STATION-MASTER McGUIRE
THE new station agent at Plainfield saw the sun rise on the morrow
of his first night on the plains. He had watched it sinking in
the sage-covered Sahara on the previous evening with a feeling of
loneliness, and now he welcomed the return of day with all the
enthusiasm of his youthful nature. He almost enjoyed the novelty of
preparing his own breakfast, of bread, bacon, and black coffee. A long
freight lumbered by, and the conductor, hanging low from the corner
of the way-car, dropped off a delay report, and the operator scanned
it eagerly. When the caboose had dropped from the horizon he sat down
and told Omaha how a dragging brake-beam had ditched a car of ore
and he was glad, for it gave him something to do and an opportunity
to show his usefulness; but he didn’t send that over the wire. He
busied himself putting things to rights in his bachelor home, and it
was noon before the day had seemed fairly begun. When the west-bound
passenger train came by the express car gave up a full kit of tools to
the station-master. An axe, a hammer, a saw, a pick and shovel, and a
case of eggs. The Union Pacific Company was liberal with the men who
helped them to open the great trail across the plains, and helped them
to keep it open. McGuire watched the train, as he had watched each and
every train that had come and gone since his arrival, until the rear
car sank below the level of the plain. When he prepared his supper his
little friend, the ground squirrel, came and sat in the door and ate
crumbs. When the shadows began to creep across the plain from the east
the agent sat by the door of his hut and watched the twilight deepen on
the dreary plain. Between him and the glow in the west that marked the
spot where the sun went down, he saw the same gaunt shadow that he had
seen limping across the face of the sun on the previous evening. Still
farther away he saw a horse outlined against the pink sky. Its rider
sat, a bunchy, bareheaded being, that might be half man and half bear.
The agent could make out that the horseman wore a blanket and feathers,
and that he was gazing at the little station. McGuire had been aiming
at the coyote when the Indian came up out of the west, where all things
seemed to come from, if we save the sun, and now, to show the skulking
Sioux that he was armed, he let go at the wolf. It was a long shot, but
the boy had aimed well, having the pink sky beyond, and the wolf leaped
high and fell dead, only a thousand feet from the Sioux. The Indian
having marked the performance of the marksman, turned his horse’s head
and rode slowly away to the north. The agent knew that the Government
troops had been battling with the Sioux over on Pole Creek, and made
no doubt that this was a scout from the dangerous tribe. He would have
reported the incident to Omaha, but he was afraid of being laughed at
over the wire by the other operators along the line. Sitting there in
the twilight he began to wonder what he should do if this Indian came
back with a few dozen or a few hundred followers. He could bar the
door and kill a few while they stormed the station, but when they had
kindled a fire under the shack he must surely perish in the flames. It
was not a pretty picture, and he determined to go to work at once upon
a more substantial fortification. He dreaded the dreary darkness of the
house, and so sat in the twilight until the gold faded from the sunset
and the little brown mouse went away to bed. “God takes care of the
little squirrel,” mused McGuire, “and he’ll take care of me as well;”
and he too went to bed, but not to sleep. He lay awake planning how
best to fortify the place. After dwelling upon, and then dismissing,
many schemes, he decided to dig a tunnel from beneath the floor of the
shed, under the railroad track and across to the water tank. If the
Sioux came he could make a hard fight and then take to the tunnel and
hide in the tank, for they would not be apt to burn that, having their
eyes upon the burning station, watching for the agent to come out and
be killed. His first plan was to dig out the tunnel without disturbing
the surface of the ground, but that would take too long. He would
work from the top, making a short section each day and covering the
ditch over with boards and dirt as he went along, so that if any Sioux
should come scouting about they might not know of the tunnel. Away off
to the west he heard a wolf howl. The cry of the coyote was answered
by another nearer the station, and by another and yet another still
farther away. Presently he heard a low scratching on the outer shed
door, and, after a long time, he fell asleep.
* * * * *
The sun was shining when the agent woke. The brown squirrel was sitting
in the centre of the room, waiting for his breakfast.
When McGuire had made breakfast the squirrel came and ate from the
agent’s hand. Having finished his morning meal and reported the through
freight on time, the station-master got out his pick and shovel and
began his tunnel. First he made a trap door in the floor of the shed
and excavated a place to drop into. Going out he measured off the
distance to the tank. It was sixty feet, and he set himself the task of
doing twenty feet a day and covering up the sign.
On the second morning he was stiff and lame, and his hands were so sore
that he could scarcely close his fingers on the pick handle, but he
worked on, and at night had the tunnel completed under the track. At
the close of the third day he went into the shed, dropped to the mouth
of the tunnel, crawled through, and came out in the base of the water
tank that was boarded up from the ground to the tank proper. Before
retiring he carried a goodly supply of cartridges and stored them in
the framework of the tank near the top, and then sat down to watch the
sunset. The same glory flooded the west, and when the sun was down the
same gaunt shadows came and stood in the gloaming, only more of them.
They had begun to scent the food supply at the station and so grew less
timid. The agent had by this time determined that it was only a waste
of ammunition to shoot the hungry brutes, and when he showed no fight
the wolves came so near that he could have reached them with a stone.
Far away he thought he heard the roar of an approaching train. The
muffled sound grew louder, but looking where the two shining threads
of steel drew close together, and dipped down into the desert, he could
see no break on the horizon. Sweeping the plain with his eager eyes
he saw a black something coming out of the north-west. It looked like
a low black cloud just rising from the earth. The strange sound grew
louder, and the agent thought of the sudden storms of which he had
read, but the quiet sky gave no sign of storm. Already he could see
a big star burning in the west. The growling cloud came nearer with
each passing moment, but still lay close to the sage-brush. It grew
broader but no higher, and in its wake a gray fog arose, like the mist
that hangs over a swamp on a summer’s morning. Higher and higher the
gray cloud rose, trailing behind the black one, like the smoke from
a locomotive. In a little while it covered the whole west and shut
out the light from the far pink sky. The wolves, lifting their heads,
listened to the roar of the advancing cloud. The darkness deepened as
the roar of the cloud increased. The agent, with his rifle resting on
his arm, stood and stared down the plain. A moment later the head of
the cloud swept across the track just below the water tank. It looked
like a regiment of cavalry riding the desert. It must be so, for he
could hear hoofs rattling over the rails and cross-ties. Now the agent
observed that they were riderless horses,--horses with horns,--and
realized that this was no cloud, but a band of buffalo. He could see
neither the beginning nor the end of the herd, and raising his rifle
he began pumping lead into the flying band. With a great crash one of
the animals drove its head against the base of the water tank and then
lay still while the drove galloped past. The roar of ten thousand feet
beating the desert, the wild snorts of the wounded brutes, and the
mad rush of the flying mass, so excited the agent that he ran forward
firing as he went into the dark and roaring flood. Presently the noise
began to die down, and the agent, standing in a cloud of dust, knew
that the end had come and that the dark cloud was vanishing down the
desert.
When the dust had fallen McGuire found a fine calf that had driven
its poor head against the tank and broken its neck. There was not a
scratch upon its hide, so all his bullets had gone wide of the mark or
had been carried away under the shaggy coats of the wild cattle. Here
was fresh meat for the agent, but before he could remove the animal’s
robe the hungry wolves were pressing about in the twilight. They grew
so bold that McGuire was obliged to take what he could carry and fly
for the house. Before he could reach the door the wolves were snapping
and fighting over the feast. Their howls and cries brought a great
band, and when they had finished with what was left outside they came
clawing at the shed door, demanding the agent’s share. It was many
hours before he could find relief from the din in unquiet dreams.