It was late breakfast time when the Transcontinental Limited swept
around the great curve in the eastern fringe of Denver, paused for a
registering moment at “yard limits,” and went clattering in over the
switches to come to rest at the end of its long westward run on the
in-track at the Union Depot.
Having wired ahead to have his mail meet him at the yard limits
registering station, Winton was ready to make a dash for the telegraph
office the moment the train stopped.
“That is our wagon, over there on the narrow-gage,” he said to Adams,
pointing out the waiting mountain train. “Have the porter transfer our
dunnage, and I'll be with you as soon as I can send a wire or two.”
On the way across the broad platform he saw the yard crew cutting out
the Rosemary, and had a glimpse of Miss Virginia clinging to the
hand-rail and enjoying enthusiastically, he fancied, her first view of
the mighty hills to the westward.
The temptation to let the telegraphing wait while he went to say good
morning to her was strong, but he resisted it and hastened the more
for the hesitant thought. Nevertheless, when he reached the telegraph
office he found Mr. Somerville Darrah and his secretary there ahead of
him, and he observed that the explosive gentleman who presided over
the destinies of the Colorado and Grand River appeared to be in a more
than usually volcanic frame of mind.
Now Winton, though new to the business of building railroads for the
Utah Short Line, was not new to Denver or Colorado. Hence when the
Rajah, followed by his secretarial shadow, had left the office, Winton
spoke to the operator as to a friend.
“What is the matter with Mr. Darrah, Tom? He seems to be uncommonly
vindictive this morning.”
The man of dots and dashes nodded.
“He's always crankier this time than he was the other. He's a holy
terror, the Rajah is. I wouldn't work on his road for a farm down
East--not if my job took me within cussing distance of him. Bet a hen
worth fifty dollars he is up in Mr. Colbert's office right now,
raising particular sand because his special engine wasn't standing
here ready to snatch his private car on the fly, so's to go on without
losing headway.”
Winton frowned thoughtfully, and he let his writing hand pause while
he said, “So he travels special from Denver, does he?”
“On his own road?--well, I should smile. Nothing is too good for the
Rajah; or too quick, when he happens to be in a hurry. I wonder he
didn't have the T. C. pull him special from Kansas City.”
Winton handed in his batch of telegrams and went his way reflective.
What was Mr. Somerville Darrah's particular rush? As set forth by
Adams, the plans of the party in the Rosemary contemplated nothing
more hasty than a leisurely trip to the Pacific coast--a pleasure
jaunt with a winter sojourn in California to lengthen it. Why, then,
this sudden change from Limited regular trains to unlimited specials?
Was there fresh news from the seat of war in Quartz Creek Canyon?
Winton thought not. In that case he would have had his budget as well;
and so far as his own advices went, matters were still as they had
been. A letter from the Utah attorneys in Carbonate assured him that
the injunction appeal was not yet decided, and another from Chief of
Construction Evarts concerned itself mainly with the major's desire to
know when he was to be relieved.
But if Winton could have been an eavesdropper behind the door of
Superintendent Colbert's office on the second floor of the Union
Depot, his doubts would have been resolved instantly.
The telegraph operator's guess went straight to the mark. Mr. Darrah
was “raising particular sand” because his wire order for a special
engine had not been obeyed to the saving of the ultimate second of
time. But between his objurgations on that score, he was rasping out
questions designed to exhaust the chief clerk's store of information
concerning the status of affairs at the seat of war.
“Will you inform me, seh, why I wasn't wired that this beggahly appeal
was going against us?” he demanded wrathfully. “What's that you say,
seh? Don't tell me you couldn't know what the decision of the cou't
was going to be before it was handed down: that's what you-all are
heah for--to find out these things! And what is all this about Majah
Eva'ts resigning, and the Utah's sending East for a professional
right-of-way fighteh to take his place? Who is this new man? Don't
know? Dammit, seh! it's your business to know! _Now when do you faveh
me with my engine_?”
Thus the Rajah; and the chief clerk, himself known from end to end of
the Colorado and Grand River as a queller of men, could only point out
of the window to where the Rosemary stood engined and equipped for the
race, and say meekly: “I'm awfully sorry you've been delayed, Mr.
Darrah; very sorry, indeed. But your car is ready now. Shall I go
along to be on hand if you need me?”
“No, seh!” stormed the irate master; and the chief clerk's face became
instantly expressive of the keenest relief. “You stay right heah and
see that the wires to Qua'tz Creek are kept open--wide open, seh. And
when you get an ordeh from me--for an engine, a regiment of the
National Gyua'd, or a train-load of white elephants--you fill it. Do
you understand, seh?”
Meantime, while this scene was getting itself enacted in the
superintendent's office, a mild fire of consternation was alight in
the gathering room of the Rosemary. As we have guessed, Winton's
packet of mail was not the only one which was delivered by special
arrangement that morning to the incoming Limited at the yard
registering station. There had been another, addressed to Mr.
Somerville Darrah; and when he had opened it there had been a volcanic
explosion and a hurried dash for the telegraph office, as recorded.
Sifted out by the Reverend Billy, and explained by him to Mrs.
Carteret and Bessie, the firing spark of the explosion appeared to be
some news of an untoward character from a place vaguely designated as
“the front.”
“It seems that there is some sort of a right-of-way scrimmage going on
up in the mountains between our road and the Utah Short Line,” said
the young man. “It was carried into the courts, and now it turns out
that the decision has gone against us.”
“How perfectly horrid!” said Miss Bessie. “Now I suppose we shall have
to stay here indefinitely while Uncle Somerville does things.” And
placid Mrs. Carteret added plaintively: “It's too bad! I think they
might let him have one little vacation in peace.”
“Who talks of peace?” queried Virginia, driven in from her post of
vantage on the observation platform by the smoke from the
switching-engine. “Didn't I see Uncle Somerville charging across to
the telegraph office with war written out large in every line of him?”
“I am afraid you did,” affirmed the Reverend Billy; and thereupon the
explanation was rehearsed for Virginia's benefit.
The brown eyes flashed militant sympathy.
“Oh, I wish Uncle Somerville would go to 'the front,' wherever that
is, and take us along!” she cried. “It would be ever so much better
than California.”
The Reverend William laughed; and Aunt Martha put in her word of
expostulation, as in duty bound.
“Why, my dear Virginia--the idea! You don't know in the least what you
are talking about. I have been reading in the papers about these
right-of-way troubles, and they are perfectly terrible. One report
said they were arming the laboring men, and another said the militia
might have to be called out.”
“Well, what of it?” said Virginia, with all the hardihood of youth and
unknowledge. “It's something like a burning building: one doesn't want
to be hard-hearted and rejoice over other people's misfortunes; but
then, if it has to burn, one would like to be there to see.”
Miss Bessie put a stray lock of the flaxen hair up under its proper
comb.
“I'm sure I prefer California and the orange-groves and peace,” she
asserted. “Don't you, Cousin Billy?”
What Mr. Calvert would have replied is no matter for this history,
since at this precise moment the Rajah came in, “coruscating,” as
Virginia put it, from his late encounter with the superintendent's
chief clerk.
“Give them the word to go, Jastrow, and let's get out of heah,” he
commanded. And when the secretary had vanished the Rajah made his
explanations to all and sundry. “I've been obliged in a manneh to
change ouh itinerary. Anotheh company is trying to fault us up in
Qua'tz Creek Canyon, and I am in a meashuh compelled to be on the
ground. We shall be delayed only a few days, I hope; at the worst only
until the first snow-storm comes; and, in the meantime, Califo'nia
won't run away.”
Virginia clapped her hands.
“Then we are really to go to 'the front' and see a right-of-way fight?
Oh, won't that be perfectly intoxicating!”
The Rajah glared at her as if she had said something incendiary. The
picturesque aspect of the struggle had evidently not appealed to him.
But he smiled grimly when he said: “Now there spoke the blood of the
fighting Carterets: hope you won't change your mind, my deah.” And
with that he dived into his working den, pushing the lately-returned
secretary in ahead of him.
Virginia linked arms with Bessie, the flaxen-haired, when the wheels
began to turn.
“We are off,” she said. “Let's go out on the platform and see the last
of Denver.”
It was while they were clinging to the hand-rail, and looking back
upon the jumble of railway activities out of which they had just
emerged that the Rosemary, gaining headway, overtook another moving
train running smoothly on a track parallel to that upon which the
private car was speeding. It was the narrow-gage mountain connection
of the Utah line, and Winton and Adams were on the rear platform of
the last car. So it chanced that the four of them were presently
waving their adieus across the wind-blown interspace. In the midst of
it, or rather at the moment when the Rosemary, gathering speed as the
lighter of the two trains, forged ahead, the Rajah came out to light
his cigar.
He took in the little tableau of the rear platforms at a glance, and
when the slower train was left behind asked a question of Virginia.
“Ah--wasn't one of those two the young gentleman who called on you
yestehday afternoon, my deah?”
Virginia admitted it.
“Could you faveh me with his name?”
“He is Mr. Morton P. Adams, of Boston.”
“Ah-h! and his friend--the young gentleman who laid his hand to ouh
plow and put the engine on the track last night?”
“He is Mr. Winton--a--an artist, I believe; at least, that is what I
gathered from what Mr. Adams said of him.”
Mr. Somerville Darrah laughed, a slow little laugh, deep in his chest.
“Bless youh innocent soul--he a picchuh--painteh? Not in a thousand
yeahs, my deah Virginia. He is a railroad man, and a right good one at
that. Faveh me with the name again; Winteh, did you say?”
“No; Winton--Mr. John Winton.”
“D-d-devil!” gritted the Rajah, smiting the hand-rail with his
clenched fist. “Hah! I beg your pahdon, my deahs--a meah slip of the
tongue.” And then, to the full as savagely: “By Heaven, I hope that
train will fly the track and ditch him before eveh he comes within
ordering distance of the work in Qua'tz Creek Canyon!”
“Why, Uncle Somerville--how vindictive!” cried Virginia. “Who is he,
and what has he done?”
“He is Misteh John Winton, as you informed me just now; one of the
brainiest constructing engineers in this entiah country, and the
hardest man in this or any otheh country to down in a right-of-way
fight--that's who he is. And it's not what he's done, my deah
Virginia, it's what he is going to do. If I can't get him killed up
out of ouh way,”--but here Mr. Darrah saw the growing terror in two
pairs of eyes, and realizing that he was committing himself before an
unsympathetic audience, beat a hasty retreat to his stronghold at the
other end of the Rosemary.
“Well!” said the flaxen-haired Bessie, catching her breath. But
Virginia laughed.
“I'm glad I'm not Mr. Winton,” she said.