“DOCTORED” FIELD NOTES?
There was no more trouble---immediately. When the other engineers
heard of the row---which news they obtained through Jake, not
from Reade---they soon made it plain to ’Gene Black that Tom Reade
was a favorite in the corps. Black was therefore treated with
a coldness that he strove hard to overcome.
In the matter of being a capable civil engineer ’Gene Black speedily
proved himself efficient. Assistant Chief Engineer Blaisdell
soon reported at headquarters that the new member of the corps
was an exceedingly valuable man. Black was therefore placed at
the head of a leveling squad that obtained the field notes from
which were to be estimated the cost of making excavations in several
cuts that must be made ere the coming tracks could be laid.
In the days that passed Tom and Harry saw little of the field
work. They were kept at the chief’s tent. Hence Reade had but
little to do with ’Gene Black, which may have been fortunate,
as Tom still retained his first instinctive dislike for the black-eyed
fellow.
<tb>
“Reade and Hazelton, you two young men are going to forge ahead
rapidly, and you are sure to earn good salaries, if you don’t
make the too common mistake of young engineers first starting
out,” Mr. Thurston told the cubs one forenoon.
“And what is that mistake, sir, if you please?” Tom queried.
“Don’t make the mistake of getting too large an idea of the value
of your services,” replied the chief. “Just work hard all the
time and be wholly unassuming.
“I think we can follow that advice, sir,” Tom replied, with a
smile.
“If you can, you’ll get along rapidly. I have already written
to our officers in New York, thanking them for having sent you
two young men.”
“Here’s the map I have just finished, sir,” said Harry, rising
from his drawing table on which were arranged the various draughtsman’s
inks and washes---the latter being thin solutions of water colors
with which some parts of the maps were colored.
“Very handsomely done, Hazelton. Reade, what are you doing?”
“I’m at work on Black’s field notes of the leveling,” Tom answered.
“I am very much pleased with Black’s work,” replied Mr. Thurston.
“His notes show that we are going to get out of the excavating
in the cuts at about one third of the trouble and expense that
I had looked for.”
“Black’s field notes certainly do look good, sir, for they show
that you can get the work through on this division in much less
time than you had supposed.”
As he turned around to speak, Tom sat where he could easily see
the colored field map that Harry had just turned in to the chief.
“Hold on, there, Harry,” Tom objected.
“You’ve lined in a pretty high hill on Section Nineteen. You’ll
have to cut that down a bit.”
“The surveyor’s field notes call for that hill,” Hazelton retorted.
“But, as it happens,” objected Tom, “I’m just working out the
profile drawing of Section Nineteen from Black’s notes. See here-----”
Tom rested a pencil point on a portion of the hill depicted on
Hazelton’s map. “You’ve drawn that pretty steep. Now, as you’ll
see by Black’s notes, the upgrade at that point is only a three
per cent. grade.”
“Humph! It’s all of an eight per cent. grade,” grunted Hazelton.
“See, here are the surveyor’s field notes.”
“Three per cent. grade,” insisted Tom, holding forward Black’s
leveling notes.
“There’s a difference there, then, that must be reconciled,” broke
in Mr. Thurston, rising, a look of annoyance on his face. “We
can’t have any such disagreement as that between the field map
and the profile sheet. Let us find out, at once, where the trouble
lies.”
Yet the more the three pondered over the matter the greater became
the puzzle. The notes of the surveyor, Matt Rice, and of the
leveler, ’Gene Black, were at utter variance.
“We must get hold of these men as soon as they come in tonight,”
exclaimed Mr. Thurston, much disturbed. “We must find out just
which one is at fault.”
“Rice is a very reliable man, sir,” spoke up Tom.
“Yes; but Blaisdell reports that Black thoroughly understands
his work, too,” grumbled the chief. “We must settle this tonight.”
“May I make a suggestion, sir?” asked Tom.
“Certainly. Go ahead.”
“There is no use, sir, in my going ahead with this profile drawing,
if there’s a chance that the sights turned in by Black are wrong.
Until we know, my time at this drawing board may all be wasted.
Trotter, one of the rodmen, is in camp today. I might take him,
and a level along, and go over the foresights and backsights myself.
All of the stakes will be in place. In two hours I ought to
have a very good set of leveling notes. Then I can bring them
back and compare them with Black’s sights.”
“Can you run a level well?” inquired Mr. Thurston.
“Of course I can, sir. It’s simple enough work, and I’ve done
a good bit of it in the east.”
“Go along, then, and see if you can throw any light on this,”
sighed the disturbed chief.
“Reade really ought to have two rodmen,” broke in Harry eagerly.
“May I go along, sir, to serve as the other rodman?”
“Run along,” assented Mr. Thurston. “Remember, boys, I can’t
go any further until this tangle is settled. Come back as speedily
as you can.”
Tom and Harry snatched up their sombreros, hurrying forth. Trotter
was found readily, and was ordered to saddle three ponies. Tom
busied himself in picking out the best leveling instrument in
camp, while Hazelton secured the rods and a chain. Then the party
set forth in Indian file, Tom riding in advance.
A trot of half an hour brought them to Section Nineteen. Here
Tom speedily adjusted his instrument, taking up his post over
the first stake at the bottom of the hill.
Leveling is not difficult work, though it calls for some judgment
and a good deal of care. For instance, when Tom set his telescope
exactly level and took a reading of the rod at the second stake,
which Harry held, he read the height as eight feet and four inches.
Then he trudged forward, carrying his instrument, while Trotter
held his rod exactly perpendicular over the first stake. From
the second stake Tom sighted back through his telescope, reading
two feet three inches. The difference between these two readings
was six feet and one inch, showing that, for the distance between
first and second stakes the rise in the hillside was six feet
one inch. Thereupon Reade turned and sighted, from stake number
two to stake number three, noting in his book the reading he secured
from the rod at number three. Once at number three he turned
his telescope backward, taking a reading from Trotter’s rod at
number two. Ten stakes were thus covered, and not only were the
foresights and backsights read and recorded, but the distance
between each pair of stakes was measured with the chain and the
distances entered on the record.
At stake number ten Tom halted.
“Harry,” he directed, “you take Black’s leveling notes and hold
them while I read my own notes. Stop me every time that you note
a difference between the two records.”
After that Harry steadily stopped his chum at every reading.
By the time that they had finished the comparisons Hazelton’s
face looked blank from sheer astonishment.
“Why, every single one of Blacks foresights and backsights is
wrong!” gasped Harry. “And yet Mr. Blaisdell reported that ’Gene
Black is such a fine engineer.”
Tom turned to make sure that Trotter was resting out of hearing
before he replied:
“Harry, Black isn’t such a fool as to bring in an absolutely wrong
record of sights, and yet do it innocently. If he didn’t do it
unintentionally, then he must have tangled the record purposely.”
“But why should he do it purposely?” Harry insisted. “He would
know that, sooner or later, his blunders or lies would be discovered,
and that he would be discharged. Now, Black really wants to hold
his job with this outfit.”
“Does he?” asked Tom bluntly.
“Why, what do you mean?”
“I don’t know,” Reade confessed. “I never heard of any such bungle
as this before by an engineer. Why, Harry, this hillside averages
an eight and a third grade, yet Black’s field notes show it to
be only a three per cent. grade. Hang it, the fellow must have
played the trick purposely!”
“Yet why?” pressed Hazelton.
“I’ll admit that I can’t understand. Unless, well---unless-----”
“Say it!”
“Unless Black joined this outfit with the express purpose of
queering all the work of the entire corps as he could easily
do. Harry, do you think that Black could possibly be serving
with this outfit as the paid tool of the rival road, the W.C.
& A.? Can he be the enemy’s spy within our lines---sent to prevent
our finishing the road on time?”