Chapter XIV: Old 93

The west wire was open, sure enough, and Ralph had accomplished his purpose. He knew it, and he felt a thrill of satisfaction as he heard the sharp tic-tac that announced the receipt of his message. He had raised up off the sounder.

"L. M. due at 11:53. Will hold--9," and 9, Ralph well knew, meant train orders. He had stirred up a hornet's nest for the conspirators, present and absent, and headquarters would soon get busy in running down the plot of the night.

"He's done it!" almost shrieked Grizzly, as the return message conveyed to his expert ear the sure token that Ralph had shrewdly, secretly out-rivaled him. "Did you send a message?" he yelled, jumping at Ralph, both fists raised warningly, while his eyes glared with baffled fury.

"That is what I am here for," replied the young railroader tranquilly. "You had better try and undo what you have already done."

Bang! Seizing an iron bar, the maddened operator smashed into the open west wire, as if that did any good. Then he grabbed at Ralph and threw him brutally to the floor. His foot was raised, as if to wreak a cruel vengeance upon his defenseless victim, but his companion interposed.

"See here, Grizzly," he shouted, snatching up the tool bag and making for the door, "I'm shy!"

The operator bent his head towards the instrument, now clicking away urgently and busily, growled out like a caged tiger, and ran to his desk and ripped open drawer after drawer.

Ralph watched him poke papers and other personal belongings into his pockets. With a final snarl at Ralph, he made after Mason.

"It's a big jump, and a quick one," Ralph heard him say to his hurrying companion, as they bolted down the stairs, "but a thousand dollars goes a long way."

Their footsteps faded away. Ralph was now alone. He listened intently to the messages going over the wires. O.S. messages, consists, right of track orders began to fly in every direction, while ever and constantly from headquarters came the keen imperative hail:

"R.S.--R.S.--sine."

"I've got no 'sine' and nothing to say," replied Ralph, half humorously, despite his forlorn situation. "It's wait for somebody now, and somebody will be along soon--sure enough!"

It was old Glidden who broke in upon the solitude first. He came up the outside stairs in big jumps and burst into the operating room breathless, his eyes agog.

"Hello! H'm! thought something wrong. Up with you, Fairbanks," he shouted, pulling at Ralph and tearing him free from his bonds. "Now, then, out with it, quick! What's up?"

"Foul play."

"I guessed it. The double call enlightened me, and you've got headquarters and down lines wild. Out with it, I say!"

Ralph talked about as fast as he had ever done. There was need for urgency, he felt that. The old operator knew his business.

"I'll mend up this mess," he said promptly. "That smashup--get to the superintendent. Do something anyway. Be a live wire!"

Ralph ran down from the relay room. He could trust Glidden to get at work and straighten out the tangle left behind by the fugitive conspirators.

The north branch was cut out and the operator ordered off duty. Ralph trusted to it that Glidden would try some circuitous work to get word around to the other end of the branch.

"Anyhow, the Limited is safe," ruminated Ralph, as he reached the ground.

His first thought was to get to headquarters. He looked for some stray freight or switch locomotive to help him on his way. He made out a live one on a side track. Ralph ran over to it.

"Hello, Roberts!" he hailed, recognizing the fireman, and a jolly-faced, indolent looking young fellow smiled a welcome. "Going to the Junction?"

"Exactly the other way."

Ralph, his foot on the step of the tender, drew back disappointedly.

"Waiting for Bob Evers. He's my engineer," explained Roberts. "We're to run to Acton, over the old dumping tracks--north branch."

"What!" exclaimed Ralph eagerly. "Right away?"

"No, any time; so we report at 5 a. m. for a short haul on the north branch."

"Look here, Roberts," said the young railroader eagerly, "you think I understand my business?"

"Know it, Fairbanks," nodded the fireman.

"When will Evers be here?"

"Any time within two hours."

"Two hours?" retorted Ralph. "That won't do at all. I'm going for a special order, and I want you to have steam up to the top notch by the time I get back."

"That so," drawled the fireman in his usual indolent fashion, but he arose from his lounging attitude instantly, and his great paw of a hand grasped the coal scoop with zest. "All right."

"Good for you," said Ralph, and he started back to the relay station.

"Mr. Glidden," he spoke rapidly, as he came again into the operating room. "There is no time to lose. All we know is that a wild engine is to be sent down the north branch."

"Yes, that's all we know, and no way to stop it," replied Glidden.

"There may be a way. Ninety-three is fired up for a fly down the dump to Acton."

"Aha!" nodded the old operator, pricking up his ears with interest.

"I don't say it, but it may be that we can get to the branch before the runaway does."

"Suppose so?"

"We'll set the switch and ditch her."

"Good boy!"

"I have no orders, though."

"I'll give them to you--I'll fix it up with headquarters. Fire away."

Ralph was out of the relay station and down the tracks in a hurry. Roberts was bustling about and had fired up the old switch locomotive as if ordered for a mile-a-minute dash.

"What's the programme?" he inquired simply.

"To reach the north branch just as quick as we can."

"All right. You'll run her?"

"Yes."

"You know how."

Ralph was delighted with his helper. Roberts made no delay, asked no questions. Ralph was all nerved up with the exploit in view.

Their destination was a good forty miles to the northwest. The dump tracks comprised practically an abandoned line, and, as Ralph knew, was free of either freight or passenger traffic at that hour. It was occasionally used as a cut-off in cases of emergency. The roadbed was somewhat neglected and uneven, but he had run over it twice within a few months, and as they started out Roberts announced that their special orders had shown clear tracks.

The route was a varied one, and there were some odd old-fashioned curves and a few hair-raising ten per cent. grades.

No. 93 buckled down to work right royally. There were two switches to unset, and then right again before they left the main line. At these points Roberts ran ahead and did emergency duty.

As they slid off onto the dump tracks, Ralph consulted the clock in the cab, estimated distance and set his running pace.

"She acts like a pet lamb," he observed approvingly to Roberts after a five-mile spurt.

"Yes, she'll chase to terminus all right if the coal holds out," replied the fireman. "There's a bunch of sharp curves and steep grades ahead."

"Here's one of them, see," said Ralph, and he pushed back the throttle and let the locomotive move on its own momentum.

The sturdy little engine wheezed through cuts, grunted up grades and coughed down them.

"She's only an old tub," submitted Roberts, though fondly; "but how do you like her, anyway?"

"Famous!" declared Ralph, warming to his work.

The run for a good twenty miles was a series of jarring slides, the wheels pounding the rails and straining towards a half tip over a part of the time.

There was not a signal light along the old, abandoned reach of tracks, and only one or two scattered settlements to pass. At length they came in sight of the signals of the north branch. No. 93 paralleled it on a curving slant for nearly a mile.

They were barely two hundred rods from the point where they would slide out onto the rails of the branch, and Ralph had started to let down on speed, when his helper uttered a vivid shout.

"Fairbanks--something coming!"

Ralph cast his eyes to the other side of the cab. Something, indeed, was coming--coming like a flash, going like a flash. It whizzed even with them, and ahead, like some phantom of the rail. Its course was so swift that the cab lights were a flare, then a disappearing speck.

"We are too late," said Ralph. "That is the runaway."

"So?" questioned Roberts, who only half understood the situation.

"We ran here in the hopes of ditching that engine."

"Did?"

"We're too late."

"Are?"

"Roberts," added the young railroader determinedly, "we've got to catch that runaway."

"Then it's a race, is it?" asked Roberts, grasping the fire rake.

"Yes."

"I'm with you to the finish," announced the doughty fireman of No. 93.