William Wallace Cook

“ The fast train vanished into the gloom to the eastward, and the wreckers were halting on the gravel spur and making ready to back down to the main track and find out what in Sam Hill Number Twenty-eight meant by treating an extra's rights in that high-handed fashion.
The engine crew ahead of the derrick was as badly demoralized as the crew ahead of the mail car, for both had rubbed elbows with death in that agonizing moment when the opposing head lights crossed. ”

“ The engine hauling the wreckers broke from the screen of timber, and Harding found himself full in the headlight's glare. He rushed toward it, jumped clear of the rails to the switch stand, and the light helped him to get the key in the lock; and then he swung back on the target.
The big engine, the flat with the derrick, the box car behind, and the waycar at the end, slewed to the spur and leaped and jumped over the poorly ballasted track that led to the gravel pit. ”

“ And, William”—here she lifted a forefinger admonishingly—“if you ever try to grow a beard and get work on the division under a false name, I'll never speak to you again! The idea! You're not a skulker, and that name of yours is one to be proud of.”
“Just what I was telling him, Milly,” came the voice of Mrs. Harding from the open door. “I'm glad you feel about that as I do. If Mr. Trawl can't give William a chance under his own name, then he doesn't want the chance.”
“Let him make a chance for himself,” answered Milly. “He wouldn't be a Harding if he couldn't do that.” ”

“ A struggle on the top of that lurching box car would fall little short of madness. And why was this stranger, who was a passenger and should have been an innocent bystander, so rabidly coming to the aid of Chris Davy? Here was a mystery beyond Harding's power to solve. But Harding would retreat no farther. If he must fight for his passage, he would take his enemies one at a time. ”

“ The dispatcher had to stop the fast train here in order not to lay out the wreckers—and so he was playing directly into the hands of the holdup fellows. What a situation! You left the stop signal displayed and went over to the boarding house after the day man. When you came back, the stop signal had disappeared, for Higgins had crawled out of the baggage room and pulled it in to foil the robbers, not knowing about the washout at Hesperous or the new orders for Twenty-eight. There's a game of cross-purposes in all this that makes a man's head swim! ”

“ If Chris Davy happened to be caught in the web, it would mean nothing to Harding one way or the other.
The station lights threw but a feeble glow over the spot where Harding climbed to the platform. He stumbled over something at the edge of the planks, and found it to be a velocipede car. The speeder had been taken from the tracks, and carelessly left where some railroad man stood a very good chance of tripping over it and doing himself an injury. Harding pushed the speeder to the other side of the platform and went into the station building. ”

“ You'll never have a better chance to get it out of your system.
“I want an engine, Mr. Trawl,” said Harding respectfully.
“I suppose,” and the superintendent slowly struck a match, “that you're not particular whether it's a switch bumper in the yards or one of the new ten-wheelers on the fast-passenger run?”
“No,” was the answer, while the wistful gray eyes searched the official's face, “I'm not particular. I've knocked around, tin-canned and double-crossed by my record on this division, until I'm tired of it. Either I'll get that private hoodoo of mine, or it will get me. ”

“ Those lips paid tribute to the impetuous William, and no grudging tribute, either.
“Now, Miss Kent,” said William, straightening erect, “if you'll just come up on the porch and sit down, we'll have a bit of a talk. I'll tell you what Hardluck has been doing, and what he intends to do. You see,” he finished, “I'm going to change that name before I give you a chance to change yours.”
“Is there much of a chance?” she queried archly, springing lightly up the steps.
“Watch my smoke, Milly!” he answered. ”

“ But Harding reasoned that the man, if he had learned of his loss, must have supposed that the bag with the money had fallen into the right of way at about the spot where the set-to occurred, and to go hunting for so small an object as a tobacco sack among the rocks would have been worse than looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. ”

“ After the men up and down the line hear what happened at Cardigan, they'll be glad enough to work with you. You've pulled the fangs of the jinx, my lad, and I don't see how this road can get along without you. Harding”—and Trawl stretched out his hand with a smile as he spoke—“it will be a pleasure to have you on the pay rolls once more.” ”

“ A pleased look crossed Milly's face.
“That's the way I like to hear you talk, William,” said she. “Every man ought to be bigger than his troubles. When you left the road, you know, I thought it looked like a stampede. It wasn't like you to show a white feather on the firing line.”
“Trawl was back of the stampede. You remember, Milly, he said I was too big a load for the division to carry, and that he was obliged to dispense with my valuable services. ”

“ Davy retreated a few steps, and Harding released his antagonist and carefully drew away. The man in the leather cap got up sullenly, muttering to himself.
“Well, he can ride, if that's the way of it,” snorted Davy, “but he can't roost in the waycar. I've had more'n I can stand from him for one night. Come on, Dan.”
The conductor retraced his way cautiously to the lookout, the other man following him. When they had disappeared the brakeman slumped to his knees and began digging something out from under the boards of the toe-path—an object wedged between the boards and the car roof. ”

“ THE TOBACCO BAG.
HARDING had been away from the Jerkwater Division for a year, but he had managed at least once a month to get back to Divide. The old mother was there, and William was all she had left. No matter how difficult it was for William to “breast the blows of circumstance,” he never forgot or neglected his filial duties.
The women in the homes of railroad men, of men who run the trains, never know when they send their breadwinners forth whether they will ever come back. ”

“ Dad's on the fast express run to-night, and I know he'd let me ride with him on the engine.”
“That wouldn't do, Milly,” protested Harding; “never in the world. I'll fight my own battles, little girl.”
Anson Kent, Milly's father, was one of the best engineers on the division. He had been on the left side of the cab at Rolling Stone, and it was William's father who had flung him from the gangway to safety.
“I guess you're right about that, William,” said Milly. “There's one man on this road that's not afraid to work with you, and that's dad. ”

“ Lightning zigzagged out of the inky clouds. In the glare he might have taken some account of his desperate situation had the rain not blinded him. As it was, he was conscious of no more than a dull gleam through the curtain of water. The ripping roar of the thunder seemed to shake the whole mountain. ”

“ The police, the paper stated, had absolutely no clew to work on, and it was doubtful whether the robbers would ever be apprehended or the stolen money recovered.
“I'm not the only fellow that's playing in hard luck,” thought Harding, as he tossed the paper aside and reached into a pocket for his pipe. “We're never so bad off in this world, I guess, but what we can look around and see some one else who is worse off. Now I guess——”
He had his pipe, and was fishing in his coat for the half bag of “smoking” given to him by Lansing. ”

“ Trawl won't listen to you, now. He has given advice, and you're not taking it. He's a man, I think, who likes to have his way. I can't imagine how he'd be so cruel hard on one of our family. Did you tell Milly about that message he sent to Sweetbriar?”
Telling his mother about that message was one thing, but repeating it to Milly, with all the attending circumstances, was quite another. Harding's pride balked at letting the girl know the extremity to which he had been reduced. ”

“ Harding laughed grimly as he turned back.
“It's up to me to find Higgins,” he thought, “and if I can't find him in time it's up to me to lay out the fast mail and express and give the wreckers a clear track through Cardigan.”
He reasoned swiftly as to what had happened. The fast freight that had gone into the ditch at Hesperus, followed Twenty-eight, the fast mail and express. Hesperus lay to the west of the mountain about as Cardigan lay to the east. ”

“ He missed his footing when he leaped from the platform to the gloom of the tracks and fell, striking his knee on the rail and rolling over and over in the sharp cinders. In a twinkling he had his feet under him again, and was plunging on. ”

“ That's the reason, Fordney, you couldn't find your man when you went up the Crook City yards to meet Davy's train.”
“That's it, sure,” agreed Fordney.
“I don't know yet, Billy,” continued Trawl, “how you happened to be at Cardigan at just the time a clear-headed, all-around railroad man was needed so badly. How was that?”
Harding explained about his desire to talk with the sheriff and place in legal hands the money belonging to Prebble and the proof regarding those who had robbed him. ”

“ So I'm going back to Crook, to break the hoodoo on the same line of track where it first got me. That's sensible, isn't it?”
“I don't know, Billy,” murmured Lansing, dubious and noncommittal.
“Well, I know? Any man with good, red blood in his 'veins is a fool to lie down and let the hard luck trample all over him. I'm going up to see Trawl, and the old man has got to give me another chance. I'm entitled to it in my own right; and then there's the mother, up at Divide. ”

“ The grades were steep, and the little speeder needed a curb, rather than a spur, every foot of the way. With the gale at his back, Harding exerted his strength against the jumping levers. Hard work had strengthened his muscles, but they buckled under the fierce strain he imposed on them.
The question that early presented itself to. him was this: Could he hold out until he reached the foot of that twisting twenty-mile grade? There was but one answer to that question: He must hold out, for if the speeder got beyond his control, it would leave the rails and either maim or kill him. ”

“ He had got his discharge, you see, before the company had a chance to hand it to him.”
“Don't you think it's in a man to live down such a hard run of luck?” inquired Harding quietly.
“It's in you, lad, if it's in anybody; but”—and O'Grady shook his head ominously—“it's far and away too deep a subject for a mere night man to discuss.” ”

“ If Twenty-eight isn't in sight, run over to boarding house and get Blake on the job.”
There it was! The same old distrust of Hardluck Harding was cropping out. Perhaps it was only natural that the dispatcher should want a regular employee of the road on the job instead of a chance outsider. Harding was worn and tired, and an easy prey to bitterness. He had little time to consider the matter, and left the key to hurry out on the station platform.
A hill to the west hid trains approaching from that direction until they were close upon the Cardigan station. ”

“ Harding's prisoner was half dragged and half carried to the station platform, bound with ropes and laid on the floor of the waiting room. Higgins had crawled into the, station, and he lay in a corner, haggard and bleeding and almost spent.
“I'll get division headquarters on the wire,” said Harding, “and have a doctor sent up to look after the night man. You wreckers had better be hammering the fishplates—I can do all that's to be done here.” ”

“ The sheriff turned on Trawl. “What sort of freight conductors have you got on your line, anyhow?” he demanded.
“Well,” grunted Trawl, “we'll have one less of the wrong sort before I get through with Davy—you can bank on that. Looks to me as though Davy was in bad, all around. He brought at least one of the hoodlums back with him from the west end—probably he brought the other one, too, and maybe more—and he dropped the crowd off at Cardigan, to play hob with Higgins and fix the signals to stop Twenty-eight, so they could hop aboard and go through the express car. ”

“ Harding stated the facts briefly, keeping himself in the background as much as possible, considering the star part he had been obliged to play in the proceedings.
“Well, I'll be blamed!” muttered Berdyn. “So that”—and he held his lantern in front of the man in the reefer jacket—“is one of the gang that was layin' to stick up the fast train!”
“And Harding whipped us over upon the spur just in the nick of time to keep us from going into Twenty-eight!” exclaimed the wondering Hackelmyer. “I guess his luck must have changed. But we've lost too much time here, Berdyn,” he fretted ”

“ It's Western Union business, and the railroad has nothing to do with it.”
“Sure, I'll keep it under my hat, Billy,” sighed O'Grady, “but you've got me going, for fair. Before I send the message I'll just help you get the speeder on the rails. And I'll loan ye a lantern. It's a poor light for those twenty twisting miles, but maybe it'll help you to save your fool neck. Just a minute, lad.”
The night man took a spare lantern down from a hook, shook it to make sure there was oil in it, then lifted the globe and touched a match to the wick. After that, he led the way to the platform. ”

“ Prebble, his five hundred dollars in his pocket, had been watched and waylaid within a stone's throw of Crook City's main street. Badly beaten up and stripped of his possessions, he had been found and taken to the railroad company's hospital. ”

“ It's none of your affair, anyhow, and Davy will have to explain his foolishness to the superintendent.”
If the man said anything in reply Harding did not hear it. The fellow kept coming on, and Harding retreated to the other end of the box and perched on the brake wheel.
The man kept his feet well as the train twisted around the ugly grades and rumbled over the trestles of its twenty-mile climb. If he was not a railroad man now, it seemed plain that he must have been one at some time or other in his career. ”