HUMMEL KEEPS HIS WORD
ALLAN, as he turned into the street before the house, was caught by a
fierce gust of wind, whirled against a tree at the edge of the pavement,
and would have fallen, had not a strong arm grasped him about the waist.
“Sure, an’ ’tis a reg’lar hurricane,” shouted a well-known voice, and
Allan found himself gazing into the cheerful face of Reddy Magraw.
“Why, Reddy,” he cried, “what are you doing here?”
“I was sent after you,” Reddy explained, “an’ it was well I was—ye niver
could have got up there by yerself.”
“Nonsense!” Allan protested. “I’m nearly as strong as I ever was. That
gust caught me unprepared, that’s all. Come on.” He didn’t ask who it
was had sent Reddy, but supposed of course it was Stanley.
“I’ll jest hold on to yer arm, anyways,” said Reddy. “Is this the well
one?”
“Yes; hold on to it, if you want to; maybe it’ll keep you from being
blown away;” but to himself Allan was forced to confess more than once
that Reddy’s arm was a welcome support. For he was weaker than he had
thought—weaker than he was willing to acknowledge, even to himself.
As for Reddy, he judged it best to say nothing as to how he had come to
be appointed Allan’s body-guard. He had been routed out of bed by Mrs.
Magraw at the first explosion. Across the yards from their front window
they could see the flames spreading, and Reddy jumped into his clothes
in a hurry.
“Now listen to me,” his wife had said, as this process was in progress,
“there’s jist one thing fer ye t’ do this night, Reddy Magraw, an’ that
is t’ kape yerself glued t’ Allan West an’ t’ see the boy don’t come t’
no harm. They’ll be gittin’ him out o’ bed the first thing, an’ him
scarce able t’ stand! Reddy Magraw, if any harm comes t’ him this night,
I’ll niver fegive ye!”
“Don’t ye fear, darlint,” Reddy assured her. “I’ll stick t’ him like
beeswax,” and, giving her a quick hug, he ran from the house and down
the path to the gate.
Mrs. Magraw opened her lips to call to him; but closed them again by a
mighty effort, and stood watching his dim figure until it vanished in
the darkness. Then, drawing a chair close to the front window, she sat
down and watched the flames grow and spread. Her face was very pale, and
her lips moved mechanically as she told over and over again the beads of
her rosary.
* * * * *
“There’s the very divil t’ pay,” Reddy went on, as he and Allan hurried
forward. “I didn’t stop t’ see much of it, but I saw enough.”
As a matter of fact, he hadn’t stopped at all, but had made a bee-line
for Allan’s gate, fearing that he would miss him.
“You kin see the fire now,” he added, a moment later, and Allan, looking
up, saw ahead of him a red glow against the sky, which spread and
brightened, even as he watched it.
All about them were people hastening in the same direction, and as they
neared the yards, they could hear the excited shouts of the crowd
already assembled, the clanging of the fire-engines, and finally, just
as they arrived, the swish and hiss of water as it was turned on the
flames.
But Allan paused for only a glance at the fire, serious as it appeared
to be. Mere property loss, however heavy, was a little thing in
comparison with the possible loss of life which the wrecking of the
freight-house involved, and he pushed his way forward through the crowd,
anxious to learn the worst at once. The town’s limited police force was
already on the scene, but the crowd was entirely beyond its control, and
the most it could accomplish was to keep clear a space on the freight
platform where two physicians were already busily at work, by the light
of an engine headlight.
Toward these, Allan made his way with a curious sinking of the heart.
The policemen recognized him and passed him through, and at that moment,
one of the doctors rose with a little gesture of despair.
“We can’t do anything for him,” he said. “The poor devil’s about out of
his misery.”
Allan, staring down at the blackened shape upon the platform, scarcely
recognized in it a human being.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know him,” said the doctor, looking up and recognizing the
chief dispatcher. “Maybe you do,” and he knelt down again and turned the
distorted and blackened countenance so that the light shone full upon
it.
At the first sickened glance, Allan decided that he had never seen the
man, then a certain familiarity struck through to his consciousness.
“Why, it’s Rafe Bassett!” he cried.
“Rafe Bassett!” echoed a voice, and Allan turned to find that Stanley
had broken a way through the crowd. “Well, that’s justice for you!”
“Justice?” echoed Allan.
“It was him did all that,” said Stanley, with a wave of the hand toward
the burning cars. “Set fire to them an’ got burned up hisself!”
The crowd pressing upon the policemen heard the words and a low angry
murmur ran through it, for with that blackened shape before them, the
detective’s words sounded particularly heartless.
“Men,” cried Stanley, facing them, “this ain’t no guesswork. Rafe
Bassett was kicked out of the brotherhood t’-night, an’ decided t’ git
even this way. He set that car of oil on fire—_but he was inside the
car_—an’ before he could git the door open, this is what happened to
him. I pity the poor devil as much as any of you—an’ yet I say ’twas
justice.”
“He’s right,” nodded a man at the front of the crowd. “He’s right. Let’s
have no trouble here, men.”
Allan looked down again at the dim and shapeless mass.
“Is there an ambulance?” he asked.
“Yes,” answered one of the doctors. “Two of them.”
“Take him away, then; and see that he is cared for. After all, he’s
dead, Stanley.”
“An’ a blamed good thing, too,” muttered Stanley, whose stock of
sentiment was very small; but he took care that the crowd did not hear
the words. After all, there was no use in provoking trouble.
“And how about the others?” asked Allan.
“What others?”
“The men in the freight-house.”
“Oh,” answered Stanley, with a grin, “they was more scared than hurt.”
Allan drew a quick breath of relief.
“But didn’t the bomb wreck the place?” he asked.
“Oh, it wrecked it all right; at least this end of it; but by good luck,
it blew the end wall out, instead of in, and the roof didn’t fall until
everybody had scrambled out. I thought there’d been at least a dozen
killed by the way they hollered after the bomb went off, but nobody was
hurt beyond some cuts and bruises.”
“Well, that was good luck!” said Allan. “That takes the biggest kind of
a load off my heart.”
“Yes; and the best luck of all,” added Stanley dryly, “is that I caught
the man who did it.”
“The man who did it?” Allan stopped short in amazement to look at his
companion. “Do you mean it, Stanley?”
“Mean it? I should say I did. It was the merest luck—I fell right on to
him as he was gettin’ away, and when I started to take him back to the
freight-house he was scared to death—but he don’t deny it, fer that
matter.”
“Who was it?” asked Allan. “One of the strikers?”
“No,” said Stanley, grinning again. “One of the strike-breakers.”
Again Allan stopped to gaze in amazement at his companion.
“Hummel,” explained Stanley, his face fairly glowing with satisfaction.
“Oh, this has been a great night.”
“Where is he now?”
“I’ve got him under guard in the freight office—I’ll send him up to the
county jail pretty soon—but he said he wanted to see you first.”
“To see me? What for?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he wants to confess and tell who his pals were. Of
course we know Bassett was. I’ve got a sort of idea that Bassett was at
the head of the whole thing. There’s the freight-house. You kin see what
damage the bomb did.”
It was certainly a frightful looking place. The end wall of the building
had been blown out bodily, and a great section of the platform had also
been blown away. Evidently Hummel had placed the bomb just inside the
wall. There was, at either end of the building, a small square
ventilator near the ground, covered with a piece of perforated iron, as
such openings usually are. Later investigation showed that Hummel had
probably knocked out this plate, and as the ventilator was too small to
permit the passage of his body, he had placed the bomb as far inside as
he could reach, and had then attached and lighted the fuse. The position
of the bomb, by a fortunate chance, was such that the greatest force of
the explosion was directed outwards, and while the end wall had fallen,
it had fallen outward and not inward, and the side walls had remained
nearly intact. The roof had sagged badly, but had not fallen. The other
end of the freight-house, at which were the offices, had not been
injured at all.
Allan stood for a moment contemplating this wreckage, and as he turned
away, he felt a touch on his arm. He turned to find himself face to face
with Simpson, the special delegate.
“Mr. West,” said Simpson, “I hope I may have a few words with you.”
“Why, certainly,” said Allan. “What is it?”
“In the first place, I want to assure you that no brotherhood man had
anything to do with this,” and he waved his hand toward the wrecked
freight-house and the blazing cars.
“We know who did both,” said Allan quietly. “The man who set fire to the
cars was a union man.”
“Who was it?” asked Simpson quickly.
“Rafe Bassett.”
Simpson’s face grew a shade paler, and his eyes lighted with a grim
satisfaction, as he realized how this discovery vindicated the course he
had taken with regard to the strike.
“Bassett was not a union man; he was suspended from the lodge last
night,” he said, quietly. “He would never have been reinstated. I
suspect him of having had something to do with that outrage at
Cincinnati, and I believe all this was done simply to revenge himself on
the brotherhood and give it a black eye.”
“And you were going to carry on the strike for a man like that?”
“No, Mr. West, we were not,” answered Simpson earnestly. “After Bassett
was run out of the hall last night, a committee was appointed to wait
upon you in the morning and declare the strike off.”
Allan’s face brightened wonderfully.
“Without condition?” he asked.
“With only one condition—that the men be reinstated in their old
positions—all except Bassett.”
“We have promised to give permanent positions to any of the new men who
made good,” said Allan. “We must keep that promise.”
“We have no objection to that. Mighty few of them can hold a permanent
job. Mr. West, I’m going to be candid with you. This strike was begun
foolishly and without proper investigation. You know why—it was because
of your exposure of Nixon. Now we are anxious to make such amends as we
can, and we go further than we usually do. We agree, as I have said, to
your giving permanent places to as many of the strike-breakers as you
care to keep and as care to stay.”
Allan held out his hand quickly.
“Then I understand the strike is ended?”
“It will end at noon, if you say so.”
“I do say so.”
“Good!” cried Simpson, and grasped the hand held out to him.
Not more than half a dozen men were within hearing, but the news of the
great event passed like lightning from mouth to mouth, and the crowd was
soon cheering like mad.
“Well,” said Stanley, “I guess my job’s done. I’ll be mighty glad t’ git
back t’ my bed ag’in. Will you see Hummel before I send him up-town?”
“Yes; only I’ve got two or three things to do first. Let’s have a look
at the fire.”
They started together toward the lower yards, and Stanley, after
glancing back once or twice, leaned over and spoke in a carefully
repressed undertone.
“There’s a tough-lookin’ feller been follerin’ you around all night,” he
said. “He’s right behind us now. Glance around kind of careless-like an’
see if you know him.”
Allan glanced apprehensively over his shoulder, and then laughed
outright as he recognized his faithful body-guard.
“Why, that’s Reddy Magraw,” he said. “He thinks I’m going to keel over
any minute, and he’s ready to catch me when I do.”
“Oh,” said Stanley, in a chagrined tone; “I didn’t recognize him in the
dark.”
“Didn’t you send him after me?”
“Send him? Why, no. Did he say I did?”
“No, I don’t know that he said exactly that. But if you didn’t, who did?
I wonder—”
But they had reached the place where the cars were blazing, and the
matter was driven from Allan’s mind for the time being. It was soon
evident that all danger of the fire spreading further was over. The cars
in the neighbourhood had been jerked away to a place of safety, and
three or four lines of hose were playing upon the fire, with the result
that it was soon under control. Six cars and their contents had been
destroyed and twice as many more damaged to some extent, but this loss
seemed trifling to Allan beside what might have been.
“Now I’ve got a report to make, and then I’m done,” he said to Stanley.
“I’ll come over to the freight office just as soon as I can.”
“All right, sir,” said Stanley, and hurried away to provide fresh
quarters for the strike-breakers. He found them fraternizing with the
brotherhood men, and Simpson himself proposed a solution of the problem
of lodging them.
“Why not bring them up to the lodge room?” he said. “It’s plenty big
enough, and each man can bring his cot with him. We’ll see that
breakfast is ready for them in the morning and after that, I guess they
can get board around town somewhere. I hope you’ll approve,” he added to
Stanley. “We want to show we’re in earnest about this thing and that we
bear no grudge against anyone.”
“All right,” agreed Stanley; “I don’t see no objections; though of
course, I see your little game,” he added, in an undertone. “These
fellers’ll be union men inside of a week.”
Simpson made no reply, but smiled a diplomatic smile; and Stanley’s
prediction came true; for all of the strangers who secured permanent
positions, joined the brotherhood in a very short time. It may be added,
in passing, however, that not above eight or ten remained at Wadsworth.
Most of them had the wanderlust in their blood; they could be contented
in one place only for a very short time, and then must be moving on;
while the rest were victims of an even worse disease, which converted
them from men into brutes, and rendered them unfit to hold any position.
* * * * *
Allan, hurrying across the yards in the direction of his office, was
conscious of quick steps behind him, and turned to find that Jack Welsh
had joined Reddy Magraw.
“So here you are!” cried Jack. “Well, I certainly am glad to see you.
And you’re not hurted?”
“Hurt?” repeated Allan. “Why, no, of course not; why should I be?”
“And you’re about ready to go home? The women are jest naterally
worrited to death about you.”
“Oh, I’m all right,” Allan assured him, though he was conscious that
both head and shoulder were aching numbly. “Reddy’s been dogging me like
a shadow. I’ll be ready to go back before long. You’ve heard the news?”
“No. What?”
“The strike’s off. I’m just going to wire the news to Mr. Schofield.
Then I’ll be ready to go home. I must be up early in the morning.”
“We’ll wait fer you,” said Jack, and he and Reddy sat down on the bottom
step of the steep flight which led to the dispatchers’ office, while
Allan hurried up the stairs.
It took but a moment to get Mr. Schofield on the line. He had been sent
the first news of the disaster, and was anxious to know how serious it
was. Allan’s first words reassured him.
“Nobody hurt,” Allan flashed, “and not over six cars destroyed, though
some damage to others. Fire about out. Freight-house badly wrecked.
Bassett set fire to cars and was burned to death. We also have fellow
who set off bomb. Just saw Simpson, and arranged to have strike called
off at noon to-day. No conditions. Admits that strike was mistake and
says Bassett was fired from brotherhood last night. Willing to do most
anything to square himself. And I guess that’s all till I see you.”
There was an instant’s pause before Mr. Schofield answered.
“West,” he began, “this is the greatest night’s work you ever did. Are
you able to be up?”
“I’m aching some,” Allan answered, “but I’m going home to bed now.
Everything is well in hand. I guess there’s no further danger of
trouble.”
“Wait a minute,” came the answer.
Allan waited until his instrument began again to call him.
“All right,” he said.
“This is Round,” chattered the instrument. “Schofield has just been
telling me. I want to congratulate you—and order you to take at least a
month’s vacation.”
“I guess I’ll wait till my honeymoon,” answered Allan, and laughed to
himself at the thought.
“Are you engaged?”
“Yes. Tell Mr. Schofield I’ve taken his advice.”
“When is it to be?”
“Don’t know yet.”
“Well, mind you ask me.”
“I will.”
“And here’s my best wishes, my boy. Now go home and go to bed. I’ll be
at Wadsworth in a day or two, and will tell you then what I think about
your work.”
“All right; thank you. Good-bye.”
Allan closed his key with a click, and as he did so, he was conscious of
a throng around his desk. He looked up to see all the employees on duty
and some who weren’t on duty, but who had been got out of bed by the
disturbance, crowding around him.
“Shake!” they said. “Of course we heard that,” and Allan gripped one
hand after another, his eyes shining.
“Thank you, boys,” was all he could say. “Thank you.”
* * * * *
He rejoined Jack and Reddy, at last, at the foot of the stairs.
“Just one more errand and then I’m ready to go home,” he said.
“Seems to me they allers is one more,” rejoined Jack. “What is it now?”
“The fellow who blew up the freight-house wants to see me.”
“The fellow who blew up the freight-house? Have you got him?”
“Yes; Stanley nabbed him and has got him over there in the freight
office. I guess he’s kept it quiet for fear the fellow’d be mobbed.”
“An’ that’s more sense than Stanley usually shows,” said Reddy. “Who is
the varmint?”
“His name’s Hummel—you’ll remember him, Jack.”
“Did I iver see him?”
“He’s the fellow who ran after me across the yards that night—”
“An’ tried t’ knife ye,” added Jack, his face flushing darkly. “Bad cess
to him. What’s he want with ye now?”
“Stanley thinks maybe he wants to confess.”
“More likely he wants to take a shot at you. Don’t you go, Allan.”
“Oh, nonsense, Jack,” laughed Allan. “He’s under arrest. He can’t harm
me, even if he wants to. There he is now,” he added, as a little
procession emerged from the freight office.
Stanley had seen Allan coming across the tracks, and anxious to have the
interview over and get his prisoner away before any hint of his identity
should get about, had brought him out, surrounded by three or four
officers. The crowd had melted away considerably, and what there was
left of it was either watching the last embers of the fire, or
inspecting the ruined freight-house. So the little group came out into
the yards unnoticed, and stopped in the shadow of the building until
Allan and his two friends came up.
Allan, stopping close to Hummel, saw that he was handcuffed, and
therefore incapable of doing any one harm. He seemed bent and shrunken
and only half-conscious, as though on the verge of collapse.
“Well, Hummel,” he said, “you wanted to see me?”
Hummel lifted his eyes and stared at him coldly, for an instant, as
though not recognizing him; then his eyes brightened with rage.
“Yes,” he said, thickly, “I wanted t’ see you. I hope you’re satisfied
with this night’s work.”
“Why, yes,” said Allan with a smile. “Don’t you think I have reason to
be? Have you anything to tell me?”
“Yes,” said Hummel, his face growing more livid still, as he glared at
the other. “It’s this—I’ll be in hell to-night an’ so will you!”
And he suddenly raised his handcuffed hands.
Allan was dimly conscious of a heavy form hurling itself past him, of a
close grapple, of an instant’s pause broken only by oaths and hoarse
shouting; he seemed to see Reddy Magraw grappling with the anarchist;
then the world was blotted out in a white flash of flame.
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