“But when I do come I’ll probably have a trainload of directors,
commissioners, stockholders.”
“Bring them on,” said Neale. “Maybe if they saw more of what we’re up
against they wouldn’t holler so.”
“Right.... Remember, you’ve full charge and that I trust you implicitly.
Good-by and good luck!”
The chief boarded his train as it began to move. Neale watched it leave
the station, and with a swelling heart he realized that he had been
placed high, that his premonition of advancement had not been without
warrant.
The work-train was backing into the station and would depart westward in
short order. Neale hurried to his lodgings to pack his few belongings.
Larry was lying on his cot, fully dressed and asleep. Neale shook him.
“Wake up, you lazy son-of-a-gun!” shouted Neale.
Larry opened his eyes. “Wal, what’s wrong? Is it last night or
to-morrow?”
“Larry, I’m off. Got charge of a big job.”
“Is thet all?” drawled Larry, sleepily. “Why, shore I always knowed
you’d be chief engineer some day.”
“Pard--sit up,” said Neale, unsteadily. “Will you stay sober--and
watch--and listen for some news of Allie?... Till I come back to
Benton?”
“Neale, air you still dreamin’?” asked Larry, incredulously.
“Will you do that much for me?”
“Shore.”
“Thank you, old friend. Good-by now. I’ve got to rustle.” He left Larry
sitting on his cot, staring at nothing. On the way to the station Neale
encountered the gambler, Place Hough, who, despite his nocturnal habits,
was an early riser. In the excitement of the hour Neale gave way to
an impulse. Briefly he told Hough about Allie--her disappearance and
probable hidden presence in Benton, and he asked the gambler to keep
his eyes and ears open. Hough seemed both surprised and pleased with the
confidence, and he said he would go out of his way to help Neale.
Neale had to run to catch the train. A brawny Irishman extended a
red-sleeved arm to help him up.
“Up wid yez. Thor!”
Neale found himself with bag and rifle and blanket sprawling on the
gravel-covered floor of a flat car. Casey, the old lineman, grinned at
him over the familiar short, black pipe.
“B’gorra, it’s me ould fri’nd Neale.”
“It sure is. How’re you Casey?”
“Pritty good fur an ould soldier.... An’ it’s news I hear of yez, me
boy.”
“What news?”
“Shure yez hed a boost. Gineral Lodge hisself wor tellin’ Grady, the
boss, that yez had been given charge of Number Ten.”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“I’m dom’ glad to hear ut,” declared the Irishman. “But yez hev a hell
of a job in thot Number Ten.”
“So I’ve been told. What do you know about it, Casey?”
“Shure ut ain’t much. A fri’nd of mine was muxin’ mortor over there. An’
he sez whin the crick was dry ut hed a bottom, but whin wet ut shure hed
none.”
“Then I have got a job on my hands,” replied Neale, grimly.
Those days it took the work-train several hours to reach the end of the
rails. Neale rode by some places with a profound satisfaction in the
certainty that but for him the track would not yet have been spiked
there. Construction was climbing fast into the hills. He wondered when
and where would be the long-looked-for meeting of the rails connecting
East with West. Word had drifted over the mountains that the Pacific
division of the construction was already in Utah.
At the camp Colonel Dillon offered Neale an escort of troopers out to
Number Ten, but Neale decided he could make better time alone. There had
been no late sign of the Indians in that locality and he knew both the
road and the trail.
Early next morning, mounted on a fast horse, he set out. It was a
melancholy ride. Several times he had been over that ground, once
traveling west with Larry, full of ardor and joy at the prospect of soon
seeing Allie Lee, and again on the return, in despair at the loss of
her.
He rode the twenty miles in three hours. The camp of dirty tents was
clustered in a hot valley surrounded by hills sparsely fringed with
trees. Neale noted the timber as a lucky augury to his enterprise. It
was an idle camp full of lolling laborers.
As Neale dismounted a Mexican came forward.
“Look after the horse,” said Neale, and, taking his luggage, he made for
a big tent with a fly extended in front. Several men sat on camp-chairs
round a table. One of them got up and stepped out.
“Where’s Blake and Coffee?” inquired Neale.
“I’m Blake,” was the reply, “and there’s Coffee. Are you Mr. Neale?”
“Yes.”
“Coffee, here’s our new boss,” called Blake as he took part of Neale’s
baggage.
Coffee appeared to be a sunburnt, middle-aged man, rather bluff and
hearty in his greeting. The younger engineer, Blake, was a tanned,
thin-faced individual, with a shifty gaze and constrained manner. The
third fellow they introduced as a lineman named Somers. Neale had not
anticipated a cordial reception and felt disposed to be generous.
“Have you got quarters for me here?” he inquired.
“Sure. There’s lots of room and a cot,” replied Coffee.
They carried Neale’s effects inside the tent. It was large and spare,
containing table and lamp, boxes for seats, several cots, and bags.
“It’s hot. Got any drinking-water?” asked Neale, taking off his coat.
Next he opened his bag to take things out, then drank thirstily of the
water offered him. He did not care much for this part of his new task.
These engineers might be sincere and competent, but he had been sent
on to judge their work, and the situation was not pleasant. Neale had
observed many engineers come and go during his experience on the road;
and that fact, together with the authority given him and his loyalty
to, the chief, gave him cause for worry. He hoped, and he was ready to
believe, that these engineers had done their best on an extremely knotty
problem.
“We got Lodge’s telegram last night,” said Coffee. “Kinda sudden. It
jarred us.”
“No doubt. I’m sorry. What was the message?”
“Lodge never wastes words,” replied the engineer, shortly. But he did
not vouchsafe the information for which Neale had asked.
Neale threw his note-book upon the dusty table and, sitting down on the
box, he looked up at the men. Both engineers were studying him intently,
almost eagerly, Neale imagined.
“Number Ten’s a tough nut to crack, eh?” he inquired.
“We’ve been here three months,” replied Blake.
“Wait till you see that quicksand hole,” added Coffee.
“Quicksand! It was a dry, solid stream-bed when I ran the line through
here and drew the plans for Number Ten,” declared Neale.
Coffee and Blake stared blandly at him. So did the lineman Somers.
“You? Did YOU draw the plans we--we’ve been working on?” asked Coffee.
“Yes, I did,” answered Neale, slowly. It struck him that Blake had paled
slightly. Neale sustained a slight shock of surprise and antagonism. He
bent over his note-book, opening it to a clean page. Fighting his first
impressions, he decided they had arisen from the manifest dismay of the
engineers and their consciousness of a blunder.
“Let’s get down to notes,” Neale went on, taking up his pencil. “You’ve
been here three months?”
“Yes.”
“With what force?”
“Two hundred men on and off.”
“Who’s the gang boss?”
“Colohan. He’s had some of the biggest contracts along the line.”
Neale was about to inquire the name of the contractor, but he refrained,
governed by one of his peculiar impulses.
“Anybody working when you got here?” he went on.
“Yes. Masons had been cutting stone for six weeks.”
“What’s been done?”
Coffee laughed harshly. “We got the three piers in--good and solid
on dry bottom. Then along comes the rain--and our work melts into the
quicksand. Since then we’ve been trying to do it over.”
“But why did this happen in the first place?”
Coffee spread wide his arms. “Ask me something easy. Why was the
bottom dry and solid? Why did it rain? Why did solid earth turn into
quicksand?”
Neale slapped the note-book shut and rose to his feet. “Gentlemen, that
is not the talk of engineers,” he said, deliberately.
“The hell you say! What is it, then?” burst out Coffee, his face
flushing redder.
“I’ll inform you later,” replied Neale, turning to the lineman. “Somers,
tell this gang boss, Colohan, I want him.”
Neale left the tent. He had started to walk away when he heard Blake
speak up in a fierce undertone.
“Didn’t I tell you? We’re up against it!”
And Coffee growled a reply Neale could not understand. But the tone of
it was conclusive. These men had made a serious blunder and were blaming
each other, hating each other for it. Neale was conscious of anger. This
section of line came under his survey, and he had been proud to be given
such important and difficult work. Incompetent or careless engineers
had bungled Number Ten. Neale strode on among the idle and sleeping
laborers, between the tents, and then past the blacksmith’s shop and the
feed corrals down to the river.
A shallow stream of muddy water came murmuring down from the hills.
It covered the wide bed that Neale remembered had been a dry,
sand-and-gravel waste. On each side the abutment piers had been
undermined and washed out. Not a stone remained in sight. The banks were
hollowed inward and shafts of heavy boards were sliding down. In the
middle of the stream stood a coffer-dam in course of building, and near
it another that had collapsed. These frameworks almost hid the tip of
the middle pier, which had evidently slid over and was sinking on its
side. There was no telling what had been sunk in that hole. All the
surroundings--the tons of stone, cut and uncut, the piles of muddy
lumber, the platforms and rafts, the crevices in the worn shores up and
down both sides--all attested to the long weeks of fruitless labor and
to the engulfing mystery of that shallow, murmuring stream.
Neale returned thoughtfully to camp. Blake and Coffee were sitting under
the fly in company with a stalwart Irishman.
“Fine sink-hole you picked out for Number Ten, don’t you think?” queried
Blake.
Neale eyed his interrogator with somewhat of a penetrating glance. Blake
did not meet that gaze frankly.
“Yes, it’s a sink-hole, all right, and--no mistake,” replied Neale.
“It’s just what I calculated when I ran the plans.... Did you follow
those plans?”
Blake appeared about to reply when Coffee cut him short “Certainly we
did,” he snapped.
“Then where are the breakwaters?” asked Neale, sharply.
“Breakwaters?” ejaculated Coffee. His surprise was sincere.
“Yes, breakwaters,” retorted Neale. “I drew plans for breakwaters to
be built up-stream so that in high water the rapid current would be
directed equally between the piers, and not against them.”
“Oh yes! Why--we must have got--it mixed,” replied Coffee. “Thought they
were to be built last. Wasn’t that it, Blake?”
“Sure,” replied his colleague, but his tone lacked something.
“Ah--I see,” said Neale, slowly.
Then the big Irishman got up to extend a huge hand. “I’m Colohan,” he
boomed.
Neale liked the bronzed, rough face, good-natured and intelligent. And
he was aware of a shrewd pair of gray eyes taking his measure. Why these
men seemed to want to look through Neale might have been natural enough,
but somehow it struck him strangely. He had come there to help them, not
to discharge them. Colohan, however, did not rouse Neale’s antagonism as
the others had done.
“Colohan, are you sick of this job?” queried Neale, after greeting the
boss.
“Yes--an’ no,” replied Colohan.
“You want to quit, then?” went on Neale, bluntly. The Irishman evidently
took this curt query as a foreword of the coming dismissal. He looked
shamed, crestfallen, at a loss to reply.
“Don’t misunderstand me,” continued Neale. “I’m not going to fire
you. But if you are sick of the job you can quit. I’ll boss the gang
myself... The rails will be here in ten days, and I’m going to have a
trestle over that hole so the rails can cross. No holding up the work
at this stage of the game... There’s near five thousand men in the
gangs back along the line--coming fast. They’ve all got just one
idea--success. The U. P. R. is going through. Soon out here the rails
will meet.... Colohan, make it a matter of your preference. Will you
stick?”
“You bet!” he replied, heartily. A ruddy glow emanated from his face.
Neale was quick to sense that this Irishman, like Casey, had an honest
love for the railroad, whatever he might feel for the labor.
“Get on the job, then,” ordered Neale, cheerily. “We’ll hustle while
there’s daylight. We’ll have that trestle ready when the rails get
here.”
Coffee laughed scornfully. “Neale, that sounds fine, but it’s impossible
until the trains get here with piles and timbers, iron, and other stuff.
We meant to run up a trestle then.”
“I dare say,” replied Neale. “But the U. P. R. did not start that way,
and never would finish that way.”
“Well, you’ll have your troubles,” declared Coffee. “Troubles!... Do
you imagine I’m going to think of MYSELF?” retorted Neale. These fellows
were beginning to get on his nerves. Coffee grew sullen, Blake shifted
uneasily from foot to foot, Colohan beamed upon Neale. “Come on with
them orders,” he said.
“Right!... Send men up on the hills to cut and trim trees for piles and
beams.... Find a way or make one for horses to snake down these timbers.
Haul that pile-driver down to the river and set it up.... Have the
engineer start up steam and try out.... Look the blacksmith shop over
to see if there’s iron enough. If not, telegraph Benton for more--for
whatever you want--and send wagons back to the end of the rails....
That’s all for this time, Colohan.”
“All right, chief,” replied the boss, and he saluted. Then he turned
sneeringly to Blake and Coffee. “Did you hear them orders? I’m not
takin’ none from you again. They’re from the chief.”
Colohan’s manner or tone or the word chief amazed Coffee. He looked
nasty.
“Go on and work, then, you big Irish Paddy,” he said, violently. “Your
chief-blarney doesn’t fool us. You’re only working to get on the right
side of your new boss.... Let me tell you--you’re in this Number Ten
deal as deep--as deep as we are.”
It had developed that there was hatred between these men. Colohan’s face
turned fiery red, and, looming over Coffee, he looked the quick-tempered
and dangerous nature of his class. “Coffee, I’m sayin’ this to your face
right now. I ain’t deep in this Number Ten deal.... I obeyed orders--an’
damn strange ones, some of them.”
Neale intervened and perhaps prevented a clash. “Don’t quarrel, men.
Sure there’s bound to be a little friction for a day or so. But we’ll
soon get to working.”
Colohan strode away without another word. His brawny shoulders were
expressive of a doubt.
“Get me my plans for Number Ten construction,” said Neale, pleasantly,
for he meant to do his share at making the best of it.
Blake brought the plans and spread them out on the table.
“Will you both go over them with me?” inquired Neale.
“What’s the use?” returned Coffee, disgustedly. “Neale, you’re
thick-headed.”
“Yes, I guess so,” rejoined Neale, constrainedly. “That’s why General
Lodge sent me up here--over your clear heads.”
No retort was forthcoming from the two disgruntled engineers. Neale went
into the tent and drew a seat up to the table. He wanted to be alone--to
study his plans--to think about the whole matter. He found his old
figures and drawings as absorbing as a good story; still, there came
breaks in his attention. Blake walked into the tent several times, as
if to speak, and each time he retired silently. Again, some messenger
brought a telegram to one of the engineers outside, and it must have
caused the whispered colloquy that followed. Finally they went away, and
Neale, getting to work in earnest, was not disturbed until called for
supper.
Neale ate at a mess-table with the laborers, and enjoyed his meal. The
Paddies always took to him. One thing he gathered early was the fact
that Number Ten bridge was a joke with the men. This sobered Neale and
he left the cheery, bantering company for a quiet walk alone.
It was twilight down in the valley, while still daylight up on the
hilltops. A faint glow remained from the sunset, but it faded as Neale
looked. He walked a goodly distance from camp, so as to be out of
earshot. The cool night air was pleasant after the hot day. It fanned
his face. And the silence, the darkness, the stars calmed him. A
lonely wolf mourned from the heights, and the long wail brought to mind
Slingerland’s cabin. Then it was only a quick step to memory of Allie
Lee; and Neale drifted from the perplexities and problems of his new
responsibility to haunting memories, hopes, doubts, fears.
When he returned to the tent he espied a folded paper on the table in
the yellow lamplight. It was a telegram addressed to him. It said that
back salaries and retention of engineers were at his discretion, and was
signed Lodge. This message nonplussed Neale. The chief must mean that
Blake and Coffee would not be paid for past work nor kept for future
work unless Neale decided otherwise. While he was puzzling over this
message the engineers came in.
“Say, what do you make of this?” demanded Neale, and he shoved the
telegram across the table toward them.
Both men read it. Coffee threw his coat over on his cot and then lit his
pipe.
“What I make of this is--I lose three months’ back pay... nine hundred
dollars,” he replied, puffing a cloud of smoke.
“And I lose six hundred,” supplemented Blake.
Neale leaned back and gazed up at his subordinates. He felt a subtle
change in them. They had arrived at some momentous decision.
“But this message reads at my discretion,” said Neale. “It’s a plain
surprise to me. I’ve no intention of making you lose your back pay, or
of firing you, either.”
“You’ll probably do both--unless we can get together,” asserted Coffee.
“Well, can’t we get together?”
“That remains to be seen,” was the enigmatic reply.
“Ill need you both,” went on Neale, thoughtfully. “We’ve a big job.
We’ve got to put a force of men on the piers while we’re building the
trestle... Maybe I’ll fall down myself. Heavens! I’ve made blunders
myself. I can’t condemn you fellows. I’m willing to call off all talk
about past performances and begin over again.”
Neale felt that this proposition should have put another light on
the question, that it should have been received appreciatively if not
enthusiastically. But he was somewhat taken aback by the fact that it
was not.
“Ahem! Well, we can talk it over to-morrow,” yawned Coffee.
Neale made no more overtures, busied himself with his notes for an hour,
and then sought his cot.
Next morning, bright and early, Neale went down to the river to make his
close inspection of what had been done toward building Number Ten. From
Colohan he ascertained the number of shafts and coffer-dams sunk; from
the masons he learned the amount of stone cut to patterns. And he was
not only amazed and astounded, but overwhelmed, and incensed beyond
expression. The labor had been prodigious. Hundreds of tons of material
had been sunk there; and that meant that hundreds of thousands of
dollars also had been sunk.
Upon investigation Neale found that, although many cribbings had been
sunk for the piers, they had never been put deep enough. And there were
coffer-dams that did not dam at all--useless, senseless wastes of time
and material, not to say wages. His plans called for fifty thirty-foot
piles driven to bedrock, which, according to the excavations he had had
made at the time of survey, was forty feet below the surface. Not a pile
had been driven! There had been no solid base for any of the cribbings!
No foundations for the piers!
At the discovery the blood burned hot in Neale’s face and neck.
“No blunder! No incompetence! No misreading of my plans! But a rotten,
deliberate deal!... Work done over and over again! Oh, I see it all now!
General Lodge knew it without ever coming here. The same old story! That
black stain--that dishonor on the great work! ... Graft! Graft!”
He clambered out of the wet and muddy hole and up the bank. Then he saw
Blake sauntering across the flat toward him. Neale sat down abruptly to
hide his face and fury, giving himself the task of scraping mud from his
boots. When Blake got there Neale had himself fairly well in hand.
“Hello, Neale!” said Blake, suavely. “Collected some mud, I see. It’s
sure a dirty job.”
“Yes, it’s been dirty in more ways than mud, I guess,” replied Neale.
The instant his voice sounded in his ears it unleashed his temper.
“Sure has been a pile of money--dirty government money--sunk in there,”
rejoined Blake. He spoke with assurance that surprised Neale into a
desire to see how far he would go.
“Blake, it’s an ill wind that blows nobody good.”
A moment of silence passed before Blake spoke again. “Sure. And it’ll
blow you good, too,” he said, breathing hard.
“Every man has his price,” replied Neale, lightly.
Then he felt a big, soft roll of bills stuffed into his hand. He took
it, trembling all over. He wanted to spring erect, to fling that bribe
in its giver’s face. But he could, control himself a moment longer.
“Blake, who’s the contractor on this job?” he queried, rapidly.
“Don’t you know?”
“I don’t.”
“Well, we supposed you knew. It’s Lee.”
Neale started as if he had received a stab; the name hurt him in one way
and was a shock in another.
“Allison Lee--the commissioner?” he asked, thickly.
“Sure. Oh, we’re in right, Neale,” replied Blake, with a laugh of
relief.
Swift as an Indian, and as savagely, Neale sprang up. He threw the roll
of bills into Blake’s face.
“You try to bribe me! ME!” burst out Neale, passionately. “You think
I’ll take your dirty money--cover up your crooked job! Why, you sneak!
You thief! You dog!”
He knocked Blake down. “Hold--on--Neale!” gasped Blake. He raised
himself on his elbow, half stunned.
“Pick up that money,” ordered Neale, and he threatened Blake again.
“Hurry!... Now march for camp!”
Neale walked the young engineer into the presence of his superior.
Coffee sat his table under the fly, with Somers and another man. Colohan
appeared on the moment, and there were excited comments from others near
by. Coffee stood up. His face turned yellow. His lips snarled.
“Coffee, here’s your side partner,” called Neale, and his voice was
biting. “I’ve got you both dead to rights, you liars!... You never even
tried to work on my plans for Number Ten.”
“Neale, what in hell do you suppose we’re out here for?” demanded
Coffee, harshly. “They’re all getting a slice of this money. There’s
barrels of it. The directors of the road are crooked. They play both
ends against the middle. They borrow money from the government and then
pay it out to themselves. You’re one of these dreamers. You’re Lodge’s
pet. But you can’t scare me.”
“Coffee, if there was any law out here for stealing you’d go to jail,”
declared Neale. “You’re a thief, same as this pup who tried to bribe me.
You’re worse. You’ve held up the line. You’ve ordered your rotten work
done over and over again. This is treachery to General Lodge--to Henney,
who sent you out here. And to me it’s--it’s--there’s no name low enough.
I surveyed the line through here. I drew the plans for Number Ten. And
I’m going to prove you both cheats. You and your contractor.”
“Neale, there’s more than us in the deal,” said Coffee sullenly.
Colohan strode close, big and formidable. “If you mean me, you’re a
liar,” he declared. “An’ don’t say it!” Coffee was plainly intimidated,
and Colohan turned to Neale. “Boss, I swear I wasn’t in on this deal.
Lately I guessed it was all wrong. But all I could do was obey orders.”
“Neale, you can’t prove anything,” sneered Coffee. “If you have any
sense you’ll shut up. I tell you this is only a LITTLE deal. I’m on the
inside. I know financiers, commissioners, Congressmen, and Senators--and
I told you before the directors are all in on this U. P. R. pickings.
You’re a fool!”
“Maybe. But I’m no thief,” retorted Neale.
“Shut up, will you?” shouted Coffee, who plainly did not take kindly to
that epithet before the gathering crowd. “I’m no thief... Men get shot
out here for saying less than that.”
Neale laughed. He read Coffee’s mind. That worthy, responding to the
wildness of the time and place, meant to cover his tracks one way or
another. And Neale had not lived long with Larry Red King for nothing.