THROUGH SHADOW VALLEY
Hoo! Too-hoo-hoo!
The man on the other bench pulled the whistle cord for each crossing
and station, but the huge eight-driver engine and its long tail of
varnished cars sped past the switch targets and the station lights
with no decrease of speed.
The other fireman sprayed the coal into the firebox door, keeping an
even bed of living embers from which the lambent flames sprang like
live tongues. Occasionally Ralph stepped back upon the deck to look
over the fireman’s shoulder into the hot maw of the box.
The two firemen changed places every hour. And Ralph did not wonder at
this. When he had served his time with the shovel and bar it was on no
such mighty machine as this that drew the Midnight Flyer. The mountain
climbers and moguls had been big enough in those days. But this was
even a more powerful locomotive than the oil-burners, of which the
Great Northern owned several.
One man could never have fed the furnace of this engine for four
hours—the length of the run. They had to spell each other. The attempt
to make the schedule across the country from Rockton to Hammerfest was
no small job!
The minute he had got the long train out of the Rockton yard, Ralph
had set his mind to the work of arriving at Hammerfest on time. After
all, a good locomotive engineer pulls his train with his head more
than by any bodily exertion.
Sitting on the bench with the throttle within easy touch, Ralph for
the most part gazed ahead at the rails glimmering under the white
radiance of the headlight. It was true that he knew almost every foot
of this road as a boy knows his own back yard.
Here, he remembered, was a level with a sharp curve at the end. He
took three-quarters of the straight stretch at top speed; then he shut
off the steam and went around the sudden curve so easily that few of
the passengers, unless they were awake, would know anything about it.
For not only does the engineer of a fast and expensive train have to
make time, but he must run the train so well and with such precision
as to make a reputation for the road and the train which will bring
passengers back over the route.
On the mild grades Ralph could use the steam so skillfully that the
speedometer registered the same speed as on the levels. Nor had his
firemen anything to complain of.
“We got to hand it to you, Boss,” said one of the firemen, as Ralph
slowed to a stop at Shadow Valley Station. “You don’t waste the
precious steam. But poor old By was a hog for it, going up a grade.”
This point was a big summer resort place and had several hotels. There
was a junction here, too, with a small line, and a Y. Of course, at
this hour of the night the station was practically empty save for the
station workers and the few people who wished to board the Flyer.
The workers, however, were increased in number by men whom Ralph,
looking out of the cab window, marked as Mr. Adair’s operatives. Each
important station along the entire division was now guarded by
railroad detectives. Ralph hoped he might see his friend, Zeph Dallas.
The latter’s queer telegram had been sent from this station. But he
observed nobody who looked at all like the tall and gawky Zeph.
He got the conductor’s sign and rolled out of the Shadow Valley
Station exactly on the dot of the scheduled time. That alone was an
achievement, although Ralph well knew that the hardest part of the run
was ahead.
“Gee, Boss!” joked one of his crew, “I bet if you’d known you were
going to hold the lever on this old mill you would have given us a
little more time between here and Oxford, eh?”
Ralph laughed good-naturedly. It was true the cook had to drink his
own broth. But when making up the schedule in the Rockton train
dispatcher’s office, the young fellow had been confident that under
ordinary conditions the Midnight Flyer should hit the stopping point
on the nick of time. Provided, of course, west-bound freight kept off
the express train’s time.
Through Shadow Valley there were several places where the going was
hard. Ralph knew this quite well. But he had got the “feel” of the big
eight-wheeler now and he believed that it could show even greater
speed than it had ever recorded.
When they pulled out of the station he did not let the train merely
coast down the first grade. He opened her throttle wide and she began
to rock gently on the perfectly ballasted rails. The firemen began to
exchange glances—they could not exchange speech at this speed—and
realized that poor old Byron Marks had never got such speed out of the
engine.
Ralph, of course, was taking a chance. The grade really called for
brakes; but this was no ordinary situation. He realized that if he was
to make time at all, anywhere within the next fifty miles, it must be
right here.
“Shadow Valley.” Well named by some old pioneer with a poetic slant to
his brain. When the moon shone the black reflections of cliffs and
trees lay across the right of way of the railroad like blankets of
black velvet.
The locomotive headlight cut these shadows like the stroke of a
scimitar. Yard by yard the clear-way was revealed to the engineer as
the train plunged down the slope. He was taking a chance—a big
chance—Ralph knew, in opening the engine up in this way. Especially
now that there had been threats made against the road by the strikers
and their sympathizers.
All those people in the coaches behind him—most of them peacefully
sleeping—stirred the young fellow’s thought. He had pulled a Class-A
passenger train before this night—many times, in fact—and had felt
something of the same oppression of responsibility; but this case
seemed particularly important.
Thick forest hid the bottom of the valley. When he glanced down he
could see the pale moon silvering the tops of the firs and larches.
The express seemed plunging into a vast and bottomless pool of black
water.
He began to pull down for the curve at the bottom of the grade. This
was always a dangerous point. Once, years before, Ralph had seen the
wreck of the head-end of a freight piled up at the foot of this cliff,
which overhung the right-of-way.
Since that time the engineers of the Great Northern had broken off the
granite overhang of the cliff above this spot and had seemingly made a
repetition of that accident impossible.
Yet an enemy of the road might place some obstruction on the track
just below the curve. Until the head of the locomotive was right at
the turn, Ralph could not see what was ahead.
The road should have kept a signalman at this point, day and night.
Never before had the young fellow so understood the weight of
responsibility that rested on the engine driver’s shoulders.
Perhaps it was because he was growing older. Or perhaps the recent sad
happening to old Byron Marks had made a deep impression on Ralph
Fairbanks’ mind. At any rate, he felt that he would never round this
curve again—or any other blind curve on the division—without
experiencing a tremor of fear.
Suddenly a figure leaped into view, silhouetted against the silver
tree tops beyond and behind it, not on the dangerous side of the
rails. It stood upon a high bowlder across the right-hand ditch. A
tall, ghostly figure, the appearance of which made Ralph reach for the
reverse lever with nervously crooked fingers.
Then he realized that it was some person who signalled “All clear”
with arms like those of a semaphore. Somebody then was on watch here
at this dangerous turn.
Ralph applied the brakes carefully, gently. The long train shuddered;
but there was no harsh jouncing of the coaches. The wheels slid around
the turn.
And as the ray of the headlight caught the figure on the bowlder for a
moment, the young railroader knew who it was.
“Zeph!” he ejaculated, under his breath.
The young assistant of Bob Adair had selected the most perilous point
in Shadow Valley to watch. While Zeph was there, Ralph might be pretty
sure that no harm would befall the division trains.
He was carried past the bowlder swiftly. He leaned out to wave his arm
and try to attract the notice of his friend. But the flash of the
headlight’s ray had undoubtedly blinded Zeph for the moment and there
was no answering signal from him. However, as long as Zeph was
faithful at that post Ralph would feel little anxiety in approaching
it.
The young engineer pulled on through the valley at top speed and then
charged the hill to Oxford with four minutes to spare. Perfect running
of a passenger train means keeping at an exact and harmonious speed
for the entire distance between stops. In this case, however, Ralph
knew that if he had not gained something on the schedule before
striking the Oxford hill he never would have made that stop, as he
did, exactly on the schedule moment.
The worst of the run for the Midnight Flyer was then behind him.