CHAPTER IXAN ACT OF FOLLY AND A CRUEL DISPATCH.THE ridicule that he had to endure on account of “Lord Steerem,” combined with the mortification of losing the boat-race, was more than Ben Watkins could endure. He was heard to declare at the beginning of the long vacation that he should never return to X—— College again; and as for boat-racing, he had had enough of it to last the rest of his life. Then he disappeared, but where he went or what became of him none of his recent companions either knew or cared. They had had quite enough of Ben Watkins, with his mean disposition and overbearing ways, and were quite willing to lose sight of him.As the summer wore on Myles Manning steadily increased his list of friends. His fellow-reporters on thePhonographliked him because he was good-natured, obliging, and of a happy disposition. Thoseon the other papers liked him because, while he was keen in pursuit of news and would use every honest method to obtain a “beat” on them, he never forgot that he was a gentleman or descended to dishonorable means to accomplish his purpose. Mr. Haxall liked him because he did not shirk his work nor show the slightest disinclination to accept any assignment, no matter how unpleasant its nature.When Van Cleef was given the enviable summer job of visiting the principal watering-places and resorts of the country, for the purpose of writing letters from them to the paper, Myles was assigned to his night station-work. He particularly hated this, but he attended to it as well and thoroughly as though he had chosen it, and only Mr. Haxall suspected, from a chance remark, how distasteful it was to him.He studied the best models of newspaper-writing carefully, and before the summer was over developed an easy and pleasant style of his own. He was becoming recognized on the paper as a valuable man, but his salary still continued to be what it was at the first, and there was no intimation that it would ever be raised. The boy tried to send five dollars ofit home every week, for family affairs were becoming worse and more discouraging with each day, but he found it very hard to keep up his neat personal appearance and also pay his weekly board-bills with the small sum that remained.It would seem from all this that our hero must be a paragon of virtue; and, as some of those who have followed his fortunes thus far would say, “Altogether too good to live.” If this were the case this story might as well end right here, leaving the reader to imagine how Myles rose from one position to another until he finally became proprietor of the great paper on which he was now but one of the humblest workers. That it does not thus end was because the young reporter was possessed of two grave faults, either one of which, if unchecked, would eventually lead him to disgrace and ruin. He was in danger of becoming both a drunkard and a gambler.Myles would have been terribly shocked if any one had said this to him, and would have indignantly denied it. At the same time he could not have denied that he was fond of all sorts of games of chance, nor that he rarely refused an offered glassof wine. He had fallen into the habit of drinking, now and then, while in college, because he was too good-natured to refuse an offered “treat,” and too generous not to “stand treat” in turn. Now, as a reporter, he found the temptation to do these same things increased a hundred-fold. It seemed as though almost every assignment on which he was sent led to accepting or offering drinks of some kind of liquor. He began to think that the gaining of interesting items of news depended largely upon his willingness to “stand treat” for, or be “treated” by, those from whom he sought it. Several times he had returned to the office flushed and noisy with wine, and once or twice Mr. Haxall’s keen eye had detected him in this condition. It was for this reason that the city editor had decided to wait a little longer and test him a little further before advancing his salary. He liked the young fellow and was watching him anxiously. He even went so far as to warn him of the dangers and temptations that beset a reporter’s path, though he did not make his allusions personal.Thus matters stood with Myles Manning when one day, toward the end of September, Mr. Haxall called him to his desk and said,“Mr. Manning, it now looks as though the most general and serious railroad strike this country has ever seen were about to break out. If it does it will be a very different thing from the horse-car strike in which you received your first lessons at reporting. That was only a local affair, while this will be of interest to the whole country. Of course thePhonographwants the earliest news of it, and I am sending out half a dozen of our best reporters to important railroad points that seem likely to become centres from which the strikers will operate. At these points we must have our steadiest and most reliable men, of whom I count you as one. You will, therefore, start at once for Mountain Junction, the terminus of the Central and Western Divisions of the A. & B. Road. Send us full dispatches of all that happens, and remain there until relieved or recalled. Here is an order on the cashier for your expenses, and if you find yourself in need of more money you can telegraph for it. Remember that thePhonographexpects to receive the news—and all the news—from its reporters, but that it has no use for their individual opinions. Those are formed for it by its editors.”With the promptness that Mr. Haxall liked sowell Myles answered, “All right, sir. I think I understand,” left the office at once, and the next train westward bound over the A. & B. Road carried him as a passenger.As Mr. Haxall turned again to his desk, after having started Myles on this important and perhaps dangerous mission, he said to himself:“I hope I have done right to trust him with this job. He is entitled to at least one fair trial on big work and a chance for himself outside the city. At any rate we can’t get badly beaten whatever happens, for Rolfe, in Chicago, is certain to get hold of any thing important from the Junction and send it in on chance.”Mountain Junction was a railroad town in every sense of the word. Here the main line of the A. & B. Road was met by an important branch, and here were located its car-shops, locomotive-works, and general repair-shops. It was in a coal and iron region, and several large mines were in operation not far from it. Its entire population, therefore, consisted of the families of railroad employés and miners. During the daytime it was a scene of busy industry and the air was filled with the crash ofsteam-hammers, the shriek of locomotive-whistles, and the rattle of trains. At night the noise was hardly diminished, while the sky was reddened by the glow from hundreds of furnaces, foundries, and coke-ovens.The place did not look attractive to Myles, as, late in the afternoon, he surveyed what he could of it from the platform of the railway station at which the New York train had just dropped him, and he hoped he should not be kept there long.He found a more comfortable hotel than he expected, and in it, after thoroughly cleansing himself from the dust and cinders of his long ride, he went down to supper. The seats at two long tables, extending the whole length of the room, were filled with the bosses and heads of departments of the many shops, mills, and foundries of the place. A chair had been reserved for him at a small table placed by a window, at which two persons were already busily eating. One of these uttered an exclamation of surprise as Myles entered the room, and, looking at him, the reporter saw his old rival, Ben Watkins.“Well, of all things!” cried Ben. “What brings you here, Myles Manning?”“Business,” answered Myles. “But I suppose you are here for health and pleasure.”“Not much I ain’t,” growled Ben. “I am here to make my living. My uncle is superintendent of the Western Division A. & B. Road, and I am his valuable assistant.”Although Myles had no love for Ben Watkins, especially as he recalled the nature of their last interview, he did not wholly dislike him, and, after all, it was pleasant to meet an acquaintance in a place where he expected to find only strangers.Ben introduced the other occupant of the table, a supercilious-looking, pale-faced little man in uniform, as Lieutenant Easter. He belonged to a company of country militia, sent to this point from a neighboring town to be on hand in case of any serious emergency, and to his own intense satisfaction found himself, owing to the enforced absence of his captain, in command of the troops.Ben Watkins ridiculed the precaution thus taken, and in answer to a question from Myles declared that he did not believe there would be any strike, in spite of all the talk. The lieutenant agreed with him, and, caressing his silky little mustache, said,with an absurdly pompous tone, that the mere presence of himself and his men was sufficient to prevent any such thing.After supper Ben, who had displayed an unusual friendliness toward Myles ever since their meeting, asked him how he intended to spend the evening.“I must go out and find the telegraph office,” replied Myles, “and make arrangements to have my dispatches sent through promptly. Then I thought I would look about the town a little.”“Oh, well,” said Ben, “that won’t take you long, and when you come back you’d better drop into my room, No. 16. There isn’t any thing to do of an evening in this beastly place, but a few of us generally manage to put in the time somehow, and perhaps we can make it pleasant for you. Come and see, at any rate.”Myles promised he would, and after receiving directions how to reach the telegraph office he went out.A wickedly cruel expression swept over Ben Watkins’ face as he watched his recent rival out of sight.“I’ll fix you, my young man. See if I don’t! I haven’t forgotten ‘Lord Steerem’ and the trick youplayed on me. If I don’t get even with you this very night I will before long. Oh, yes, Ben Watkins doesn’t forget in a hurry.”Myles, on the other hand, as he walked down the street, was thinking.“Ben doesn’t seem half a bad fellow, after all. He has decidedly changed for the better since last June, and I shouldn’t wonder if he proved a great help to me in this place.”He found the telegraph operator to be a brisk, wide-awake young man, who said he was ready to handle any amount of press matter, and who also promised to send word to Myles if any thing important took place during the night.Leaving the office Myles started toward the railway station, which was only a block farther on, to assure himself that every thing about it was still quiet. As he reached its broad platform he noticed there a child four or five years old, and wondered what such a little thing could be doing all alone in such a place at that hour, for it was now about eight o’clock. Stepping up to the child he asked:“Well, little one, what is your name?”“My name Bobby,” replied the child, gravely,lifting a roguish but self-possessed little face to look at the tall young fellow bending over him.As the light from a reflector hung outside the station fell on it, Myles thought he had never seen a sweeter or more winning face on a child, and he at once became greatly interested in the little fellow.“Well, Bobby, where do you live?” he asked.“Over there.” And the child pointed vaguely into the darkness behind them.“But what are you doing out here so late, and all alone? Don’t you know it is high time for all good little boys to be in bed?”“I’s waiting for my papa.”“Who is your papa?”“Why, my papa is my papa,” answered the child, with an air of surprise that any one should ask such a question.“Well, where is your papa, then?” asked Myles, looking about with the expectation of seeing a papa at no great distance.“My papa is on the chu-chu cars.”“The chu-chu cars?”“Yes, over there.”Here the child pointed to a freight train that hadjust hauled in on a siding beyond the tracks of the main line. Then crying out, “I see my papa,” the child jumped from the platform, and, before Myles could stop him, was running across the tracks toward a twinkling lantern that was approaching from the direction of the freight train.All at once, with a cry of pain, the child fell directly across one of the glistening lines of steel.Myles sprang toward him. As he did so the eastbound night express dashed, with a shriek and a roar, out from behind a round-house that had, until that moment, concealed it, and rushed with fiery breath and gleaming head-light toward where the child lay.Myles’ heart ceased its beating, but he did not hesitate nor flinch, though it seemed impossible that he could get there before the iron monster. He did, though, with a second to spare, and snatched the child as he ran. The little foot was caught in the angle of a switch and the child uttered a sharp scream of pain as the strong young arms tore it away, leaving a tiny shoe behind. Both rolled together in the cinders, barely beyond reach of the cruel wheels that ground over the quivering rails.With a long wild howl, as of baffled rage, the night express swept on, leaving Myles and the child almost suffocated in its dust, and breathless with the rush of wind that followed it.As Myles staggered to his feet, and lifted the limp form of the child whom he had saved at so imminent a risk of his own life, a man with a lantern on his arm sprang forward, and snatching the child from him, cried, in a tone of agony:“It’s my boy! My only boy! My little Bob—and he’s killed! The last one; and he had to be taken too! Oh, it’s too hard, too hard!”While Myles was trying to soothe him, the child, who was more frightened than hurt, put up a little hand, and, patting its father’s face, said:“Bobby was coming to you, papa, but he fell down and got hurted. His foot hurts now.”The father was Jacob Allen, one of the best-known men on the A. & B. road. He had just come in, as he did every other night at the same hour, in charge of a through freight train. At this point he was relieved, and could spend every other night in his home near the station. His wife and little Bob were in the habit of coming as far asthe platform to meet him. But this evening Mrs. Allen was detained at home, and the child had slipped away alone unnoticed.Great tears rolled down the man’s begrimed and weather-beaten cheeks as he tried to thank Myles for what he had done, and to tell him how dark and cheerless his home would be without its bit of golden-haired sunlight.Myles made light of his service and escaped from the other’s overpowering gratitude as soon as possible, promising to call and see the child, and find out how he was getting along, on the morrow. Before he left the man had learned his name, and the last words he heard were:“If ever the time comes when Jake Allen can lift a hand for you, or say a word that will in any way serve you, Mr. Manning, you may count on his doing it, so long as he has breath left in his body. And who knows but the time may come sooner than you think!” he added significantly.As Myles, hot, bruised, and covered with dust and cinders, re-entered the hotel almost the first person he met was Ben Watkins, who exclaimed in astonishment at his appearance. Myles told him in a fewwords what had happened, and, pushing him into a chair, Ben said:“Wait there a minute, old man, and I’ll fix you all right.”He returned quickly, bringing a great tumbler of something that foamed and sparkled and tinkled with cool bits of ice. Without asking or caring what it was Myles thirstily drained the glass saying:“That’s the very thing I wanted, and it was awfully good of you to think of it, Ben.”“Oh, that’s all right,” replied Watkins. “Come up to my room and have another as soon as you get dusted off.”Myles went to No. 16, where he found that Ben and Lieutenant Easter were playing cards. There he drank another glass of the cool, pleasant mixture that was “just the thing he wanted.” It made him feel so good that he was easily persuaded to take a third. “It is as mild as milk,” Ben said, “and wouldn’t upset a baby.”Then he winked at his companion, who looked at Myles and winked back at Ben.Myles now began to talk loud and boastfully. Then he joined in a game of cards and began to losemoney and say that it was no matter, for there was plenty more where that came from. All the while Ben Watkins, with an evil smile on his face, kept urging him to take a sip of this or a taste of that; and after a time, when his money was nearly gone and he could no longer keep awake, they carried him to his own room and put him to bed.The breathless messenger who came at midnight from the telegraph office to tell Myles that the great strike had begun failed to arouse him. The young reporter knew nothing of the exciting scenes taking place in the streets of the lawless town. Of all the important events, for news of which his paper depended upon him, he sent no dispatch.Somebody, however, did send a dispatch that night to thePhonograph, and it was:“Your reporter at Mountain Junction too drunk to send any news. Better replace him with a sober man.”
CHAPTER IXAN ACT OF FOLLY AND A CRUEL DISPATCH.THE ridicule that he had to endure on account of “Lord Steerem,” combined with the mortification of losing the boat-race, was more than Ben Watkins could endure. He was heard to declare at the beginning of the long vacation that he should never return to X—— College again; and as for boat-racing, he had had enough of it to last the rest of his life. Then he disappeared, but where he went or what became of him none of his recent companions either knew or cared. They had had quite enough of Ben Watkins, with his mean disposition and overbearing ways, and were quite willing to lose sight of him.As the summer wore on Myles Manning steadily increased his list of friends. His fellow-reporters on thePhonographliked him because he was good-natured, obliging, and of a happy disposition. Thoseon the other papers liked him because, while he was keen in pursuit of news and would use every honest method to obtain a “beat” on them, he never forgot that he was a gentleman or descended to dishonorable means to accomplish his purpose. Mr. Haxall liked him because he did not shirk his work nor show the slightest disinclination to accept any assignment, no matter how unpleasant its nature.When Van Cleef was given the enviable summer job of visiting the principal watering-places and resorts of the country, for the purpose of writing letters from them to the paper, Myles was assigned to his night station-work. He particularly hated this, but he attended to it as well and thoroughly as though he had chosen it, and only Mr. Haxall suspected, from a chance remark, how distasteful it was to him.He studied the best models of newspaper-writing carefully, and before the summer was over developed an easy and pleasant style of his own. He was becoming recognized on the paper as a valuable man, but his salary still continued to be what it was at the first, and there was no intimation that it would ever be raised. The boy tried to send five dollars ofit home every week, for family affairs were becoming worse and more discouraging with each day, but he found it very hard to keep up his neat personal appearance and also pay his weekly board-bills with the small sum that remained.It would seem from all this that our hero must be a paragon of virtue; and, as some of those who have followed his fortunes thus far would say, “Altogether too good to live.” If this were the case this story might as well end right here, leaving the reader to imagine how Myles rose from one position to another until he finally became proprietor of the great paper on which he was now but one of the humblest workers. That it does not thus end was because the young reporter was possessed of two grave faults, either one of which, if unchecked, would eventually lead him to disgrace and ruin. He was in danger of becoming both a drunkard and a gambler.Myles would have been terribly shocked if any one had said this to him, and would have indignantly denied it. At the same time he could not have denied that he was fond of all sorts of games of chance, nor that he rarely refused an offered glassof wine. He had fallen into the habit of drinking, now and then, while in college, because he was too good-natured to refuse an offered “treat,” and too generous not to “stand treat” in turn. Now, as a reporter, he found the temptation to do these same things increased a hundred-fold. It seemed as though almost every assignment on which he was sent led to accepting or offering drinks of some kind of liquor. He began to think that the gaining of interesting items of news depended largely upon his willingness to “stand treat” for, or be “treated” by, those from whom he sought it. Several times he had returned to the office flushed and noisy with wine, and once or twice Mr. Haxall’s keen eye had detected him in this condition. It was for this reason that the city editor had decided to wait a little longer and test him a little further before advancing his salary. He liked the young fellow and was watching him anxiously. He even went so far as to warn him of the dangers and temptations that beset a reporter’s path, though he did not make his allusions personal.Thus matters stood with Myles Manning when one day, toward the end of September, Mr. Haxall called him to his desk and said,“Mr. Manning, it now looks as though the most general and serious railroad strike this country has ever seen were about to break out. If it does it will be a very different thing from the horse-car strike in which you received your first lessons at reporting. That was only a local affair, while this will be of interest to the whole country. Of course thePhonographwants the earliest news of it, and I am sending out half a dozen of our best reporters to important railroad points that seem likely to become centres from which the strikers will operate. At these points we must have our steadiest and most reliable men, of whom I count you as one. You will, therefore, start at once for Mountain Junction, the terminus of the Central and Western Divisions of the A. & B. Road. Send us full dispatches of all that happens, and remain there until relieved or recalled. Here is an order on the cashier for your expenses, and if you find yourself in need of more money you can telegraph for it. Remember that thePhonographexpects to receive the news—and all the news—from its reporters, but that it has no use for their individual opinions. Those are formed for it by its editors.”With the promptness that Mr. Haxall liked sowell Myles answered, “All right, sir. I think I understand,” left the office at once, and the next train westward bound over the A. & B. Road carried him as a passenger.As Mr. Haxall turned again to his desk, after having started Myles on this important and perhaps dangerous mission, he said to himself:“I hope I have done right to trust him with this job. He is entitled to at least one fair trial on big work and a chance for himself outside the city. At any rate we can’t get badly beaten whatever happens, for Rolfe, in Chicago, is certain to get hold of any thing important from the Junction and send it in on chance.”Mountain Junction was a railroad town in every sense of the word. Here the main line of the A. & B. Road was met by an important branch, and here were located its car-shops, locomotive-works, and general repair-shops. It was in a coal and iron region, and several large mines were in operation not far from it. Its entire population, therefore, consisted of the families of railroad employés and miners. During the daytime it was a scene of busy industry and the air was filled with the crash ofsteam-hammers, the shriek of locomotive-whistles, and the rattle of trains. At night the noise was hardly diminished, while the sky was reddened by the glow from hundreds of furnaces, foundries, and coke-ovens.The place did not look attractive to Myles, as, late in the afternoon, he surveyed what he could of it from the platform of the railway station at which the New York train had just dropped him, and he hoped he should not be kept there long.He found a more comfortable hotel than he expected, and in it, after thoroughly cleansing himself from the dust and cinders of his long ride, he went down to supper. The seats at two long tables, extending the whole length of the room, were filled with the bosses and heads of departments of the many shops, mills, and foundries of the place. A chair had been reserved for him at a small table placed by a window, at which two persons were already busily eating. One of these uttered an exclamation of surprise as Myles entered the room, and, looking at him, the reporter saw his old rival, Ben Watkins.“Well, of all things!” cried Ben. “What brings you here, Myles Manning?”“Business,” answered Myles. “But I suppose you are here for health and pleasure.”“Not much I ain’t,” growled Ben. “I am here to make my living. My uncle is superintendent of the Western Division A. & B. Road, and I am his valuable assistant.”Although Myles had no love for Ben Watkins, especially as he recalled the nature of their last interview, he did not wholly dislike him, and, after all, it was pleasant to meet an acquaintance in a place where he expected to find only strangers.Ben introduced the other occupant of the table, a supercilious-looking, pale-faced little man in uniform, as Lieutenant Easter. He belonged to a company of country militia, sent to this point from a neighboring town to be on hand in case of any serious emergency, and to his own intense satisfaction found himself, owing to the enforced absence of his captain, in command of the troops.Ben Watkins ridiculed the precaution thus taken, and in answer to a question from Myles declared that he did not believe there would be any strike, in spite of all the talk. The lieutenant agreed with him, and, caressing his silky little mustache, said,with an absurdly pompous tone, that the mere presence of himself and his men was sufficient to prevent any such thing.After supper Ben, who had displayed an unusual friendliness toward Myles ever since their meeting, asked him how he intended to spend the evening.“I must go out and find the telegraph office,” replied Myles, “and make arrangements to have my dispatches sent through promptly. Then I thought I would look about the town a little.”“Oh, well,” said Ben, “that won’t take you long, and when you come back you’d better drop into my room, No. 16. There isn’t any thing to do of an evening in this beastly place, but a few of us generally manage to put in the time somehow, and perhaps we can make it pleasant for you. Come and see, at any rate.”Myles promised he would, and after receiving directions how to reach the telegraph office he went out.A wickedly cruel expression swept over Ben Watkins’ face as he watched his recent rival out of sight.“I’ll fix you, my young man. See if I don’t! I haven’t forgotten ‘Lord Steerem’ and the trick youplayed on me. If I don’t get even with you this very night I will before long. Oh, yes, Ben Watkins doesn’t forget in a hurry.”Myles, on the other hand, as he walked down the street, was thinking.“Ben doesn’t seem half a bad fellow, after all. He has decidedly changed for the better since last June, and I shouldn’t wonder if he proved a great help to me in this place.”He found the telegraph operator to be a brisk, wide-awake young man, who said he was ready to handle any amount of press matter, and who also promised to send word to Myles if any thing important took place during the night.Leaving the office Myles started toward the railway station, which was only a block farther on, to assure himself that every thing about it was still quiet. As he reached its broad platform he noticed there a child four or five years old, and wondered what such a little thing could be doing all alone in such a place at that hour, for it was now about eight o’clock. Stepping up to the child he asked:“Well, little one, what is your name?”“My name Bobby,” replied the child, gravely,lifting a roguish but self-possessed little face to look at the tall young fellow bending over him.As the light from a reflector hung outside the station fell on it, Myles thought he had never seen a sweeter or more winning face on a child, and he at once became greatly interested in the little fellow.“Well, Bobby, where do you live?” he asked.“Over there.” And the child pointed vaguely into the darkness behind them.“But what are you doing out here so late, and all alone? Don’t you know it is high time for all good little boys to be in bed?”“I’s waiting for my papa.”“Who is your papa?”“Why, my papa is my papa,” answered the child, with an air of surprise that any one should ask such a question.“Well, where is your papa, then?” asked Myles, looking about with the expectation of seeing a papa at no great distance.“My papa is on the chu-chu cars.”“The chu-chu cars?”“Yes, over there.”Here the child pointed to a freight train that hadjust hauled in on a siding beyond the tracks of the main line. Then crying out, “I see my papa,” the child jumped from the platform, and, before Myles could stop him, was running across the tracks toward a twinkling lantern that was approaching from the direction of the freight train.All at once, with a cry of pain, the child fell directly across one of the glistening lines of steel.Myles sprang toward him. As he did so the eastbound night express dashed, with a shriek and a roar, out from behind a round-house that had, until that moment, concealed it, and rushed with fiery breath and gleaming head-light toward where the child lay.Myles’ heart ceased its beating, but he did not hesitate nor flinch, though it seemed impossible that he could get there before the iron monster. He did, though, with a second to spare, and snatched the child as he ran. The little foot was caught in the angle of a switch and the child uttered a sharp scream of pain as the strong young arms tore it away, leaving a tiny shoe behind. Both rolled together in the cinders, barely beyond reach of the cruel wheels that ground over the quivering rails.With a long wild howl, as of baffled rage, the night express swept on, leaving Myles and the child almost suffocated in its dust, and breathless with the rush of wind that followed it.As Myles staggered to his feet, and lifted the limp form of the child whom he had saved at so imminent a risk of his own life, a man with a lantern on his arm sprang forward, and snatching the child from him, cried, in a tone of agony:“It’s my boy! My only boy! My little Bob—and he’s killed! The last one; and he had to be taken too! Oh, it’s too hard, too hard!”While Myles was trying to soothe him, the child, who was more frightened than hurt, put up a little hand, and, patting its father’s face, said:“Bobby was coming to you, papa, but he fell down and got hurted. His foot hurts now.”The father was Jacob Allen, one of the best-known men on the A. & B. road. He had just come in, as he did every other night at the same hour, in charge of a through freight train. At this point he was relieved, and could spend every other night in his home near the station. His wife and little Bob were in the habit of coming as far asthe platform to meet him. But this evening Mrs. Allen was detained at home, and the child had slipped away alone unnoticed.Great tears rolled down the man’s begrimed and weather-beaten cheeks as he tried to thank Myles for what he had done, and to tell him how dark and cheerless his home would be without its bit of golden-haired sunlight.Myles made light of his service and escaped from the other’s overpowering gratitude as soon as possible, promising to call and see the child, and find out how he was getting along, on the morrow. Before he left the man had learned his name, and the last words he heard were:“If ever the time comes when Jake Allen can lift a hand for you, or say a word that will in any way serve you, Mr. Manning, you may count on his doing it, so long as he has breath left in his body. And who knows but the time may come sooner than you think!” he added significantly.As Myles, hot, bruised, and covered with dust and cinders, re-entered the hotel almost the first person he met was Ben Watkins, who exclaimed in astonishment at his appearance. Myles told him in a fewwords what had happened, and, pushing him into a chair, Ben said:“Wait there a minute, old man, and I’ll fix you all right.”He returned quickly, bringing a great tumbler of something that foamed and sparkled and tinkled with cool bits of ice. Without asking or caring what it was Myles thirstily drained the glass saying:“That’s the very thing I wanted, and it was awfully good of you to think of it, Ben.”“Oh, that’s all right,” replied Watkins. “Come up to my room and have another as soon as you get dusted off.”Myles went to No. 16, where he found that Ben and Lieutenant Easter were playing cards. There he drank another glass of the cool, pleasant mixture that was “just the thing he wanted.” It made him feel so good that he was easily persuaded to take a third. “It is as mild as milk,” Ben said, “and wouldn’t upset a baby.”Then he winked at his companion, who looked at Myles and winked back at Ben.Myles now began to talk loud and boastfully. Then he joined in a game of cards and began to losemoney and say that it was no matter, for there was plenty more where that came from. All the while Ben Watkins, with an evil smile on his face, kept urging him to take a sip of this or a taste of that; and after a time, when his money was nearly gone and he could no longer keep awake, they carried him to his own room and put him to bed.The breathless messenger who came at midnight from the telegraph office to tell Myles that the great strike had begun failed to arouse him. The young reporter knew nothing of the exciting scenes taking place in the streets of the lawless town. Of all the important events, for news of which his paper depended upon him, he sent no dispatch.Somebody, however, did send a dispatch that night to thePhonograph, and it was:“Your reporter at Mountain Junction too drunk to send any news. Better replace him with a sober man.”
AN ACT OF FOLLY AND A CRUEL DISPATCH.
THE ridicule that he had to endure on account of “Lord Steerem,” combined with the mortification of losing the boat-race, was more than Ben Watkins could endure. He was heard to declare at the beginning of the long vacation that he should never return to X—— College again; and as for boat-racing, he had had enough of it to last the rest of his life. Then he disappeared, but where he went or what became of him none of his recent companions either knew or cared. They had had quite enough of Ben Watkins, with his mean disposition and overbearing ways, and were quite willing to lose sight of him.
As the summer wore on Myles Manning steadily increased his list of friends. His fellow-reporters on thePhonographliked him because he was good-natured, obliging, and of a happy disposition. Thoseon the other papers liked him because, while he was keen in pursuit of news and would use every honest method to obtain a “beat” on them, he never forgot that he was a gentleman or descended to dishonorable means to accomplish his purpose. Mr. Haxall liked him because he did not shirk his work nor show the slightest disinclination to accept any assignment, no matter how unpleasant its nature.
When Van Cleef was given the enviable summer job of visiting the principal watering-places and resorts of the country, for the purpose of writing letters from them to the paper, Myles was assigned to his night station-work. He particularly hated this, but he attended to it as well and thoroughly as though he had chosen it, and only Mr. Haxall suspected, from a chance remark, how distasteful it was to him.
He studied the best models of newspaper-writing carefully, and before the summer was over developed an easy and pleasant style of his own. He was becoming recognized on the paper as a valuable man, but his salary still continued to be what it was at the first, and there was no intimation that it would ever be raised. The boy tried to send five dollars ofit home every week, for family affairs were becoming worse and more discouraging with each day, but he found it very hard to keep up his neat personal appearance and also pay his weekly board-bills with the small sum that remained.
It would seem from all this that our hero must be a paragon of virtue; and, as some of those who have followed his fortunes thus far would say, “Altogether too good to live.” If this were the case this story might as well end right here, leaving the reader to imagine how Myles rose from one position to another until he finally became proprietor of the great paper on which he was now but one of the humblest workers. That it does not thus end was because the young reporter was possessed of two grave faults, either one of which, if unchecked, would eventually lead him to disgrace and ruin. He was in danger of becoming both a drunkard and a gambler.
Myles would have been terribly shocked if any one had said this to him, and would have indignantly denied it. At the same time he could not have denied that he was fond of all sorts of games of chance, nor that he rarely refused an offered glassof wine. He had fallen into the habit of drinking, now and then, while in college, because he was too good-natured to refuse an offered “treat,” and too generous not to “stand treat” in turn. Now, as a reporter, he found the temptation to do these same things increased a hundred-fold. It seemed as though almost every assignment on which he was sent led to accepting or offering drinks of some kind of liquor. He began to think that the gaining of interesting items of news depended largely upon his willingness to “stand treat” for, or be “treated” by, those from whom he sought it. Several times he had returned to the office flushed and noisy with wine, and once or twice Mr. Haxall’s keen eye had detected him in this condition. It was for this reason that the city editor had decided to wait a little longer and test him a little further before advancing his salary. He liked the young fellow and was watching him anxiously. He even went so far as to warn him of the dangers and temptations that beset a reporter’s path, though he did not make his allusions personal.
Thus matters stood with Myles Manning when one day, toward the end of September, Mr. Haxall called him to his desk and said,
“Mr. Manning, it now looks as though the most general and serious railroad strike this country has ever seen were about to break out. If it does it will be a very different thing from the horse-car strike in which you received your first lessons at reporting. That was only a local affair, while this will be of interest to the whole country. Of course thePhonographwants the earliest news of it, and I am sending out half a dozen of our best reporters to important railroad points that seem likely to become centres from which the strikers will operate. At these points we must have our steadiest and most reliable men, of whom I count you as one. You will, therefore, start at once for Mountain Junction, the terminus of the Central and Western Divisions of the A. & B. Road. Send us full dispatches of all that happens, and remain there until relieved or recalled. Here is an order on the cashier for your expenses, and if you find yourself in need of more money you can telegraph for it. Remember that thePhonographexpects to receive the news—and all the news—from its reporters, but that it has no use for their individual opinions. Those are formed for it by its editors.”
With the promptness that Mr. Haxall liked sowell Myles answered, “All right, sir. I think I understand,” left the office at once, and the next train westward bound over the A. & B. Road carried him as a passenger.
As Mr. Haxall turned again to his desk, after having started Myles on this important and perhaps dangerous mission, he said to himself:
“I hope I have done right to trust him with this job. He is entitled to at least one fair trial on big work and a chance for himself outside the city. At any rate we can’t get badly beaten whatever happens, for Rolfe, in Chicago, is certain to get hold of any thing important from the Junction and send it in on chance.”
Mountain Junction was a railroad town in every sense of the word. Here the main line of the A. & B. Road was met by an important branch, and here were located its car-shops, locomotive-works, and general repair-shops. It was in a coal and iron region, and several large mines were in operation not far from it. Its entire population, therefore, consisted of the families of railroad employés and miners. During the daytime it was a scene of busy industry and the air was filled with the crash ofsteam-hammers, the shriek of locomotive-whistles, and the rattle of trains. At night the noise was hardly diminished, while the sky was reddened by the glow from hundreds of furnaces, foundries, and coke-ovens.
The place did not look attractive to Myles, as, late in the afternoon, he surveyed what he could of it from the platform of the railway station at which the New York train had just dropped him, and he hoped he should not be kept there long.
He found a more comfortable hotel than he expected, and in it, after thoroughly cleansing himself from the dust and cinders of his long ride, he went down to supper. The seats at two long tables, extending the whole length of the room, were filled with the bosses and heads of departments of the many shops, mills, and foundries of the place. A chair had been reserved for him at a small table placed by a window, at which two persons were already busily eating. One of these uttered an exclamation of surprise as Myles entered the room, and, looking at him, the reporter saw his old rival, Ben Watkins.
“Well, of all things!” cried Ben. “What brings you here, Myles Manning?”
“Business,” answered Myles. “But I suppose you are here for health and pleasure.”
“Not much I ain’t,” growled Ben. “I am here to make my living. My uncle is superintendent of the Western Division A. & B. Road, and I am his valuable assistant.”
Although Myles had no love for Ben Watkins, especially as he recalled the nature of their last interview, he did not wholly dislike him, and, after all, it was pleasant to meet an acquaintance in a place where he expected to find only strangers.
Ben introduced the other occupant of the table, a supercilious-looking, pale-faced little man in uniform, as Lieutenant Easter. He belonged to a company of country militia, sent to this point from a neighboring town to be on hand in case of any serious emergency, and to his own intense satisfaction found himself, owing to the enforced absence of his captain, in command of the troops.
Ben Watkins ridiculed the precaution thus taken, and in answer to a question from Myles declared that he did not believe there would be any strike, in spite of all the talk. The lieutenant agreed with him, and, caressing his silky little mustache, said,with an absurdly pompous tone, that the mere presence of himself and his men was sufficient to prevent any such thing.
After supper Ben, who had displayed an unusual friendliness toward Myles ever since their meeting, asked him how he intended to spend the evening.
“I must go out and find the telegraph office,” replied Myles, “and make arrangements to have my dispatches sent through promptly. Then I thought I would look about the town a little.”
“Oh, well,” said Ben, “that won’t take you long, and when you come back you’d better drop into my room, No. 16. There isn’t any thing to do of an evening in this beastly place, but a few of us generally manage to put in the time somehow, and perhaps we can make it pleasant for you. Come and see, at any rate.”
Myles promised he would, and after receiving directions how to reach the telegraph office he went out.
A wickedly cruel expression swept over Ben Watkins’ face as he watched his recent rival out of sight.
“I’ll fix you, my young man. See if I don’t! I haven’t forgotten ‘Lord Steerem’ and the trick youplayed on me. If I don’t get even with you this very night I will before long. Oh, yes, Ben Watkins doesn’t forget in a hurry.”
Myles, on the other hand, as he walked down the street, was thinking.
“Ben doesn’t seem half a bad fellow, after all. He has decidedly changed for the better since last June, and I shouldn’t wonder if he proved a great help to me in this place.”
He found the telegraph operator to be a brisk, wide-awake young man, who said he was ready to handle any amount of press matter, and who also promised to send word to Myles if any thing important took place during the night.
Leaving the office Myles started toward the railway station, which was only a block farther on, to assure himself that every thing about it was still quiet. As he reached its broad platform he noticed there a child four or five years old, and wondered what such a little thing could be doing all alone in such a place at that hour, for it was now about eight o’clock. Stepping up to the child he asked:
“Well, little one, what is your name?”
“My name Bobby,” replied the child, gravely,lifting a roguish but self-possessed little face to look at the tall young fellow bending over him.
As the light from a reflector hung outside the station fell on it, Myles thought he had never seen a sweeter or more winning face on a child, and he at once became greatly interested in the little fellow.
“Well, Bobby, where do you live?” he asked.
“Over there.” And the child pointed vaguely into the darkness behind them.
“But what are you doing out here so late, and all alone? Don’t you know it is high time for all good little boys to be in bed?”
“I’s waiting for my papa.”
“Who is your papa?”
“Why, my papa is my papa,” answered the child, with an air of surprise that any one should ask such a question.
“Well, where is your papa, then?” asked Myles, looking about with the expectation of seeing a papa at no great distance.
“My papa is on the chu-chu cars.”
“The chu-chu cars?”
“Yes, over there.”
Here the child pointed to a freight train that hadjust hauled in on a siding beyond the tracks of the main line. Then crying out, “I see my papa,” the child jumped from the platform, and, before Myles could stop him, was running across the tracks toward a twinkling lantern that was approaching from the direction of the freight train.
All at once, with a cry of pain, the child fell directly across one of the glistening lines of steel.
Myles sprang toward him. As he did so the eastbound night express dashed, with a shriek and a roar, out from behind a round-house that had, until that moment, concealed it, and rushed with fiery breath and gleaming head-light toward where the child lay.
Myles’ heart ceased its beating, but he did not hesitate nor flinch, though it seemed impossible that he could get there before the iron monster. He did, though, with a second to spare, and snatched the child as he ran. The little foot was caught in the angle of a switch and the child uttered a sharp scream of pain as the strong young arms tore it away, leaving a tiny shoe behind. Both rolled together in the cinders, barely beyond reach of the cruel wheels that ground over the quivering rails.With a long wild howl, as of baffled rage, the night express swept on, leaving Myles and the child almost suffocated in its dust, and breathless with the rush of wind that followed it.
As Myles staggered to his feet, and lifted the limp form of the child whom he had saved at so imminent a risk of his own life, a man with a lantern on his arm sprang forward, and snatching the child from him, cried, in a tone of agony:
“It’s my boy! My only boy! My little Bob—and he’s killed! The last one; and he had to be taken too! Oh, it’s too hard, too hard!”
While Myles was trying to soothe him, the child, who was more frightened than hurt, put up a little hand, and, patting its father’s face, said:
“Bobby was coming to you, papa, but he fell down and got hurted. His foot hurts now.”
The father was Jacob Allen, one of the best-known men on the A. & B. road. He had just come in, as he did every other night at the same hour, in charge of a through freight train. At this point he was relieved, and could spend every other night in his home near the station. His wife and little Bob were in the habit of coming as far asthe platform to meet him. But this evening Mrs. Allen was detained at home, and the child had slipped away alone unnoticed.
Great tears rolled down the man’s begrimed and weather-beaten cheeks as he tried to thank Myles for what he had done, and to tell him how dark and cheerless his home would be without its bit of golden-haired sunlight.
Myles made light of his service and escaped from the other’s overpowering gratitude as soon as possible, promising to call and see the child, and find out how he was getting along, on the morrow. Before he left the man had learned his name, and the last words he heard were:
“If ever the time comes when Jake Allen can lift a hand for you, or say a word that will in any way serve you, Mr. Manning, you may count on his doing it, so long as he has breath left in his body. And who knows but the time may come sooner than you think!” he added significantly.
As Myles, hot, bruised, and covered with dust and cinders, re-entered the hotel almost the first person he met was Ben Watkins, who exclaimed in astonishment at his appearance. Myles told him in a fewwords what had happened, and, pushing him into a chair, Ben said:
“Wait there a minute, old man, and I’ll fix you all right.”
He returned quickly, bringing a great tumbler of something that foamed and sparkled and tinkled with cool bits of ice. Without asking or caring what it was Myles thirstily drained the glass saying:
“That’s the very thing I wanted, and it was awfully good of you to think of it, Ben.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” replied Watkins. “Come up to my room and have another as soon as you get dusted off.”
Myles went to No. 16, where he found that Ben and Lieutenant Easter were playing cards. There he drank another glass of the cool, pleasant mixture that was “just the thing he wanted.” It made him feel so good that he was easily persuaded to take a third. “It is as mild as milk,” Ben said, “and wouldn’t upset a baby.”
Then he winked at his companion, who looked at Myles and winked back at Ben.
Myles now began to talk loud and boastfully. Then he joined in a game of cards and began to losemoney and say that it was no matter, for there was plenty more where that came from. All the while Ben Watkins, with an evil smile on his face, kept urging him to take a sip of this or a taste of that; and after a time, when his money was nearly gone and he could no longer keep awake, they carried him to his own room and put him to bed.
The breathless messenger who came at midnight from the telegraph office to tell Myles that the great strike had begun failed to arouse him. The young reporter knew nothing of the exciting scenes taking place in the streets of the lawless town. Of all the important events, for news of which his paper depended upon him, he sent no dispatch.
Somebody, however, did send a dispatch that night to thePhonograph, and it was:
“Your reporter at Mountain Junction too drunk to send any news. Better replace him with a sober man.”