This happened at a period in the history of the Hill Division when trade was very bad, and the directors, scowling over the company’s annual report, threw up their hands in holy horror; while from the sacred precincts of the board-room there emanated the agonized cry:
“Economy!”
The general manager took up the slogan and dinned it into the ears of the division superintendents.
“Operating expenses are too high,” he wrote. “They must be cut down.” And the superintendents of divisions, painfully alive to the fact that the G. M. was not dictating for the mere pleasure of it, intimated in unmistakable language to the heads of departments under them that the next quarterly reports were expected to show a marked improvement.
John Healy had charge of the roundhouse at Big Cloud, in those days, and the morning after the lightning struck the system he came fuming back across the yards from his interview with the superintendent, stuttering angrily to himself. As he stamped into the running-shed his humor a shade worse than usual the first object that caught his eye was Speckles, squatted on the lee side of 483, dangling his legs in the pit.
That is, it would have been the lee side if Healy had come in the other door.
“Cut down operatin’ expinses, is ut?” Healy muttered. “Begorra, I’ll begin right now!”
And he fired Speckles on the spot.
Now, Speckles—whose name, by the way, was Dolivar Washington Babson—had been fired on several occasions before, and if he swallowed a little more tobacco-juice than was good for his physical comfort it was rather as a gulp of startled surprise at Healy’s appearance than because of any poignant regret at the misfortune that had overtaken him. Nevertheless, he felt it incumbent on himself to expostulate.
“Git out an’ stay out!” said Healy, refusing to argue.
And Speckles got out.
For a day he kept away from the roundhouse, the length of time past experience had taught him was required to cool the turner’s anger; then he sauntered down again and came face to face with Healy on the turntable.
“I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” he began, broaching the subject timidly.
“Phwat?” demanded Healy.
“I came down to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,” Speckles repeated monotonously.
“Oh, I heard you—I heard you,” said Healy, a little inconsistently. “On ag’in, is ut? Ut’ll be a long toime, me son, mark that!”
This being quite different from Healy’s accustomed, “Well, git back to yer job,” it began to filter vaguely through Speckles’ brain that his name was no longer to adorn the company’s pay-sheets.
“Am I fired for good, Mr. Healy?” he faltered.
“You are!” said Healy. “Just that!” Then, relenting a little as Speckles’ face fell: “If’twere not fer the big-bugs down yonder “—he jerked his thumb in the general direction of the East—“I might—moind, I don’t say I would, but I might—put you on ag’in. As ut is, we’ve instructions to cut down the operatin’ expinses, an’ there’s an ind on ut!”
Speckles stood for a moment in dismay as Healy went back into the roundhouse; then he turned disconsolately away, crossed the tracks to the platform of the station, and, seeking out a secluded corner of the freight-house, sat down upon a packing-case to think it out.
To Speckles it was no mere matter of cutting down expenses. It was a blasted career!
Whatever Speckles’ faults, and he was only a lad, he had one redeeming quality, before which, in the eyes of the business he had elected to follow, his strayings from the straight and narrow path dwindled into insignificance—railroading was born in him.
At ten he had started in as caller for the night-crews, and, during the five years the company had had the benefit of his valuable services in that capacity, there was not a man on the division but sooner or later came to know long-armed, bony, freckled-faced, red-haired Speckles—came to know the little rascal, and like him, too.
Then Speckles had been promoted to the post of sweeper in the roundhouse, and occasionally, under Healy’s critical inspection, to washing out boiler-tubes. Fresh fuel thereby added to the fire of his ambition, he began to figure how long it would be before he got to wiping, then to firing, and after that—even Speckles’ boundless optimism did not have the temerity to specify any particular date—the time when he would attain his goal and get his engine.
Now, instead, at the age of sixteen, he found himself seated on a cracker-box, his dreams for the future rudely shattered—thanks to Healy, old Sour Face Healy!
So Speckles sighed, and as he sighed the shop whistle blew. It was noon, and the men began to pour out of the big gates. Then Speckles, remembering that the schools were also “letting out,” hurried down the platform and up the main street. He would confide in Madge. Madge would understand.
Madge Bolton was the daughter of the ticket agent at the station, and between Mr. Bolton and Speckles there existed a standing feud, thecasus bellibeing fifteen-year-old, blue-eyed Madge. Speckles kicked his heels on the corner until she appeared; then he turned and fell into step beside her, reaching a little awkwardly for her strap of books.
“Hallo, Dol!” was Madge’s greeting. She was the only person in Big Cloud who did not call him Speckles.
“Hallo, Madge!” he returned.
Madge glanced at his face and hands. “Haven’t you been to work?” she asked.
“Nope.”
“Why, Dol?”
“Fired,” said Speckles laconically.
“Oh, Dol, again!” she cried reproachfully. “What for?”
“‘Tain’t only the third time, and ‘twasn’t for nothin’,” said Speckles, a bit sullenly. “I was only restin’.”
“Dolivar Babson,” she accused, “you were loafing. Oh, Dol, you’ll never get to firing, and—and—” She hesitated and stopped, her cheeks a little red with the hint of boy-and-girl castle-building that would have increased her father’s ire against the luckless Speckles had he seen it.
Speckles, somewhat shamefaced, and having no excuse to offer, trudged on in silence.
“Did you ask Mr. Healy to take you back?” she inquired, after a moment.
“He won’t,” said Speckles.
“What are you going to do, Dol?”
“I dunno.”
“Well,” said Madge, hopefully, “perhaps you could get a job in one of the stores. I’ll ask Mr. Timmons, the grocer, if you like. I know him pretty well.”
Speckles came to an abrupt and sudden halt, cast in Madge’s face one look that carried with it a world of unutterable reproach, handed over her books in silence—and fled.
He, a railroad man, go into astore!And this from Madge! Madge, who, of all others—it was too much! Speckles ate his dinner, dispirited and crushed. Everything and everybody was against him.
His mother’s curt inquiry as to when he was going back to work did not in any way tend to mitigate his troubles—rather, on the contrary, to accentuate them.
“Old Sour Face won’t put me back,” he jerked out, in response to his mother’s repeated question.
“No wonder he won’t,” said his mother sharply, “if you’re as disrespectful as that. I’m ashamed of you, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself.”
Speckles was too much depressed to offer any defense. He finished his meal in silence, gulped down his cup of tea in two swallows, took his hat, and started out.
Unconsciously he directed his steps toward the yards, and, some five minutes later, arrived at the station. Here, about half-way down the platform, he spotted Mat Bolton in the open doorway of the ticket office.
As he approached, the nonchalant air with which the other leaned with folded arms against the jamb of the door aroused Speckles’ suspicions. To reach the seat of his meditations—the cracker-box in the freight shed which had now become his objective point—he would be obliged to pass Mr. Bolton. He therefore began to incline his course toward the edge of the platform nearest the rails, so that, when he came opposite the office door, some fifteen feet were between him and his arch enemy.
Mr. Bolton awoke from his lethargy with surprising suddenness.
“You young rascal,” he shouted, “what you been doing to my girl? I’ll teach you to make girls cry, you little speckled-face runt, you!”
He made a dash for Speckles, but by the time he had recovered his balance and saved himself from toppling over the edge of the platform to the tracks, Speckles had reached the safe retreat of the freight-shed door. And as the irate parent, after shaking his fist impotently, walked back and disappeared within his domain, Speckles indulged in a series of pantomimes in which his fingers and his nose played an intimate and comprehensive part.
Perched once more on the cracker-box, Speckles again resolved himself into a committee on ways and means. His little skirmish with Madge’s father had exhilarated him to such an extent that his heavy and oppressing sense of despondency had vanished, and in its place came a renewed determination to resume, somehow or other, the railroad career that Healy had so emphatically interrupted.
He turned over in his mind the feasibility of applying to Regan, the master mechanic, for a job in the shops, but dismissed the idea almost immediately on the ground that shop men were not, strictly speaking, railroaders.
He might start in switching and braking, and work up to conductor. That, at least, was railroading—not to be compared with engine-driving, not by long odds, but still it was railroading. His face brightened. He would interview Farley, the trainmaster.
Farley was in his office. Speckles had not very far to go, only a few steps down the platform. All the offices—and Big Cloud was division headquarters—were under the same roof.
At Speckles’ request, Farley swung around in his swivel-chair with a quizzical expression on his face. Then he grinned.
“Want to go on with the train-crews, eh? What do you think, kid, that I’m running a kindergarten outfit, even if some of ‘em do act like it? How old are you?”
“Sixteen,” said Speckles, with a sinking heart.
“Sixteen, eh? Well, come back in a couple of years, and——”
But, for the second time that day, Speckles fled. He was in no mood to stand much chaffing, and Farley, as he well knew, had a leaning that way. Speckles halted outside the door, undecided what move to make next, when the clicking of the instruments in the dispatcher’s room overhead came to his ears like an inspiration.
Why hadn’t he thought of that before? Spence, who had been on the night trick most of the years that Speckles was caller, was now chief dispatcher. If he had any friend anywhere, it was Spence, the man at whose elbow he had sat through those long, dark hours of the night that beget confidences, and into whose ears he had so often poured the tales of his cherished aims and ambitions.
Speckles covered the stairs three steps at a time, in his new-found exuberance. Spence looked up from his key and listened as Speckles told his story.
“So you’re Healy’s contribution to economy, eh?” he said when Speckles had finished. “And he won’t take you back?”
“No,” said Speckles.
“Well, that’s pretty rough. But I don’t see how I can help you any, Speckles. I haven’t any rights over Healy, you know.”
Speckles hesitated a moment and fidgeted nervously from one foot to the other. “I know you ain’t,” he began, “but I thought maybe you’d put me on here.”
“W-what!” ejaculated Spence. Then, smothering a laugh at the sight of Speckles’ woebegone countenance, he demanded gravely “You mean dispatching?”
Speckles nodded.
“No, no, Speckles, that would never do. You go back and see Healy. I’ll do what I can for you with him.”
“‘Twon’t do no good,” said Speckles hopelessly. “I’ve asked him twice already.”
“Well, ask him again. Look here, Speckles, it’s up to you to square yourself with Healy, somehow or other. If you want your job very badly, you ought to be sharp enough to find a way of getting it. Go on, now.”
So Speckles descended the stairs to the platform and irresolutely began to cross the tracks in the direction of the running-shed. He reached the roundhouse and skirmished cautiously along its front. No Healy was in sight, so he dived in between two engines and made his way to the rear of the shed. Here, by peering around the end of a tender, he could see Healy’s cubby-hole—Healy called it an office—a bit of space about four by six partitioned off from the back wall in the corner, with a greasy book the engine-crews signed, and two or three others, equally greasy, in which Healy kept tabs on things in general.
In spite of his trepidation, Speckles grinned. Healy was there, bending over a very flimsy, spindle-legged table that he had wheedled out of the claim-agent some months before. His brows were puckered into a ferocious scowl, and he growled and muttered to himself, now laboring furiously with a stubby pencil on the sheets of paper in front of him, now pausing to bite that unoffending article almost in two in his desperation.
Healy was working on his invention. All the division knew about Healy’s ideas on Westinghouse and “air,” and that these ideas, when perfected, were to be patented. As to what the consensus of opinion of their value was is neither here nor there, except that in Healy’s presence, when referred to at all, the subject was treated with dignity and respect, for Healy’s physical powers were beyond the ordinary, and dearest to Healy’s heart and most sacred in his eyes was this creation of his brain, or, to be more accurate, fancy.
Speckles sidled up to the cubby-hole, and, without any peroration, took the plunge.
“I came to ask you to put me on again, Mr. Healy,”—he spoke rapidly, as though he feared his courage might ooze out before he could finish.
Healy wheeled round with a grunt.
“Oh, ut’s you, is ut?” he demanded grimly.
Speckles, ready to run at the first sign of violence, acknowledged the impeachment by nodding his head affirmatively, and smiled sheepishly while Healy scrutinized him with a long stare from head to foot.
“Well,” said Healy, “you wait a minute an’ I’ll give you me answer.”
Speckles’ heart bounded in joyous hope. Healy very deliberately gathered up his papers, folded them carefully, and opening the cupboard where his coat hung—it was a hot day, and Healy was in his shirtsleeves—tucked them into the inside pocket. Then, like a flash, he turned and reached for the first thing in sight. It was a broom.
But, quick as he was, Speckles was quicker, and he led Healy by the length of the pit as he dodged around the tail end of a tender and darted out of the running-shed across the tracks to the freight-house.
Healy followed no farther than the turntable. There he halted, and Speckles, from his retreat, saw him shake his fist and listened to the threat that thundered across the yards:
“Show yer face around here ag’in, you young rascal, an’ I’ll bate the loife out av you, so I will!”
Speckles betook himself to the cracker-box, and from his lips there flowed a fluent and unrestrained expression of his opinion on things in general, but more particularly of Healy, and more particularly still of Healy’s invention. Then, his indignation subsiding, it was followed by a fit of the blues; so that when, at the expiration of half an hour, Healy, still in his shirt-sleeves, came out of the roundhouse and walked up the tracks in the direction of the shops, Speckles, through the freight-house door, remarked the incident in complete apathy and as one in which he had no interest whatever.
Ten minutes later, however, his apathy vanished and he sprang to his feet at the sound of the excited shouts of the men in the running-shed. Some were hastily swinging the big engine doors wide open, others were setting the table in position, while one started on a run in the direction Healy had taken.
Another minute and the shop whistle had boomed out its warning, and as Healy, with the man who had gone after him, came tearing down the track like mad, Speckles saw the smoke beginning to curl up over the roof at the back. The running-shed was afire.
With a whoop, Speckles traversed the platform, leaped to the rails, and was hard on Healy’s heels by the time the turntable was crossed. Healy paused but an instant. The thing to do was to get the engines out, and Healy was the man to do it.
“Get tackle rigged on 463,” he ordered. “She’s cold, an’ we’ll have to haul her out. Set the table fer 518; I’ll take her.”
Then he started on the jump for the cubby-hole and his precious papers.
Now, the tackle that Healy had referred to was stored in the rear of the roundhouse in the same general direction as the cubby-hole, and as the order had been given to no one in particular, Speckles, shouting “I’ll get it,” started after Healy.
Some grease and waste had caught and was rolling up a nasty smoke. Through it, even while he tugged manfully at the heavy tackle, Speckles saw Healy run into his office, snatch his coat, rush out again, and dash for the cab of 518, throwing the coat up on the tender. As he did so, something fell from the pocket.
Speckles dropped the tackle and pounced upon it. It was the bundle of papers he had seen Healy put in his coat-pocket a little while before.
It was Healy’s invention!
Speckles’ first impulse was to shout to Healy, but just then 518 glided out of the shed, and the men in front of 463 were yelling in chorus for the tackle, so Speckles put his tongue in his cheek and the papers in his pocket.
It wasn’t much of a blaze, but it looked bad while it lasted. Even after the shop-hands had got their hose-lengths connected and a stream playing on the fire, and the engines were all in safety in the yard, the smoke continued to roll out in clouds, with here and there a vicious tongue of flame.
Then Healy, his duty done, bethought him of his coat on the tender of 518. And Speckles, as he heard Healy’s gasp of dismay on discovering that his papers were gone, had an inspiration.
“Me papers! Me papers!” wailed Healy. “Fer the love av Mike, I must av dropped thim on the flure!”
“I’ll get them for you, Mr. Healy,” said Speckles, quick as a shot.
“You’ll not!” said Healy. “I’ll have no wan risk his life fer thim, bad as I want thim. Hey, come back, you runt!”
But Speckles was gone. Headed straight for the big, yawning doors that vomited their smoke and flames? Oh, no, not Speckles! Hardly! Speckles would make his attempt from the rear! And around the end of the shed and in behind he raced.
Some of the men were fighting the fire from that side, but they were too busy to pay any attention to Speckles. A dab of soot and dirt on his face which he obtained by rubbing his fingers along the blackened wall, an artistic smudge of generous proportions on the outside of the papers, which he took from his pocket, and Speckles’ make-up was complete and convincing.
Now, Speckles had an eye for the dramatic and an appreciation of its value. He peered in through one of the windows. It was not nearly as bad inside as it had been, and he decided there would be no risk and very little discomfort in carrying out the plan that had popped into his head.
So he climbed in through a window and dropped down to the floor on the other side. The next minute he had dashed through the running-shed, and emerged from a whirl of black smoke into the open in front of the turntable, the papers waved aloft in his fist.
It was effective—decidedly effective! A cheer went up, and the men crowded around, while Healy rushed forward and began to pump Speckles’ arm up and down like an engine-piston.
“Ut’s a hero you are, me bright jool av a lad!” he cried in his delight. “‘Tis mesilf, John Healy, that ses ut, an’ the bhoys are me witness. Come back to yer job in the mornin’ an’, by my sowl, Speckles, I’ll niver fire you ag’in, niver! An’ ut’s more I’ll do—I’ll promote you. Ut’s a wiper you are from now on, me son, an’ to blazes wid cuttin’ down operatin’ expinses! Where did you foind the papers?”
“On the floor,” said Speckles—and he told the truth.
Munford came to the work before the gangs were deep enough into the hills to lose daily, or rather nightly, touch with Big Cloud. And the way of his coming was this: The town, springing up in a night, had its beginning in the wooden shanty the engineers built as headquarters for the Hill Division that was to be. Then, with mushroom growth, came shacks innumerable; and these shacks, for the most part, were gambling hells and dives and saloons, and the population was Indian, Chinese and bad American. To these places of lurid entertainment flocked the toilers at night, loading down the construction empties as they backed their way to the spurs and sidings that soon spread out like a cobweb around headquarters.
Naturally, rows were of pretty frequent occurrence between the company’s men and the leeches who bleed them with crooked games and stacked decks over the roulette, faro and stud-poker tables. But of them all in the delectable pursuit of separating the men and their pay-checks, Pete McGonigle’s “Golden Luck” saloon was in the van, both as to size and crookedness. And that high station of eminence it maintained until the night a stranger wrecked it by no more delicate a method than that of kicking over the roulette table, sending it and the attendant, who was presiding over the little whirling ball in Pete’s interest, crashing to the floor. That stranger was Munford. And that was how Munford came to join the army of the Rockies.
A number of the company men were present and they sided in with Munford. Before this amalgamation, Pete and his hangers-on went down to ignominious defeat, and the “Golden Luck,” to utter demolishment and ruin. News of the fracas spread rapidly to the other “joints.” The dive-keepers joined forces, the company men did likewise, and that night became the wildest in the history of Big Cloud.
Munford took command of his new-found friends from the start. In the street fight that followed he did wondrous things—and did them with zest, delight and effectiveness. With his great bulk he towered above his companions, and the sweep of his long arms as they rose and fell, the play of his massive shoulders as he lunged forward to give impetus to his blows, was a marvelous sight to see. But the details of that fight have no place here. Its result, however, was that Munford, previously unknown and unheard of, became thereafter, a marked man in Big Cloud.
When the fight was over the company men, elated with victory though somewhat the worse for wear, retired to the yard to wait for the construction trains to take them up to their work. And while they waited they spent the time gazing in admiration at Munford who sat on the edge of a flat-car, his legs dangling over, blowing softly on his knuckles, a smile of divine contentment on his face.
What was Munford going to do? demanded McGuire and the cronies of his particular gang who had had the honor of being present at Pete’s when the evening’s proceedings were instituted, and who therefore felt they had a prior claim to the hero’s consideration over and above that of the men from other sections of the work who had taken part in the fight. Munford did not know. Would he go up the line with them and take a job with their gang if they promised to get him one? Munford would. So he kept his seat when the construction train pulled out just as the dawn was breaking, and twenty miles up the road at Twin Bear Creek they tumbled him off and introduced him to Alan Burton, foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3.
At the sight of his battered and jaded crew, who in no wise appeared fit for the day’s work before them, Burton swore savagely and with great bitterness of tongue bade them get to their work. Then he turned in his ill-humor to Munford, who was still standing beside him.
“Who the devil are you? What you doin’ here? Where d’ye come from?”
The questions came quick and sharp like a volley of small arms.
Munford eyed the wiry little chunk of a man, scarcely up to his own shoulders, in silence, taking him in from head to foot.
“Well,” snapped Burton, “speak up!”
“Munford’s my name,” said Munford, coolly. “I’m here for a job. Where I come from ain’t none of your blamed business, is it?”
“Ain’t it?” said Burton. “Well, then, you can walk back there, my bucko!” and he turned on his heel and followed the men to their work.
Munford sat down on the doorsill of the camp shanty and with a laugh pulled out his pipe and began to smoke. He was still sitting there a half-hour later when the foreman came back.
“If you’ve got far to go,” grinned Burton, “you’d better get started.”
“No hurry,” replied Munford, imperturbably.
“You’re a queer card,” said Burton, after a moment. “What’s this about the trouble down at Big Cloud last night the boys are so full of they can’t do anything besides talk?”
Munford chuckled quietly. “Nothin’ much,” said he.
“Nothing much, eh? They say you put the ‘Golden Luck’ and Pete McGonigle to the bad, and then cleaned out every dive in town. You’re quite a reformer, ain’t you? I’ll tell you this, though, it won’t be healthy for you around these parts from now on.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Munford. “Say, how about that job?”
Burton laughed. “You’ve got a sweet nerve to ask for a job, and you responsible for a gang that won’t be able to do a day’s work among the lot of them between now and night. Did up McGonigle’s, eh? Well, I don’t know, I reckon in the long run that’ll be worth more to the company than the day’s work. All right, sport, you can go to work—until Pete and his crowd scare you out, which I predict won’t be long. And while you’re here, if you get itchy for trouble don’t look for it among the men, come tome.”
“Well, I’ll—” gasped Munford. “Why, I could twist you like—” Then he laughed in pure delight at Burton’s spunk “Oh, sure!Sure, I will.”
It took Munford no longer than a day to get the hang of the work. He was already more than a demigod in the eyes of Bridge Gang No. 3, and that counted for much. They were eager and ready to show him what they knew themselves, whereas the ignorance and rawness of any other newcomer would have been turned to good account in the shape of gibes and jests at his expense. In two days, from a natural adaptability coupled with his great strength, that was the strength of two men, Munford had fitted into place with the same nicety that one part of a well designed machine fits into another.
To the crews of the construction trains bringing up the bridge material he was pointed out with pride by his mates—though, indeed, that action was superfluous—as “the boy who did the trick at Pete’s.” And from these in turn Munford learned that down at Big Cloud, Pete and others of his ilk had sworn that, sooner or later, they would fix him for it. At this he only laughed and, doubling his great arm bared to the shoulders, intimated that there could be no greater pleasure in life for him than to have them try it. And that night sitting outside the camp after supper, McGuire, as spokesman, alluding to the threat, proposed that under Munford’s leadership they should make another raid on Big Cloud.
Burton, passing by, caught the gist of the conversation. “I want to see you a minute, Munford,” he called, shortly.
Munford got up and followed to the foreman’s little shanty that stood a few yards away from the main camp. Once inside, Burton shoved him into a chair and shook his fist under Munford’s nose.
“Didn’t I tell you yesterday morning,” he spluttered angrily, “that if you were looking for trouble to come to me and leave the gang alone? And here you’re at it again, what? Go down to Big Cloud and raise hell, eh? You great, big overgrown calf!” Munford blinked at the foreman, speechless. It was a long time since he had taken words like these from any man, much less a little spitfire like Burton.
“Trouble!” continued the irate Burton, hardly pausing for breath. “You live on it, don’t you? Eat it, eh? Well, you’ll get a fill of it before long that’ll give you the damnest indigestion you ever heard of. I promise you that! But you keep your hands off my crew! Now you listen to what I’m saying!”
“Aw, go hang!” said Munford, contemptuously. “I can’t help it, can I, if they want to go down to Big Cloud? If you’re so blamed anxious about them, it’s a wonder you don’t go around every night and tuck ‘em into their bunks!”
For a moment Burton looked as though he were going to jump into Munford and mix it then and there; but instead, with a short laugh, he turned and walked to the other side of the room, sat down on the edge of his bunk and pulled out his pipe. He cut some tobacco from his plug, rolled it between his palms, packed his pipe slowly and lighted it. It was five minutes before he broke the silence; Munford was beginning to feel uncomfortable.
“I don’t suppose throwing a few timbers across Twin Bear Creek means much of anything to you, Munford, eh?” he asked quietly.
“Not so much,” replied Munford carelessly, a little puzzled at the question.
“No? Well, it means a lot to me, a whole lot! Until that trestle is up, we can’t shove material over to the other side, ties and rails and heavy stuff. Progress on the Hill Division depends just at this minute on Bridge Gang No. 3, and concretely on me. I don’t propose to have it interfered with by the men going down to Big Cloud and getting their heads broke, understand?”
“Oh, I guess we can take care ofourheads, if that’s all that bothers you,” drawled Munford. “And I furthermore guess your bloomin’ little bridge you seem so stuck on won’t take any hurt by lettin’ the boys have their fling. Anyway, whether it will or not, what’s the use of you shootin’ off all your talk? You can’t stop ‘em! If they want to go, they’ll go. And say, Burton”—an inspiration coming to Munford—“come on down with us. I’ll promise you the time of your life.”
“I ought to have put it up to you differently, I guess, and saved my breath,” said Burton in disgust. “You’re just a hulk of bone and muscle and your head’s wood. You can lift a timber and swing a pick or axe because you’ve got the strength. But that’s all you know, or all you’re good for!”
The cool contempt in Burton’s voice stung Mun-ford more than the words themselves.
“Is that so!” he snarled, resorting to his favorite habit of blowing on his knuckles. “I’d show you fast enough what I’m good for, you runt, if you was a little bigger!”
“Maybe you’ll find I’m big enough one of these days,” said Burton, sharply. “Now I’ll put it to you straight so that you’ll understand. I’ll show you whether I can stop the gang going to Big Cloud or not. No man rides on the construction trains after to-day without a pass signed by me. That’s orders! If the men don’t like it, you can tell them it’s your fault. The next row in Big Cloud wouldn’t stop at fists. And as for you, you wouldn’t come out of it alive.”
“You needn’t worry about me,” sneered Munford. “I’m——”
“You’re a fool! The thickest-headed, trouble-hunting fool it’s ever been my cursed luck to run against!” exclaimed Burton angrily.
Munford brushed his great shock of hair out of his eyes with a nervous sweep of his hand. “I ain’t ever before taken the back talk from any man that I’ve taken from you—without hurtin’ him,” he said thickly, rising from his chair. “And I’m goin’ to get out of here before I hurtyou!” He walked quickly across the shanty and swung around in the doorway. “By God, I wish you was bigger!” he flung out.
Munford walked back to the men’s camp and listened to their conversation awhile in sullen silence. They were still on the same topic and were waxing more enthusiastic each minute.
“Aw, dry up!” said Munford, cutting in at last. “It’ll be a long time before any of you see Big Cloud again.”
“Who says so?” demanded McGuire, aggressively.
Munford jerked his thumb in the direction of the foreman’s shanty. “Him,” he said laconically.
“How’s he goin’ to stop it? What for? What’s the matter with him, anyway? It’s none of his business!” the men were talking in chorus.
“He’s fussy about gettin’ his dinky little bridge through,” sneered Munford. “He says he ain’t goin’ to have broken heads interferin’ with it, either. From now on you’ve got to get a pass to ride on the construction train. Likewise, he said if you didn’t like it I was to tell you”—here Munford paused to glance around the circle—“that it’s my fault and I’m the cause of all the trouble.”
“What did you tell him?” demanded the crew.
“I told him to go hang. What else would I tell him?”
“Bully for you!” shouted McGuire, slapping his leg in delight. “Did he fire you?”
This was something Munford had not thought of.
“Fire me?” he repeated. Then slowly, pondering the idea: “No, he didn’t. It’s funny he didn’t, though; I gave him back talk ‘enough.”
“Aw,” said McGuire, with a sneer, “that’s easy. He’d have fired you quick enough if he dared.”
“Why,” said Munford innocently. “I wouldn’t have touched him if he had. He’s too small to touch—I told him that, too.”
“‘Tain’t that,” McGuire returned. “He ain’t afraid of any man, big or little. I’ll give him credit for that. It’s his bridge, and that means his job, that he’s afraid of.”
“What’s my gettin’ fired got to do with the bridge?” demanded Munford, in amazement.
“Aw, go on; you know what I mean. If Burton has trouble with us the bridge work stops, don’t it? And the company’ll be askin’ Burton the reason why, won’t they? Well, Burton knows there’s some things we won’t stand for, and firin’ you after we brought you up here is one of them. And that’s right, too, eh, mates?”
There was emphatic assent from the men.
Munford, a little flustered at this wholesale exhibition of homage, fidgeted nervously. “Much obliged,” said he, clumsily. “Don’t put yourselves out on my account. I——”
“That’s all right,” broke in McGuire. “Burton won’t try it; he knows better. As for gettin’ a pass to get out of camp, I dunno aboutthat.” He got up, stretched himself and yawned. “The way I look at it, it’s more up to Munford here than it is to Burton. I’m goin’ to turn in, but I’ll say first that the night Munford says Big Cloud, then Big Cloud it is for Bridge Gang No. 3. That’s the way we talked it before we knew about Burton mixin’ in, and I reckon it stands just the same now.”
And the camp retired to their bunks and to sleep, voicing McGuire’s sentiments and swearing a unanimous and enthusiastic allegiance to Munford; all but Munford himself who did not sleep but lay awake tossing restlessly though, withal, in a very self-satisfied frame of mind.
This outburst of popularity pleased Munford exceedingly. The more so that it was directly traceable to his great strength and physical courage of which he was inordinately vain. He began to regard Burton with contempt. Burton was a man whose backbone wobbled when it came to a showdown! As Munford turned the situation over in his mind his contempt grew stronger until he came to decide that he despised the little foreman heartily. Would he, he demanded of himself with a snort, have fired a man that had talked to him as he had talked to Burton, had he been in Burton’s place? He would! And the gang, bridge, job and everything else could go to blazes! Munford sat up to emphasize his feelings on this point with a crash of his fist on the side of the bunk. He thrilled with the fierce joy of enacting just such a rôle as his imagination depicted, despising Burton accordingly for lacking in what were, to him, the essentials of a man. He decided, as he fell asleep, to make the foreman’s life a burden to him—and he did.
No flagrant violation or disobedience of orders was there, instead the inauguration of a petty little system of nagging that embraced every indignity Munford could think of. And the range of his attack was from profound and exaggerated attention and politeness to the utter and complete ignoring of the very existence of such a person as Alan Burton, foreman of Bridge Gang No. 3. While the gang, taking their cue from Munford, would shift from one extreme to the other with a precision and significance that cut deeper into a man of Burton’s high-strung, nervous temperament than any other form of torture they could have devised.
Three times during three days Burton, who was afraid of no man or aggregation of men, took the bull by the horns and struck Munford a violent blow in an effort to bring matters to a head. On the first occasion the gang watched the action with a gasp of mixed pity and admiration—looking for Burton’s instant annihilation. But Munford, with a bit of a laugh, only reached out and grasping Burton’s neck held him wriggling, helplessly, impotently, at arm’s length. “You got to grow, boy; just keep quiet now, I ain’t going to hurt you,” he taunted. And the gang promptly lost their faint appreciation of Burton’s nerve in their relish of the ridiculous figure cut by the white-faced, raging foreman.
It was dirty work, and deep down in his heart Munford knew it. But his better nature no sooner manifested itself by sundry pricks of conscience than it was smothered beneath the new sense of authority and command that was now his for the first time in his experience; and which, catering as it did to his peacock vanity, was paramount to all things else. The work lagged sadly and fell behind. The daily reports Burton signed and sent down to headquarters became worse and worse.
Each day, too, the feud between the dives at Big Cloud and Bridge Gang No. 3, fanned by the crews of the construction trains, who taunted McGuire and the men with cowardice, grew stronger. For the trainmen, having no idea of disregarding Burton’s orders and allowing the bridge men to ride down on the empties, rubbed it in until the gang writhed under their gibes.
Munford did not come in for much of this personally. The trainmen, none of them, seemed to display any particular hankering for discussing the question in his presence; but he got it second-hand from McGuire and the gang. The outcome of it all was a decision one night after supper to board the construction train the following evening, Burton, the train crew and the company to the contrary, and go down to Big Cloud if they had to run the train themselves. Munford concurred in the decision by blowing very gently on his knuckles. It looked bad for the peace and quiet of Big Cloud; and it looked bad for Burton’s standing with the company.
Munford, as commander-in-chief, and McGuire, as chief of staff, withdrew from the circle and strolled off by themselves to perfect their plans for the next day’s campaign, taking the trail in the direction of Big Cloud—a trail still called, but now a passable road due to the traffic incident to the building of the Hill Division, whose right of way it paralleled from Big Cloud to the ford at Twin Bear Creek. At the end of a quarter of a mile the two men sat down on a felled tree by the side of the trail to talk. Some ten minutes had passed when McGuire, in the midst of a graphic description of what they would do to Pete McGonigle and the rest, suddenly stopped and gripped Munford tightly by the shoulder.
“Keep mum,” he cautioned. “There’s someone comin’!”
In the bright moonlight they could make out the figure of a man about a hundred yards down the road coming toward them from the camp.
“He walks like Burton,” whispered McGuire. “What the devil is he followin’ us for? Get back into the trees and let him pass.”
They moved noiselessly a little deeper into the wood that fringed the road, and lying flat, watched the man who was approaching.
“It’s Burton,” McGuire announced at last.
Munford grunted assent.
“He’s been followin’ us all right, and now he’s goin’ to wait for us to come back,” continued McGuire, as Burton halted within a few yards of them and sat down to smoke. “Well, we’ll give him a run for his money. He can wait a while, I’m thinkin’.”
Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed. McGuire began to tire of his self-selected game of hide and seek, “Come on,” said he, “let’s go out and see what he wants.”
“Wait,” Munford answered. “There’s someone comin’ from Big Cloud way. It’s not us Burton’s after. Listen!”
There was the faint beat of horse’s hoofs gradually drawing nearer. Then presently rider and horse loomed out of the shadows and Burton, getting up, stepped out into the middle of the road.
The horseman drew up beside him. “That you, Burton?” he called softly.
“Yes,” said Burton, shortly.
“You got Pete’s letter, then,” the man went on, dismounting from his horse. “I suppose it’s all right to talk here. No one around, eh?”
“As well here as anywhere. Only cut it short.”
“Oh, there ain’t any hurry,” returned the man, with a laugh. “Wait till I tie my horse, then we can sit down and chew it over comfortable.”
“Now,” he went on, that task performed, “what I came to see you about was this fellow Munford.”
“Well,” demanded Burton, “what about him?”
“It looks to us down to Big Cloud, from the way the fellows on the construction trains are talkin’, you ain’t got any cause to love him, eh? So Pete figured you and him could deal. You want to get rid of him, don’t you?”
“I wish to God I’d never seen his face!” exclaimed Burton, with great bitterness.
“Sure! That’s the idea. You don’t want him; we do want him—bad! There’s nothin’ against the rest of the men; we’ll forget all about that. It’s just Munford we’re after.”
“Why don’t you get him, then?” said Burton curtly.
“We’re goin’ to,” the man replied, with a nasty laugh. “We’re goin’ to, all right. It’s a fair deal. You’re on, eh? Pete said you’d jump at the chance to sit in. We want you to fire him.”
“That all I’m to do?” asked Burton, quietly.
“Sure, that’s all there is to it—except this.”
Munford’s hand closed on his companion’s arm in a tight, spasmodic grip as Pete’s emissary produced a wad of bills and began to peel off the outer ones.
“Three hundred plunks,” said the man, extending the money he had abstracted from the roll to Burton. “Pretty good for just firin’ a man we’ve been lookin’ for you to fire for the last week, anyway. Besides, there’s been some talk down at headquarters about you not bein’ able to handle your men, and about them gettin’ someone that can. Pete says not to bother about that, he’ll fix it for you. Here, take the money.”
“Suppose I fired him,” said Burton, slowly, “where’d he go?”
“What do you care where he goes, so long as you get rid of him?”
“He couldn’t go West,” went on Burton, paying no attention to the other’s remark; “so he’d have to go East—that’s Big Cloud—andmurder!” He turned fiercely, savagely on the man. “You dirty, low-lived hound!” he flashed. “You offer me three hundred dollars to murder a man, do you? You wonder why I’ve stood for what I did, do you, you scrimp! Fire him, eh, to get a cowardly knife or shot in his back! You think I didn’t know what would happen if I let him out, eh? Get out of here, you cur! And get out now—while youcan!” Burton’s voice rasped, hoarse with passion. He turned abruptly away and strode quickly in the direction of the camp.
“Hold on, wait a minute, Burton,” cried the other, following him. “Don’t get batty.”
Unconsciously Munford had tightened his grip on McGuire’s arm until the latter whimpered with the pain, and now Munford lifted him bodily to his feet making cautiously for the spot where the horse was standing. The two figures were still discernible, and Burton’s angry voice continued to reach the listeners, though the words were now indistinguishable.
Munford’s face in the moonlight was colorless, the muscles around his mouth twitched convulsively. “D’ye hear what they said? D’ye hear what they said?My God!d’ye hear it all?” he was mumbling incoherently in McGuire’s ear, his eyes strained up the road.
“Yes, I heard it. Let go of my arm, you’re breakin’ it!”
“He’s comin’ back,” said Munford, hoarsely.
Burton had disappeared around a turn in the road and the man, after hesitating a moment, began to retrace his steps to his horse, muttering fiercely to himself as he came along. As he reached for the bridle, Munford leaped out and grasped him by the throat, choking back the man’s cry of terror.
“You make a noise,” snarled Munford, “and I’ll finish you! Oh, it’s you, eh? Look here, Mac, it’s the cuss that ran the roulette wheel that night at Pete’s. So my price is three hundred, eh? Well, hand it out.Quick!”
Slowly the fellow put his hand in his pocket and for the second time that night pulled out his roll.
Munford’s anger seemed to have vanished. He laughed softly as he took the money.
“What are you going to do with me?” whined the gambler.
Munford made no answer. In the imperfect light, he was laboriously counting the bills. McGuire watched the operation, at the same time keeping an eye on their prisoner.
“Two sixty—eighty—three hundred,” said Munford at last, cramming that amount into his pocket and handing back by far the larger part of the roll to the man. “What am I goin’ to do with you? Nothin’! You get on that horse and ride back to Pete. I want him to know this. Tell him all about it. Tell him Munford told you to tell him. That’s worth more than breakin’ your neck—and that’s all that saves you from gettin’ it broke, savvy? You tell himI’vegot the three hundred, and I’ll give him his chance at me for it one of these days.. And when I do—My God,you ridebefore I begin with you!”
The fellow glanced fearfully from Munford to McGuire and back again to Munford to assure himself that he was free to go. Then he clambered frantically into the saddle and lashing his beast in a frenzy of terror disappeared down the trail.
Munford, with swift revulsion of mood, threw himself down on the grass, burying his face in his hands. Not a word from McGuire; he walked awkwardly up and down, whistling under his breath. After a minute Munford looked up.
“I got to square this with Burton,” he said brokenly.
McGuire nodded.
“He’s a better man than you and me and the whole gang put together”—Munford’s tones were fiercely assertive.
“He is that,” assented McGuire, with conviction.
There was silence for a moment between them; then McGuire spoke: “Why didn’t you take it all?” he asked.
“Take it all!” flared Munford. “I’m no thief, am I? Well, then, what’s the matter with you? That’s my price, ain’t it? Three hundred. That’s what Pete offered for a chance to get his paws on me. Well,I’llgive him his chance, you heard me promise, didn’t you? That’s right, eh? That’s Pete’s proposition, and the money’s mine, ain’t it?”
“It is,” said McGuire.
“It is, and it ain’t,” said Munford. “Burtoncouldhave had it if he’d sold me out, couldn’t he? Well, then, I’m goin’ to see he gets it anyway.”
“He wouldn’t take it, not by any means, he wouldn’t,” objected McGuire.
“Not outright, he wouldn’t,” agreed Munford. “I know that well enough. We got to fix it so he won’t know where it come from, and so it will square me with him, and you fellows, too.”
“How you goin’ to do that?” demanded McGuire. “I dunno,” said Munford. “We’ll talk it over with the boys. Come on back to camp.”
The next day and the day after, the gang worked like Trojans, and the lack of any sneer or incivility on their part, coupled with a subdued, expectant excitement that the men tried fruitlessly to hide, made Burton more anxious and ill at ease than during the days that had gone before. It looked like the lull before the storm; and he wondered bitterly what culminating piece of deviltry they were hatching.
To the taunts of the train crews the gang grinned and said nothing.
On the second day a package, addressed to Munford, came up from the East, and at noon hour the men handed it around from one to another in awestruck wonder at the magnificence of the solid gold repeater that chimed the quarters, halves and hours, and split the seconds into fractions. It was indeed a beauty. Maybe the chain was a little massive, but the men opined that it was therefore strong. They pried open the case to read the inscription over whose wording they had wrestled most of a night.
“Nifty, ain’t it?” cried McGuire, admiringly; and he read it aloud: “‘This is to certify that Alan Burton is as square as they make them, and Munford and the gang are sorry. So help us!’” They delivered it solemnly to Munford, who was to make the presentation, and started in a body for Burton’s shanty. Burton met them at the door, his face hard and set.
“So it’s a showdown at last, eh, boys?” he laughed grimly. “Well, what is it?”
The men shoved Munford bodily forward and he stood balancing himself sheepishly, first on one foot and then on the other, as he faced Burton. He cleared his throat painfully once or twice, then he found his voice. From a point of oratory or rhetoric it was perhaps the lamest presentation speech on record, for Munford suddenly thrust the watch and chain into the astounded Burton’s hands.
“Here, take it,” he sputtered. “It’s all written out on the inside.” And breaking through the men, he turned and fled incontinently.