Big Denny confronted the roundhouse foreman, an obstructing block in his
path. He was one of the heaviest men in the service, built like an ox,
and immensely good-natured.
Just now, however, he was also immensely excited and serious, and the
crowd stared at him curiously, and at Forgan in an astonished way.
"This is none of your business. Don't you interfere, don't you try to
shield that miserable blunderer!" shouted the foreman.
"Hold on, Tim," advised the watchman, putting out his big arm, and
abruptly checking Forgan in a forward dash.
"Do you know what he's done!" howled Forgan.
"Do you?"
"Do I----"
"I guess you don't, Tim," said Big Denny quietly. "Just you cool down.
This way, boys," called the watchman into the crowd at his heels. "Keep
cool, Tim--there's no harm done, but there might have been if Fairbanks
here wasn't quicker than lightning, and a brave young hero, besides!"
The crowd parted, a switchman came into view. He carried in his arms,
white and limp, a little girl about ten years of age.
Hanging by the neck ribbon was her pretty summer hat, crushed and cut
squarely in two. One temple was somewhat disfigured, and her dress was
soiled with roadbed dust and grime.
Tim Forgan looked once and his jaws dropped. He shuddered as if some
one had dealt him a blow, and staggered where he stood, his face turning
to a sickly gray.
"Nora!" he gasped--"my little Nora! Denny--boys! she is hurt--dead!"
"Neither," answered the big watchman promptly, placing a soothing hand
on the foreman's quivering arm. "Steady, old man, now!"
"Give her to me!" shouted Forgan, in a frenzy. "Nora, my little Nora!
What has happened? what has happened?"
The big fellow had one idol, one warm corner in his heart--his little
grandchild.
His rugged brow corrugated, and he was frantic beyond all reason as he
covered the still white face with kisses, nestling the motionless child
in his arms tenderly.
"Take her into the office," directed Denny. "Give her air, lads--and
get some cold water, some of you."
He blocked the doorway with his bulky frame as the foreman and his
charge passed through, admitting a moment later a switchman with a can
of water, and two of the older engineers at his heels.
Then he closed the door, and looked around for Ralph. The latter had
sunk to a bench, still pale and faint-looking. The lame helper was
ransacking his locker. Coming thence with some clean waste and a bottle
of liniment, he snatched up a pail, went outside, got some warm water
from a locomotive, and approached Ralph.
Ralph regarded him in some wonder, but made no demur as the strange,
silent fellow began to wash and dress his injured arm with a touch soft
and careful as that of a woman.
Big Denny continued to stand on guard at the closed door of the
foreman's little office.
The crowd from the outside was exchanging information with the
roundhouse throng, trying to patch mutual disclosures together into some
coherency.
Ike Slump's look of malevolent gratification had faded away. He began
to surmise that Ralph had a purpose in so summarily deserting his post,
and that the anticipated "turning of the tables" was not destined to
materialize.
"What's the rights of things, Denny?" asked one of the engineers. "That
was little Nora Forgan, wasn't it!"
"Sure--and you know what she is to gruff old Tim, apple of his eye. If
anything happened to her, I believe he'd go mad."
"He's pretty near there now, with his tantrums!" volunteered a voice
from the crowd.
"I think this will cure him a bit," said Denny. "The little one has
been bringing him his dinner lately, you know. A child like that has no
business along the tracks, but he usually had her come back of the
roundhouse, where there wasn't so much risk. This time, I suppose she
feared she'd be late, and crossed over the busiest switches. My heart
stood still, lads, when, ten minutes since, five hundred feet away from
her, I saw her trip, fall, strike her head on the rails, and lay there
stunned, squarely in the way of a dead-end freight, coming."
Big Denny squirmed with real feeling in his powerful, husky voice, as he
dabbed the perspiration from his brow.
"Next thing, I saw a flash come out through the roundhouse door here. It
was--him!"
Mechanically the crowd turned. Twenty pairs of eyes rested on Ralph,
whom Denny had pointed out.
"Yes, sir--it was him, young Fairbanks! He's got the right blood in
him, that kid. I knew his father, and he wouldn't be Jack Fairbanks'
son if he hadn't acted just as he did!"
No comment could have pleased Ralph more than that. He darted a
grateful look at his bulky champion.
"No one any good seemed to have noticed the accident except him," went
on Denny, the eyes of his absorbed auditors again riveted intently upon
him. "I counted the seconds in a sort of sickly horror, for it seemed
impossible that he could make it in time."
"But he did!" cried a strained voice.
"He did--it was terrifying. The last ten feet he saw his only chance.
It was like a fellow sliding for base. Flat he dived and drove. It
must have been an awful scrape! The first wheels of the backing car
fairly reached the little angel's long, golden curls. As it was, they
cut the dangling hat straight in two. He grabbed her, just escaping the
wheels, not a second too soon."
With a working face the lame helper had stood listening, rooted to the
spot like a statue.
The crowd swayed towards Ralph. They were all in one uniform mood of
admiration for his nervy exploit, only they expressed it in different
ways.
A dozen shook his hand till they nearly wrung it off; a big, bluff
fireman, with a fist like a ham, slapped his shoulders so exuberantly
that the contact nearly drove the breath out of his body.
"As to that little heap of rubbish," observed Big Denny, with lofty
contempt indicating the broken brick wall--"I reckon Tim Forgan won't
let that count against the life of that child."
Ralph arose to his feet.
"But I didn't do it," he asseverated.
"Don't you worry about trifles, kid," advised Denny.
"But I didn't!" insisted Ralph.
Denny looked annoyed. He wished to dismiss the subject peremptorily
while his hero was still on the pedestal, and, human-like, he believed
Ralph was trying to square himself at the cost of a lame explanation, or
a lie.
"That's--that's right," suddenly interposed a quavering voice.
"Hello!" laughed Denny, turning to confront the sphinx-like helper,
whose taciturnity was proverbial. "You'll be making a speech, next!"
"Yes," bolted out the lame helper, very much agitated over his own
unusual temerity.
"Give it a voice, Limpy."
"He didn't do it."
"Didn't do what?"
"Run that engine into the wall."
"How do you know?"
"I saw him--he started her up, but shut her off, dead, before he jumped
for the tracks and ran outside."
Ralph looked surprised, but pleased, Big Denny convinced, and the crowd
tremendously interested.
On the outskirts of the crowd Ike Slump gave ear, perked up his face in
a grimace, and a minute later sneaked out of the place.
"Saw the whole thing," declared Limpy. "Fellow in the next engine
leaned over soon as Fairbanks left, slipped the lever, and let her
drive."
"Who was it?" demanded the watchman indignantly.
"Slump, the scamp."
"Where is he?"
The crowd made a search, but it was unavailing--Ike Slump had "jumped
his job" permanently, to all appearances, for his locker was empty.
The fireman came out of the office.
"She's all right," he announced to Denny, "but the old man's terribly
broken up. Better go in and give him a word."
"All right," said Denny--"you come, too, Fairbanks."
"I'd rather not," said Ralph--"I've got work to do."
"You take a rest and eat your dinner before you do anything else,"
advised the big watchman.
The noon whistle sounded just then and dispersed the crowd. Ralph went
over to a bench and brought out his dinner pail.
His arm was sore and smarting, but he was not at all seriously crippled,
and he sat thoughtfully eating his lunch and wondering how the damage to
the wall would be repaired.
Ralph noticed the two engineers leave the office, then Big Denny. The
latter had hold of the hand of little Nora.
He led the way up to Ralph. Limpy had just taken his seat on the other
end of the bench.
"I'm going to take her home," said the watchman. "Nora, do you know who
this young gentleman is?"
The little girl looked still pale and frightened, but except for the
torn dress and hat and a dark bruise on her forehead seemed none the
worse for her recent perilous experience.
"No, sir," she said shyly.
"It's Ralph Fairbanks. He saved your life."
"Oh, sir! did you? did you?" she cried, running up to Ralph. She put
her arms around his neck and kissed him, the tears running down her
cheeks. "When I tell mamma, she'll come down and thank you, too!" she
continued and then passed on.
Ralph was affected by the incident. His heart warmed up as he reflected
how the tide of feeling had changed towards him in the past hour. Then,
reaching for his lunch pail, his hand unexpectedly came in contact with
a big, juicy square of pie. The lame helper had disappeared.
It was a further tribute from that strange, silent man, and it told
Ralph unmistakably that beyond that grim wall of reserve was probably
hidden a heart of gold.
The excitement and rough usage of the morning had used up Ralph
considerably. He felt the need of fresh air, put aside his dinner pail,
and started for the outside.
Just then, the helper came across to him from the direction of the
little office.
"Wanted," he said sententiously. "Foreman wants to see you."