.” Below, halfway down
- the column, was the reproduction of a photograph—Marley’s.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan was up from his chair, bending over the super’s shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I thought I’d seen you somewhere before”—Carle-ton’s voice sounded
- strained and hollow in his own ears. “It must have been the picture. I
- remember now. You—you killed a man in Denver a year ago.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s all there,” said Marley, licking his lips again. “I never saw him
- before. I killed him like I almost killed Boileau this summer. I didn’t
- know till afterward that he was rich, not until the family hung out that
- reward.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton did not speak. Regan reached viciously for his plug. Marley
- stirred uneasily, and drew the back of his hand across his forehead. It
- came away soggy wet. In the silence the chime of the Limited’s whistle
- floated in through the open window, then, presently, the roar of the train
- and the grinding shriek of the brake-shoes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My God,” said Carleton in a whisper, “you want me to give you up and get
- the reward—for her!”
- </p>
- <p>
- A queer smile flickered across Marley’s face. Heavy steps came running up
- the stairs. There was a smart rap upon the door and a man stepped quickly
- inside. For a second his eyes swept the little group. Then he whirled like
- a flash, and the blue-black muzzle of a revolver held a bead on Marley’s
- heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, Shorty,” he cried grimly, “we’ve got you at last, eh? Put out your
- hands!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Without protest, with the same queer smile on his face, Marley obeyed.
- There was a little click of steel, and he dropped his locked wrists before
- him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re Mr. Carleton, aren’t you?”—the newcomer had swung to the
- desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Carleton numbly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m Hepburn of the Denver police,” went on the officer. “We appreciate
- this, Mr. Carleton. Shorty here has been badly wanted for a long time. We
- got your letter yesterday.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Hepburn paused to reach into his pocket, and in the pause Carleton’s eyes
- met Marley’s—and he understood. Marley had written the letter
- himself and signed his, Carleton’s, name. And, too, it was clear enough
- now, the telegram he had puzzled over the previous afternoon. It was lying
- before him on his desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- His eyes dropped to it. “Will be on hand on arrival of Limited, (signed)
- Denver.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We can’t give you any receipt for him as you requested,” continued
- Hepburn, drawing a paper out of his pocket; “but here’s an acknowledgment
- that his capture is due to information furnished by you. I guess that will
- answer the purpose. You won’t have any trouble getting the reward.” He
- handed the paper to Carleton.
- </p>
- <p>
- The super took it mechanically, and started as it crackled in his fingers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now,” said Hepburn briskly, “I don’t want to appear abrupt, but there’s a
- local East at two-twenty. We’ll move along, Shorty. Good-by, Mr. Carleton.
- Next time you’re in Denver look us up.” He took Marley’s arm and moved
- toward the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t—tell her, Mr. Carleton”—there was a catch in Marley’s
- voice, and the words came low.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton did not answer. He was staring at the paper in his hand—Marley’s
- price.
- </p>
- <p>
- Regan had turned his back, with a hasty movement of his fist to his eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t tell her”—the plea came again from the doorway.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton tried to speak and his voice broke, then he cleared his throat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “She will never know, Marley,” he said huskily.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- X—THE MAN! WHO DIDN’T COUNT
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>e was a little
- gray-haired hostler, wiper, sweeper, assistant night man in the roundhouse
- at Big Cloud, anything you like, and this is the story he told me one
- night, leaning against the blackened jamb of one of the big doors, wiping
- his hands occasionally upon a hunk of greasy waste.
- </p>
- <p>
- They were a rough lot out in the mountains in the days when the Hill
- Division was shaking her steel into something like a permanent right of
- way—a pretty rough lot. The railroaders because they had to be; the
- rest because they were just that way naturally. Miners and Indians made up
- the citizenship mostly, and there’s no worse mixture. They’ve got the
- redskins corralled on reserves now; but they hadn’t then, and it didn’t
- take more than one bad word and one drop of bad whisky to set things in
- lively motion.
- </p>
- <p>
- There’s a few highfaluting poems, and some other things, about the noble
- red man that works you up so when you read them that you get to wishing
- the Almighty had seen fit to let you be a red man, too. Well, that’s all
- right in its way because, after you’ve rubbed elbows with some of the real
- thing, you realize that the world owes the poets a living just as much as
- it does anybody else, and that what they say has to sound good; so you
- just come to keep the cautionary signals up by instinct, and let it go at
- that.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, to give the poets their due, there’s one thing they never trip up on,
- and that’s the Indian’s compound efficiency for smell. The Indian can
- smell. When he sticks out his chest, faces southeast, and begins to draw
- in the God-given mountain air, you’re free to bet that the distilleries
- down Kentucky way are doing enough business to make regular dividend
- checks a sure thing. That’s generally good whisky. Bad whisky, in smell
- and otherwise, carries farther—and it’s only fifteen miles from here
- to Coyote Bend!
- </p>
- <p>
- Coyote Bend wasn’t even a pin prick on the engineers’ blue prints when
- they mapped out the right of way, and there wasn’t any such place when the
- steel was all spiked down until the day some wandering prospector staked
- out a bunch of claims—and the news spread.
- </p>
- <p>
- Gold in the Rockies? No; there’s never been much of it <i>found</i>, but
- there’s an all-fired big superstition that the mother lode of the whole
- country is tucked away here somewhere. That’s why, in two days, the
- wilderness and a gurgling stream that trickled peacefully down through a
- high-walled canon became Coyote Bend; and that’s why the local freight
- began to make regular stops to dump off supplies alongside the track.
- There was no station, of course, no agent, no nothing; the stuff was just
- dumped, that’s all. The consignees picked out their goods if they could
- read, or guessed at it if they couldn’t.
- </p>
- <p>
- Maybe I ought to have told you this before; anyway, I’ll stick it in now.
- There are three men that figure in this story, though one of them doesn’t
- count for much. He was a young chap named Charlie Lee. A graduate of an
- Eastern college he was, and all he had to his name was his diploma and the
- clothes he stood in when he hit the West. He struck the super for a job,
- and he got it—braking on the local freight. Hell for a man like him,
- eh? Well, it was, in more ways than one! Anyway, from that day to this it
- was the best job he ever held down long enough to draw a second month’s
- pay check.
- </p>
- <p>
- The other two were Matt Perley and Faro Clancy—“Breed” Clancy, they
- called him behind his back.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley was a very good sort, pretty straight, pretty clean, measuring by
- the standards out here in those days; a little bit of a sawed-off,
- blond-haired, blueeyed man, full of grit inside, and an out-and-out
- railroad man—only a freight conductor, conductor on the local, but
- he knew his business; he’d have gone up, ‘way up, in time.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clancy was a hellion, there’s no other name for him, and even that doesn’t
- express it—no one word could. Indian one way, Irish the other. He
- looked mostly Indian; the Irish came out in the brogue. Black, swarthy,
- small eyes like needle points, coarse dry hair that straggled down over
- his eyebrows, a hulking bony frame with the strength of a wrecking crane—that’s
- Clancy, Breed Clancy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Oh, yes, he was slick, slick as they’re made—with his hands. Faro,
- stud poker, dice, anything—it was his business; that, and running
- booze joints. Mining camps and brand-new boom towns were Clancy’s meat
- mostly—after Perley drove him out of Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- Don’t ask me. I don’t know what there was between them. That was before my
- time. A woman probably—a woman’s generally blamed anyhow. Anyway,
- one night Perley got the drop on Breed and marched him down the street in
- front of his pistol and out of the town. After that, Clancy kept away from
- Big Cloud. As I say, that part was before my time. I only know there was
- bad blood between them; wicked bad blood on one side, as you’ll see.
- Clancy disappeared from Big Cloud, and the two didn’t foul each other
- again until Coyote Bend started.
- </p>
- <p>
- Breed Clancy hit the Bend with the first inrush of the miners, and before
- any of them had time to much more than get a pick into the ground he was
- busy knocking together a bit of a shack he called a hotel, and was
- ordering the furnishings—liquid furnishings, you understand—from
- Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- There were three barrels of it, the hardest kind of fire water that ever
- went into the mountains waybilled to Clancy at Coyote Bend by the local,
- on the first trip that Charlie Lee ever made with Matt Perley. I’m getting
- back to Lee now, you see.
- </p>
- <p>
- Well, it was about noon when they whistled for the Bend that day, and Lee,
- riding the brake wheels on the front end, could see about a dozen
- “blankets” squatting alongside the right of way about where the train
- would stop. Grouped behind these were a number of stragglers from the
- camp, among whom was a big fellow in a red shirt you could see farther
- than a semaphore arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, I don’t say those Indians were attracted by the gold rush to Coyote
- Bend. Coyote Bend, or any other place, old or new, stale or prosperous,
- would get its share of the redskins. Where they came from or where they
- went nobody knew. They’d drop in from nowhere, and, if they liked the
- place, they’d grunt and settle down for a spell; if they didn’t like it,
- they’d grunt, in benediction or otherwise, and leave.
- </p>
- <p>
- I’m not saying they smelled the whisky in that train. I’m not saying they
- knew Clancy was importing fire water, and they were just there to feast
- their eyes on the barrels and meditate on what was inside. I’m not saying
- anything at all about that, or what followed. There’s only one man that
- perhaps might have explained it—-I say “perhaps” because he never
- did; and also, because he knew Indian nature as well as any white man in
- the West. That was Perley.
- </p>
- <p>
- Whether Perley even knew that Clancy was at the Bend or not, I don’t know.
- I only know that he could have known it if he’d bothered to read the
- waybills; and it was likewise on the cards that he might have learned the
- day before, down at Big Cloud, that the whisky was going up the following
- morning. I don’t know, and that’s straight. Sometimes I think he did;
- sometimes I think he didn’t. I don’t know.
- </p>
- <p>
- Anyway, Lee slid to the ground as the train stopped, and went back to the
- car that held the consignment for the Bend. As he fumbled with the door,
- he got a whiff of raw spirit that nearly knocked him over. And then, right
- behind him, rose a chorus of appreciative “ughs!”
- </p>
- <p>
- I told you an Indian could smell whisky, but I didn’t tell you why. It’s
- his ruling passion. That’s straight. I’m not judging the Indian; the taste
- was born in him. There are some white men just as bad. I’m not judging
- them, either. Some drink for the same reason the Indian does, some for
- others, and some—some men drink because they have to.
- </p>
- <p>
- What was I saying? Oh, yes, Lee getting that whiff. Well, before he got
- the door unfastened, the man in the red shirt had pushed through the
- Indians and come up beside him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Me name’s Clancy,” said he. “Did yez bring up any stuff for me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s three barrels for somebody,” replied Lee, and slid open the door—and
- the next minute he had jumped back with a yell, colliding with Clancy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ugh!” ejaculated the apparition that confronted him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s drunk! Majestically drunk! An’ on <i>my</i> stuff!” roared Clancy;
- and then, turning fiercely on Lee: “Fwhat did ye let him in there for, eh?
- Fwhat did ye let him in for, ye mealy-faced little——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Let him in nothing!” retorted Lee, getting back his grip on himself.
- “Here, you, get out—and <i>quick!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Indian blinked gravely, but never moved. He sat cross-legged on the
- floor, exactly in the middle of the car between the doors, swaying
- slightly backward and forward. Beside him, up-ended and broached, was one
- of Clancy’s kegs. The car reeked with the smell of it, for of the half
- kegful that had gushed out what hadn’t gone into the Indian had gone on to
- the floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- The half-breed was raving mad. I’ve a notion sometimes the man wasn’t
- human at all. He had his hand on Lee’s throat when Perley came running up
- from the rear end.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the row?” he began, and then he stopped. He was a cool devil was
- Perley, and he never turned a hair as he stepped between the two men. “Ah,
- Clancy, it’s you, is it, you copper-faced renegade?”—no loud talk,
- no bluster, he didn’t raise his voice; but his insult, the worst he could
- have laid his tongue to, cut like the sting of a lash.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clancy swung around like a flash—and stared into the muzzle of the
- conductor’s.45. His hands were clenching and unclenching as he recognized
- Perley, and the cords in his neck swelled into knotty lumps.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ut’s your worrk, this job, is ut?” he snarled. “Some day, Perley, I’ll
- show you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Queer, you say, he’d act like that—nothing to warrant it. Well,
- maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know what was between them before; but I do
- know the awful deviltry of Breed Clancy, and I know that Lee, leaning back
- against the car, shivered at the look that passed between the two of them.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley cut the half-breed short off. “Once,” said he contemptuously, still
- quiet, not a tone raised, and his voice the more deadly for it, “once,
- perhaps you’ll remember, I warned you to keep out of my road. Lee, how’d
- that Indian get in the car?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know,” said Lee.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, throw him out,” said Perley shortly, snapping his watch with
- his free hand. “We can’t stay here all day.”
- </p>
- <p>
- This little ruction between Perley and the half-breed has taken me longer
- to tell it, I guess, than it did to happen. Anyway, it didn’t cause the
- excitement you might think it would. The “blankets” were too busy drinking
- in the smell of that whisky to let their hungry eyes wander very far from
- anywhere but the open door of that car. And as for the stragglers, by the
- time they’d caught on to the fact that there was something on the boards
- besides that drunken Indian, Perley, with the same cool contempt, had
- slipped his gun back in his pocket and was boosting Lee into the car.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Indian offered no opposition as Lee tackled him. He couldn’t—he
- was beyond all that—he was so full of dead-eye it was oozing out by
- the pores. He just sat there, and Lee slid him to the door just as he was,
- still sitting, and dropped him out. He struck the ground with a thud,
- rebounded a foot, rolled over, grunted, and lay like a log. There was a
- guffaw from the camp stragglers, and a deep and envious chorus of “Ughs!”
- from the “blankets.”
- </p>
- <p>
- No, I’m not joking—it’s a long way from a joke, as you’ll see. They
- <i>were</i> envious. It acted like a red rag on a bull—the
- possibility of attaining the condition, the state of heavenly bliss, that
- had been reached by their red brother, do you understand?
- </p>
- <p>
- Clancy wasn’t laughing. He stood where Perley had left him, sullen and
- with twitching face. I don’t know, I think it was Perley’s sheer nerve
- that kept the halfbreed from drawing and shooting the conductor when his
- back was turned. I don’t know—brute beast cowed by the human mind,
- perhaps. No one ever knew Breed Clancy. He had his yellow streak at times,
- and then again the blood that was in him made him worse than a frenzied
- madman. Yes, I guess it was a case of “brute” all right, for there was no
- cowing him when the frenzy was on him.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley wasn’t laughing, either. He was opening and shutting his watch
- impatiently. “Come on! Come on!” he cried at Lee. “Get those barrels out.
- We’ve got to cross Number Two at the Creek. It’ll be the carpet for ours
- if we hold her up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee grabbed the broached cask and edged it toward the doorway. The
- contents slopped and sloshed inside as he moved it, and occasionally a
- little of the stuff would spill out through the bunghole. Then, somehow,
- just as he got it to the door, his hold slipped, out it went, bounded on
- the edge of the ties, and then went down the embankment right into the
- hands of those squatting “blankets.” They didn’t squat long; I don’t need
- to tell you that. They were on it in a mob, and they got the taste—they’d
- had the smell—and the fill was to come presently.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clancy was cursing in streams; and no fouler-mouthed man than Clancy ever
- lived. He tried once to get the Indians off the barrel, and the stragglers
- backed him up half-heartedly. You might as well have tried to move that
- mogul on the pit there behind you. He didn’t try but once, then he fell
- back on cursing again, and Perley was the target for most of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley? He never answered him, but his face grew harder and harder—and
- his gun was in his hand again. “Throw out those other two barrels!” he
- snapped at Lee.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The redskins will get every last drop if I do,” objected Lee, hesitating.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Owner’s risk. We’ve no station here. Throw ‘em out!” repeated Perley,
- grimmer than before, only this time loud enough for Clancy to hear him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye do,” roared the half-breed, “ye do, an’ I’ll worse than murdher ye one
- of these——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Throw ‘em out!” said Perley quietly, waving the go-ahead signal to the
- engine crew.
- </p>
- <p>
- And out they went—down the embankment after the first.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee jumped to the ground and banged the door shut, just as the drawbars
- began to snap tight along the train and the local jolted into motion. He
- waited beside Perley to swing the caboose as it came up. And while he
- waited he watched and grinned.
- </p>
- <p>
- Funny? I don’t know; it depends on the way you look at it, depends on what
- you call fun. Lee thought it was funny—then. The air was full of
- curses, Indian yells, shouts, oaths; and there was one jumbled mess of
- arms, and legs, and barrels. The Indians were after their <i>fill</i>, and
- this time Clancy and the stragglers were in the game for keeps.
- </p>
- <p>
- Up ahead the engine crew hung grinning out of the gangway. Behind, the
- other brakeman was occupying a reserved seat on the top of the caboose. A
- quarter of a mile away over by the camp, men, attracted by the shouting,
- were beginning to run toward the track. Inconsistent kind of a mix-up, eh?—Indians,
- miners, whisky barrels, and railroaders. I don’t know; call it funny if
- you like, though perhaps you can size it up better when I’m through.
- </p>
- <p>
- By this time the caboose was up to where Perley and Lee were standing.
- Perley motioned Lee aboard, and then swung on himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- Just as he did so, Clancy’s red shirt loomed up out of the mêlée, his arm
- lifted, and over the clack of the car trucks pounding the steel came the
- tinkle of breaking glass from the shattered pane in the door—the
- bullet had passed between the heads of the two men on the platform,
- missing them by a hair’s breadth. Another shot followed the first, another
- and another, dangerously close; splintering the woodwork around them; and
- then Perley fired. The half-breed spun round like a top, clapped his hand
- to his face and pitched over.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the curve of the track shut out the scene, but for five minutes after
- they were out of sight they still got the whoops of the redskins, the
- shouts and curses of the miners, and the crackle of guns like the quick
- fire of a Gatling. You see it came to that before it was through, and
- there was some blood spilled—a lot of it—and, not counting
- Clancy’s, it wasn’t all “blanket” blood, either.
- </p>
- <p>
- Clancy? I’m coming to him. No, he wasn’t killed—if he had been I’d
- never be telling you this story.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was two or three days before Lee and Perley got the details of what
- happened. The redskins fought like fiends after the miners began to fire
- on them and had killed one or two, and, though they were finally subdued,
- the casualties, as I’ve said, weren’t all on their side by a hanged sight.
- </p>
- <p>
- But I was talking about Clancy. Well, that bullet of Perley’s caught him
- on the cheek bone, glanced in, plowed through his left eye, and landed up
- somewhere against the cartilage of his nose—a bullet will make queer
- tracks sometimes, worse than surveyors by a heap. They got him down to Big
- Cloud to a doctor’s, and before he was half cured he disappeared. They had
- a sort of makeshift hospital here in those days, and when I say
- “disappeared” I mean they found his bed empty one morning, that was all.
- </p>
- <p>
- I told you I didn’t know whether Perley had any hand in putting that
- Indian in the car, or the other redskins at the Bend. I don’t. I told you
- I didn’t know what was between him and the half-breed before all this
- happened. I don’t. Perley never said. But day after day as he and Lee
- pounded up and down on the local through the mountains, he began to grow
- silent and moody.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee, young Lee then, was the only one that could get anywhere near the
- inside of his vest. He took to Lee, and Lee liked him; but even Lee had
- his limits when it came to confidences. There was lots Perley never opened
- his lips about. No, I don’t know as it makes much difference now.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee was the first of the two to hear that Faro Clancy was “loose.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It looks to me like a bad business,” he said, after telling Perley the
- news.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley’s eyes just narrowed a little. “It looks more like a bad shot, a
- rotten bad shot,” he answered evenly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That, if you like,” returned Lee; “but there’ll be more to follow.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “One would think you <i>knew</i> Clancy,” said Perley, cool as ever.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee was anxious. Call it presentiment or what you like, from that moment
- the thing was on his nerves. Perley had been pretty good to him; had made
- things a heap easier for the young fellow, green and raw as he was, in a
- hundred different ways. Things like that mean something.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here, Perley,” said he, “I’ve heard some talk, and I know there’s
- something behind all this between you and that devil. I’m not asking for
- confidences——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley cut him short, and caught him almost angrily by the shoulder.
- “Don’t meddle!” he snapped. “Let it drop. <i>You</i> don’t count in this,
- whatever happens. Your being at the Bend that day was an accident. What’s
- between me and Clancy concerns ourselves. You don’t count. Unless you’re
- looking for another run besides the local, just remember that and don’t
- meddle.”
- </p>
- <p>
- That was all. Lee never mentioned it to Perley again. Perley was right,
- wasn’t he? I told you there were three men in this story, but that one of
- them didn’t count. No, Lee didn’t count. Why should he?
- </p>
- <p>
- What did he have to do with it? Perley was right, I leave it to you.
- </p>
- <p>
- You’ve been over the division, and you know the Devil’s Slide just west of
- the Gap from here. You know the grade—the worst in the mountains.
- The trains crawl up at the pace a man could walk, because they can’t go
- any faster; and they crawl down just as slowly, because they don’t dare do
- anything else.
- </p>
- <p>
- I’ve seen the passengers get off the observation and walk—so have
- you. Done it yourself probably? I thought so. Extra engine on the rear end
- to push or hold back, and one in the middle if the train’s heavy, to keep
- it from breaking apart—lessens the drawbar pull, you know. They’re
- tunneling now to do away with that particular grade, but that’s nothing to
- do with this story, nor, for that matter, with the night, some six weeks
- after that business at the Bend, when the local, eastbound, was climbing
- the Devil’s Slide.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a dirty night outside the caboose. A storm had been racketing
- through the mountains all afternoon, and by the time it got dark it was a
- howling gale, raining hard enough to float the ties.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee’s place was on the front end, going up that bit of track, but he
- wasn’t well that night, and the other brakeman was doing his snatch. Touch
- of mountain fever, or something, nothing serious; just enough to make him
- shiver and boil alternately over the little stove in the caboose, sitting
- with his back to the door. Up above him in the cupola, holding down the
- swivel chair where he could watch the train—that is, see his engine
- fling up the sparks, for that’s about all he could see, I guess—was
- Perley.
- </p>
- <p>
- The car was swinging like a hammock with the heave and strain of the big
- pusher coupled right behind it—it acts queer, that does. Every time
- I’ve felt it I’ve always thought of a cat and a mouse. It’s like the
- engine had the caboose by the scruff and was trying to shake the life out
- of it.
- </p>
- <p>
- You’ve felt it a little if you’ve ever been in the rear Pullman going up—the
- difference is that a caboose hasn’t any springs to speak of, you
- understand? Racket enough to raise the dead. You couldn’t hear yourself
- think. Not so much from the noise of the train or the storm, but from the
- booming roar of the trailer’s exhaust—like she was trying to cough
- her boiler tubes out every time the valves slid.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, there’s just one more thing I want you to get. The engine crew of a
- pusher naturally can’t see any track, road-bed, or anything of that kind,
- and it isn’t their business to, either. All they watch is the leader and
- the intermediate, if there is one. Their headlight plays along over a few
- cars if it’s high enough, or loses itself on the top of the door or the
- roof of the caboose if it isn’t, understand?
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee didn’t hear anything. He was sitting bent over with his head between
- his hands, and it was the current of air from the opening door that made
- him twist around and look up, thinking it had blown open. I don’t know as
- you’d call him a coward; maybe yes, maybe no; anyway, he was a
- white-faced, terrified man that next instant, as he started up from his
- chair. He never got to his feet. Instead, he shut up like a jackknife, and
- went down to the floor with a blow over the head from a revolver butt that
- knocked him senseless.
- </p>
- <p>
- It all happened in a second, but in that second Lee got it with more
- vividness than a thousand hours would have given him—the great,
- hulking figure, the water trickling to the floor in little pools from the
- dripping clothes, the sickly pallor of the face, the thin new skin of the
- livid scar across the cheek, the sightless eye—Clancy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee couldn’t have lain unconscious more than twenty minutes, perhaps it
- was only fifteen, for it takes about forty minutes to climb the four miles
- of the Slide, you see. Call it twenty, that allows for what happened
- before and what happened after. When he came to his senses the light in
- the bracket lamp was out; blown out by the draft, for the door was open. A
- stray beam or two from the pusher’s headlight filled the caboose with an
- uncertain, wavering light—from the jolt and swing, you know, though
- Lee thought at first it was his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- He tried to get up, but he couldn’t move. He was bound hand and foot, laid
- out on the flat of his back—helpless. For a minute he was too dazed
- to understand, then he remembered—Clancy. He stared up into the
- cupola above him. The swivel chair was empty—Perley had gone.
- </p>
- <p>
- The car trucks were beating a steady <i>clack, clack-clack</i>, as they
- pounded the fishplates; from behind came the full, deep-chested thunder of
- the trailer’s exhaust; around, the hundred noises of the creaking,
- groaning, swaying car; without, the patter of rain, the wail of the wind.
- But over it all, low though it was, came a sound that sent a chill to
- Lee’s heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was like a breathless moan, do you understand? That was the inhuman
- part of it; it was breathless—there was no break—a sort of
- sobbing monotone. It came from behind him. Lee shivered as he listened,
- and then his heart began to pound as though it would burst. He was afraid—<i>afraid</i>.
- Premonition, perhaps; I don’t know. He rolled himself over on his side,
- and he saw——
- </p>
- <p>
- How can I tell it! A figure was crouched against the side of the car in a
- half-sitting posture, the face was red—red with the blood that was
- flowing from the forehead. Lee shrieked aloud in terror. “Perley! Perley!”
- Then he grew sick with the horror that was on him. Worse than murder the
- half-breed had threatened—and he had kept his word. Perley had been
- scalped!
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee’s cry must have reached the poor wretch’s consciousness, for he
- staggered to his feet, sweeping his eyes clear with both hands. Lee, sick
- to the depths of his soul, the sweat breaking out in great, cold drops
- upon his forehead, fought like a maniac with his bonds.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perley never spoke, never paid any attention to Lee—he was past all
- that—but his brain, at least, was still capable of coherent
- impression. It must have been—to account for what he did. Right in
- front of him, as he hung there tottering and swaying, was a broken bit of
- mirror tacked up on the side of the car. He was staring into it.
- </p>
- <p>
- His moaning stopped. The shock of his own awful horror must have revolted,
- shaken his very being. His hand groped weakly, subconsciously perhaps, for
- his pocket—his revolver—the end.
- </p>
- <p>
- Again Lee shrieked as he struggled to free himself, and then, as Perley
- fired, he burst out into a peal of wild, discordant laughter. His mind was
- giving way. He began to gibber like a madman—that’s the way they
- found him—with Perley’s body pitched full across his chest.
- </p>
- <p>
- Don’t ask me. I told you Perley was a little, undersized, sawed-off man. I
- don’t know, do I? The halfbreed, physically, could have handled him like a
- baby, once he caught him unawares. That’s all I know.
- </p>
- <p>
- They buried Perley down at Big Cloud; and they buried Clancy where the
- posse dropped him, drilled full of holes. That’s the story.
- </p>
- <p>
- Lee? Charlie Lee? Why, he doesn’t count, does he? He had nothing to do
- with it. Well, if you’re interested in him I’ll tell you. His college
- diploma never did him any good. Once he got better and out of the
- hospital, he took to drinking periodically—<i>hard</i>. Between
- times straight as a string, you understand, for six weeks say, then off
- again. That was fifteen years ago, and he’s done it ever since. The
- doctors said that blow on the head unsettled him, skull splinter, or
- something like that; but medicine’s not an exact science. The doctors were
- wrong. The trouble was deeper than the skull—it was in his soul. Lee
- drank to save himself from the madhouse—I told you, didn’t I, that
- some men drink because they have to?
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton, the super, and the men before Carleton, understood what the
- doctors didn’t, so Lee’s working for the railroad yet. Not braking—he’s
- not fit for that, but he keeps the job they gave him—and it’s kept
- for him—when he gets back after his spells. I———there’s
- the foreman shouting for me. Sorry, but I’ll have to go. “If you’re going
- out on Number One she’s just coming down the gorge now. Good night, sir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- I lost him in the shadows of the big mogul on the pit behind me. Then I
- turned and walked slowly out of the roundhouse, over the turntable, and
- across the tracks to the station platform. Number One’s mellow chime
- floated down from the gorge, then the flare of the electric headlight, and
- the rumble of the train. And in quick, fierce tempo, the beating, drumming
- trucks caught up the name I had heard the foreman shout, and rang it over
- and over again in my ears:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh-you-Lee! Charlie-Lee! Lee! Charlie-Lee—Lee!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- XI—“WHERE’S HAGGERTY?”
- </h2>
- <p>
- “The Hill Division was proud enough over it, of course, for Carleton was
- its old chief; but, none the less, it read General Order Number 38 with
- dismay and misgiving.
- </p>
- <p>
- “T. J. Hale,” the G. O. ran, “is hereby appointed Superintendent of the
- Hill Division, with headquarters at Big Cloud, vice H. B. Carleton
- promoted to General Manager of the System.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now who in the double-blanked, blankety-blanked blazes is Hale?” demanded
- the roundhouse and the engine crews.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Carleton was all to the good, h’m?—what!” growled the dispatchers.
- </p>
- <p>
- The train crews swung their lanterns with a defiant air, and the passenger
- conductors juggled their punches around their little fingers, smiling a
- superior smile to themselves. Hale might be a good, man, perhaps he was,
- but Carleton was—“Royal” Carleton. “I guess he’ll get along all
- right with us, <i>but</i> he don’t want to get fresh, that’s all. Where’d
- he come from, h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- That question, at first, no one seemed able to answer. The general
- impression was that the Transcontinental had got him from some Eastern
- road. Certainly he was a new man, bran new, to the System.
- </p>
- <p>
- And then the renown of one Haggerty, who was braking on a passenger local,
- became great, and, in consequence, the displeasure of the Division
- increased.
- </p>
- <p>
- Said Haggerty: “When I was on the Penn five years back, this fellow Hale
- was assistant super. I knew him well. You wanter look out for him, you can
- take my little word for that. He’s a holy terror, an’ that’s a fact. Got
- any chewin’?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty got his chewing, being an egregious liar; and Hale got a damaged
- reputation for the same reason.
- </p>
- <p>
- But Haggerty got more than his chewing—and he had not long to wait.
- On the day that the new super was expected, Haggerty, on passenger local
- Number Seven, got into Big Cloud about noon, and, taking advantage of the
- ten-minute wait for refreshments, straddled a stool at the lunch-counter.
- Between bites, he fired questions at Spence the dispatcher, who was
- bolting his mid-day meal.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hale come yet?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haven’t seen him,” replied Spence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “When d’ye expect him?” persisted Haggerty.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know,” Spence answered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, don’t be so blasted close!” snapped Haggerty. “You ain’t givin’ away
- any weighty secret if you let out what time his special ‘ll be along, I
- suppose.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t heard of any special,” said Spence. “Say, Haggerty, they tell
- me Hale’s an old friend of yours, h’m? No wonder you’re anxious. I forgot
- about that. As soon as I get word about him, I’ll wire up the line to you
- so’s you can jump your train, come back on a hand-car, and be here on the
- platform to meet him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You go to blazes!” retorted Haggerty, and scowled across the counter at
- an inoffensive looking little fellow who had taken the liberty of smiling
- at the dispatcher’s words.
- </p>
- <p>
- At Haggerty’s look, the smile disappeared in a cup of coffee raised
- hastily to the lips. “Huh!” snorted Haggerty, by way of driving home to
- the other the audacity and temerity of his act, and likewise the
- inadvisability of repeating it. Haggerty was galled. Once before that
- morning he had been obliged to relegate this insignificant, squint,
- eye-glassed individual, who had persisted in riding on the platform, to a
- proper sense of submission. And the method employed had been no more
- delicate a one than that of jerking the man bodily into the car by the
- collar of his coat. “Huh!” he repeated, with rising inflexion.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, Haggerty,” went on Spence pleasantly, “Don’t you worry. I won’t fail
- you. When the super steps off the train, and the first words he says is,
- ‘Where’s Haggerty?’ and you’re not here to respond in kind I can plainly
- see there’ll be doings. Oh, no, don’t you fret, I’ll not throw you down on
- anything like that——‘twouldn’t be wise for us, that’s got to
- live with him, to rile him up at the outset! No, it certainly wouldn’t,
- what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You go bite on a brake-shoe, you’re too sharp to be munchin’ doughnuts,”
- snarled Haggerty. And, swinging himself from his seat, he went back to his
- train.
- </p>
- <p>
- An hour later when he reached Elk River, the end of his run, he found a
- telegram waiting for him from Spence. He sucked in his under lip as he
- read it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You sly joker,” wired the dispatcher, “why didn’t you tell us that your
- friend came up with you on Number Seven?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty pushed his cap to the back of his head, and swore softly under
- his breath. He began to go over in his mind the passengers that had been
- aboard the train when they ran into Big Cloud. No one individual seemed to
- stand out carded and waybilled as the new super.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then an idea struck Haggerty, and he climbed into the rear coach where
- Berkely, his conductor, was making up his report sheets.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say, Jim,” said Haggerty, “was there any passes into Big Cloud this
- mornin’?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Berkely looked up suspiciously. “You mind your own business, an’ you’ll
- get along better!” he snapped.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, punk!” returned Haggerty. “My count’s the same as your’n, ain’t it?
- What’s the matter with you, then? Honest, Jim, I wanter know. Was there
- any passes?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, there wasn’t,” grunted Berkely, cooling down a little.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, you might have said so at first, instead of jumpin’ a fellow
- for nothin’,” said Haggerty, and went out of the car to hang meditatively
- over the handrail and spit reflectively at the ties.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now wouldn’t that sting you?” he demanded of the universe in general.
- “Wouldn’t that sting you? Who ever heard of a new super comin’ on the job
- ridin’ a local on a <i>ticket!</i> An’ me askin’ when he was goin’ to turn
- up. Oh, yes, it sure would sting you! That funny boy Spence ‘ll pass this
- along an’—oh, punk! I ain’t sure it wouldn’t have been better if I’d
- kept my mouth shut about knowin’ Hale, but who’d ever thought he’d come up
- on <i>my</i> train! How was I to know, h’m?” And during all that
- afternoon’s layup at Elk River, Haggerty pondered the matter. He continued
- to ponder it as they pulled out for the return trip in the evening, and he
- was still pondering it when they whistled for Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was no moon up that night, and it was pretty dark as they ran in.
- Haggerty, with his lantern, was standing on the rear end. As the train
- slowed itself to a halt, a man came tearing down the station platform at a
- run.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where’s Haggerty?” he called breathlessly. “Where’s——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here,” said Haggerty promptly, leaning out over the steps and showing his
- light. “What d’ye want?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, all right,” said the man. “I’ll be back—” and he disappeared in
- the shadow of the station.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He acts like he was nutty,” muttered Haggerty, and swung himself off the
- steps.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, though Haggerty waited, the man did not come back, and he had not
- come back when the train began to roll out of the station, and Haggerty
- was again on the rear platform of the car. Then, just as his hand reached
- out to open the door, he stopped and started suddenly as though he had
- been stung.
- </p>
- <p>
- A voice came out of the darkness from the other side of the track over by
- the roundhouse. “Where’s Haggerty?” it demanded anxiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Haggerty tumbled, and his face went red with rage. He leaned far out
- over the rail, and, forgetful that the pantomime was lost in the darkness,
- shook his clinched fist in the direction from whence the voice had come.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You go to he-ee-ll-lll!” he bawled, the exclamation shaken into syllables
- by reason of the car wheels jolting over the siding switches at that
- precise moment. And then, his senses being very acute, from where the
- light shone in the dispatcher’s window he-thought he heard, above the
- momentarily increasing rattle of the train, a laugh—a laugh that
- produced anything but a quieting effect on his already outraged
- sensibilities.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now Haggerty was not the nature of those who can pass lightly over a joke
- at their own expense, especially if that joke be too prolonged and carries
- with it a hint of underlying venom. Therefore, as the “one on Haggerty”
- spread over the division, and scarcely an hour of the day passed that the
- cry “Where’s Haggerty?” did not reach his ears, he began to sulk and
- treasure up his injury. The division was rubbing it in pretty hard. But
- the curious part of it all was that his bitterness was not directed
- against himself who was the direct cause of his discomfiture, nor against
- Spence who was the indirect cause, but against Hale, who was no cause at
- all.
- </p>
- <p>
- Just once had Haggerty seen the superintendent. Hale was pointed out to
- him on the platform at Big Cloud, and Haggerty had ducked hastily back
- inside his train. Hale was the inoffensive little fellow he had treated
- with such scant courtesy at the lunch-counter, the insignificant,
- squint-eye-glassed individual he had hauled from the car platform by the
- coat collar! When Haggerty’s mingled feelings of perturbation and
- amazement permitted him any speech at all, it was rather incoherent.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>That</i>—the runt!” he gasped, and subsided into an empty seat.
- </p>
- <p>
- And in this inelegant, but pithy, summing up of the capacity and
- dimensions of the new official the division was with him to the last
- section hand. Him—a railroad man! The Hill Division remembered
- “Royal” Carleton and was ashamed, and it rankled for the shame that it
- considered had been put upon it. Out of it all, Haggerty was the only
- thing of saving grace! So upon Haggerty they loosened, behind the humor,
- some of their bitterness. Haggerty became the safety valve of the
- division.
- </p>
- <p>
- A month had gone by and Hale had lived well up to what his appearance had
- led them to expect. He might have been an automaton for all the signs of
- life that emanated from his office. Just routine, the routine business,
- routine, that was all. The disquiet and unrest that brooded over the
- division became contempt—the kind of contempt that made the
- car-tinks put on airs, and in their heart of hearts figure themselves
- better railroad men than he who sat over them in supreme authority.
- </p>
- <p>
- Even Haggerty no longer ducked out of sight when circumstances required
- that he should breathe the same air as his superior. Haggerty had acquired
- a swagger; also, he now voiced his opinion, his cordially poor opinion, of
- Mr. Hale without restraint and with no check upon his tongue.
- </p>
- <p>
- And then Haggerty got a shock. It was imparted by Spence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Got it from Hale’s clerk last night,” said the dispatcher. “He’s going to
- run an inspection special over the division, and he’s picked out the fag
- end of all things for the crew. He picked you first, Haggerty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw, forget it!” growled Haggerty, with a scowl.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I think there’s something behind it, though,” Spence went on, his voice
- modulated confidentially. “Between you and me, Haggerty, the inspection
- trip is a bluff.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty pricked up his ears. “How’s that?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said Spence serenely, backing to a safe distance, “I think he’s
- hurt at the way you’ve cut him since he’s been here. He’s pining for your
- company, and——”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty sprang to his feet from the baggage truck on which he had been
- seated, and shook his fist frantically at the fast retreating figure. He
- was still gesticulating fiercely and muttering savagely to himself when
- the window in the dispatcher’s room overhead opened softly, and Spence
- stuck out his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hey, there, Haggerty,” he called, “quit practising that deaf and dumb
- alphabet. You haven’t got any time to waste. You want to run along and get
- the missus to press out a pair of panties, and iron a boiled shirt for
- you. You’ll get your orders in the morning.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come down for one minute,” choked Haggerty, his rage fanned to a white
- heat by the knowledge of his own impotence, for Spence, as he well knew,
- was safely entrenched behind locked doors. “Just one minute, an’ I’ll make
- your face look like it had never been born. I will that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haggerty,” said Spence in an injured tone, as the window closed, “you are
- disgruntled.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Haggerty was to be still more disgruntled, for the next morning, true
- to Spence’s words, he found himself assigned to Inspection Special Number
- Eighty-nine. Haggerty was not happy; but he boarded the forward car, as
- they pulled out for the mountains with the mental resolution that he would
- keep out of the super’s way.
- </p>
- <p>
- Resolutions, however, like many other things, are sometimes rudely upset
- in the face of conditions that are not taken into account in the
- reckoning. They had been running at a forty-mile clip, and were about into
- the yard at Coyote Bend, when Haggerty nearly went to the floor as the
- “air” came on with a sudden rush, and the train came jerking to a halt
- like a bucking bronco. The whistle was going like mad for the block ahead.
- Haggerty grabbed his red flag, dropped to the ground, and ran back past
- the super’s car to take his distance.
- </p>
- <p>
- Up ahead, he could see the tail end of a freight disappearing around the
- bend, crawling into safety on the siding. Nothing very interesting about
- that, somebody would get Tokio for laying out the Special, he supposed.
- Maybe the freight had had a breakdown, and was off schedule making the
- Bend. Personally, Haggerty did not care. It made very little difference to
- him. He picked up a handful of stones, and began to plug them at the
- nearest telegraph pole. Suddenly he changed the direction of his shots,
- and let fly with all his might at a gopher he had spotted squatting in
- front of his hole.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy Mac!” he ejaculated in unbounded astonishment. “I believe I hit the
- cuss!”—and he went back to see.
- </p>
- <p>
- Just as he got down the embankment, the Special began to whistle for her
- flag, “one—two—three—four,” and Haggerty, scrambling to
- the track again, began to run. But fast as he ran, he had only covered
- about half the distance when the train began to move. It was, therefore, a
- very breathless and panting Haggerty who just managed to grab the rail of
- the rear car—the super’s car!
- </p>
- <p>
- There was nothing for it but to pass through and Haggerty, with his
- acquired swagger, started. The super was alone in the rear compartment,
- seated at a table, a mass of papers before him. Haggerty was industriously
- rolling up his flag as he passed along.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Haggerty!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty stopped and swung around at the sound of his name.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hale reached his hand into a box of cigars that lay open on the table,
- selected one carefully, lighted it, and leaned back in his chair. “I would
- like to offer you one, Haggerty,” he said quietly, “but I am afraid you
- would misunderstand.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty shifted a little before the super’s look. Somehow, there wasn’t
- any squint at all; instead, behind the glasses, the gray eyes were
- remarkably bright and clear, and their steadiness was discomposing—to
- Haggerty.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It seems,” said Hale, a little smile playing around the corners of his
- mouth, “that they don’t measure men by the same standard out West here
- that they did when we were back on the Penn together, eh?” Haggerty
- reddened. His only belief would have been in bluster; but, curiously
- enough, there was something about this little man, he couldn’t tell just
- what, that made bluster impossible. Therefore, Haggerty held his peace,
- and his fingers played nervously with the flag, twirling it around and
- around awkwardly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t make any mistake, Haggerty,” the super continued pleasantly. “I’m
- not trying to rub it in. I want you to know that I’ve heard the story. I
- want you to know that I didn’t nose it out. I heard it at the
- lunch-counter that day after you went out, and before the men there knew
- who I was. I want to start straight with you, Haggerty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty was puzzled and flustered at this opening. “Well, sir,” he
- blurted out, “of course you know it was all a lie. I only did it for a
- josh.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I understand,” Hale answered. “In itself it didn’t amount to
- anything, but the consequences are a little more than you reckoned on,
- aren’t they? It’s acted like a boomerang, and you’re pretty sore,
- Haggerty, aren’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The openness and friendly tones of the super took hold of Haggerty, and he
- warmed toward the other.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, yes, sir, I suppose I am,” he admitted.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hale nodded. “Now, I want you to see the other side of it, Haggerty—my
- side. No division of any railroad, or anything else for that matter, can
- do itself justice unless everyone connected with it is pulling together <i>for</i>
- it. I want <i>every</i> man out here with me, and first of all I want you.
- There is nothing destroys respect so much as ridicule. The division, much
- after the fashion that an epidemic of measles springs up amongst children,
- took it into their heads to dislike the successor of Mr. Carleton, no
- matter who he might be. Now, unfortunately, instead of having checked the
- spread, the germs are being fostered because, back of their fun with you,
- a description of contempt for me is constantly kept alive. So I want you
- to cooperate with me, Haggerty, and show them that, after all, whether I’m
- a holy terror or not, whether I’m a runt of a giant, no matter what, I’m
- entitled to a fair deal out here in the West. There, Haggerty, that’s a
- pretty long sermon for me. I’m not much at preaching. Just turn what I’ve
- said over in your mind, that’s all. I think I can safely offer you a cigar
- now. Will you have one?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty accepted the cigar with a flustered mumble of thanks, and as he
- went forward to the other coach he chewed the end pensively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, how’s the little fellow? Hope the ride ain’t makin’ him car-sick,”
- sneered Slakely, the conductor.
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty strode up to the other, and shoved his fist savagely within an
- inch of Slakely’s nose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll have you know, the super’s all right, you walleyed coyote, you! I’m
- tellin’ you he’s a <i>man</i>. Do I hear any remarks to the contrary?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say,” gasped Slakely blankly, retreating down the aisle, “what’s the
- matter with you, anyway?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what’s the matter!”—Haggerty’s explanation was more forcible
- than explicit, though the meaning of his clenched fist which he shook at
- the other was pointed enough in its inference. “That’s what’s the matter,
- my bucko,” he repeated fiercely, “an’ don’t you forget it! I’m givin’ it
- to you straight, an’ I’ll take none of your lip about it neither! See?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty had raised the standard. Not, perhaps, as the super had expected;
- but according to his own ideas, or rather to his fiery temper which led
- him to act blindly on the spur of the moment as his impulse directed.
- </p>
- <p>
- But it was not this method of Haggerty’s, if such a term could by any
- stretch of the imagination be applied to Haggerty, that was to bring about
- the desired result, and at the same time rid him of his tormentors—tormentors
- who continued to sound the cry, “Where’s Haggerty?” with undiminished
- frequency—tormentors who were much too wary to allow themselves to
- be caught anywhere within striking distance, for Haggerty’s forearm was a
- thing to wonder at. Instead, the end came from another source as totally
- different as it was unexpected. It came on the third day of the inspection
- trip, up in the Rockies at the new bridge across the Stony River—and
- it was the new bridge that did it.
- </p>
- <p>
- They were to lay out there for the morning, and Haggerty started in to
- employ the two or three hours of leisure this gave him by looking over the
- work. It wasn’t much of a bridge as bridges go, for the Stony wasn’t much
- of a river; but the approaches were enough to pull the heart out of the
- stoutest bridge crew that ever toiled and sweated and slaved. Just rock,
- solid, gray, massive; and so it was blast, blast, blast, hour after hour
- all through the day, day after day. One span, resting on the shore
- abutments, was to bridge the canon that yawned six hundred feet below,
- where the Stony swirled and eddied, a foaming, angry, chattering, little
- stream.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the eastern side, where Haggerty stood, the anchorage was pretty well
- under way, but over across on the western shore they were still pitting
- their blasting powder against the stubborn rock of the mountainside.
- Haggerty crossed over on the old bridge to take a look at this. Just as he
- reached the other side a stationary engine blew shrilly for a blast, and
- the men began to run for cover. Haggerty pulled his watch and marked the
- time—one minute and fifteen seconds. Then the blast thundered,
- echoed, reechoed, and died away through the mountains. He joined the men
- as they went back to their work.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy Mac!” he exclaimed to the foreman, as he peered over the edge of the
- excavation and looked down some fifteen or twenty feet to the ledge where
- the men were already busy again. “Holy Mac! You’ve got to look sharp, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I dunno,” replied the foreman. “We give ‘em plenty of time. When the
- whistle blows the men hump it. We don’t touch the button till the last one
- is crawlin’ over the top of the bank. Then, with the time fuse, there’s a
- minute, lots of time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty looked on for awhile, then he turned away, sat down by one of the
- shanties, and loaded his pipe. The pipe once alight, he settled himself in
- a more comfortable position by sprawling on his back, his hands under his
- head. From where he lay, he commanded a view of the other side of the
- river as well as the work before him. He could see Hale across there
- talking to one of the bridge engineers. He watched the two men lazily, in
- drowsy contentment, until he lost sight of them as they started to come
- over to his side, then his attention became riveted again on his immediate
- surroundings.
- </p>
- <p>
- They were getting ready for another blast. Haggerty sat up. It was rather
- exciting to see the men come scrambling out of the hole. The whistle had
- just gone three toots. They were coming now, one head after another
- popping up over the edge, then the shoulders, and finally the men on their
- feet running like deers for shelter—not far, only a few yards, for
- the excavation itself afforded protection, once clear of it. Haggerty
- himself was not fifteen yards away.
- </p>
- <p>
- He counted the men as they came out. It was the eighteenth who, just as
- his head and shoulders appeared, waved an arm and shouted: “All out. Let
- ‘er go!” He saw the foreman bend over the battery and make the connection
- that would spark the timefuse at the other end, and then a groan of horror
- went up around him. Number Eighteen, with a cry and a desperate effort to
- pull himself over the top, had slipped back and disappeared from sight!
- </p>
- <p>
- Haggerty’s pipe dropped to the ground from between his teeth, his heart
- seemed to stop its beats, a cold sweat broke out upon his face. He was on
- his feet now, and the foreman’s words were ringing in his ears: “Then
- there’s a minute, lots of time! <i>Then there’s a minute, lots of time!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- He began to run, and the seconds, as he ran, lengthened into years and
- cycles. “My God!” he muttered in a catchy way.
- </p>
- <p>
- But fast as he ran, someone was faster than he. Five yards from the edge
- of the excavation, a figure, small, short, speeding like the wind, passed
- him. It was Hale—the super!
- </p>
- <p>
- Behind, the foreman’s voice bellowed hoarsely: “Come back! Come back! Ye
- can’t get to the fuse! D’ye hear!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mabbe,” mumbled Haggerty between his teeth, “mabbe we can get the <i>man</i>.
- Mary, Mother, help us!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Hale, flat on the ground, was making to swing himself over as Haggerty,
- for the second time, caught him by the collar of his coat. “You ain’t
- strong enough,” he grunted, yanking the super back. “You help me from the
- top “—and over the edge he went himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then there’s a minute, lots of time!”—the words came again
- unbidden. How much, in God’s name how much, of that minute had gone, how
- much was left? His teeth were set, his heart pounds so fierce and rapid
- that his breath came hard and choked, as he lowered himself to a little
- ledge, projecting out some seven or eight feet below the surface that had
- caught and held the body of Number Eighteen. The man lay there groaning.
- It was easy to see what had happened. A misplaced step in the climb, then
- a loosened rock, his balance gone, and the stone had crashed down upon his
- legs and ankles.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a look of helpless terror in the eyes of the wounded man as
- Haggerty reached and bent over him. “Get out,” the white lips quivered.
- “You ain’t got time. I give the signal. The blast ‘ll be goin’ now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a minute, lots of time,” said Haggerty in a sing-song, crazy way.
- He was trying to fit the words to an air he had heard somewhere. Queer he
- couldn’t remember it, the words were straight enough! Then he laughed—foolishly—as
- he worked like a madman!
- </p>
- <p>
- He had raised the man in his arms and now, heaving with all his strength,
- was gradually pushing him up, up. The strain became terrific. Haggerty’s
- muscles cracked. One of his arms was almost useless to him owing to the
- narrowness of the ledge that, to maintain even a precarious footing as,
- little by little, he rose to an upright position, forced him tight against
- the wall of rock and earth. Haggerty panted with cruel, gasping sobs.
- “Then there’s a minute, lots of time!” The repetition of the words came
- surging upon him with a shock of horror, lending him a frenzied strength.
- A desperate twist, and he had made the halfturn that brought his back to
- the cutting. His other arm was free now. A heave, and he had swung Number
- Eighteen above his shoulders within reach of the super’s outstretched
- hands. A second more, and, with Hale pulling above and Haggerty lifting
- below, the man, with a cry of agony as his wounded leg banged limply
- against the ground, was forced up over the bank.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Quick, Haggerty! For God’s sake, be quick yourself,” cried Hale. “Hurry,
- man, <i>hurry!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a minute”—Haggerty sprang for the top of the bank, clutched
- it—“lots of—” The last word was blotted out as he dragged
- himself over the edge, and heard Hale’s sharp command: “Lie flat!” From
- behind and below him came the roar of the detonation, he felt the ground
- shake and quiver beneath him, the echoes were rolling and reverberating
- like a park of artillery—then Hale’s low, fervent: “Thank God!”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was Hale who got it first as the mob of men rushed forward, cheering,
- laughing, gabbling hysterically. And it was at Hale’s uplifted hand that
- the clamor died suddenly away, and in its stead came the super’s voice in
- quiet tones: “Where’s Haggerty?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw, gwan!” sputtered Haggerty sheepishly, trying to fight his way out of
- the crowd that pressed upon him to haul and maul him, to thump his back,
- to shake his hand. “Aw, gwan! I wanter get me pipe that I left over by the
- shanty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- XII—McQUEEN’S HOBBY
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>here isn’t much
- use in talking about the logical or the illogical when you come to couple
- up with a man’s hobby, because a hobby is a hobby and that’s all there is
- to it—with nothing left to be said on the subject. Most men have a
- hobby. McQueen’s was coal—just coal.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen talked coal with a persistence that was amazing. On all occasions
- and under any pretext it was coal. Was he off schedule with a regularity
- that entailed his presence on the carpet before the division
- superintendent, it was coal. Did he break down between meeting-points with
- the attendant result that the dispatchers fretted and fumed and swore as
- they readjusted their schedules and rearranged their train sheets, it was
- coal. Everlastingly and eternally coal.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s coal?” McQueen would demand oracularly. “It’s carbon and oxygen
- and hydrogen with a dash of nitrogen, ain’t it? Well, then, what are you
- talking about? Coal <i>ain’t</i> just coal, some of it’s mostly slate. Two
- hundred and ten pounds all the way, all the time, with the grate bars
- cluttered with that, huh! What?”
- </p>
- <p>
- No purchasing agent that had ever hit the division had been quite able to
- satisfy McQueen with the brand of the commodity that was supplied in
- accordance with the requisition orders that he drew. And so, day in and
- day out, big 802 puffed her way through the mountains, and McQueen, in the
- cab, absorbed coal statistics, coal data, coal everything, with an
- avidity, a thoroughness, and a masterliness of detail, that would have put
- some noted geologists to shame and given the rest a run to hold their
- rights on the marked-up schedule.
- </p>
- <p>
- Up at headquarters—when things were running smoothly and McQueen was
- behaving himself with no scores chalked up against him on the time-card—they
- treated his hobby as a joke. So that when his whistle boomed out of the
- gorge to the westward, or shrilled across the cut to the eastward,
- followed a moment afterward by the sight of the big, flying mogul with her
- string of slewing dark-green coaches, the staff on duty at Big Cloud would
- lean from the upper windows and watch the Limited as she shattered the
- yard switches with a roar—watch as, with a hiss of the air and the
- grinding of the brake shoes as they sparked the tires, she would draw up,
- panting, at the platform, and the big engineer would swing himself from
- the cab for an oil around. Then the badinage flew thick and fast while
- McQueen swabbed his hands on a hunk of waste and punctuated the remarks
- with squirts from his long-spouted can as he filled the thirsty oil cups.
- </p>
- <p>
- So the big fellows laughed and joked, and the Brotherhood chaffed him
- unmercifully.
- </p>
- <p>
- If anyone had asked McQueen what had started, let alone caused him to
- exhaust the subject of coal with such painstaking and conscientious
- insistence, he couldn’t for the life of him have answered. It had started—just
- started, that’s all—and, fascinating him, had pursued its insidious
- advance unchecked and unquestioned—that is, unquestioned until one
- morning when Clarihue, the turner at the Big Cloud roundhouse, kind of
- jerked him up a little on the proposition.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re against the red, you and your coal, Mac, all right, all right,”
- Clarihue chuckled, as the engineer came in to sign on for the day’s run.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen was patting 802’s slide bars affectionately. “How’s that?” he
- asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oil!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oil?” repeated McQueen, puzzled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure thing! No more coal—no more slate—no more cinders—you
- touch her off, and there you are! You’ll have to cut out the coal and plug
- up on oil, Mac.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh!” said McQueen, enlightened. “Oil-burners, eh? I saw one of ‘em down
- East. They’re evil smelling, inhuman, stinking brutes, that’s what they
- are! don’t you let ‘em side track you like that, son. They may do down
- there, but not in the hills. Not while you and me are pulling throttles,
- and don’t you think so.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Clarihue grinned.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, mabbe,” said he. “But say, honest, Mac, what’s the sense of gassing
- about coal the way you do? What’s to come out of it? What’s the good of
- it? You just get the laugh from the boys, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen’s answer was to scratch his head. To put the matter into the
- concrete class of practicability was a phase of the subject that he had
- not considered. He scratched his head when the turner had gone; and, also,
- he scratched his head for several days thereafter. Then he caught at a
- happy inspiration whereby to solve the riddle, and therein he fell—but
- of that in a moment.
- </p>
- <p>
- Things were booming on the Hill Division. Traffic was doubled, trebled.
- Everything on the train sheets was in sections. Promotions flew thick and
- fast. Wipers were set to firing, and the firemen moved over to the
- right-hand side of the cabs. Every wheel the division could beg, borrow or
- steal was doing fancy time stunts smashing records. Everyone from car-tink
- to superintendent, was on the jump. Even the directors, not to be outdone
- in the general order of things, worked overtime rubbing fat hands in
- gleeful anticipation of juicy, luscious dividends to be; only <i>they</i>
- neglected to figure in Noonan as an item on the balance sheets.
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan? Where is the Brotherhood that does not number among its members
- men with grievances, fancied or real? Noonan had a grievance,—no
- particular grievance, just a grievance—and Noonan was a power in
- that branch of the Brotherhood that held sway over the Hill Division.
- Noonan always had a grievance; due, primarily, to the fact that he had a
- deep and long-seated grudge against himself. It dated way back—he’d
- been born that way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Grievances!” he spluttered to a group of his admirers. “Grievances? Why,
- we’re against the worst of it all the time. We’re not track-walkers, are
- we? Well then, who runs the road? It’s us on the throttles, what? Who’s to
- blame for our measly schedule of hours and pay? We are, ‘cause we haven’t
- the sand to stand up for our rights. That’s what, and don’t you forget
- it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a chorus of assent. “Noonan’s right,” said one Devins, “only it
- don’t look to me like now was what you might rightly call the time to
- growl. Times are good, everything’s double-headed, and the paycar’s
- running carload lots.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan glared. “You’ve got the brains of a piston head, that’s what you
- have,” he exploded. “It’s times like these we’d win hands down. Perhaps
- you’d like to wait till there’s nothing doing, and they’re laying the boys
- off and everybody, mostly, is running spare! What chance d’ye think any
- demands would stand then?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Of a truth it was the accepted time and a most glorious opportunity. In
- that, Noonan was right. Only one obstacle lay between him and the
- accomplishment of his cherished ambition to make something of his
- trouble-hunting proclivities and become a leader of men—in a strike.
- That obstacle was McQueen.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen was a company man. Out and out a company man; though nothing would
- have surprised McQueen more than to learn that he was looked up to as a
- leader by the conservative element of the Brotherhood. True, he and his
- coal was the joke of the division; but that was only a joke, and in no
- wise to be held up against him. His influence, of whose existence he was
- oblivious, was based on things apart from that. Big, kindly, honest,
- incapable of deceit, simple, straight-forward, staunch in his friendships,
- somewhat inclined to stubborness in his beliefs perhaps, easily ruffled
- but as easily pacified, such was McQueen. Such was the McQueen the
- officials honored, and such was the McQueen with whom the boys would
- gladly and loyally have shared their pay checks to the last cent.
- </p>
- <p>
- All this Noonan knew. Knew, too, that to gain his end he must first win
- over McQueen. And to that object he began to devote himself. He and
- McQueen shared the honors of the fast mail, and under ordinary conditions
- communication between the two men was limited to a flirt of the hand from
- the cab as one or other of them tore by the siding designated as their
- meeting-point by the lords of the road, the dispatchers. But now things
- were a bit different, everything was more or less off schedule. And while
- the Limited, East and West, was nursed along as near her running time as
- possible, and generally got the best of it over everything else, there
- were, nevertheless, occasions when both men were stalled together on time
- orders at the same point.
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan tackled McQueen at the first opportunity.
- </p>
- <p>
- He picked his way cautiously as though not quite sure of his rights and
- ready for a quick reverse.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say, Mac,” he began, “what do you think of all this talk that’s going
- ‘round?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Talk?” said McQueen. “What talk?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t mean to say,” gasped Noonan, in well-simulated surprise, “that
- you haven’t heard it? And the boys are slinging it pretty hot, at that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t heard anything,” McQueen answered, slightly suspicious that
- Noonan was about to spring one at his expense. “What you giving us?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Straight,” confided Noonan earnestly. “It’s strike, Mac, that’s what.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Strike!” ejaculated McQueen, bewildered. “What for?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What for!” cried Noonan. “What for? That’s a sweet question to ask. Well,
- pretty dashed near everything,”—he waved his hand expansively—“hours,
- scale, and—and—”
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen shook his head. “I’m not kicking,” he said. “I don’t see anything
- to strike about. Looks to me as though you fellows were hunting trouble.
- You’ll probably get it, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You never see anything,” Noonan blurted out, irritation getting the
- better of diplomacy. “Nothing but the blamed coal you’re forever yapping
- about.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What I know about coal,” returned McQueen with dignity, “you’ll never
- know. It’s a subject that requires brains.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is that so!” Noonan jeered. “You tell it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It requires brains,” McQueen repeated stolidly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a shame that the only man on the division that has ‘em, don’t know
- how to use ‘em, then,” Noonan prodded. “Who cares about your blazing old
- coal and what it’s made of? Talk’s cheap. There’s no sense to it, anyhow.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Maybe there isn’t, and then again maybe there is. At any rate, there’s a
- dollar a day for every man pulling a throttle,” McQueen announced
- triumphantly. “I don’t know yet just how much for the firemen, I haven’t
- figured it on their schedule.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan pricked up his ears. “What’s that you say, Mac,” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here was McQueen’s vindication. They’d laugh at his absurd, pointless
- theories on coal, would they? Well then, he’d show them! And it wasn’t any
- of their business, either, how many days he’d racked his brains, puzzling
- out an adequate solution to the question Clarihue had flung at him! He
- shook two impressive fat fingers at Noonan.
- </p>
- <p>
- “One dollar a day, every day, and the spare men proportionately, that’s
- what! Do you get that, Noonan?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Rats!” said Noonan. “You’d better go into the shops for repairs. You need
- new stay-bolts on your dome cover!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Never you mind my dome cover,” McQueen flung back, beginning to get
- exasperated. “It may need a little tinkering, but it’s not ready for the
- scrap-heap yet, the way some are I could mention—but won’t. It all
- goes back to what I said. It’s a subject that requires brains—which
- you haven’t got. There’s no use explaining anything to you because——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can’t,” Noonan interrupted craftily. “You’re only long on wind, Mac.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You listen to me, you rust-jointed disgrace to the throttle!” cried
- McQueen, stung into retort. “You listen to me! What are you paid for?
- Mileage, ain’t it? How do you get your mileage? Steam! What makes steam?
- Coal! D’ye hear? Coal! Coal, and don’t you forget it. Well then, poor coal
- means poor steam, and poor steam means poor mileage, don’t, it, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan burst into a loud and derisive guffaw.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen glared. “You’re a wild, uneducated, hee-hawing ass!” he choked.
- “What do you know, anyway? Nothing! But <i>I</i> know! A dollar a day I
- said, and I say so now. I figured it out. It’s the difference between high
- grade coal and the muck we burn. It’s the difference between the mileage
- we make and the mileage we <i>could</i> make in the same time. That totes
- up one dollar a day. Supposing they wouldn’t let us have any more mileage
- than they do now, well, we’d do it in better time, and the difference
- would be ours, wouldn’t it? And time’s money. And <i>that</i> totes up one
- dollar a day just the same. It’s the same either way—time or
- mileage. Take your choice!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There, Johnny, that’s a good boy, run along and fetch me a bucket of
- steam,” Noonan scoffed.
- </p>
- <p>
- With a snort of unutterable contempt, McQueen turned to swing himself into
- his cab.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hold on a minute, Mac,” Noonan cried, afraid that he had overstepped
- himself. “Don’t get whiffy. I swear, I believe you’re right. Let’s see how
- you figure it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And McQueen, mollified, figured it. Figured it with the stub of a pencil
- in greasy, scrawling characters on the back of a time order. As to the
- process by which the conclusion was arrived at, that was something of
- which Noonan was in profound and utter ignorance. Whether it was right or
- wrong, he did not know. He never knew—and cared less! Certainly the
- result was there.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen completed the last figure of his calculation with a flourish.
- “There!” he cried exultingly. “How about it now, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Noonan took the paper, wrinkled his brows, pursed his lips, and stared at
- it with the air of a connoisseur of calculus. “H’m,” said he slowly, “are
- you dead sure it’s right, Mac?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Right!” McQueen fairly yelled, touched in another tender spot. “Right!
- Confound you, it’s there in black and white, ain’t it? Figures don’t lie,
- do they? Well, what in thunder’s wrong with you, then?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wanted to be sure, Mac, that’s all. Holy fishplates, I knew it was bad,
- rotten bad, but I didn’t think they were handing it to us like this.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You bet it’s bad. It’s the worst ever. There’s more kinds of coal than
- there are spikes in the right of way from here to Big Cloud and back
- again, but the coal we get is the last on the list. Bad! It’s what I’ve
- always said, ain’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s fierce!” continued Noonan with rising emphasis. “And when the boys
- hear this, it’ll be the last straw. They’ll fix ‘em!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fix who?” inquired McQueen, blankly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, ain’t I telling you! The company.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—I was talking about the coal,” said McQueen a little uneasily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure you were,” Noonan agreed heartily. “Sure you were, and how the
- company is robbing every engineer on the division of a dollar a day, to
- say nothing of the firemen and the train crews. It’s enough to make a man
- mad. Well, I should say yes!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—I didn’t say the company was robbing us,” protested McQueen.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that!” cried Noonan sharply; then in apparent disgust: “So your
- crazy old figures are just gas-bag filling like the rest of your coal
- talk, eh? They <i>did</i> look pretty scaly, and that’s a fact. I had my
- suspicions. That’s why I asked you if you were sure they were right. But I
- might have known they weren’t without asking.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, you might, might you?” exploded McQueen, goaded once more into angry
- outburst. “You and your suspicions! Who are you! I tell you they are
- right, and that’s the end of it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if they’re right, why don’t you stand by them, then? We’re being
- robbed every day we work, ain’t we?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye-e-es, I suppose we are,” McQueen admitted reluctantly; “but I didn’t
- figure it out for the purpose of——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mac,” Noonan interrupted unctuously, “‘tain’t for you nor me to say the
- purpose it’s to be put to. There’s others besides us. But I do say, Mac,
- you’re almighty smart.”
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen shook his head. “I’m a company man,” he said dubiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Company man! Of course you are. We’re all company men. But right’s right
- and wrong’s wrong before anything else. Well, ta ta, Mac, see you again.
- I’m off. There’s Hake with the tissue. I’ll tell the boys where you
- stand.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a somewhat dazed McQueen that in turn pulled himself up into his
- own cab. He stood in the gangway and squinted meditatively at the coal
- heaped high on the tender. To his conscientious self-communion, his
- triumphant vindication had somewhat the appearance of a boomerang. “I
- don’t know,” he reflected. “It is damn poor coal, and—and figures <i>don’t</i>
- lie. We—we’ve been getting the worst of it, and—and a man <i>should</i>
- stand up for his rights.” And while McQueen, busy with new and momentous
- problems, was steaming west into the Rockies, Noonan, with his tongue in
- his cheek, was cutting along for Big Cloud with a wide-flung throttle.
- </p>
- <p>
- That night, at Big Cloud, Noonan’s cronies got the story. That is, they
- got what Noonan saw fit to tell them. And the burden of his tale was that
- McQueen was with the Brotherhood and against the company. That was
- sufficient. They looked with appreciative admiration at the man who had
- done the trick, and then they flew to obey his orders.
- </p>
- <p>
- By morning, every engineer on the division had the news. On way freights,
- on stray freights, on regulars, specials, and sections, they got it—every
- last one of them. And McQueen coming east again on Number Two got it, and
- marvelled a little at his new importance, never seeing Noonan’s hand in
- the marked deference paid to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- First and last it was a bad business. Bad for the company, bad for the hot
- heads led by Noonan, bad for the others, and bad for McQueen. It caught
- the company none too well prepared, and Carleton, for this happened in the
- days of his superintendency, was hard put to it to move anything. There
- was pretty bitter feeling; and before it was over there was blood spilled.
- But the roughs at Big Cloud, who didn’t know the pilot from a horn-block,
- were responsible for the most of that, though, in their own way, too, they
- ended it.
- </p>
- <p>
- It came to a show-down the night they carried young Carl Davis home from
- the yard on a door they had wrenched from a box-car. Davis was braking in
- the yard then, and he was a nephew of McQueen’s. He had lived with the
- engineer ever since, as a little chap of ten, he had come out to the West.
- Childless themselves, McQueen and his wife thought as much of the lad as
- though he had been their own.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen in his grief didn’t get the rights of it. Only in a confused sort
- of a way he understood the roughs had winged the boy with a cowardly shot,
- meaning perhaps to do no more than shoot out his lamp as he swung by on
- the top of a car. And while his wife with tender hands busied herself in
- rendering such assistance to the surgeon as she could, McQueen sat in a
- chair and stared, dry-eyed and bitter of heart, at the white face on the
- bed.
- </p>
- <p>
- Also McQueen was getting sense. Certainly, he had never intended to
- strike. Now, the shock of Carl’s hurt had sobered his judgment and he saw
- things as he should have seen them, saw them as he cursed himself for not
- having seen them before he had allowed his senseless egotism to carry him
- off his feet. As the thoughts came crowding through his brain, his cheeks
- burned dull red at his own shame. But through it all he blamed only
- himself, with never an inkling that he had been used as a cat’s-paw by the
- crafty Noonan—that was to come afterward.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen waited only to wring a half-grudging assurance from the doctor
- that the boy would pull through, then he took his hat and left the house.
- It was getting on toward eleven o’clock when he walked into the hall
- across from the station where the boys had their headquarters, and had
- been in the habit of congregating each night ever since the strike began.
- Usually noisy in a good-natured, devil-may-care way, there was a subdued
- and serious quiet pervading the room as McQueen stepped in. The shooting
- in the yard was something they had not counted on and, like McQueen, it
- was acting on them as a tonic. All except Noonan who, evidently bolstered
- up with a few drinks, was more noisy, hilarious and quarrelsome than ever.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen answered the questions they crowded at him as to the boy’s
- condition soberly, and going over to Noonan took him by the arm and led
- him into a corner.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The game ain’t worth it,” he said shortly. “I’ve had my lesson to-night
- and I’m through!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What for?” demanded Noonan aggressively. “We didn’t have anything to do
- with it. We’re not responsible, are we?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We are,” said McQueen sturdily. “Morally responsible.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Morally responsible!” Noonan mocked with a sneer. “Oh, mamma, listen to
- him! Streak of yellow, that’s you, McQueen.” Then fiercely: “You play the
- scab and I’ll bash your head to jelly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re drunk,” retorted McQueen contemptuously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Drunk, eh? I’m not so drunk but that I know who’s running this strike.
- It’s me, and don’t you forget it! And what I says goes, d’ye hear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m asking you to call it off. Blood on our heads I won’t stand for. Our
- grievances don’t warrant what’s likely to happen here if things go on. You
- owe it to the men who followed you into the strike, Noonan.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I do, do I? Followed <i>me</i> into the strike, eh? How about the men
- that followed <i>you?</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That followed me?” repeated McQueen in amazement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, that followed you! You didn’t think I took any stock in your batty
- coal talk, did you? You must think I’m green! All I wanted was <i>you</i>—you
- bit fast and easy enough—the rest of the softies came along then
- like a pack of sheep. What d’ye think now about <i>me</i> owing it all to
- the men, Mr. Morally Responsible, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- It took McQueen a minute to get the whole of it—the bitter whole of
- it. Then the blood rushed to his face in a crimson flood. He reached out
- and grasping Noonan by neck and shoulders shook him as a terrier shakes a
- rat. “You cur!” he cried hoarsely, and flung the other suddenly away
- against the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men at the sound of the scuffle came running over.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a scab! Kill him!” shrieked Noonan.
- </p>
- <p>
- McQueen turned to face the men. “If beating this strike’s a scab, I’m a
- scab,” he said quietly. “I’m out to beat it right now! I’ve been a fool
- and I’m ready to admit it. But I didn’t know until to-night that I’d been
- bait for a whining thing like that!” pointing at Noonan. “He says some of
- you men came in on the strike because I did. If that’s so, then get out of
- it because I do. Get out of it before there’s more on our hands than we’ll
- be able to answer for when we go into Division for the last time. That’s
- all I’ve got to say. I’m going over now to ask Carle-ton to put me on
- again, if it’s nothing better than pulling a way freight. And—and I
- hope you’ll come with me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As the flood follows the fracture in the dam, so the breaking of the
- tension filled the room with pandemonium. Cheers, yells, hisses, curses,
- shouts—the Brotherhood was divided against itself. But ten minutes
- later, the majority of them were clustered behind McQueen in the super’s
- office.
- </p>
- <p>
- Carleton and his staff were sleeping at headquarters those days, and they
- gathered in a group around the green-shaded lamp on the dispatcher’s table
- to face the delegation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mr. Carleton,” McQueen began, “we——”
- </p>
- <p>
- That was all. He never got any further. From the platform outside came
- hoots and cat-calls, and above the chorus Noonan’s voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Soak the scab! Kill him! If he’s so fond of it, let him have it! <i>Now!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- The window pane was shivered with a crash, and McQueen, struck full in the
- head by a huge hunk of coal, sank without so much as a moan to the floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- They cured him of brain fever in the course of time all right, but they
- never cured him of coal. Up and down from one end of the division to the
- other, when he got around again, he talked coal harder than ever—it
- was his business. McQueen was doing the buying for the road.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There wasn’t anything wrong with what I said about coal,” he asserts with
- a smile, when the boys put it up to him. “Not for a minute! Good coal
- makes better steam, better everything, and pays the company. They saw that
- all right. That’s why I’m buying it, see? As for figuring it into the
- schedule, the sum was too hard and they couldn’t do it. Me? Oh, I can’t,
- either, I lost the paper I did it for Noonan on. I ain’t so good on
- figures as I was, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- XIII—THE REBATE
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>e was known as
- Dutchy, but his name was Damrosch.
- </p>
- <p>
- This is Dutchy’s story when Dutchy and the Transcontinental were in the
- making; and before, as has been recorded elsewhere, he came to Big Cloud.
- He started railroading as cook’s helper on a construction gang that was
- laying track across the prairie. As the mileage grew, so Dutchy grew. At
- first lank and lean, he took on, little by little, the appearance of being
- comfortably nourished, until, by the time they hit the Rockies, Dutchy’s
- gait had become a waddle and his innocent blue eyes were almost hidden by
- the great rolls of fat that puffed out his face like a toy balloon. Then
- Dutchy, slow of body and likewise of brain, and yearning for a quiet and
- peaceful existence, secured the lunch-counter rights for Dry Notch.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, Dry Notch, half-way across the prairie, consisted of a water-tank, a
- small roundhouse, a smaller station and a diminutive general store. But
- because of its geographical position, it was headquarters for the
- Mid-Plains Division.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here, T. V. Brett was superintendent; Thornley was his chief clerk; and
- MacDonald was dispatcher. And these, with the railroad hands and
- train-crews comprised the population of Dry Notch, unless there might be
- added a few ranchers somewhere in the neighborhood.
- </p>
- <p>
- The staff bunked in a room over the station, and the men had their
- quarters in the roundhouse, but one and all they ate at Dutchy’s counter.
- Sinkers and coffee, apple pie and sandwiches they stood as a steady diet
- for a month after he had appeared upon the scene, and then a delegation
- waited upon him and demanded dishes more substantial.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can make meat pies and chicken stew and all that sort of thing, can’t
- you?” they demanded. “Sure!” said Dutchy. “But dot iss oxpensive.” Money
- was no object, they assured him, and thereupon proceeded to fix a schedule
- of prices—fifteen cents for a meat pie; twenty cents for a chicken
- stew—with two slices of bread and butter thrown in for good measure.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil,” said Dutchy, “so iss it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And a few nights later, true to his promise, they got their chicken stew—canned
- chicken stew.
- </p>
- <p>
- The huge pot, full to the brim, had been emptied, and Dutchy, his face
- beaming with smiles, had bustled into the back room for a further supply,
- when MacDonald’s voice rose plaintively:
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s—it’s <i>chicken</i>, isn’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The crowd looked inquiringly at the dispatcher.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Because,” went on MacDonald softly, “I—never heard of any chickens,
- in Dry Notch.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And then, amid the laughter that ensued, Thornley rose dramatically from
- his seat, and, picking up a bone from his plate, waved it aloft.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gentlemen, this is no time for mirth!” he cried. “We are the victims of a
- swindle. We are in the clutch of an octopus—that is to say, a food
- trust, composed of Dutchy and the dining-car conductors of Numbers One and
- Two. It is my painful duty to assert that I recognize this bone as the
- identical bone on which I fed two nights ago coming up the line on Number
- One.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy entered, staggering under the load of the replenished pot, when
- Thornley solemnly demanded a rebate on the spot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Vat iss it?” said Dutchy, halting and peering anxiously into the pot;
- then, evidently reassured that no essential ingredient had been forgotten,
- he looked up at the ring of faces that were regarding him with grave
- inquiry. “Vat iss a repate?” he demanded. “It something iss mit der bread
- und butter for twenty cents to go, yess?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The crowd roared, and up and down the division train-crews, engine-crews,
- and section-gangs got the joke and passed it on until the lunch-counter
- became known to every man on the system as “The Rebate.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They did not explain the joke to Dutchy, and for days he endured the chaff
- stolidly, though with much bewilderment, until, one afternoon, MacDonald
- patiently and ploddingly acquainted him with the unhallowed baseness of
- one Thornley—helping himself, by way of compensation, to the heap of
- doughnuts under the glass cover.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy listened, his cheeks getting redder and redder as MacDonald,
- exaggerating some hundredfold, suavely rubbed it in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dot Thornley iss—iss a pig!” shouted Dutchy suddenly, as the light
- burst in upon him.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald nodded assent, his mouth too full of doughnut to speak.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Und I a fool iss, yess?” continued the proprietor, pounding a fat fist on
- the counter.
- </p>
- <p>
- Again MacDonald nodded, smiling sweetly—and reached for another
- doughnut.
- </p>
- <p>
- But this time Dutchy’s fingers were firmly clasped around the cover, and
- he peered suspiciously through the glass at the number of doughnuts
- remaining, then glared at the dispatcher.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You—you git out from here!” he said slowly, but with rising
- emphasis.
- </p>
- <p>
- And MacDonald, chuckling, went.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was not until after supper that same evening, when Number One pulled
- in, that Dutchy made any move toward retribution—then Dutchy cut
- loose. It was Taggart who got it—little Shorty Taggart, the driver
- of Number One, who was red-haired and an inveterate joker, and likewise a
- great crony of Thornley’s.
- </p>
- <p>
- The first intimation MacDonald had that anything was up was an enraged
- howl that, rising above the tumult of the station, reached him where he
- sat in the dispatcher’s office. There was no mistaking the voice—it
- was Dutchy’s. MacDonald stuck his head hastily out of the window, while
- Thornley, who was in the room, leaned over his shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy was bellowing like a mad bull. “Say it! Shusht say it. Oh! py
- golly!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Here followed a volcanic eruption of guttural German with one or two words
- common to all languages intermingled.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then, flying through the doorway of the lunchroom, dashing down the
- platform, scattering loungers, passengers, and car-tinks in all
- directions, in a mad rush for the engine end of the train, tore a short
- figure in tight-fitting, bandy-legged overalls, whose flaming red hair
- presented a shining mark for the plate that whizzed past his ear and
- smashed into a hundred pieces against a baggage-truck.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Dutchy, blowing hard, his sleeves rolled up over the fat of his arms,
- waddled to the center of the platform and shook a frantic fist after the
- retreating engineer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ta fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he screamed, and, puffing his
- cheeks in and out like a whezzy injector, he turned, reentered the
- restaurant, and the door closed behind him with a resounding bang.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald drew in his head, and the tears were running down his cheeks as
- he held his sides.
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley groped for a chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess Taggart was asking for a rebate,” he gasped. “It was worth pay to
- see him run.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You bet!” said MacDonald eloquently, when he could get his breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- The door opened, and Brett, the super, came in.
- </p>
- <p>
- “D’ye see Taggart and Dutchy, Brett?” cried Thornley.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Brett, laughing. Then, more seriously: “Look here, you’d
- better patch it up with Dutchy. There’s no use rubbing it in too hard.
- MacDonald, tell Blaney to put my car on Number Two when she comes in. I’m
- going east to-night.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The patching, however, was quite a different matter than talking about it.
- </p>
- <p>
- The next morning the lunch-room door was ominously closed—and the
- staff went breakfastless. By listening at the keyhole, and from an
- occasional glimpse through the window, they knew that Dutchy was inside.
- </p>
- <p>
- But to pleadings, threats, and door-kickings the occupant was, to all
- intents and purposes, oblivious. Things began to look serious for the
- staff and station hands who were wont to depend on Dutchy for their
- grub-stakes.
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley whistled softly and pulled at his pipe, his feet on the
- dispatcher’s desk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’ll <i>have</i> to open up when Number Ninety-Seven pulls in,” Thornley
- was saying, more by way of reassuring himself than of presenting any new
- view of the case to MacDonald. “The company won’t stand for any
- inconvenience to the passengers—that is” he hastened to amend, “not
- of this kind. What? They’ve got a sort of lien on that joint, and if he
- waits for them to get after him he’ll get into trouble. Wish Brett were
- back—he’d make him open up quick, I guess. What’s the matter with
- Number Ninety-Seven, anyhow? Thought you said she was on time?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So she is,” said MacDonald, grinning. “Hear her?”
- </p>
- <p>
- From the eastward came the hoarse shriek from the whistle of a
- five-hundred class.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess I’ll go down,” said Thornley. “Coming?”
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald nodded and got up from his chair. The two men reached the
- platform in time to acknowledge a flirt of the hand from Sanders in the
- cab as the big machine, wheel-tires sparking from the tight-set brakes,
- rolled slowly past them, coming to a halt farther on.
- </p>
- <p>
- Simultaneously the door of the lunch-room swung wide open, and on the
- threshold, completely filling the opening with his bulk, stood Dutchy. In
- his left hand he held his bell, which he began to ring clamorously; in his
- right hand, almost but not quite concealed behind his apron, was no less a
- weapon than a substantial-looking rolling-pin. A crowd of passengers began
- to surge toward the restaurant, and among them mingled the hungry railroad
- men of Dry Notch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come on!” shouted Thornley exultantly. “I knew he’d have to open up.
- Here’s where we feed—h’m?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Vait!” cried Dutchy imperiously, as the head of the column reached him.
- “You, yess; you, no. Vat iss it?” He was sorting the sheep from the goats,
- allowing the passengers to enter, pushing the railroaders ruthlessly to
- one side.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You, yess; you, no. You, yess; you—oh! py golly!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He had caught sight of Thornley, and, swinging suddenly, struck out
- viciously in that direction with the rolling-pin. Being obliged, however,
- to maintain his position in the doorway, the strategic key to the
- situation, the jab fell short by two or three inches, barely missing
- Thornley’s nose.
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley fell back instinctively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here, you old ass!” he yelled angrily, “we’ve had about enough of
- this. It’s past a joke. The company’s got a lien on that joint of yours,
- and we’ll close it up so tight you’ll never open it again—d’ye
- hear?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy stopped short in the monotonous, “You, yess; you, no,” on which he
- had recommenced, and his paunch began to shake.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yah!” he cried. “Dot iss a joke. Oh, py golly, <i>lean!</i> Dot iss ven
- you ge-starving get, yah? Ho, ho! Ha, ha!”
- </p>
- <p>
- In Dutch’s burst of merriment first one and then another joined, until
- even Thornley, his good nature getting the better of him, roared with the
- rest at his own expense.
- </p>
- <p>
- But if this apparent return to good humor on Dutchy’s part inspired any
- hope in the minds of the railroad men that he had relented and that former
- friendly relations were to be resumed, they were doomed to disappointment,
- for Dutchy stolidly continued to allow the passengers to go in and as
- stolidly barred the entrance to the others.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then they gave it up, and bought out the slender stock of canned goods and
- biscuits from the shelves of the general store.
- </p>
- <p>
- They messed in the baggage-room and they swallowed their scanty portions
- to the tune of “Die Wacht am Rhein,” bellowed out by a strong and sonorous
- voice, through the partition, on the other side of which, laid out in
- tempting confusion, as they were painfully aware, was plenty.
- </p>
- <p>
- What they had, however, did little more than whet their appetites, and by
- three o’clock some of the men were talking of carrying the position by
- storm, helping themselves, and doing a few fancy stunts with Dutchy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We can’t have any row,” said Thornley, pulling at his mustache and
- staring at MacDonald. “What had we better do? The boys’ll be pulling the
- old shack down around his ears. He’ll fight like blazes, and some one’ll
- get hurt. And then the company’ll want to know what’s what. Say, the old
- geeser has got us where he wants us, sure—eh, what?”
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald nodded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll tell you what it is,” Thornley went on impressively, “there’s some
- one besides Dutchy in this. They’ve been giving him a steer, and <i>I</i>’d
- give a few to know who it is. It’s mighty queer Dutchy would wake up so
- suddenly to the fact that he was a joke. Then, there isn’t enough to that
- rebate josh to make him so sore. Some one’s been stringing him good and
- plenty. What had we better do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know,” MacDonald answered. “Let’s go and see if we can’t talk him
- over.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At the sight of Thornley and the dispatcher heading for the lunch-room,
- the trainmen and station-hands fell in behind them.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald halted a few paces from the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You boys, stay here,” he directed. “Let me see what I can do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley and the men halted obediently, while MacDonald went on and
- knocked at the door. There was no response.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dut—Mr. Damrosch!” he called. “It’s MacDonald. I want to talk to
- you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- This time his knock was answered, and so suddenly as to cause him to jump
- back in surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil, vat iss it?” demanded Dutchy, scowling belligerently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’re—we’re—” stammered MacDonald, his confidence a little
- shaken at the proprietor’s attitude. Then, desperately: “Oh, I say,
- confound it all, Dutchy, we’re hungry.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So!” Dutchy’s exclamation was a world of innocent astonishment and kindly
- interest.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” went on MacDonald, diplomatically. “You bet we are. It’s been a
- good joke, but you’ve had the best end of it. Let’s call it quits, there’s
- a good fellow, and—and give us all a handout.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy listened attentively to the appeal.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I, a fool iss no longer yet, don’d it?” he queried softly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You most decidedly are not,” MacDonald assured him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You vill for repates no longer ask, yet?” persisted Mr. Damrosch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not on your life!” replied the dispatcher earnestly, beginning to see
- daylight. “That’s all off. We’ll apologize, too, if you like. I promise
- you, we are quite willing to apologize.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil, den,” announced Mr. Damrosch, “ve vill aggravate”—and he
- slammed the door in MacDonald’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, hold on, Dutchy!” cried MacDonald piteously, for he was very hungry.
- “What did you say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Vat I said iss dot ve vill aggravate!” shouted Dutchy from the other side
- of the door. “Dot iss English, don’d it? Aggravate!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He means arbitrate,” prompted Thornley from the platform.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, all right!” said MacDonald. “We’ll agree to that, Dutchy. Come on——open
- up!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I vill not mit you aggra—arra—<i>do it</i>—hang dot
- vord!” Dutchy asserted decisively, but again opening the door. “But mit
- Mister Brett I vill do it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But Mr. Brett isn’t here, you know that,” retorted MacDonald, beginning
- to get exasperated. “And, what’s more, he won’t be back until the day
- after tomorrow. I guess you know that, too, don’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy smiled a patient, chiding smile. “Dot iss too bad,” he remarked
- regretfully. “But dot Thornley a pig iss, und you—oh, py golly! you—I
- could not you pelief. Ve vill vait for Mister Brett.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He was closing the door again, when MacDonald put his foot against the
- jamb and, leaning toward Dutchy, said quickly, in an undertone:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here, Dutchy, you’re going too far. If I couldn’t see any farther
- than you, I’d wear glasses. Now’s the time to make your deal. I’ll help
- you—see? You can get anything out of the boys now, but you push them
- too far and they’ll pull the whole outfit down over your ears. You say
- what you want, and I’ll get it for you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy looked meditatively into MacDonald’s face, and shook his head with
- a sad smile of wisdom.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I could not you pelief,” he repeated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t have to. You don’t have to believe anybody. Whatever you want
- us to do we’ll do before you let us in to eat. You can’t lose. What do you
- say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Damrosch scratched his head pensively, without taking his eyes off the
- dispatcher. After a minute he tapped MacDonald on the shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil,” he announced, “I vill tell you. Listen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald listened—incredulously. Then he whistled a low,
- long-drawn-out note of consternation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, you’ve got a nerve!” he gasped. “What do you think, eh? The boys’ll
- never—” He stopped suddenly, a smile came over his face, and he
- chuckled softly to himself. “Dutchy, you’re great! It’ll be meat for the
- boys to make Thornley stand for it. That’s what you want to do—make
- Thornley stand for it. Will the boys make him? Oh, will they! Give them
- the chance. That’s the way to handle it. I told you I’d help you. Now,
- make your <i>spiel</i>” MacDonald turned to the group on the platform.
- “Dutchy’ll arbitrate!” he cried.
- </p>
- <p>
- At this the men began to push forward, but Dutchy stopped them. “Vait as
- you iss! Ven der—der—hang dot word—iss, den iss it.
- Vait!”
- </p>
- <p>
- They waited, and Dutchy began to count on his fingers. “Dere iss sixteen
- dot breakfasted didn’d,” he began. “Dot—iss—iss—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Average ‘em up at a quarter apiece,” prompted MacDonald in a whisper.
- “That makes four dollars.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Iss four dollars—yess,” went on Dutchy. “Veil, I vant dot. Dere iss
- der crews dot in-came und out-vent und didn’d eat ven der door vas closed.
- Dot iss two dollars—yess? Veil, I vant dot.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The men came to, and a roar of derision rent the air, in the face of which
- even Dutchy was a little shaken.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Stand pat,” encouraged MacDonald. “You’ve got them coming and going.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Dutchy held up his hand for silence. “Dere iss der sixteen over again yet
- dot dinnered didn’d. Dot iss four dollars—yess? Veil, I vant dot.
- Dot iss four und two and four. Dot iss ten dollars—don’d it? Veil, I
- vant dot, und den you come in—yess, one py one—for a quarter
- py each.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then, amid the storm of abuse and jeers that greeted Dutchy’s ultimatum,
- MacDonald, with a final injunction to the proprietor to stand by his guns,
- turned and joined Thornley and the men.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil, py golly!” screamed Dutchy above the din. “Vat iss it? Who was der
- commencer of dot joke dot iss ten dollars to pay? It iss dot Thornley!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, you wretched old thief,” yelled Thornley, “Do you think we’re going
- to pay you for grub we didn’t get, because you wouldn’t let us have it,
- and then pay you for it again when you do dole it out? We’ll see you
- further, first.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It vas agreed in front of der—hang dot word!—py der—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Agreed nothing!” snorted Thornley.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dot you vill for repates no longer ask, yet, don’d it? Veil, der price
- ten dollars iss. Dere iss no repate. Oh, py golly, Mister Thornley, dot
- vas an oxpensive joke—yess? Dot vas your joke, und I shusht thought
- me dot I hope you will pay dot yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley paid. With no good grace, but because, as MacDonald had said they
- would, the men made him. Disgruntled and angry, he led the file into the
- restaurant, placing ten dollars and twenty-five cents in Dutchy’s hand
- before he crossed the threshold.
- </p>
- <p>
- Behind him followed MacDonald and the grinning line of men, each
- contributing their quarters—in advance—for the first square
- meal they had had that day.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Eat vat you like,” said Dutchy magnanimously.
- </p>
- <p>
- Thornley glared. “Eat vat you like! Eat vat you like!” he mimicked
- savagely. “I like your colossal generosity at my expense!”
- </p>
- <p>
- For a long time there was no other noise save the rattle of dishes and the
- busy clatter of knives, forks, and spoons. Then Thornley beckoned to
- Dutchy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Veil, vat iss it?” inquired the proprietor from behind the counter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who put you on to this?” demanded Thornley. “I’ve had to stand for it,
- and I’d like to know. I would that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald, sitting beside Thornley, noticed, with some misgivings, a
- peculiar expression sweep over Dutchy’s face, but to his relief the
- proprietor’s only reply was a grunt, as he answered a call for more
- coffee.
- </p>
- <p>
- “By the hokey, I’ll bet it was that red-haired Taggart!” exclaimed
- Thornley suddenly, turning to the dispatcher.
- </p>
- <p>
- MacDonald buried his face in his cup, ostensibly to drain the last drop,
- then he set it down quickly and jerked his watch from his pocket.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Holy Moses!” he ejaculated, and fled from the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- An hour later, as Thornley was again sitting with his feet on MacDonald’s
- desk, Dutchy stuck his head into the room and beckoned to the dispatcher.
- MacDonald walked across the floor and joined him. Dutchy pulled him out of
- the room and closed the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dere iss one thing dot I forgotted did,” announced Mr. Damrosch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that?” inquired MacDonald.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dere iss five doughnuts dot iss paid for not.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh!” said MacDonald.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dot vas der time you told dot it vas Thornley—yess? Dot vas von
- dollar py each. Veil, I vant dot—yess?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Really!” laughed MacDonald. “Well, I guess <i>not!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dot—vas—der—time”—Dutchy was raising his voice,
- each word growing louder and more distinct than the preceding one.
- Thornley’s chair inside creaked ominously. MacDonald glanced furtively
- toward the door, and his face grew red—“you—told—dot——”
- </p>
- <p>
- With a hasty movement, MacDonald clapped one hand over Dutchy’s mouth, and
- with the other thrust a five-dollar bill into his fingers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get out!” he choked, and shoved Dutchy violently toward the stairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the bottom, Dutchy halted, turned and looked up with a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Py golly,” said he, “I shusht thought me dot I like jokes pretty good,
- and I hope dot——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, shut up!” said MacDonald.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- XIV—SPECKLES
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>his happened at a
- period in the history of the Hill Division when trade was very bad, and
- the directors, scowling over the company’s annual report, threw up their
- hands in holy horror; while from the sacred precincts of the board-room
- there emanated the agonized cry:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Economy!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The general manager took up the slogan and dinned it into the ears of the
- division superintendents.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Operating expenses are too high,” he wrote. “They must be cut down.” And
- the superintendents of divisions, painfully alive to the fact that the G.
- M. was not dictating for the mere pleasure of it, intimated in
- unmistakable language to the heads of departments under them that the next
- quarterly reports were expected to show a marked improvement.
- </p>
- <p>
- John Healy had charge of the roundhouse at Big Cloud, in those days, and
- the morning after the lightning struck the system he came fuming back
- across the yards from his interview with the superintendent, stuttering
- angrily to himself. As he stamped into the running-shed his humor a shade
- worse than usual the first object that caught his eye was Speckles,
- squatted on the lee side of 483, dangling his legs in the pit.
- </p>
- <p>
- That is, it would have been the lee side if Healy had come in the other
- door.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cut down operatin’ expinses, is ut?” Healy muttered. “Begorra, I’ll begin
- right now!”
- </p>
- <p>
- And he fired Speckles on the spot.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, Speckles—whose name, by the way, was Dolivar Washington Babson—had
- been fired on several occasions before, and if he swallowed a little more
- tobacco-juice than was good for his physical comfort it was rather as a
- gulp of startled surprise at Healy’s appearance than because of any
- poignant regret at the misfortune that had overtaken him. Nevertheless, he
- felt it incumbent on himself to expostulate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Git out an’ stay out!” said Healy, refusing to argue.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Speckles got out.
- </p>
- <p>
- For a day he kept away from the roundhouse, the length of time past
- experience had taught him was required to cool the turner’s anger; then he
- sauntered down again and came face to face with Healy on the turntable.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” he began,
- broaching the subject timidly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Phwat?” demanded Healy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” Speckles repeated
- monotonously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I heard you—I heard you,” said Healy, a little inconsistently.
- “On ag’in, is ut? Ut’ll be a long toime, me son, mark that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- This being quite different from Healy’s accustomed, “Well, git back to yer
- job,” it began to filter vaguely through Speckles’ brain that his name was
- no longer to adorn the company’s pay-sheets.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Am I fired for good, Mr. Healy?” he faltered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You are!” said Healy. “Just that!” Then, relenting a little as Speckles’
- face fell: “If’twere not fer the big-bugs down yonder “—he jerked
- his thumb in the general direction of the East—“I might—moind,
- I don’t say I would, but I might—put you on ag’in. As ut is, we’ve
- instructions to cut down the operatin’ expinses, an’ there’s an ind on
- ut!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles stood for a moment in dismay as Healy went back into the
- roundhouse; then he turned disconsolately away, crossed the tracks to the
- platform of the station, and, seeking out a secluded corner of the
- freight-house, sat down upon a packing-case to think it out.
- </p>
- <p>
- To Speckles it was no mere matter of cutting down expenses. It was a
- blasted career!
- </p>
- <p>
- Whatever Speckles’ faults, and he was only a lad, he had one redeeming
- quality, before which, in the eyes of the business he had elected to
- follow, his strayings from the straight and narrow path dwindled into
- insignificance—railroading was born in him.
- </p>
- <p>
- At ten he had started in as caller for the night-crews, and, during the
- five years the company had had the benefit of his valuable services in
- that capacity, there was not a man on the division but sooner or later
- came to know long-armed, bony, freckled-faced, red-haired Speckles—came
- to know the little rascal, and like him, too.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Speckles had been promoted to the post of sweeper in the roundhouse,
- and occasionally, under Healy’s critical inspection, to washing out
- boiler-tubes. Fresh fuel thereby added to the fire of his ambition, he
- began to figure how long it would be before he got to wiping, then to
- firing, and after that—even Speckles’ boundless optimism did not
- have the temerity to specify any particular date—the time when he
- would attain his goal and get his engine.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, instead, at the age of sixteen, he found himself seated on a
- cracker-box, his dreams for the future rudely shattered—thanks to
- Healy, old Sour Face Healy!
- </p>
- <p>
- So Speckles sighed, and as he sighed the shop whistle blew. It was noon,
- and the men began to pour out of the big gates. Then Speckles, remembering
- that the schools were also “letting out,” hurried down the platform and up
- the main street. He would confide in Madge. Madge would understand.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge Bolton was the daughter of the ticket agent at the station, and
- between Mr. Bolton and Speckles there existed a standing feud, the <i>casus
- belli</i> being fifteen-year-old, blue-eyed Madge. Speckles kicked his
- heels on the corner until she appeared; then he turned and fell into step
- beside her, reaching a little awkwardly for her strap of books.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hallo, Dol!” was Madge’s greeting. She was the only person in Big Cloud
- who did not call him Speckles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hallo, Madge!” he returned.
- </p>
- <p>
- Madge glanced at his face and hands. “Haven’t you been to work?” she
- asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nope.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, Dol?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fired,” said Speckles laconically.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, Dol, again!” she cried reproachfully. “What for?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Tain’t only the third time, and ‘twasn’t for nothin’,” said Speckles, a
- bit sullenly. “I was only restin’.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Dolivar Babson,” she accused, “you were loafing. Oh, Dol, you’ll never
- get to firing, and—and—” She hesitated and stopped, her cheeks
- a little red with the hint of boy-and-girl castle-building that would have
- increased her father’s ire against the luckless Speckles had he seen it.
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles, somewhat shamefaced, and having no excuse to offer, trudged on
- in silence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did you ask Mr. Healy to take you back?” she inquired, after a moment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He won’t,” said Speckles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are you going to do, Dol?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I dunno.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said Madge, hopefully, “perhaps you could get a job in one of the
- stores. I’ll ask Mr. Timmons, the grocer, if you like. I know him pretty
- well.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles came to an abrupt and sudden halt, cast in Madge’s face one look
- that carried with it a world of unutterable reproach, handed over her
- books in silence—and fled.
- </p>
- <p>
- He, a railroad man, go into a <i>store!</i> And this from Madge! Madge,
- who, of all others—it was too much! Speckles ate his dinner,
- dispirited and crushed. Everything and everybody was against him.
- </p>
- <p>
- His mother’s curt inquiry as to when he was going back to work did not in
- any way tend to mitigate his troubles—rather, on the contrary, to
- accentuate them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Old Sour Face won’t put me back,” he jerked out, in response to his
- mother’s repeated question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No wonder he won’t,” said his mother sharply, “if you’re as disrespectful
- as that. I’m ashamed of you, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles was too much depressed to offer any defense. He finished his meal
- in silence, gulped down his cup of tea in two swallows, took his hat, and
- started out.
- </p>
- <p>
- Unconsciously he directed his steps toward the yards, and, some five
- minutes later, arrived at the station. Here, about half-way down the
- platform, he spotted Mat Bolton in the open doorway of the ticket office.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he approached, the nonchalant air with which the other leaned with
- folded arms against the jamb of the door aroused Speckles’ suspicions. To
- reach the seat of his meditations—the cracker-box in the freight
- shed which had now become his objective point—he would be obliged to
- pass Mr. Bolton. He therefore began to incline his course toward the edge
- of the platform nearest the rails, so that, when he came opposite the
- office door, some fifteen feet were between him and his arch enemy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mr. Bolton awoke from his lethargy with surprising suddenness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You young rascal,” he shouted, “what you been doing to my girl? I’ll
- teach you to make girls cry, you little speckled-face runt, you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He made a dash for Speckles, but by the time he had recovered his balance
- and saved himself from toppling over the edge of the platform to the
- tracks, Speckles had reached the safe retreat of the freight-shed door.
- And as the irate parent, after shaking his fist impotently, walked back
- and disappeared within his domain, Speckles indulged in a series of
- pantomimes in which his fingers and his nose played an intimate and
- comprehensive part.
- </p>
- <p>
- Perched once more on the cracker-box, Speckles again resolved himself into
- a committee on ways and means. His little skirmish with Madge’s father had
- exhilarated him to such an extent that his heavy and oppressing sense of
- despondency had vanished, and in its place came a renewed determination to
- resume, somehow or other, the railroad career that Healy had so
- emphatically interrupted.
- </p>
- <p>
- He turned over in his mind the feasibility of applying to Regan, the
- master mechanic, for a job in the shops, but dismissed the idea almost
- immediately on the ground that shop men were not, strictly speaking,
- railroaders.
- </p>
- <p>
- He might start in switching and braking, and work up to conductor. That,
- at least, was railroading—not to be compared with engine-driving,
- not by long odds, but still it was railroading. His face brightened. He
- would interview Farley, the trainmaster.
- </p>
- <p>
- Farley was in his office. Speckles had not very far to go, only a few
- steps down the platform. All the offices—and Big Cloud was division
- headquarters—were under the same roof.
- </p>
- <p>
- At Speckles’ request, Farley swung around in his swivel-chair with a
- quizzical expression on his face. Then he grinned.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Want to go on with the train-crews, eh? What do you think, kid, that I’m
- running a kindergarten outfit, even if some of ‘em do act like it? How old
- are you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sixteen,” said Speckles, with a sinking heart.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sixteen, eh? Well, come back in a couple of years, and——”
- </p>
- <p>
- But, for the second time that day, Speckles fled. He was in no mood to
- stand much chaffing, and Farley, as he well knew, had a leaning that way.
- Speckles halted outside the door, undecided what move to make next, when
- the clicking of the instruments in the dispatcher’s room overhead came to
- his ears like an inspiration.
- </p>
- <p>
- Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Spence, who had been on the night
- trick most of the years that Speckles was caller, was now chief
- dispatcher. If he had any friend anywhere, it was Spence, the man at whose
- elbow he had sat through those long, dark hours of the night that beget
- confidences, and into whose ears he had so often poured the tales of his
- cherished aims and ambitions.
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles covered the stairs three steps at a time, in his new-found
- exuberance. Spence looked up from his key and listened as Speckles told
- his story.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you’re Healy’s contribution to economy, eh?” he said when Speckles had
- finished. “And he won’t take you back?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Speckles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, that’s pretty rough. But I don’t see how I can help you any,
- Speckles. I haven’t any rights over Healy, you know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles hesitated a moment and fidgeted nervously from one foot to the
- other. “I know you ain’t,” he began, “but I thought maybe you’d put me on
- here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “W-what!” ejaculated Spence. Then, smothering a laugh at the sight of
- Speckles’ woebegone countenance, he demanded gravely “You mean
- dispatching?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles nodded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, no, Speckles, that would never do. You go back and see Healy. I’ll do
- what I can for you with him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Twon’t do no good,” said Speckles hopelessly. “I’ve asked him twice
- already.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, ask him again. Look here, Speckles, it’s up to you to square
- yourself with Healy, somehow or other. If you want your job very badly,
- you ought to be sharp enough to find a way of getting it. Go on, now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- So Speckles descended the stairs to the platform and irresolutely began to
- cross the tracks in the direction of the running-shed. He reached the
- roundhouse and skirmished cautiously along its front. No Healy was in
- sight, so he dived in between two engines and made his way to the rear of
- the shed. Here, by peering around the end of a tender, he could see
- Healy’s cubby-hole—Healy called it an office—a bit of space
- about four by six partitioned off from the back wall in the corner, with a
- greasy book the engine-crews signed, and two or three others, equally
- greasy, in which Healy kept tabs on things in general.
- </p>
- <p>
- In spite of his trepidation, Speckles grinned. Healy was there, bending
- over a very flimsy, spindle-legged table that he had wheedled out of the
- claim-agent some months before. His brows were puckered into a ferocious
- scowl, and he growled and muttered to himself, now laboring furiously with
- a stubby pencil on the sheets of paper in front of him, now pausing to
- bite that unoffending article almost in two in his desperation.
- </p>
- <p>
- Healy was working on his invention. All the division knew about Healy’s
- ideas on Westinghouse and “air,” and that these ideas, when perfected,
- were to be patented. As to what the consensus of opinion of their value
- was is neither here nor there, except that in Healy’s presence, when
- referred to at all, the subject was treated with dignity and respect, for
- Healy’s physical powers were beyond the ordinary, and dearest to Healy’s
- heart and most sacred in his eyes was this creation of his brain, or, to
- be more accurate, fancy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles sidled up to the cubby-hole, and, without any peroration, took
- the plunge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I came to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,”—he spoke rapidly,
- as though he feared his courage might ooze out before he could finish.
- </p>
- <p>
- Healy wheeled round with a grunt.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, ut’s you, is ut?” he demanded grimly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles, ready to run at the first sign of violence, acknowledged the
- impeachment by nodding his head affirmatively, and smiled sheepishly while
- Healy scrutinized him with a long stare from head to foot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said Healy, “you wait a minute an’ I’ll give you me answer.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles’ heart bounded in joyous hope. Healy very deliberately gathered
- up his papers, folded them carefully, and opening the cupboard where his
- coat hung—it was a hot day, and Healy was in his shirtsleeves—tucked
- them into the inside pocket. Then, like a flash, he turned and reached for
- the first thing in sight. It was a broom.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, quick as he was, Speckles was quicker, and he led Healy by the length
- of the pit as he dodged around the tail end of a tender and darted out of
- the running-shed across the tracks to the freight-house.
- </p>
- <p>
- Healy followed no farther than the turntable. There he halted, and
- Speckles, from his retreat, saw him shake his fist and listened to the
- threat that thundered across the yards:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Show yer face around here ag’in, you young rascal, an’ I’ll bate the
- loife out av you, so I will!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles betook himself to the cracker-box, and from his lips there flowed
- a fluent and unrestrained expression of his opinion on things in general,
- but more particularly of Healy, and more particularly still of Healy’s
- invention. Then, his indignation subsiding, it was followed by a fit of
- the blues; so that when, at the expiration of half an hour, Healy, still
- in his shirt-sleeves, came out of the roundhouse and walked up the tracks
- in the direction of the shops, Speckles, through the freight-house door,
- remarked the incident in complete apathy and as one in which he had no
- interest whatever.
- </p>
- <p>
- Ten minutes later, however, his apathy vanished and he sprang to his feet
- at the sound of the excited shouts of the men in the running-shed. Some
- were hastily swinging the big engine doors wide open, others were setting
- the table in position, while one started on a run in the direction Healy
- had taken.
- </p>
- <p>
- Another minute and the shop whistle had boomed out its warning, and as
- Healy, with the man who had gone after him, came tearing down the track
- like mad, Speckles saw the smoke beginning to curl up over the roof at the
- back. The running-shed was afire.
- </p>
- <p>
- With a whoop, Speckles traversed the platform, leaped to the rails, and
- was hard on Healy’s heels by the time the turntable was crossed. Healy
- paused but an instant. The thing to do was to get the engines out, and
- Healy was the man to do it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get tackle rigged on 463,” he ordered. “She’s cold, an’ we’ll have to
- haul her out. Set the table fer 518; I’ll take her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he started on the jump for the cubby-hole and his precious papers.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, the tackle that Healy had referred to was stored in the rear of the
- roundhouse in the same general direction as the cubby-hole, and as the
- order had been given to no one in particular, Speckles, shouting “I’ll get
- it,” started after Healy.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some grease and waste had caught and was rolling up a nasty smoke. Through
- it, even while he tugged manfully at the heavy tackle, Speckles saw Healy
- run into his office, snatch his coat, rush out again, and dash for the cab
- of 518, throwing the coat up on the tender. As he did so, something fell
- from the pocket.
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles dropped the tackle and pounced upon it. It was the bundle of
- papers he had seen Healy put in his coat-pocket a little while before.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was Healy’s invention!
- </p>
- <p>
- Speckles’ first impulse was to shout to Healy, but just then 518 glided
- out of the shed, and the men in front of 463 were yelling in chorus for
- the tackle, so Speckles put his tongue in his cheek and the papers in his
- pocket.
- </p>
- <p>
- It wasn’t much of a blaze, but it looked bad while it lasted. Even after
- the shop-hands had got their hose-lengths connected and a stream playing
- on the fire, and the engines were all in safety in the yard, the smoke
- continued to roll out in clouds, with here and there a vicious tongue of
- flame.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Healy, his duty done, bethought him of his coat on the tender of 518.
- And Speckles, as he heard Healy’s gasp of dismay on discovering that his
- papers were gone, had an inspiration.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Me papers! Me papers!” wailed Healy. “Fer the love av Mike, I must av
- dropped thim on the flure!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll get them for you, Mr. Healy,” said Speckles, quick as a shot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ll not!” said Healy. “I’ll have no wan risk his life fer thim, bad as
- I want thim. Hey, come back, you runt!”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Speckles was gone. Headed straight for the big, yawning doors that
- vomited their smoke and flames? Oh, no, not Speckles! Hardly! Speckles
- would make his attempt from the rear! And around the end of the shed and
- in behind he raced.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some of the men were fighting the fire from that side, but they were too
- busy to pay any attention to Speckles. A dab of soot and dirt on his face
- which he obtained by rubbing his fingers along the blackened wall, an
- artistic smudge of generous proportions on the outside of the papers,
- which he took from his pocket, and Speckles’ make-up was complete and
- convincing.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, Speckles had an eye for the dramatic and an appreciation of its
- value. He peered in through one of the windows. It was not nearly as bad
- inside as it had been, and he decided there would be no risk and very
- little discomfort in carrying out the plan that had popped into his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- So he climbed in through a window and dropped down to the floor on the
- other side. The next minute he had dashed through the running-shed, and
- emerged from a whirl of black smoke into the open in front of the
- turntable, the papers waved aloft in his fist.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was effective—decidedly effective! A cheer went up, and the men
- crowded around, while Healy rushed forward and began to pump Speckles’ arm
- up and down like an engine-piston.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ut’s a hero you are, me bright jool av a lad!” he cried in his delight.
- “‘Tis mesilf, John Healy, that ses ut, an’ the bhoys are me witness. Come
- back to yer job in the mornin’ an’, by my sowl, Speckles, I’ll niver fire
- you ag’in, niver! An’ ut’s more I’ll do—I’ll promote you. Ut’s a
- wiper you are from now on, me son, an’ to blazes wid cuttin’ down
- operatin’ expinses! Where did you foind the papers?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “On the floor,” said Speckles—and he told the truth.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- XV—MUNFORD
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>unford came to the
- work before the gangs were deep enough into the hills to lose daily, or
- rather nightly, touch with Big Cloud. And the way of his coming was this:
- The town, springing up in a night, had its beginning in the wooden shanty
- the engineers built as headquarters for the Hill Division that was to be.
- Then, with mushroom growth, came shacks innumerable; and these shacks, for
- the most part, were gambling hells and dives and saloons, and the
- population was Indian, Chinese and bad American. To these places of lurid
- entertainment flocked the toilers at night, loading down the construction
- empties as they backed their way to the spurs and sidings that soon spread
- out like a cobweb around headquarters.
- </p>
- <p>
- Naturally, rows were of pretty frequent occurrence between the company’s
- men and the leeches who bleed them with crooked games and stacked decks
- over the roulette, faro and stud-poker tables. But of them all in the
- delectable pursuit of separating the men and their pay-checks, Pete
- McGonigle’s “Golden Luck” saloon was in the van, both as to size and
- crookedness. And that high station of eminence it maintained until the
- night a stranger wrecked it by no more delicate a method than that of
- kicking over the roulette table, sending it and the attendant, who was
- presiding over the little whirling ball in Pete’s interest, crashing to
- the floor. That stranger was Munford. And that was how Munford came to
- join the army of the Rockies.
- </p>
- <p>
- A number of the company men were present and they sided in with Munford.
- Before this amalgamation, Pete and his hangers-on went down to ignominious
- defeat, and the “Golden Luck,” to utter demolishment and ruin. News of the
- fracas spread rapidly to the other “joints.” The dive-keepers joined
- forces, the company men did likewise, and that night became the wildest in
- the history of Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford took command of his new-found friends from the start. In the
- street fight that followed he did wondrous things—and did them with
- zest, delight and effectiveness. With his great bulk he towered above his
- companions, and the sweep of his long arms as they rose and fell, the play
- of his massive shoulders as he lunged forward to give impetus to his
- blows, was a marvelous sight to see. But the details of that fight have no
- place here. Its result, however, was that Munford, previously unknown and
- unheard of, became thereafter, a marked man in Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- When the fight was over the company men, elated with victory though
- somewhat the worse for wear, retired to the yard to wait for the
- construction trains to take them up to their work. And while they waited
- they spent the time gazing in admiration at Munford who sat on the edge of
- a flat-car, his legs dangling over, blowing softly on his knuckles, a
- smile of divine contentment on his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- What was Munford going to do? demanded McGuire and the cronies of his
- particular gang who had had the honor of being present at Pete’s when the
- evening’s proceedings were instituted, and who therefore felt they had a
- prior claim to the hero’s consideration over and above that of the men
- from other sections of the work who had taken part in the fight. Munford
- did not know. Would he go up the line with them and take a job with their
- gang if they promised to get him one? Munford would. So he kept his seat
- when the construction train pulled out just as the dawn was breaking, and
- twenty miles up the road at Twin Bear Creek they tumbled him off and
- introduced him to Alan Burton, foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the sight of his battered and jaded crew, who in no wise appeared fit
- for the day’s work before them, Burton swore savagely and with great
- bitterness of tongue bade them get to their work. Then he turned in his
- ill-humor to Munford, who was still standing beside him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who the devil are you? What you doin’ here? Where d’ye come from?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The questions came quick and sharp like a volley of small arms.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford eyed the wiry little chunk of a man, scarcely up to his own
- shoulders, in silence, taking him in from head to foot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” snapped Burton, “speak up!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Munford’s my name,” said Munford, coolly. “I’m here for a job. Where I
- come from ain’t none of your blamed business, is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ain’t it?” said Burton. “Well, then, you can walk back there, my bucko!”
- and he turned on his heel and followed the men to their work.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford sat down on the doorsill of the camp shanty and with a laugh
- pulled out his pipe and began to smoke. He was still sitting there a
- half-hour later when the foreman came back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you’ve got far to go,” grinned Burton, “you’d better get started.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No hurry,” replied Munford, imperturbably.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re a queer card,” said Burton, after a moment. “What’s this about the
- trouble down at Big Cloud last night the boys are so full of they can’t do
- anything besides talk?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford chuckled quietly. “Nothin’ much,” said he.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nothing much, eh? They say you put the ‘Golden Luck’ and Pete McGonigle
- to the bad, and then cleaned out every dive in town. You’re quite a
- reformer, ain’t you? I’ll tell you this, though, it won’t be healthy for
- you around these parts from now on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t know,” said Munford. “Say, how about that job?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Burton laughed. “You’ve got a sweet nerve to ask for a job, and you
- responsible for a gang that won’t be able to do a day’s work among the lot
- of them between now and night. Did up McGonigle’s, eh? Well, I don’t know,
- I reckon in the long run that’ll be worth more to the company than the
- day’s work. All right, sport, you can go to work—until Pete and his
- crowd scare you out, which I predict won’t be long. And while you’re here,
- if you get itchy for trouble don’t look for it among the men, come to <i>me.</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I’ll—” gasped Munford. “Why, I could twist you like—”
- Then he laughed in pure delight at Burton’s spunk “Oh, sure! <i>Sure</i>,
- I will.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It took Munford no longer than a day to get the hang of the work. He was
- already more than a demigod in the eyes of Bridge Gang No. 3, and that
- counted for much. They were eager and ready to show him what they knew
- themselves, whereas the ignorance and rawness of any other newcomer would
- have been turned to good account in the shape of gibes and jests at his
- expense. In two days, from a natural adaptability coupled with his great
- strength, that was the strength of two men, Munford had fitted into place
- with the same nicety that one part of a well designed machine fits into
- another.
- </p>
- <p>
- To the crews of the construction trains bringing up the bridge material he
- was pointed out with pride by his mates—though, indeed, that action
- was superfluous—as “the boy who did the trick at Pete’s.” And from
- these in turn Munford learned that down at Big Cloud, Pete and others of
- his ilk had sworn that, sooner or later, they would fix him for it. At
- this he only laughed and, doubling his great arm bared to the shoulders,
- intimated that there could be no greater pleasure in life for him than to
- have them try it. And that night sitting outside the camp after supper,
- McGuire, as spokesman, alluding to the threat, proposed that under
- Munford’s leadership they should make another raid on Big Cloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- Burton, passing by, caught the gist of the conversation. “I want to see
- you a minute, Munford,” he called, shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford got up and followed to the foreman’s little shanty that stood a
- few yards away from the main camp. Once inside, Burton shoved him into a
- chair and shook his fist under Munford’s nose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Didn’t I tell you yesterday morning,” he spluttered angrily, “that if you
- were looking for trouble to come to me and leave the gang alone? And here
- you’re at it again, what? Go down to Big Cloud and raise hell, eh? You
- great, big overgrown calf!” Munford blinked at the foreman, speechless. It
- was a long time since he had taken words like these from any man, much
- less a little spitfire like Burton.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Trouble!” continued the irate Burton, hardly pausing for breath. “You
- live on it, don’t you? Eat it, eh? Well, you’ll get a fill of it before
- long that’ll give you the damnest indigestion you ever heard of. I promise
- you that! But you keep your hands off my crew! Now you listen to what I’m
- saying!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw, go hang!” said Munford, contemptuously. “I can’t help it, can I, if
- they want to go down to Big Cloud? If you’re so blamed anxious about them,
- it’s a wonder you don’t go around every night and tuck ‘em into their
- bunks!”
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment Burton looked as though he were going to jump into Munford
- and mix it then and there; but instead, with a short laugh, he turned and
- walked to the other side of the room, sat down on the edge of his bunk and
- pulled out his pipe. He cut some tobacco from his plug, rolled it between
- his palms, packed his pipe slowly and lighted it. It was five minutes
- before he broke the silence; Munford was beginning to feel uncomfortable.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t suppose throwing a few timbers across Twin Bear Creek means much
- of anything to you, Munford, eh?” he asked quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not so much,” replied Munford carelessly, a little puzzled at the
- question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No? Well, it means a lot to me, a whole lot! Until that trestle is up, we
- can’t shove material over to the other side, ties and rails and heavy
- stuff. Progress on the Hill Division depends just at this minute on Bridge
- Gang No. 3, and concretely on me. I don’t propose to have it interfered
- with by the men going down to Big Cloud and getting their heads broke,
- understand?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I guess we can take care of <i>our</i> heads, if that’s all that
- bothers you,” drawled Munford. “And I furthermore guess your bloomin’
- little bridge you seem so stuck on won’t take any hurt by lettin’ the boys
- have their fling. Anyway, whether it will or not, what’s the use of you
- shootin’ off all your talk? You can’t stop ‘em! If they want to go,
- they’ll go. And say, Burton”—an inspiration coming to Munford—“come
- on down with us. I’ll promise you the time of your life.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I ought to have put it up to you differently, I guess, and saved my
- breath,” said Burton in disgust. “You’re just a hulk of bone and muscle
- and your head’s wood. You can lift a timber and swing a pick or axe
- because you’ve got the strength. But that’s all you know, or all you’re
- good for!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The cool contempt in Burton’s voice stung Mun-ford more than the words
- themselves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is that so!” he snarled, resorting to his favorite habit of blowing on
- his knuckles. “I’d show you fast enough what I’m good for, you runt, if
- you was a little bigger!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Maybe you’ll find I’m big enough one of these days,” said Burton,
- sharply. “Now I’ll put it to you straight so that you’ll understand. I’ll
- show you whether I can stop the gang going to Big Cloud or not. No man
- rides on the construction trains after to-day without a pass signed by me.
- That’s orders! If the men don’t like it, you can tell them it’s your
- fault. The next row in Big Cloud wouldn’t stop at fists. And as for you,
- you wouldn’t come out of it alive.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You needn’t worry about me,” sneered Munford. “I’m——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re a fool! The thickest-headed, trouble-hunting fool it’s ever been
- my cursed luck to run against!” exclaimed Burton angrily.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford brushed his great shock of hair out of his eyes with a nervous
- sweep of his hand. “I ain’t ever before taken the back talk from any man
- that I’ve taken from you—without hurtin’ him,” he said thickly,
- rising from his chair. “And I’m goin’ to get out of here before I hurt <i>you!</i>”
- He walked quickly across the shanty and swung around in the doorway. “By
- God, I wish you was bigger!” he flung out.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford walked back to the men’s camp and listened to their conversation
- awhile in sullen silence. They were still on the same topic and were
- waxing more enthusiastic each minute.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw, dry up!” said Munford, cutting in at last. “It’ll be a long time
- before any of you see Big Cloud again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who says so?” demanded McGuire, aggressively.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford jerked his thumb in the direction of the foreman’s shanty. “Him,”
- he said laconically.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How’s he goin’ to stop it? What for? What’s the matter with him, anyway?
- It’s none of his business!” the men were talking in chorus.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s fussy about gettin’ his dinky little bridge through,” sneered
- Munford. “He says he ain’t goin’ to have broken heads interferin’ with it,
- either. From now on you’ve got to get a pass to ride on the construction
- train. Likewise, he said if you didn’t like it I was to tell you”—here
- Munford paused to glance around the circle—“that it’s my fault and
- I’m the cause of all the trouble.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What did you tell him?” demanded the crew.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I told him to go hang. What else would I tell him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bully for you!” shouted McGuire, slapping his leg in delight. “Did he
- fire you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- This was something Munford had not thought of.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fire me?” he repeated. Then slowly, pondering the idea: “No, he didn’t.
- It’s funny he didn’t, though; I gave him back talk ‘enough.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw,” said McGuire, with a sneer, “that’s easy. He’d have fired you quick
- enough if he dared.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why,” said Munford innocently. “I wouldn’t have touched him if he had.
- He’s too small to touch—I told him that, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Tain’t that,” McGuire returned. “He ain’t afraid of any man, big or
- little. I’ll give him credit for that. It’s his bridge, and that means his
- job, that he’s afraid of.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s my gettin’ fired got to do with the bridge?” demanded Munford, in
- amazement.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Aw, go on; you know what I mean. If Burton has trouble with us the bridge
- work stops, don’t it? And the company’ll be askin’ Burton the reason why,
- won’t they? Well, Burton knows there’s some things we won’t stand for, and
- firin’ you after we brought you up here is one of them. And that’s right,
- too, eh, mates?”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was emphatic assent from the men.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford, a little flustered at this wholesale exhibition of homage,
- fidgeted nervously. “Much obliged,” said he, clumsily. “Don’t put
- yourselves out on my account. I——”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s all right,” broke in McGuire. “Burton won’t try it; he knows
- better. As for gettin’ a pass to get out of camp, I dunno about <i>that</i>.”
- He got up, stretched himself and yawned. “The way I look at it, it’s more
- up to Munford here than it is to Burton. I’m goin’ to turn in, but I’ll
- say first that the night Munford says Big Cloud, then Big Cloud it is for
- Bridge Gang No. 3. That’s the way we talked it before we knew about Burton
- mixin’ in, and I reckon it stands just the same now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And the camp retired to their bunks and to sleep, voicing McGuire’s
- sentiments and swearing a unanimous and enthusiastic allegiance to
- Munford; all but Munford himself who did not sleep but lay awake tossing
- restlessly though, withal, in a very self-satisfied frame of mind.
- </p>
- <p>
- This outburst of popularity pleased Munford exceedingly. The more so that
- it was directly traceable to his great strength and physical courage of
- which he was inordinately vain. He began to regard Burton with contempt.
- Burton was a man whose backbone wobbled when it came to a showdown! As
- Munford turned the situation over in his mind his contempt grew stronger
- until he came to decide that he despised the little foreman heartily.
- Would he, he demanded of himself with a snort, have fired a man that had
- talked to him as he had talked to Burton, had he been in Burton’s place?
- He would! And the gang, bridge, job and everything else could go to
- blazes! Munford sat up to emphasize his feelings on this point with a
- crash of his fist on the side of the bunk. He thrilled with the fierce joy
- of enacting just such a rôle as his imagination depicted, despising Burton
- accordingly for lacking in what were, to him, the essentials of a man. He
- decided, as he fell asleep, to make the foreman’s life a burden to him—and
- he did.
- </p>
- <p>
- No flagrant violation or disobedience of orders was there, instead the
- inauguration of a petty little system of nagging that embraced every
- indignity Munford could think of. And the range of his attack was from
- profound and exaggerated attention and politeness to the utter and
- complete ignoring of the very existence of such a person as Alan Burton,
- foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3. While the gang, taking their cue from
- Munford, would shift from one extreme to the other with a precision and
- significance that cut deeper into a man of Burton’s high-strung, nervous
- temperament than any other form of torture they could have devised.
- </p>
- <p>
- Three times during three days Burton, who was afraid of no man or
- aggregation of men, took the bull by the horns and struck Munford a
- violent blow in an effort to bring matters to a head. On the first
- occasion the gang watched the action with a gasp of mixed pity and
- admiration—looking for Burton’s instant annihilation. But Munford,
- with a bit of a laugh, only reached out and grasping Burton’s neck held
- him wriggling, helplessly, impotently, at arm’s length. “You got to grow,
- boy; just keep quiet now, I ain’t going to hurt you,” he taunted. And the
- gang promptly lost their faint appreciation of Burton’s nerve in their
- relish of the ridiculous figure cut by the white-faced, raging foreman.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was dirty work, and deep down in his heart Munford knew it. But his
- better nature no sooner manifested itself by sundry pricks of conscience
- than it was smothered beneath the new sense of authority and command that
- was now his for the first time in his experience; and which, catering as
- it did to his peacock vanity, was paramount to all things else. The work
- lagged sadly and fell behind. The daily reports Burton signed and sent
- down to headquarters became worse and worse.
- </p>
- <p>
- Each day, too, the feud between the dives at Big Cloud and Bridge Gang No.
- 3, fanned by the crews of the construction trains, who taunted McGuire and
- the men with cowardice, grew stronger. For the trainmen, having no idea of
- disregarding Burton’s orders and allowing the bridge men to ride down on
- the empties, rubbed it in until the gang writhed under their gibes.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford did not come in for much of this personally. The trainmen, none of
- them, seemed to display any particular hankering for discussing the
- question in his presence; but he got it second-hand from McGuire and the
- gang. The outcome of it all was a decision one night after supper to board
- the construction train the following evening, Burton, the train crew and
- the company to the contrary, and go down to Big Cloud if they had to run
- the train themselves. Munford concurred in the decision by blowing very
- gently on his knuckles. It looked bad for the peace and quiet of Big
- Cloud; and it looked bad for Burton’s standing with the company.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford, as commander-in-chief, and McGuire, as chief of staff, withdrew
- from the circle and strolled off by themselves to perfect their plans for
- the next day’s campaign, taking the trail in the direction of Big Cloud—a
- trail still called, but now a passable road due to the traffic incident to
- the building of the Hill Division, whose right of way it paralleled from
- Big Cloud to the ford at Twin Bear Creek. At the end of a quarter of a
- mile the two men sat down on a felled tree by the side of the trail to
- talk. Some ten minutes had passed when McGuire, in the midst of a graphic
- description of what they would do to Pete McGonigle and the rest, suddenly
- stopped and gripped Munford tightly by the shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Keep mum,” he cautioned. “There’s someone comin’!”
- </p>
- <p>
- In the bright moonlight they could make out the figure of a man about a
- hundred yards down the road coming toward them from the camp.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He walks like Burton,” whispered McGuire. “What the devil is he followin’
- us for? Get back into the trees and let him pass.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They moved noiselessly a little deeper into the wood that fringed the
- road, and lying flat, watched the man who was approaching.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s Burton,” McGuire announced at last.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford grunted assent.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s been followin’ us all right, and now he’s goin’ to wait for us to
- come back,” continued McGuire, as Burton halted within a few yards of them
- and sat down to smoke. “Well, we’ll give him a run for his money. He can
- wait a while, I’m thinkin’.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed. McGuire began to tire of his
- self-selected game of hide and seek, “Come on,” said he, “let’s go out and
- see what he wants.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wait,” Munford answered. “There’s someone comin’ from Big Cloud way. It’s
- not us Burton’s after. Listen!”
- </p>
- <p>
- There was the faint beat of horse’s hoofs gradually drawing nearer. Then
- presently rider and horse loomed out of the shadows and Burton, getting
- up, stepped out into the middle of the road.
- </p>
- <p>
- The horseman drew up beside him. “That you, Burton?” he called softly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said Burton, shortly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You got Pete’s letter, then,” the man went on, dismounting from his
- horse. “I suppose it’s all right to talk here. No one around, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “As well here as anywhere. Only cut it short.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, there ain’t any hurry,” returned the man, with a laugh. “Wait till I
- tie my horse, then we can sit down and chew it over comfortable.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now,” he went on, that task performed, “what I came to see you about was
- this fellow Munford.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” demanded Burton, “what about him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It looks to us down to Big Cloud, from the way the fellows on the
- construction trains are talkin’, you ain’t got any cause to love him, eh?
- So Pete figured you and him could deal. You want to get rid of him, don’t
- you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wish to God I’d never seen his face!” exclaimed Burton, with great
- bitterness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure! That’s the idea. You don’t want him; we do want him—bad!
- There’s nothin’ against the rest of the men; we’ll forget all about that.
- It’s just Munford we’re after.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why don’t you get him, then?” said Burton curtly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’re goin’ to,” the man replied, with a nasty laugh. “We’re goin’ to,
- all right. It’s a fair deal. You’re on, eh? Pete said you’d jump at the
- chance to sit in. We want you to fire him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That all I’m to do?” asked Burton, quietly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, that’s all there is to it—except this.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford’s hand closed on his companion’s arm in a tight, spasmodic grip as
- Pete’s emissary produced a wad of bills and began to peel off the outer
- ones.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Three hundred plunks,” said the man, extending the money he had
- abstracted from the roll to Burton. “Pretty good for just firin’ a man
- we’ve been lookin’ for you to fire for the last week, anyway. Besides,
- there’s been some talk down at headquarters about you not bein’ able to
- handle your men, and about them gettin’ someone that can. Pete says not to
- bother about that, he’ll fix it for you. Here, take the money.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Suppose I fired him,” said Burton, slowly, “where’d he go?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you care where he goes, so long as you get rid of him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He couldn’t go West,” went on Burton, paying no attention to the other’s
- remark; “so he’d have to go East—that’s Big Cloud—and <i>murder!</i>”
- He turned fiercely, savagely on the man. “You dirty, low-lived hound!” he
- flashed. “You offer me three hundred dollars to murder a man, do you? You
- wonder why I’ve stood for what I did, do you, you scrimp! Fire him, eh, to
- get a cowardly knife or shot in his back! You think I didn’t know what
- would happen if I let him out, eh? Get out of here, you cur! And get out
- now—while you <i>can!</i>” Burton’s voice rasped, hoarse with
- passion. He turned abruptly away and strode quickly in the direction of
- the camp.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hold on, wait a minute, Burton,” cried the other, following him. “Don’t
- get batty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Unconsciously Munford had tightened his grip on McGuire’s arm until the
- latter whimpered with the pain, and now Munford lifted him bodily to his
- feet making cautiously for the spot where the horse was standing. The two
- figures were still discernible, and Burton’s angry voice continued to
- reach the listeners, though the words were now indistinguishable.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford’s face in the moonlight was colorless, the muscles around his
- mouth twitched convulsively. “D’ye hear what they said? D’ye hear what
- they said? <i>My God!</i> d’ye hear it all?” he was mumbling incoherently
- in McGuire’s ear, his eyes strained up the road.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I heard it. Let go of my arm, you’re breakin’ it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s comin’ back,” said Munford, hoarsely.
- </p>
- <p>
- Burton had disappeared around a turn in the road and the man, after
- hesitating a moment, began to retrace his steps to his horse, muttering
- fiercely to himself as he came along. As he reached for the bridle,
- Munford leaped out and grasped him by the throat, choking back the man’s
- cry of terror.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You make a noise,” snarled Munford, “and I’ll finish you! Oh, it’s you,
- eh? Look here, Mac, it’s the cuss that ran the roulette wheel that night
- at Pete’s. So my price is three hundred, eh? Well, hand it out. <i>Quick!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Slowly the fellow put his hand in his pocket and for the second time that
- night pulled out his roll.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford’s anger seemed to have vanished. He laughed softly as he took the
- money.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What are you going to do with me?” whined the gambler.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford made no answer. In the imperfect light, he was laboriously
- counting the bills. McGuire watched the operation, at the same time
- keeping an eye on their prisoner.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Two sixty—eighty—three hundred,” said Munford at last,
- cramming that amount into his pocket and handing back by far the larger
- part of the roll to the man. “What am I goin’ to do with you? Nothin’! You
- get on that horse and ride back to Pete. I want him to know this. Tell him
- all about it. Tell him Munford told you to tell him. That’s worth more
- than breakin’ your neck—and that’s all that saves you from gettin’
- it broke, savvy? You tell him <i>I’ve</i> got the three hundred, and I’ll
- give him his chance at me for it one of these days.. And when I do—My
- God, <i>you ride</i> before I begin with you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The fellow glanced fearfully from Munford to McGuire and back again to
- Munford to assure himself that he was free to go. Then he clambered
- frantically into the saddle and lashing his beast in a frenzy of terror
- disappeared down the trail.
- </p>
- <p>
- Munford, with swift revulsion of mood, threw himself down on the grass,
- burying his face in his hands. Not a word from McGuire; he walked
- awkwardly up and down, whistling under his breath. After a minute Munford
- looked up.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I got to square this with Burton,” he said brokenly.
- </p>
- <p>
- McGuire nodded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a better man than you and me and the whole gang put together”—Munford’s
- tones were fiercely assertive.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is that,” assented McGuire, with conviction.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was silence for a moment between them; then McGuire spoke: “Why
- didn’t you take it all?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take it all!” flared Munford. “I’m no thief, am I? Well, then, what’s the
- matter with you? That’s my price, ain’t it? Three hundred. That’s what
- Pete offered for a chance to get his paws on me. Well, <i>I’ll</i> give
- him his chance, you heard me promise, didn’t you? That’s right, eh? That’s
- Pete’s proposition, and the money’s mine, ain’t it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is,” said McGuire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is, and it ain’t,” said Munford. “Burton <i>could</i> have had it if
- he’d sold me out, couldn’t he? Well, then, I’m goin’ to see he gets it
- anyway.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He wouldn’t take it, not by any means, he wouldn’t,” objected McGuire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not outright, he wouldn’t,” agreed Munford. “I know that well enough. We
- got to fix it so he won’t know where it come from, and so it will square
- me with him, and you fellows, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How you goin’ to do that?” demanded McGuire. “I dunno,” said Munford.
- “We’ll talk it over with the boys. Come on back to camp.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The next day and the day after, the gang worked like Trojans, and the lack
- of any sneer or incivility on their part, coupled with a subdued,
- expectant excitement that the men tried fruitlessly to hide, made Burton
- more anxious and ill at ease than during the days that had gone before. It
- looked like the lull before the storm; and he wondered bitterly what
- culminating piece of deviltry they were hatching.
- </p>
- <p>
- To the taunts of the train crews the gang grinned and said nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the second day a package, addressed to Munford, came up from the East,
- and at noon hour the men handed it around from one to another in awestruck
- wonder at the magnificence of the solid gold repeater that chimed the
- quarters, halves and hours, and split the seconds into fractions. It was
- indeed a beauty. Maybe the chain was a little massive, but the men opined
- that it was therefore strong. They pried open the case to read the
- inscription over whose wording they had wrestled most of a night.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nifty, ain’t it?” cried McGuire, admiringly; and he read it aloud: “‘This
- is to certify that Alan Burton is as square as they make them, and Munford
- and the gang are sorry. So help us!’” They delivered it solemnly to
- Munford, who was to make the presentation, and started in a body for
- Burton’s shanty. Burton met them at the door, his face hard and set.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So it’s a showdown at last, eh, boys?” he laughed grimly. “Well, what is
- it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The men shoved Munford bodily forward and he stood balancing himself
- sheepishly, first on one foot and then on the other, as he faced Burton.
- He cleared his throat painfully once or twice, then he found his voice.
- From a point of oratory or rhetoric it was perhaps the lamest presentation
- speech on record, for Munford suddenly thrust the watch and chain into the
- astounded Burton’s hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here, take it,” he sputtered. “It’s all written out on the inside.” And
- breaking through the men, he turned and fled incontinently.
- </p>
- <div style="height: 6em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
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