THE SPIRIT OF THE JOB
In order to make plain what was taking place at the main camp during
Carhart’s absence, we must go back to that evening during which so
many things had come up to be disposed of before the chief could leave
for Sherman and Crockett and Paradise. To begin with, Dimond came
riding in at dusk with a canteen of clear water which he laid on the
table about which the engineers were sitting. To Carhart, when he had
unscrewed the cap and taken a deep draught, it tasted like
Apollinaris. “First rate!” he exclaimed; “first rate!” Then he passed
it to Old Van, who smacked his lips over it.
“Where did he find this?” Carhart asked.
“Eighteen or twenty miles ahead.”
“Plenty of it?”
“He thinks so,” he says, “but he’s gone on to find more.”
“Are the Apaches bothering him?”
“We’ve had a pop at ’em now and then. He says he hopes to have some
beadwork for you when he sees you again. There was one fellow came too
near one night, and Mr. Scribner hit him, but the others carried him
off before we could get the beads. He sent me back to guide the wagons
to the well if you want to send ’em.”
“Well,” said Carhart, when Dimond had gone, “we have water now,
anyway. The next question is about these thieves. You say that five
animals were stolen while I was away. When the first roads went
through, they had regular troops to guard the work, and I don’t know
that we can improve on the plan. I’ll look the matter up when I get to
Sherman.”
But an hour later, when he left his division engineer and stepped
outside for a last look at “Texas,” he found Charlie hanging about
near the stable tent. The cook approached him, and made it awkwardly
but firmly plain that he had heard a rumor to the effect that Mr.
Carhart was going to Sherman for regular troops, and that, if the
rumor were true, he, Charlie, would leave.
No questions were necessary, for Carhart had never thought Jack Flagg
the only deserter in camp. He mused a moment; then he looked up
thoughtfully at the tall, loose-jointed, but well-set-up figure of the
cook. “Do you know anything about military drill and sentry duties?”
he asked abruptly.
Charlie, taken aback, hesitated.
“Never mind answering. We’ll say that you do. Now, if I were to put
you in charge of the business, give you all the men and rifles you
need, could you guarantee to guard this camp?”
Charlie’s face wore a curious mixture of expressions.
“Well, speak up.”
“I rather guess I could.”
“I can depend on you, can I?”
“You won’t get the regulars, then?”
“No, I won’t get them.”
“Then you can depend on me.”
“I want you to get about it this morning. Mr. Gus Vandervelt will give
you everything you need. Make the watches short and distribute them
among a good many of the men, so that nobody will be worked too hard.”
Carhart passed on, and let himself into the covered enclosure where
his horse lay sick. It was a quarter of an hour before he returned to
the headquarters tent, to find Vandervelt standing in silence at the
table. Apparently he had risen to leave, and had paused at the sound
of a step outside. Standing for a moment at the tent entrance,
Carhart’s eyes took on the curious expression which the sight of the
elder of the oddly assorted brothers frequently aroused there. The
lamplight threw upward shadows on Old Van’s face and deepened the
gloom about his eyes. A moment and Carhart, sobering, stepped inside.
Certain memories of Old Van’s strange career came floating through
his thoughts. It was probably the last time they would be thrown
together. Considering everything, he would not again feel like
choosing him for an assistant. Yet he admired Old Van’s strong
qualities, and--he was sorry, very sorry.
“Van,” he said, “I’ve changed my mind about the troops. I’ve told
Charlie, the cook, to organize an effective system of guards at night,
and I’ve told him, too, that he will take his orders from Gus.”
Vandervelt stood motionless, looking at this man who had risen to be
his chief, and his color slowly turned from bronze to red.
“From Gus, eh?” he said with a slight huskiness.
“Yes,” replied Carhart, steadily, “from Gus. He will represent me
while I am gone. It will be only a day or so before he’ll be around.”
Old Van might have answered roughly; instead he dropped his eyes. But
Carhart’s unpleasant duty was not yet done.
“One thing more, Van,” he said, looking quietly at the older man, but
unable to conceal a certain tension in his speech, “are you carrying a
gun?”
There was a long silence. Every one of the faint evening camp sounds
fell loud on their ears. A puff of wind shook the tent flaps and
stirred the papers on the table. The lamp flickered. Very slowly,
without looking up, Old Van reached back to his hip pocket, drew out a
revolver, laid it on the table,--laid it, oddly enough, on a copy of
the Book of Common Prayer which was acting as a paperweight, and left
the tent and went off down the grade. And for some time after his
footfalls had died away Carhart sat with elbows on table, chin on
hands, looking at the weapon.
* * * * *
Paul Carhart was gone. It would probably be a week to ten days before
he would be able to get back to the track-end. And with him had gone
the spirit of the work, the vitality and dash which had worked out at
moments through the assistants and the men in a stirring sense of
achievement, which had given to each young engineer and engineer’s
assistant a touch of the glow of creating something, which had made
this ugly scene almost beautiful. That steam-leaking locomotive and
that rattle-trap of a “private car,” bearing the chief away into the
dawn, left a sense of depression behind it. By noon of the following
day, Old Van was growing noticeably morose. By mid-afternoon every man
of the thousand felt the difference. Before supper time the heat, the
gloom, the loneliness of the desert, the sense of a dead pull on the
work, the queer thought that there was no such place as Red Hills
anywhere on the map, and that even if there were, the western
extension of the Shaky and Windy would never reach it, these thoughts
were preying on them, particularly on Young Van, who was up and at
work soon after noon.
Through the second day it was worse. Young Van made stout efforts to
throw more energy into his work, and then, in looking back on these
efforts, recognized in them a confession of weakness. Paul Carhart
never seemed to drive as he had been driving,--his work was always the
same. In this frame of mind the young man, at evening, mounted a
hummock to survey what had been accomplished during the day. But to
his altered eyes the track was no longer a link in the world’s girdle;
it was only a thin line of dirt and wood and steel, on which a
thousand dispirited men had been toiling.
Later he saw Charlie bringing the wagons into corral. He heard his
brother ordering the cook sharply about, and he noted how doggedly the
orders were obeyed. Then, finally, having laid out the details of the
morrow’s work and smoked an unresponsive cigarette or two, he went to
sleep.
Old Van sat up later. And Charlie sat up later still, nearly all night
in fact. He found a comfortable lounging place near Dimond’s post, in
the shadow of the empty train. The grade was here slightly elevated,
and, lying on one elbow, he could survey the camp. Now and then he
made the rounds, looking after the half-dozen sentries whom he had
posted on knolls outside the wide circle of tents and wagons, making
sure that there was no drinking and that his men were advised as to
their duties and responsibilities. Between trips he lay back,
surrounded by a number of wide-awake laborers, and listened while
Dimond recited the prowess of their chief. It was very comfortable
there, stretched out upon the newly turned earth. The camp was very
quiet. Only a few lights twinkled here and there, and it was not very
late when these went out, one by one.
“I heard Mr. Scribner telling, the other day,” said Dimond, “how the
boss run up against a farmer with a shotgun when he was running the
line for the M. T. S. Mr. Scribner was a boy then, carrying stakes for
him. There was quite a bunch of ’em, but nobody had a gun. They come
out of a piece of woods on to the road, and there they see the farmer
standing just inside his stump fence with the two barrels of his
shotgun resting on the top of one of the stumps. Mr. Scribner says the
old fellow was that excited he hollered so they could ‘a’ heard ’im
half a mile off. ‘Don’t you dare cross the line of my property!’ he
yells. ‘The first man that crosses the line of my property’s a dead
man!’ They all stopped, Mr. Scribner says, for they didn’t any of ’em
feel particularly like taking in a barrel or so of buckshot. But Mr.
Carhart wasn’t ever very easy to stop. He just looked at the fellow a
minute, and then he went right for him. ‘Look out!’ the man yells.
‘You cross the line of my property and you’re a dead man!’ But Mr.
Carhart went right on over the fence. ‘That’s all right,’ says he,
‘but you can’t get away with more’n one or two of us, and there’ll be
enough left to hang you up to that tree over there.’ And the next
thing they knew, Mr. Scribner says, Mr. Carhart had took the shotgun
right out of the farmer’s hands.”
Dimond had other stories. “I guess there ain’t nobody ever found it
easy to get around him. Once when he was a kid surveyor, before he
went North, they sent him over into southern Texas to look up an old
piece of property. There was a fellow claimed a lot of land that
really run over on to this property. Mr. Carhart figured it out that
the fellow was lying, but he knew it was going to be hard to prove it.
The old marks of the corners were all gone--there wasn’t a soul living
who had ever seen ’em. It was an old Spanish grant, Mr. Scribner says,
and the Spanish surveyors had just blazed trees to mark the lines.
Well, sir, would you believe it, Mr. Carhart worked out the place
where this corner ought ‘o be, cut down an old cedar tree that stood
there, sawed it up into lengths before witnesses, found the blaze mark
all grown over with bark, and took the piece of log right into court
and proved it. No, I guess it wouldn’t be so infernal easy to get
ahead o’ Mr. Carhart.”
“That’s all right,” observed one of the laborers, “if you’re working
for Mr. Carhart. But s’pose you ain’t--s’pose you’re workin’ for Mr.
Vandervelt?”
“Oh, well, of course,” Dimond replied, “Mr. Vandervelt’s different. He
ain’t nowhere near the man Mr. Carhart is.”
Charlie took in this comment quietly, but with less than the usual
good nature in his blue eyes.
“I don’t care how decent the boss is,” continued the laborer, “if I
have to have a mean old he-devil cussin’ at me from six to six, and
half the night besides, sometimes.”
Dimond grew reflective. “I know about Mr. Vandervelt,” he said
meditatively. “You see, boys, it was sort o’ lonely up ahead there
boring for water, and Mr. Scribner and me we got pretty well
acquainted.” Dimond was endeavoring to conceal the slight superiority
over these men of which he could not but be conscious. “It’s a queer
case,” he went on, “Mr. Vandervelt’s case. I know about it. It’s his
temper, you see. That’s what’s kep’ ’im back,--that’s why he’s only a
division engineer to-day.”
“Keep quiet, boys,” broke in the laborer, with a sneer. “Dimond knows
about it. He’s tellin’ us the news. Mr. Vandervelt’s got a temper, he
says.”
Dimond was above a retort. “I can tell you,” he said. “Mr. Scribner
give me the facts.” (In justice to Harry Scribner it should be
mentioned that he had told Dimond nothing whatever concerning the
personal attributes of his colleague.) “When Mr. Vandervelt gets mad,
he shoots. He don’t have to be drunk, neither, or in a fight, or
frolicking careless with the boys. He shot a waiter in the Harper
restaurant at Flemington, shot ’im right down. And then he went out
into the mountains and worked for a year without ever coming near a
town. And they say”--Dimond’s voice lowered--“they say he shot a camp
boss on the Northern, a man he used to knock around with, friendly.
They say he shot him.” Dimond paused, in order that his words might
sink into the consciousness of each listener. “He never goes North any
more. He’ll never even stay at a place like Sherman for more than a
day or two, and not that when he can help it.”
The men were silent for a little while. Then Charlie got slowly to his
feet and shook out his big frame preparatory to making his rounds. “I
guess that’s why Mr. Carhart told me to take my orders from his
brother,” he said slowly. “I was wondering.” Then he stepped off in
the direction of the corral.
It was three o’clock in the morning when Charlie finally stretched out
for three winks. The laborers had long before rolled themselves up in
their blankets. The men on guard, weary of peering into the darkness
and the silence, had made themselves as nearly comfortable as they
could. And it was half-past three, or near it, when a rope was cut by
a stealthy hand and half a dozen sleepy, obedient mules were led out
and away. Where so many animals were stirring; and where, too, lids
were perhaps drooping over hitherto watchful eyes, the slight
disturbance passed unobserved. At four the guards were changed, and
the new day began to make itself known. At five the camp was astir;
and a boy, searching in vain for his team, came upon the cut, trailing
ends of rope at the outer edge of the corral.
They told Charlie, whom they found bending, red-eyed, over a steaming
kettle. And the cook, with a straightforward sort of moral courage,
went at once to announce his failure at guarding the camp. As luck
would have it, he found the brothers Vandervelt together, at the wash
basin behind their tent.
“May I speak to you, sir?” addressing the younger.
“Certainly, Charlie--What luck?” was the reply. And then, for a
moment, they waited,--Young Van half glancing at his brother, Charlie
summoning every ounce of this wonderful new sense of responsibility
for the ordeal which he saw was to come, Old Van meaning unmistakably
to take a hand in the discussion.
“We lost six mules last night, Mr. Vandervelt,” said Charlie, at
length, plainly addressing Young Van.
“We lost six mules, did we?” mimicked the veteran, breaking in before
his brother could reply. “What do you mean by coming here with such a
story, you--?” The tirade was on. Old Van applied to the cook such
epithets as men did not employ at that time to any great extent on the
plains. All the depression of the day before, which he had not
succeeded in sleeping off, came out in a series of red-hot phrases,
which, to Young Van’s, and to his own still greater surprise, Charlie
took. Young Van, looking every second for a blow or even for a shot,
could not see that he so much as twitched a muscle. Finally Old Van
paused, not because he was in any danger of running out of epithets,
but because something in the attitude of both Charlie and his brother
tended to clarify the situation in his mind. Gus was standing almost
as squarely as Charlie, and there were signs of tension about his
mouth. It was no time for the engineers to develop a conflict of
authority.
When his brother had stopped talking, Young Van said shortly, “How did
you come to let them get away, Charlie?”
“I fell asleep, Mr. Vandervelt,--it must have been after three this
morning, and I didn’t wake up until four.”
“But what was the matter with your men?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out, sir. They must have been asleep,
too.”
“Who was on guard at that point?”
“A man named Foulk--one of the iron squad.”
“Yes, I know him. He is trustworthy, I think.”
“Oh, yes, sir, you can trust him, as far as having anything to do with
those thieves is concerned.”
“But that won’t help us much if he can’t keep awake a few hours. Where
is he now?”
Charlie hesitated. “I--I tied him up.”
“Bring him here.”
Charlie went off to obey. And Old Van returned to his ablutions. A
moment more and the unfortunate sentinel was being marched across to
headquarters, under the guidance and the momentum of a huge red hand.
“Here he is, Mr. Vandervelt.”
Young Van looked at the two. Foulk appeared honestly crestfallen.
Then, “Let him go, Charlie,” he said. And turning to Foulk, he merely
added, “You’ll get your night’s sleep after this, my friend. We want
no men on guard who can’t be relied on--and it’s evident that you
can’t. Now go and eat your breakfast, and get to work. See that this
doesn’t happen again, Charlie.”
Foulk hurried off in one direction, Charlie walked away in another;
Old Van disappeared within the tent in order to complete his very
simple toilet; Young Van stood alone, looking after one and another
of the retreating figures with an expression of something like dismay.
He had spoken with more vigor and authority than he could suppose; but
even such as it was, his momentary grip on the situation relaxed while
he stood there. The work was not going to stop, he knew that, yet this
complicated mechanism, the job, seemed to be running on without any
mainspring. Speaking for himself, there was no one of the many tasks
Carhart had left in his hands which he was not competent to perform,
yet, viewing them in mass, they bewildered him. There would be
bickerings, sliding on from bad to worse. The work would be undertaken
each day in a dogged spirit, and it would have an ugly side which had
not before shown itself. Earlier in the course of the undertaking
there had been moments when he had thought, looking out from his own
mountain range of details, that Carhart’s work was not so trying as it
seemed; that he had time to ride up and down the line, chatting with
engineers and foremen; that he could relax almost as he chose,--run
down to Sherman now and then, or even slip off for a day’s shooting.
Now he saw it differently. And his forebodings were realized.
Everybody in authority felt the unfortunate drift of the work, and
everybody felt helpless to check this drift. Attempts made now and
then by individuals were worse--because they merely succeeded in
drawing attention to it--than the general failure. That evening, when
Scribner came back and they all tried to be jolly, was the gloomiest
time in a gloomy week. Men took to deserting their work. On one
occasion thirty-odd of them left in a body to join an outfit which
halted overnight near the main camp--that was when they were living on
“mile forty-five.” Fights grew more frequent. Accidents seemed to be
almost a part of the week’s routine.
One day, Young Van, chancing to pass near the track-laying work, heard
his brother swearing at the rider of the snap-mule that drew the
rail-truck back and forth between the material train and the work. The
rider was a boy of twelve. Young Van recalled, as he listened, a scene
of a fortnight earlier (it seemed a year), when the boy, then new to
it, had been found by Carhart, quietly sobbing on his horse. “What’s
the trouble, son?” the chief had inquired good-humoredly. “I’m
afraid,” was the lad’s reply. Whereupon the chief had lifted him down,
swung himself into the saddle, and, with a twinkle in his eye, had
ridden a few trips in order to show the boy how to manage it safely.
At length a man was killed, one of pile-driver crew No. 1, on Old
Van’s division. Other men had been killed earlier in the work, but
this death struck the workmen as bearing greater significance. In the
other cases Carhart himself had done all that man could do; the last
time he had driven the body twenty miles to a priest and decent
burial. But Old Van sent out a few nerve-shaken laborers to dig a
grave, and told them to waste no time about it, beyond seeing that it
was well filled after--afterward.
* * * * *
For several nights after the trouble with Foulk Charlie did not sleep
at all. But even a frontiersman is subject to Nature’s laws, and the
time came when he was overcome, shortly after midnight, while sitting
on a box before his tent, and he rolled over and slept like a child.
They woke him at daybreak, and, without a word, handed him this rough
placard:--
Tell Mr. Carhart he’d better be carrying a gun after this.
He’ll need it.
JACK FLAGG.
“It was stuck up on the telegraph pole,” explained a sleepy-eyed
sentinel.
“Where?”
“Here in camp.”
A few moments later the cook, pale under his tan, stood before his
half-dressed acting-chief. Again the two brothers were together.
“So this is how you watch things, is it?” said Old Van. “What did you
lose for us last night?”
“The drivers are counting up now, sir. I only know of a mule and a
horse so far.”
“That’s all you know of, is it? I’ll tell you what to do. You go back
to your quarters and see that you do no more meddling in this
business. No, not a word. Go back and get your breakfast. That’s all I
expect from you after this.”
Charlie looked inquiringly at Young Van, who merely said: “I want to
know more about this, Charlie. Run it down, and then come to me.”
When the cook had gone, Young Van picked up the placard and read it
over. He was struck by the bravado of the thing. And he wondered how
much of a substratum of determination Jack Flagg’s bravado might have.
This primitive animal sort of man was still new to him. He had neither
Paul Carhart’s unerring instinct, nor his experience in handling men.
To him the incident seemed grave. There would be chances in plenty
before they reached Red Hills for even a coward to get in a shot, and
a coward’s shot would be enough to bring the career of their chief to
an abrupt end. He folded the dirty paper and put it into his pocket.
Later, with the best of intentions, he said to his brother: “You are
altogether too hard on Charlie. I happen to know that he has been
doing everything any man could do without a troop of regulars behind
him.”
To his surprise, Old Van replied with an angry outburst: “You keep out
of this, Gus! When I need your advice in running this division, I’ll
ask you for it.”
Twenty minutes later, when they were rising from breakfast, Charlie
appeared, leading with an iron grip a dissolute-looking plainsman, and
carrying a revolver in his other hand.
“Hello!” cried Young Van. “What’s this? What are you doing with that
gun?”
“I took it away from this man. He was hiding out there behind a
pile of bones. I reckon he was trying to get away when his horse went
lame and the daylight caught him.”
[Illustration: “‘You go back to your quarters.’”]
“What has he to say for himself?”
“It’s a ---- lie!” growled the stranger. “I was riding in to ask for a
job, an’ I hadn’t more’n set down to rest--”
“You ride by night, eh?”
“Well--” the stranger hesitated--“not gen’ally. But I was so near--”
“Here, here!” cried Old Van. “What’s all this talk about? I guess you
know what to do with him. Get about it.”
“What do you mean by that?” cried Young Van, flushing.
“What do I mean by it? What is generally done with horse thieves?”
The stranger blanched. “You call me a--”
But Young Van checked him. “We don’t know that he is a horse thief.”
“I do, and that’s enough. Charlie, take him off, and make a clean job
of it.”
“Charlie,” cried Young Van, “stay where you are!” He turned hotly on
his brother. “The worst we have any reason to believe about this man
is that he put up that placard.”
“Well, doesn’t that prove him one of the gang?”
“We have no proof of anything.”
“You keep out of this, Gus! Charlie, do as I tell you.”
Charlie hesitated, and looked inquiringly at the younger engineer.
This drove Old Van beyond reason. He suddenly snatched the revolver
from the cook, shouting angrily: “If you won’t obey orders, I’ll see
to it myself!”
But Young Van, with a quick movement, gripped the weapon, bent it back
out of his brother’s grasp, snapped it open, ejected the cartridges,
and silently returned it. Old Van held it in his hand and looked at
it, then at the five cartridges, where they had fallen on the ground.
Then, with an expression his brother had never before seen on his
face, he let the weapon fall on the ground among the cartridges, and
walked away to the headquarters tent.
“Charlie,” said Young Van, “keep this man safe until the sheriff comes
back.”
“All right, sir,” Charlie replied.
The cook turned away with his prisoner, and Young Van’s eyes sought
the ground. He had almost come to blows with his brother, and that
before the men, about the worst thing that could have taken place. The
incident seemed the natural culmination of these days of depression
and pulling at odds.
“It looks like the sheriff coming in now, sir.”
Young Van started and looked up. Charlie, still grasping the stranger,
was pointing down the track, where a troop of horsemen could be seen
approaching. They drew rapidly nearer, and soon the two leaders could
be distinguished. One was unmistakably Bowlegged Bill Lane. The other
was a slender man, hatless, with rumpled hair, and a white
handkerchief bound around his forehead. Young Van walked out to meet
them, and saw, with astonishment, that the hatless rider was Paul
Carhart; and never had face of man or woman been more welcome to his
eyes.
The troop reined up, dismounted, and mopped their sweating faces.
Their horses stood damp and trembling with exhaustion. All together,
the little band bore witness of desperate riding, and to judge from
certain signs, of fighting.
“Well, Gus,” said Carhart, cheerily, “how is everything?”
But Young Van was staring at the bandage. “Where have you been?” he
cried.
“Chasing Jack Flagg.”
“But they hit you!”
“Only grazed. If it hadn’t been dark, we should have got him.”
“But how in--”
The chief smiled. “How did I get here?” he said, completing the
question. “The train was stalled last night only a dozen or fifteen
miles back. The tender of that model of 1865 locomotive they gave us
went off the track, and the engine got in the same fix trying to put
it on again. When I left, they were waiting for the other train behind
to come up and help. They ought to be along any time this morning.
Where’s your brother?”
Young Van had turned to look at a group of three or four prisoners,
whom two of the posse were guarding.
“Where’s your brother?” Carhart asked again.
“My brother! Oh, back at the tent, I guess.”
The chief gave him a curious glance, for the young engineer was
flushing oddly. “Tell him to wait a minute for me, will you? I want to
see you both before the work starts.”
Young Van walked over to the headquarters tent and stood a moment at
the entrance. His brother, seated at the table, heard him, but did not
look up.
“Mr. Carhart is back,” said the young man, finally. “He asked me to
tell you to wait for him.”
Old Van gave not the slightest indication that he had heard, but he
waited. When the chief entered, motioning Young Van to join him, he
went briskly at what he had to say. He sat erect and energetic,
apparently unconscious of the red stain on his bandage, ignoring the
fact that he had as yet eaten no breakfast; and at his first words the
blood began to flow again through the arteries of this complicated
organization that men called the Red Hills extension of the S. & W.
“Now, boys,” he began, “it was rather a slow ride back from Sherman,
and I had time for a little arithmetic. Through our friend Peet--”
“D--n him!” interrupted Old Van.
The chief paused at this for another of his questioning glances, then
went quietly on. “Through our friend Peet, we have lost so much time
that it isn’t very cheerful business figuring it up. But we aren’t
going to lose any more.”
“Oh! you saw Peet!” said Young Van.
“Yes, I saw him. We won’t bother over this lost time. What we are
interested in now is carrying through our schedule. And I needn’t tell
you that from this moment we must work together as prettily as a
well-oiled engine.” He said this significantly, and paused. Of the two
men before him, the younger flushed again and lowered his eyes, the
elder looked away and muttered something which could not be
understood. “I’m bringing up a hundred-odd more men on this train.
When they get in, put them right at work. Is Dimond in camp now?”
“Yes.”
“We’ll send him up to take charge of the well business. He can do it,
now that it is so well started. We need Scribner.”
“How much must we do a day now, to make it?” asked Young Van.
“We shall average as near as possible to two miles.”
Young Van whistled, then recovered himself. “All right, Mr. Carhart,”
he said. “Two miles is good. Beginning to-day, I suppose?”
“Beginning to-day.”
The chief spent very little time on himself. He was soon out and
riding along the grade, showing no nervousness, yet making it plain to
every man on the job that he meant to give an exhibition of “the
fanciest track-laying ever seen in these United States.” That was the
way Young Van, in the exuberance of his new-found spirits, expressed
it to the foreman of the iron squad.
But even Young Van’s enthusiasm was not equal to the facts. When the
night whistle blew, and the dripping workmen dropped their picks and
sledges, and rails, and ties, and reins, and sat down to breathe
before washing up for supper,--there was water for washing now,--the
conductor of the material train called to Young Van, and waved toward
a stake beside the track. “See that stick,” he shouted.
“Yes, I see it.”
“Well, sir,”--the conductor was excited too,--“I’ve been setting up
one of those things for every time we moved ahead a train length. My
train’s a little over a thousand foot long, and--and how many of those
sticks do you suppose I’ve set up since morning? Give a guess now!”
“I should say eight or ten. We’ve been getting over the ground pretty
rapidly.”
“No, sir! No, sir! Fifteen there were, fifteen of ’em!”
“Fifteen thousand feet--three miles!” The young man stood a moment,
then turned and walked soberly away.
It was early the next morning that Young Van recalled Jack Flagg’s
communication, which he still had in his pocket. He saw that the chief
was about starting off for his breakfast, and called him back and gave
him the paper. Carhart read it, smiled rather contemptuously, and
handed it back.
“That man,” he said, “was just about big enough to stir up a little
trouble in the camp. I’m glad we’re through with him.”
“I wish I was sure we were,” replied Young Van.
“Hello! you’re right, Gus. Here he is again.”
Charlie was approaching with another dirty paper in his hand. “I
didn’t think anybody could get in last night, Mr. Carhart,” he said
ruefully, “but--here is what they left.”
The chief took this second paper and read it aloud:--
MY DEAR MR. CARHART: My shooting’s getting bum. Better luck
next time.
JACK FLAGG.
“Flagg ought to be on the stage,” he said when he had tossed the paper
away. “He is the sort of man that can’t get along without an
audience.”