THE RAILROAD WRECK
Frank had never taken part in a scene of greater disorder and
excitement. He knew at once that the train had run into some heavy
obstacle or had been derailed. A dozen of the passengers were thrown
from their seats. Women were shrieking, and the two little children in
the seat just behind the one the professor and Frank had occupied were
wailing in fright as their mother caught them in her arms and crouched
speechless and dazed.
Frank saw that they were not seriously injured. The car had tilted and
then, as a great shock passed through its strained woodwork, come to
a stop. The frightened passengers were rushing for the doors. One or
two men threw open windows and tumbled outside. Frank’s first thought
was of his new friend. He sprang to the spot where the professor lay
senseless and just in time managed to drag him out of the path of the
terrified people crowding the aisle in an attempt to escape.
“I declare!” spoke the dazed savant, as Frank pulled him into a seat.
“What happened?”
The speaker rubbed a contusion on his head and gazed about him
vacantly. Then his eyes closed and he swayed to and fro.
“Come out,” directed a train hand at the rear doorway. “It’s a wreck;
but nobody is seriously hurt.”
Frank piled over the backs of half a dozen seats and got at the water
tank. He wet his handkerchief, returned to his charge, and applied it
to his head. In a minute or two the professor recovered his senses.
“There’s been a collision, I assume,” he remarked. “Look at that front
end all smashed in! We’re lucky. Let us get out of this and see where
we’re stranded.”
“Why, yes,” agreed Frank, “only--where’s the satchel!”
For the first time Frank thought of it. The car was pretty well vacated
by this time, and many had left wraps and satchels behind in their
haste to reach a place of safety. Frank made a casual and then a more
careful survey of the floor of the coach. He finally returned to his
anxious-faced friend.
“Professor Barrington,” he said, “I fear, after all our vigilance and
trouble, we have been outwitted.”
“What do you mean, Mr. Durham?”
“Your satchel is missing.”
“Perhaps somebody caught it up by mistake. See, a lot of people have
left their belongings behind them all mixed up. Maybe someone took it
in the excitement of the moment.”
“I’d like to think that; I hope you are right,” rejoined Frank. “We
must get outside and make a search right away.”
Frank had not told the professor about the man who had sat just ahead
of them, and who he felt sure was an accomplice of the fellow who had
tried to steal the satchel. In his own mind Frank felt sure that this
accomplice had obtained the professor’s satchel during the confusion in
the passenger coach.
Frank’s mind was centered on the satchel, but when he got outside the
uproar and confusion took up his attention. It appeared that in making
a curve the express train had run into a derailed freight car, ignoring
the danger signal of a red flag, another somewhat back having been
overlooked by the engineer.
The locomotive and baggage car were badly damaged. They had plunged
into the rear of a freight train and demolished it. Both tracks were
blocked. No one apparently had been seriously hurt, although there had
been a bad shake-up all around.
The accident had occurred in a lonely cut crossed by a typical country
road. The train hands were getting the passengers into the rear coaches
that had not been badly damaged. Frank gathered enough from the talk of
the trainmen, amid the hurly-burly of the emergency, to understand that
it would be several hours before a wrecking train could arrive.
“We’re stalled here, probably till midnight,” Frank heard the conductor
say to the engineer.
“You had better get into that coach while I make another search for
that satchel, Professor Barrington,” Frank suggested.
“I sincerely hope you will find some trace of it,” was the anxious
reply. “I declare! I thought all my troubles had ended when I left New
York City with you, and here I find myself in a worse mix-up than ever.”
Frank kept a sharp eye out for the man to whom the fellow with the
hollow satchel had signalled. Although he inspected all the coaches and
looked over the crowd along the tracks, he could gain no trace of the
one he was so anxious to find.
By the time Frank rejoined the professor the conductor of the train
had got word to and from a towerman, about a mile away. He announced
that it would be some hours before the track could be cleared, a fresh
engine obtained, and the journey resumed.
“Any trace of the satchel, Mr. Durham?” was the first question the
professor asked.
“I fear we shall never see the satchel or its contents again,” returned
Frank, and thought it best to impart all of his suspicions. His
companion listened with attention.
“You’ve got it right,” he decided, reluctantly. “They have been bound
to get at that satchel all along. As soon as they did so they got
away--crossed over to some other railroad line or went into hiding. I
don’t see how we can trace them from this forlorn, out-of-the-way spot.”
“Are the contents of the satchel so very valuable, Professor
Barrington?” inquired Frank.
“To men who I am assured are trying to steal my plan, immensely so,”
was the reply. “You see, in the bag are all my private memoranda, lists
of my connections, and the details of the very important lease I expect
to close on playhouse quarters in Boston. If they get an inkling of
that and obtain an option on the lease ahead of us, it takes away
about half of the merit of our proposition.”
Frank realized that they were in a pretty bad predicament. To think of
running down the thief or thieves with the start the latter had would
be folly. Long since, undoubtedly, the knaves had rifled the satchel
and possessed themselves of the secrets of the professor’s project.
The pair grew tired of sitting in the coach and strolled outside, but
the ardor of the professor seemed dampened. He did not say much, but
acted as though depressed. They walked up and down the level space
beside the track, each busy with his own thoughts. Finally Frank
touched the professor’s arm and directed his attention to a group
gathered about a figure on a stump, who was apparently addressing them.
“Someone seems to be making a speech,” observed Frank. “I wonder what
he is saying.”
“Yes, it looks that way,” assented Professor Barrington, after a casual
glance at the individual Frank had indicated.
Both walked towards the center of the group of people. As they neared
the spot Frank saw that a bronzed, intelligent-faced lad of about
sixteen was the orator. He was dressed in blue jeans and had the
appearance of a typical farm boy.
“Gentlemen and ladies,” he said, “this train will be delayed for
several hours. Half a mile up the road is Home Farm, where I work. Mr.
Dorsett--that’s my boss--sent me down here to tell you that there will
be a lunch ready for all that want it from now up to dark.”
“What kind of a lunch, sonny?” asked a big man who seemed happy over
finding himself with a whole skin after his shaking up on the train.
“Doughnuts, pumpkin pie and cider--apples thrown in, price fifteen
cents,” was the prompt response. “Besides that, there’s a big veranda
up at the house, with easy chairs, and hammocks and a swing.”
“I think I’ll take that in,” said the fat man, smacking his lips.
“That sounds refreshing,” observed Professor Barrington. “I declare!
I have been so taken up with our business that I forgot lunch in the
city.”
“I think I would like to try this home-made fare,” said Frank. “If it’s
as good as it is cheap, it’s worth testing. Will you act as pilot?” he
asked of the boy.
“All aboard! It’s just the walk for an appetite,” declared the lad,
briskly, jumping down from the stump and starting for the road. Frank,
the professor and several others followed and they soon came in sight
of a pleasant old homestead. Under a towering oak tree was a long
picnic table, a bench on either side. The thrifty farmer and his wife
ministered to the needs of their guests.
“That was prime,” remarked Professor Barrington, after they had eaten
of the plain but appetizing fare. “A great relief, this cool shady
spot, after the bustle and excitement down at the railroad. There’s a
rustic bower over yonder; let us rest there for a bit. I would like to
get my scattered wits together.”
Frank assented to this arrangement. Others of the visitors installed
themselves on the porch or went into the big “company room” of the
house. The professor became talkative again. He went over the playhouse
project, which brought up the loss of the precious satchel.
“We had better forget that loss,” suggested Frank, “for I don’t see any
way to remedy it. If certain schemers are going to become our business
rivals on what they stole from you, they won’t succeed. Such people
never do in the end. I shouldn’t worry about it, if I were you. It’s
your brains that have worked up this idea, and you are bound to have
the best of it.
“Oh, did you want something?” Frank interrupted himself, as the boy
who had piloted them from the railroad appeared at the doorway of the
bower.
“Why, yes--no--I don’t know,” stammered the lad, in an embarrassed way.
“Say, I don’t want you to think I’m any eavesdropper. I was resting
outside here, though, and couldn’t help but hear your talk. I’m so dead
gone on shows that I just had to listen, and when you spoke of the
satchel----”
“Ah!” broke in the professor, eagerly, “you know something about that?”
“I think I do--I don’t know for certain,” was the reply; “but if you’ll
wait here for five minutes I’ll find out if what I guess amounts to
anything.”
And then the strange lad was off like an arrow, leaving Professor
Barrington in a state of great suspense and Frank wondering what the
next happening of their eventful journey was to be.