kind. Because you stole without risk. You can’t be punished. But I’ll
carry this deal higher than you.” And quick as a flash Neale snatched
some telegrams from Coffee’s vest pocket. The act infuriated Coffee. His
face went purple.
“Hand ‘em back!” he yelled, his arm swinging back to his hip.
“I’ll bet there’s a telegram here from Lee, and I’m entitled to keep
it,” responded Neale, coolly and slowly.
Then as Coffee furiously jammed his hand back for his gun Neale struck
him. Coffee fell with the overturned table out in the sand. His gun
dropped as he dropped. Neale was there light and quick. He snatched up
the gun.
“Coffee, you and Blake are to understand you’re fired,” said Neale.
“Fired off the job and out of camp, just as you are.”
Fifteen days later the work-train crossed Number Ten on a trestle and
the construction progressed with new impetus.
Not many days later a train of different character crept slowly foot by
foot over that temporary bridge. It carried passenger-coaches, a private
car containing the directors of the railroad, and General Lodge’s
special car. The engine was decorated with flags and the engineer
whistled a piercing blast as he rolled out upon the structure. Number
Ten had been the last big obstacle.
As fortune would have it, Neale happened on the moment to be standing
in a significant and thrilling position, for himself and for all who saw
him. And that happened to be in the middle of the stream opposite
the trestle on the masonry of the middle pier, now two feet above the
coffer-dam. He was as wet and muddy as the laborers with him.
Engineer, fireman, brakemen, and passengers cheered him. For Neale the
moment was unexpected and simply heart-swelling. Never in his life had
he felt so proud. And yet, stinging among these sudden sweet emotions
was a nameless pang.
Presently Neale espied General Lodge leaning out of a window of his car.
He was waving. Neale pointed down at his feet, at the solid masonry; and
then, circling his mouth with his hands, he yelled with all his might:
“Bed-rock!”
His chief yelled back, “You’re a soldier!”
That perhaps in the excitement and joy of the moment was the greatest
praise the army officer could render. Nothing could have pleased Neale
more.
The train passed over the trestle and on out of sight. Upon its return,
about the middle of the afternoon, it stopped in camp. A messenger came
with word for Neale to report at once to the directors. He hurried to
his tent to secure his papers, and then, wet and muddy, he entered the
private car of the directors.
It contained only four men--General Lodge, and Warburton, Rogers, and
Rudd. All except the tall, white-haired Warburton were comfortable in
shirt-sleeves, smoking with a table between them. The instant Neale
entered their presence he divined that he faced a big moment in his
life.
The chiefs manner, like Larry King’s when there was something in the
wind, seemed quiet, easy, potential. His searching glance held warmth
and a gleam that thrilled Neale. But he was ceremonious, not permitting
himself his old familiarity before these dignitaries of the great
railroad.
“Gentlemen, you remember Mr. Neale,” said Lodge.
They were cordial--pleasant.
Warburton vigorously shook Neale’s hand, and leaned back, after the
manner of matured men, to look Neale over.
“Young man, I’m glad to meet you again,” he declared, in his big voice.
“Remember him! Well, I do--though he’s thinner, older.”
“Small wonder,” interposed the chief. “He’s been doing a man’s work.”
“Neale, back there in Omaha you got sore--you quit us,” went on
Warburton, reprovingly. “That was bad business. I cottoned to you--and I
might have--But no matter. You’re with us again.”
“Mr. Warburton, I’m ashamed of that,” replied Neale, hastily. “But I was
hot-headed... am so still, I fear.”
“So am I. So is Lodge. So is any man worth a damn,” replied the
director.
“Mr. Neale, you look cool enough now,” observed Rogers, smiling. “Wish I
was as wet and cool as you are. It’s hot--in this desert.”
Warburton took off his frock-coat. “You gentlemen aren’t going to have
any the best of me... And now, Neale, tell us things.”
Neale looked at his papers and then at his chief. “For instance,” said
Lodge, “tell us about Blake and Coffee.”
“Haven’t you seen them--heard from them?” inquired Neale.
“No. Henney has not, either. And they were his men.”
“Gentlemen, I’m afraid I lost my head in regard to them.”
“Explain, please,” said Warburton. “We will judge your conduct.”
It was a rather difficult moment for Neale, because his actions
regarding the two engineers now appeared to have been the result of
violent temper, rather than a dignified exercise of authority. But then
as he remembered Blake’s offer and Coffee’s threat the heat thrilled
along his nerves; and that stirred him to forceful expression.
“I drove them both out of this camp.”
“Why?” queried Warburton, sharply.
“Blake tried to bribe me, and Coffee--”
“One at a time,” interrupted Warburton, and he thrust a strong hand
through his hair, ruffling it. He began to scent battle. “What did Blake
try to bribe you to do?”
“He didn’t say. But he meant me to cover their tracks.”
“So!... And what did Coffee do?”
“He tried to pull a gun on me.”
“Why? Be explicit, please.”
“Well, he threatened me. And I laughed at him--called him names.”
“What names?”
“Quite a lot, if I remember. The one he objected to was thief... I
repeated that, and snatched some telegrams from his pocket. He tried
to draw his gun on me--and then I drove them both out of camp. They got
through safely, for they were seen in Benton.”
“Sir, it appears to me you lost your head to good purpose,” said
Warburton. “Now just what were the tracks they wanted you to cover?”
“I drew the original plans for Number Ten. They had not followed them.
To be exact, they did not drive piles to hold the cribbings for the
piers. They did not go deep enough. They sank shafts, they built
coffer-dams, they put in piers over and over again. There was forty feet
of quicksand under all their work and of course it slipped and sank.”
Warburton slowly got up. He was growing purple in the face. His hair
seemed rising. He doubled a huge fist. “Over and over again!” he roared,
furiously. “Over and over again! Lodge, do you hear that?”
“Yes. Sounds kind of familiar to me,” replied the chief, with one of his
rare smiles. He was beyond rage now. He saw the end. He alone, perhaps,
had realized the nature of that great work. And that smile had been sad
as well as triumphant.
Warburton stamped up and down the car aisle. Manifestly he wanted to
smash something or to take out his anger upon his comrades. That was
not the quick rage of a moment; it seemed the bursting into flame of
a smoldering fire. He used language more suited to one of Benton’s
dance-halls than the private car of the directors of the Union Pacific
Railroad. Once he stooped over Lodge, pounded the table.
“Three hundred thousand dollars sunk in that quicksand hole!” he
thundered. “Over and over again! That’s what galls me. Work done over
and over--unnecessary--worse than useless--all for dirty gold! Not for
the railroad, but for gold!... God! what a band of robbers we’ve dealt
with!... Lodge, why in hell didn’t you send Neale out here at the
start?”
A shadow lay dark in the chiefs lined face. Why had he not done a
million other things? Why, indeed! He did not answer the irate director.
“Three hundred thousand dollars sunk in that hole--for nothing!” shouted
Warburton, in a final explosion.
The other two directors laughed. “Pooh!” exclaimed Rogers, softly. “What
is that? A drop in the bucket! Consult your note-book, Warburton.”
And that speech cooled the fighting director. It contained volumes. It
evidently struck home. Warburton growled, he mopped his red face, he
fell into a seat.
“Lodge, excuse me,” he said, apologetically. “What our fine young friend
here told me was like some one stepping on my gouty foot. I’ve been
maybe a little too zealous--too exacting. Then I’m old and testy... What
does it matter? How could it have been prevented? Alas! it’s black
like that hideous Benton... But we’re coming out into the light. Lodge,
didn’t you tell me this Number Ten bridge was the last obstacle?”
“I did. The rails will go down now fast and straight till they meet out
there in Utah! Soon!”
Warburton became composed. The red died out of his face. He looked at
Neale.
“Young man, can YOU put permanent piers in that sink-hole?”
“Yes. They are started, on bed-rock,” replied Neale.
“Bed-rock!” he repeated, and remained gazing at Neale fixedly. Then he
turned to Lodge. “Do you remember that wild red-head cowboy--Neale’s
friend--when he said, ‘I reckon thet’s aboot all?’... I’ll never forget
him... Lodge, say we have Lee and his friend Senator Dunn come in, and
get it over. An’ thet’ll be aboot all!”
“Thank Heaven!” replied the chief, fervently. He called to his porter,
but as no one replied, General Lodge rose and went into the next car.
Neale had experienced a disturbing sensation in his breast. Lee! Allison
Lee! The mere name made him shake. He could not understand, but he felt
there was more reason for its effect on him than his relation to Allison
Lee as a contractor. Somewhere there was a man named Lee who was Allie’s
father, and Neale knew he would meet him some day.
Then when the chief walked back into the car with several frock-coated
individuals, Neale did recognize in the pale face of one a resemblance
to the girl he loved.
There were no greetings. This situation had no formalities. Warburton
faced them and he seemed neither cold nor hot.
“Mr. Lee, as a director of the road I have to inform you that, following
the reports of our engineer here, your present contracts are void and
you will not get any more.”
A white radiance of rage swiftly transformed Allison Lee. His eyes
seemed to blaze purple out of his white face.
And Neale knew him to be Allie’s father--saw the beauty and fire of her
eyes in his.
“Warburton! You’ll reconsider. I have great influence--”
“To hell with your influence!” retorted Warburton, the lion in him
rising. “The builders--the directors--the owners of the U. P. R. are
right here in this car. Do you understand that? Do you demand that I
call a spade a spade?”
“I have been appointed by Congress. I will--”
“Congress or no Congress, you will never rebuild a foot of this
railroad,” thundered Warburton. He stood there glaring, final, assured.
“For the sake of your--your government connections, let us say--let well
enough alone.”
“This upstart boy of an engineer!” burst out Lee, in furious resentment.
“Who is he? How dare he accuse or report against me?”
“Mr. Lee, your name has never been mentioned by him,” replied the
director.
Lee struggled for self-control. “But, Warburton, it’s preposterous!”
he protested. “This wild boy--the associate of desperadoes--his
report, whatever it is--absurd! Absurd as opposed to my position! A cub
surveyor--slick with tongue and figures--to be thrown in my face! It’s
outrageous! I’ll have him--”
Warburton held up a hand and impelled Lee to silence. In that gesture
Neale read what stirred him to his soul. It was coming. He saw it again
in General Lodge’s fleeting, rare smile. He held his breath. The old
pang throbbed in his breast.
“Lee, pray let me enlighten you and Senator Dunn,” said Warburton,
sonorously, “and terminate this awkward interview... When the last
spike is driven out here--presently--Mr. Neale will be chief engineer of
maintenance of way of the Union Pacific Railroad.”
24
So for Neale the wonderful dream had come to pass, and but for the
memory that made all hours of life bitter his cup of joy would have been
full.
He made his headquarters in Benton and spent his days riding east or
west over the line, taking up the great responsibility he had long
trained for--the maintaining of the perfect condition of the railroad.
Toward the end of that month Neale was summoned to Omaha.
The message had been signed Warburton. Upon arriving at the terminus of
the road Neale found a marvelous change even in the short time since he
had been there. Omaha had become a city. It developed that Warburton had
been called back to New York, leaving word for Neale to wait for orders.
Neale availed himself of this period to acquaint himself with the men
whom he would deal with in the future. Among them, and in the roar
of the railroad shops and the bustle of the city, he lost, perhaps
temporarily, that haunting sense of pain and gloom. Despite himself the
deference shown him was flattering, and his old habit of making friends
reasserted itself. His place was assured now. There were rumors in the
air of branch lines for the Union Pacific. He was consulted for advice,
importuned for positions, invited here and there. So that the days in
Omaha were both profitable and pleasurable.
Then came a telegram from Warburton calling him to Washington, D.C.
It took more than two days to get there, and the time dragged slowly for
Neale. It seemed to him that his importance grew as he traveled, a fact
which was amusing to him. All this resembled a dream.
When he reached the hotel designated in the telegram it was to receive a
warm greeting from Warburton.
“It’s a long trip to make for nothing,” said the director. “And that’s
what it amounts to now. I thought I’d need you to answer a few questions
for me. But you’ll not be questioned officially, and so you’d better
keep a close mouth... We’ve raised the money. The completion of the
U.P.R. is assured.”
Neale could only conjecture what those questions might have been, for
the director offered no explanation. And this circumstance recalled
to mind his former impression of the complexity of the financial and
political end of the construction. Warburton took him to dinner and
later to a club, and introduced him to many men.
For this alone Neale was glad that he had been summoned to the capital.
He met Senators, Congressmen, and other government officials, and many
politicians and prominent men, all of whom, he was surprised to note,
were well informed regarding the Union Pacific. He talked with them, but
answered questions guardedly. And he listened to discussions and talks
covering every phase of the work, from the Credit Mobilier to the
Chinese coolies that were advancing from the west to meet the Paddies of
his own division.
How strange to realize that the great railroad had its nucleus, its
impetus, and its completion in such a center as this! Here were the
frock-coated, soft-voiced, cigar-smoking gentlemen among whom Warburton
and his directors had swung the colossal enterprise. What a vast
difference between these men and the builders! With the handsome
white-haired Warburton, and his associates, as they smoked their rich
cigars and drank their wine, Neale contrasted Casey and McDermott and
many another burly spiker or teamster out on the line. Each class was
necessary to this task. These Easterners talked of money, of gold, as a
grade foreman might have talked of gravel. They smoked and conversed
at ease, laughing at sallies, gossiping over what was a tragedy west
of North Platte; and about them was an air of luxury, of power, of
importance, and a singular grace that Neale felt rather than saw.
Strangest of all to him was the glimpse he got into the labyrinthine
plot built around the stock, the finance, the gold that was constructing
the road. He was an engineer, with a deductive habit of mind, but
he would never be able to trace the intricacy of this monumental
aggregation of deals. Yet he was hugely, interested. Much of the scorn
and disgust he had felt out on the line for the mercenaries connected
with the work he forgot here among these frock-coated gentlemen.
An hour later Neale accompanied Warburton to the station where the
director was to board a train for his return to New York.
“You’ll start back to-morrow,” said Warburton. “I’ll see you soon, I
hope--out there in Utah where the last spike is to be driven. That
will be THE day--THE hour!... It will be celebrated all over the United
States.”
Neale returned to his hotel, trying to make out the vital thing that
had come to him on this hurried and apparently useless journey. His mind
seemed in a whirl. Yet as he pondered, there gradually loomed up the
reflection that in the eastern, or constructive, end of the great
plan there were the same spirits of evil and mystery as existed in the
western, or building, end. Here big men were interested, involved; out
there bigger men sweat and burned and aged and died. The difference was
that these toilers gave all for an ideal while the directors and their
partners thought only of money, of profits.
Neale restrained what might have been contempt, but he thought that if
these financiers could have seen the life of the diggers and spikers as
he knew it they might be actuated by a nobler motive. Before he dropped
to sleep that night he concluded that his trip to Washington, and the
recognition accorded him by Warburton’s circle, had fixed a new desire
in his heart to heave some more rails and drive some more spikes for the
railroad he loved so well. To him the work had been something for which
he had striven with all his might and for which he had risked his life.
Not only had his brain been given to the creation, but his muscles had
ached from the actual physical toil attendant upon this biggest of big
jobs.
When Neale at last reached Benton it was night. Benton and night! And he
had forgotten. A mob of men surged down and up on the train. Neale had
extreme difficulty in getting off at all. But the excitement, the hurry,
the discordant and hoarse medley of many voices, were unusual at that
hour around the station, even for strenuous Benton. All these men were
carrying baggage. Neale shouted questions into passing ears, until at
length some fellow heard and yelled a reply.
The last night of Benton!
He understood then. The great and vile construction camp had reached
the end of its career. It was being torn down--moved away--depopulated.
There was an exodus. In another forty-eight hours all that had
been Benton, with its accumulated life and gold and toil, would be
incorporated in another and a greater and a last camp--Roaring City.
The contrast to the beautiful Washington, the check to his half-dreaming
memory of what he had experienced there, the sudden plunge into this
dim--lighted, sordid, and roaring hell, all brought about in Neale a
revulsion of feeling.
And with the sinking of his spirit there returned the old haunting
pangs--the memory of Allie Lee, the despairing doubts of life or death
for her. Beyond the camp loomed the dim hills, mystical, secretive, and
unchangeable. If she were out there among them, dead or alive, to know
it would be a blessed relief. It was this horror of Benton that he
feared.
He walked the street, up and down, up and down, until the hour was late
and he was tired. All the halls and saloons were blazing in full blast.
Once he heard low, hoarse cries and pistol-shots--and then again quick,
dull, booming guns. How strange they should make him shiver! But all
seemed strange. From these sounds he turned away, not knowing what to do
or where to go, since sleep or rest was impossible. Finally he went into
a gambling-den and found a welcome among players whose faces he knew.
It was Benton’s last night, and there was something in the air,
menacing, terrible.
Neale gave himself up to the spirit of the hour and the game. He had
almost forgotten himself when a white, jeweled hand flashed over his
shoulder, to touch it softly. He heard his name whispered. Looking up,
he saw the flushed and singularly radiant face of Beauty Stanton.
25
The afternoon and night of pay-day in Benton, during which Allie Lee was
barred in her room, were hideous, sleepless, dreadful hours. Her ears
were filled with Benton’s roar--whispers and wails and laughs; thick
shouts of drunken men; the cold voices of gamblers; clink of gold and
clink of glasses; a ceaseless tramp and shuffle of boots; pistol-shots
muffled and far away, pistol-shots ringing and near at hand; the angry
hum of brawling men; and strangest of all this dreadful roar were
the high-pitched, piercing voices of women, in songs without soul, in
laughter without mirth, in cries wild and terrible and mournful.
Allie lay in the dark, praying for the dawn, shuddering at this strife
of sound, fearful that any moment the violence of Benton would burst
through the flimsy walls of her room to destroy her. But the roar
swelled and subsided and died away; the darkness gave place to gray
light and then dawn; the sun arose, the wind began to blow. Now Benton
slept, the sleep of sheer exhaustion.
Her mirror told Allie the horror of that night. Her face was white; her
eyes were haunted by terrors, with great dark shadows beneath. She could
not hold her hands steady.
Late that afternoon there were stirrings and sounds in Durade’s hall.
The place had awakened. Presently Durade himself brought her food and
drink. He looked haggard, worn, yet radiant. He did not seem to note
Allie’s condition or appearance.
“That deaf and dumb fool who waited on you is gone,” said Durade.
“Yesterday was pay-day in Benton... Many are gone... Allie, I won fifty
thousand dollars in gold!”
“Isn’t that enough?” she asked.
He did not hear her, but went on talking of his winnings, of gold, of
games, and of big stakes coming. His lips trembled, his eyes glittered,
his fingers clawed at the air.
For Allie it was a relief when Durade left her. He had almost reached
the apex of his fortunes and the inevitable end. Allie realized that if
she were ever to lift a hand to save herself she must do so at once.
This was a fixed and desperate thought in her mind when Durade called
her to her work.
Allie always entered that private den of Durade’s with eyes cast down.
She had been scorched too often by the glances of men. As she went in
this time she felt the presence of gamblers, but they were quieter than
those to whom she had become accustomed. Durade ordered her to fetch
drinks, then he went on talking, rapidly, in excitement, elated,
boastful, almost gay.
Allie did not look up. As she carried the tray to the large table she
heard a man whisper low: “By jove!... Hough, that’s the girl!”
Then she heard a slight, quick intake of breath, and the exclamation,
“Good God!”
Both voices thrilled Allie. The former seemed the low, well-modulated,
refined, and drawling speech of an Englishman; the latter was keen,
quick, soft, and full of genuine emotion. Allie returned to her chair by
the sideboard before she ventured to look up. Durade was playing cards
with four men, three of whom were black-garbed, after the manner of
professional gamblers. The other player wore gray, and a hat of unusual
shape, with wide, loose, cloth band. He removed his hat as he caught
Allie’s glance, and she associated the act with the fact of her
presence. She thought that this must be the man whose voice had
proclaimed him English. He had a fair face, lined and shadowed and
dissipated, with tired blue eyes and a blond mustache that failed to
altogether hide a well-shaped mouth. It was the kindest and saddest face
Allie had ever seen there. She read its story. In her extremity she had
acquired a melancholy wisdom in the judgment of the faces of the
men drifting through Durade’s hall. What Allie had heard in this
Englishman’s voice she saw in his features. He did not look at her
again. He played cards wearily, carelessly, indifferently, with his mind
plainly on something else.
“Ancliffe, how many cards?” called one of the black-garbed men.
The Englishman threw down his cards. “None,” he said.
The game was interrupted by a commotion in the adjoining room, which was
the public gambling-hall of Durade’s establishment.
“Another fight!” exclaimed Durade, impatiently. “And only Mull and
Fresno showed up to-day.”
Harsh voices and heavy stamps were followed by a pistol-shot. Durade
hurriedly arose.
“Gentlemen, excuse me,” he said, and went out. One of the gamblers also
left the room, and another crossed it to peep through the door.
This left the Englishman sitting at the table with the last gambler,
whose back was turned toward Allie. She saw the Englishman lean forward
to speak. Then the gambler arose and, turning, came directly toward her.