Francis Lynde

“ Limiting themselves to a single haversack in which to carry a noon-day lunch; to the haversack and Dick’s field-glass; they struck out without telling anybody where they were going. Since it was impossible to make the climb on the canyon-facing side of the mountain, they made a long detour, zigzagging back and forth through the forests on the western slope of the peak, and stopping now and then as they gained altitude to catch their breath and to admire the magnificent view which opened out in wider and still wider spreadings as they ascended. ”

“ For the greater part of its length the canyon of the Tourmaline, up which the two railroads were racing, each straining every nerve to be the first to reach the newly opened gold district at the headwaters of the river, was a water-cut channel through the mountains with beetling cliffs or steep wooded slopes for its boundaries. But at this particular point some prehistoric convulsion of nature had opened a half-mile gap in the south wall, and through this broad gap, coming down from the high shoulder of Bull Peak, poured the vast river of disintegrated shale. ”

“ That day, the last day of terrible toil in the three months’ race between the two railroads, was the shortest that Dick Maxwell and Larry Donovan had ever lived through. With a thousand things to think of and to do, the hours flew by on wings. Rail by rail, with clock-like regularity, the steel went into place on the completed grade, and almost before they knew it the thunder of the blasts in the rock cutting which was holding the “enemy” had withdrawn into a distant background. ”

“ By some disastrous mischance the air-brakes had leaked and loosened their grip on the wheels; the inconsequent bit of wood that Brannigan’s fireman had thrust under a wheel had crushed to powder; and the heavy steel car with its human load was slipping away down the siding, gaining momentum as it went.
Now a runaway car on a crooked track, every mile of which is a down-grade, is about the deadliest thing that can ever happen on a mountain railroad. At sight of the moving Pullman the men of the excursion party, with Mr. Ackerman setting the pace, made a frantic dash to catch it. ”

“ A little way back from the cliff edge two men, with a pine-tree for a snubbing stake, were slowly paying out a rope at the end of which the spider-like bracket setter was dangling; and, lying on his stomach at the brink, a third man was watching the descent and calling out directions to the “anchor” man at the tree.
“Makes a fellow feel sort of creepy, doesn’t it?” said Dick, as they took a cautious look over the edge into the gorge below, and Larry grinned at him. ”

“ Meanwhile Larry and Dick strolled up to the crossing as a couple of fellows with less than nothing to do and sat down on a pile of cross-ties within a few feet of the O. C. track. Every time the blocking train jingled past in its slow, back-and-forth sentry beat the O. C. engineer, a big, stubbly-bearded man who looked, as Dick said, like a twinkly-eyed bandit, leaned out of his cab window and had something to say to them. Each time Dick grinned up at him and handed back joke for joke ”

“ The two racing machines, the beetle and the elephant, had just flicked around a curve to a long straight-away, and up ahead, partly hidden by the thick wooding of another curve, they both saw the reflection from the beam of a westbound headlight. The time freight was coming.
It was small wonder that Dickie Maxwell lost his nerve for just one flickering instant.
“Stop her, Larry—stop her!” he yelled. “If we keep on, the smash’ll catch us, too!”
But Larry Donovan was grimly hanging on to that priceless gift so lately discovered; namely, the gift which enables a fellow to hang on. ”

“ Another locomotive was run out, a train of two flat-cars was coupled on, and with these loaded with the hastily aroused men of the night shift, a record-breaking dash was made up the canyon.
So it came about that Larry and Dick, and their two willing but weary helpers, were barely at the beginning of the big digging job when the train darted around the down-canyon curve, and a few minutes later as many [107] men as the shallow tunnel cutting could hold were eating their way into the slide like a hundred-armed steam shovel. ”

“ Miss Bess Holcombe never missed a chance to make an embarrassed boy still more embarrassed, if she could help it.
“No,” Larry blurted out; “it’s Irish.” And then he turned his back on her and began to talk to Bart Johnson, telling him where he was to run slowly, and what he was coming to around the curves ahead.
“Dear me!” said the girl, in an aside to Dick, “what a bear of a boy! He’s—he’s a workingman, isn’t he?”
Dick bridled at once.
“See here, Bess,” he frowned; “down in Brewster, or back in New York where you live, you can draw all the little, no-account social lines you want to. ”

“ THE BUG AND THE ELEPHANT Engine 331, the biggest mountain passenger-train puller on the Nevada Short Line, was a Pacific-type compound, with a bewildering clutter of machinery underneath that made a wiper’s job a sort of puzzle problem; the problem being to get the various gadgets clean without knocking one’s head off too many times against the down-hanging machinery. Larry Donovan, mopping the last of the gadgets as the shop quitting-time whistle blew, called it a day’s work, flung down his handful of oily waste and crawled out of the concrete pit. ”

“ On the left the canyon wall drops sheer to the water; but on the right there is a shelving, sliding bank of loose rock at the foot of the cliff. Along this bank two workmanlike young fellows, wearing the corduroys and high lace-boots of the engineers, are making their way slowly up-stream, scanning every foot of the shelving talus ledge as they cover it.
“Gee! Some fierce old place to build a railroad, I’ll tell the world!” said Dick Maxwell, the lighter-built of the two, clawing for footholds on the steep bank. “Find anything yet, Larry?” ”

“ A few turns among the hills served to efface even the sounds of the work battle, and the wilderness stillness, after the clamor and din, was almost deafening.
“What do you reckon the chief wants us to find out, particularly?” Dick asked as they plodded along.
“Everything that goes on, I guess,” Larry answered. “The O. C. people know that we’re coming; they’ve found it out long before this time; and they’ll be rushing material out ahead as fast as they can. Because, you see, if they block the track for us, they’ll have to block it for themselves, as well.” ”

“ Reaching the temporary “front” camp at Pine Gulch, in a little park-like widening of the canyon, they left the surveying instruments in the office tent and walked on up the gorge to report for duty to Goldrick, the assistant engineer in charge of the rock cutting in the Narrows.
“Well, you got back all right, did you?” said Goldrick, as they came up. “How are things looking down along?”
They told him of the O. C. trestle-building, and of the slope-side gang they had seen just below the Pine Gulch camp. While they were talking a distant thunder-burst of heavy blasts jarred upon the air. ”

“ The shout that was raised might easily have been heard by the “enemy” army on the other side of the valley. Cries of “Bully for the lads!” “Chips off the old block!” “There’s the right stuff for ye!” “Burkett for our foreman!”—from the carpenters; “Tregarvon for ours!”—from the track-layers.
Larry waved his arms like a college yell leader.
“Go to it!” he shouted. “Let’s make this the biggest day we’ve ever had! In with that trestle, Burkett. If you can’t read the blue-prints, we’ll help you. Let’s go!” ”

“ Ackerman would do if he knew all that we know,” he threw out.
“You needn’t wonder about that,” Larry interposed quickly. “The chief stands up so straight that he leans over backward—you know he does. He’d give those O. C. people the benefit of the doubt, every time. No, it’s up to us, Dick. If we keep still about this cave he’ll dynamite the dam, because, so far as he will know, it will be the only thing that can be done. If we tell him, he’ll dynamite this cave outlet, instead—naturally.” ”

“ With the exception of one mining-camp—Red Butte—and a single railroad track—the Red Butte branch of the Short Line—skirting its western edge, that half of the clothes-basket is a jumbled wilderness of wooded hills just about as Nature left it. ”

“ Larry saw Dick drop from the engine step, run for the switch, and jerk the lever over to the outlet position for the 717. He had a fleeting hope that Dick would stay where he was; one life was enough to be risked in the perilous chase ahead. But as the engine was passing, Dick swung on.
“Let’s go!” he cried; and Larry, releasing the brake, let the light engine shoot away in chase of the vanishing Pullman. ”

“ With the shades of night creeping ghost-like through the solemn forest they hit the invisible trail again; heading westward and ever westward, rolling down steep hillsides into deep gulches, and crawling painfully up the corresponding steep on the other side, stumbling blindly over fallen trees and rocks; going on and on after their feet and legs were so numb and stiff that they could hardly be sure they had any, and with their eyes, for which they had small use in the darkness, leaden heavy with sleep. ”

“ I grant you that it was nothing but sheer boy-curiosity that took those two fellows up on Bull Peak; but there you are—none of the rest of us had the boy-curiosity. And that Donovan lad, with his, ‘it just happened’: if he doesn’t make good all the way along, it won’t be because he doesn’t keep his eyes open and his wits on edge. There are times when he seems years older than he claims to be.”
It was at this precise moment that Larry, out in the cook shack, had just pried open a can of baked beans for Dick and another for himself. ”

“ A railroad construction camp is a good bit the same way; nobody in it is going to take the trouble to ride herd on you in the field of good morals, or to decide nice questions of right and wrong for you. You’ve got to stand upon your own feet and do those things for yourselves.
“You’ve been learning fast since you came on this job, and I’ve been proud of both of you. You’ve shown aptness and courage and resourcefulness; qualities that go a long way toward making a good engineer; a good man in any walk in life. ”

“ I’ll be wiping engines for a few months, and then maybe I’ll get a job firing a switching engine in the yard. A year or two of that may get me on a road engine; and if I make good, a few years more’ll move me over to the right-hand side of the cab.”
“Good enough,” said John Donovan. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing—except that the last boost will be the end of it; you know it will, Dad. It’s mighty seldom that a locomotive engineer ever gets to be anything else, no matter how good an engineer he is. ”

“ After having made a careful examination of the new obstacle, the chief of construction had summoned his three assistants to discuss the best means of attacking it.
“It’s my notion that bulkheading is the only thing,” summed up Goldrick, who had been directing the steam-shovel operations during the day. “We’re not going to get anywhere at all unless we put in a retaining wall of some sort. The stuff slides in faster than we can take it out, and when it starts there doesn’t seem to be any end to it. The entire surface of the shale gets in motion as far up the slope as you can see.” ”

“ By this time the pressure in the storage tank had been pumped up to its maximum and the safety-valve was hissing shrilly. Larry, lying under the car, gave the word, and as the air whistled into the brake cylinder of the car, the lever moved out, the hitch held bravely, and the pipe was thrust into the clay bank the full length of the stroke.
Deftly readjusting the hitch, Larry yelled again, and again Dick gave the needed twitch to the inlet valve. “She’s going—going right along!” the hitch-shifter called out from his hard bed on the cross-ties. “Now, then; once more!” ”