Neither Tom nor Harry was stupid enough to be wholly unafraid over the threats of the day. Both realized that Jim Duff and the latter's associates were ugly and treacherous men who would fight sooner than be deprived of their chance to fleece the railway workmen. Yet neither young engineer had any intention of being scared into flight.
“They'll put up a lot of trouble for us,” said Tom that afternoon, as the two chums talked the matter over. “They may even go to extremities, and—”
“Shoot us?” smiled Hazelton, though there was a serious look under his smile.
“Yes; they may even try that,” I nodded Tom. “Though they won't make an open attempt. They may try to get us from ambush at night. They will be desperate, though not over brave. Recollect, Harry, that the better element in Paloma won't stand much nonsense. There are no braver men in the world than are found right in Arizona, and no men more decent.”
“Barring Duff and his gang,” laughed Hazelton.
“They're not real Arizona men. They're the kind of human vultures who flock after large pay rolls in any place where men work without having their families in near-by homes. If Duff had enough men of his own way of thinking, they might try to ride out here to camp and clean us out. If they did, then all the decent men in this part of Arizona would take to the saddle and drive Duff and his crew into hiding. After what happened to-day you won't find Duff daring to do anything too open.”
“Excuse me, Sir, but there's a train coming,” reported Foreman Rivers, thrusting his head in at the doorway of the little office building.
“Not a construction train?” Reade asked.
“Can't make it out yet, sir. The whistle was reported a minute ago.”
Tom and Harry, chafing a good deal under their enforced idleness while waiting for materials, hastened outdoors. Soon the train was close enough to be made out. It consisted of an engine, baggage car and one private car.
“It's one or more of the road's officials,” murmured Harry.
“I hope it's Mr. Ellsworth,” replied Reade, as the chums walked briskly down to the spot where the train would have to halt.
It turned out to be the general manager, a big and capable-looking man of fifty, with a belt-line just a trifle too large for comfort, who swung himself to the ground the instant that the train stopped.
“I'm glad you're here, Reade,” nodded the general manager, as he caught sight of his two young engineers. “Come back into my car. We can talk better there.”
Tom and Harry mounted to the platform of the car, following Mr. Ellsworth down the carpeted aisle of a very comfortable private Pullman car. The general manager pointed to seats, threw himself into another, and then said:
“Now, tell me all about the row that you've started with the town.”
Harry's lips closed tightly, but Tom launched at once into a plain, truthful account of the affair, bringing it down to the noonday meal of the present day.
“It's not clear to me just why you should feel called upon to interfere so forcefully,” said the general manager, a little fretfully. “The workmen are all twenty-one years of age and upwards. Couldn't they protect themselves if they wanted protection?”
“Yes, sir, certainly,” Tom admitted. “However, letting that fellow Duff put up his tents right on the railroad property would almost make it look as though the road shared, or at least approved, his enterprise.”
“Oh, doubtless you were right to order the fellow off the railroad property,” assented Mr. Ellsworth. “But why did you go to such trouble to get the men to start new bank accounts and thus send most of their money out of town?”
“May I answer that question, sir, by asking another?” asked Reade respectfully. “Did you wish the men to spend it in Paloma?”
“I don't care a hang what they do with it,” retorted the general manager half peevishly. “It's their own money.”
“It was you, Mr. Ellsworth, whom I wired yesterday morning, asking that you send down a representative of a savings bank who could open accounts with such of the men as desired.”
“Yes, and I sent you a couple of bank men. I didn't have any idea, however, that you'd get the whole town of Paloma by the ears.”
“I haven't, sir. I assure you of that. I've hurt only a few parasites—a flock of human vultures. The decent people of the town don't side with them.”
“I wish I could be sure that we haven't offended the town as a whole,” mused Mr. Ellsworth, “The good will of the people along our line is a great asset.”
“You're acquainted with a lot of the real people in Paloma, aren't you, Mr. Ellsworth?”
“With some of them, yes.”
“Then, while you're here, sir, I'd be glad if you'd look up some of these acquaintances in town and find out for yourself just how the sentiment stands. We don't wish you to feel that we're a pair of trouble-makers who are doing our best to ruin the road with its future customers.”
“I believe I will go into town,” mused Mr. Ellsworth. “Is there an automobile anywhere about here?”
“No, sir; but our telegraph operator can wire into town for one. It will take but a few minutes to have a car here.”
“Send for it, then.”
“Would you like to see Mr. Hawkins while you're waiting, sir?” Tom suggested, rising. “You know Hawkins, and probably you'll be satisfied with his judgment.”
“Send Hawkins along.”
“Yes, sir; and we won't return for the present, unless you send for us,” Reade replied, going toward the forward end of the car.
Superintendent Hawkins was closeted with the general manager until the arrival of the automobile. There was a frown on Mr. Ellsworth's face as they started townward.
“Well,” asked Harry Hazelton, with a grin on his face, as he watched the departing car, “are we going to be fired or praised?”
“We're going to lay the track across the Man-killer,” returned Reade resolutely.
“How about the gambler and his bad crowd? Are we going to beat them?”
“We're going to do whatever the general manager orders, just as long as we remain here,” replied Tom. “He's our only source of authority. If he tells me to let Jim Duff bring a cityful of tents out here and run night or day—then that's all there will be to it.”
“I'd sooner quit,” growled Hazelton, “than knuckle to such a crew of rascals.”
“So would I,” nodded Tom good-humoredly, “if it were my quit. But, if Mr. Ellsworth gives such orders it will be his quit, not ours.”
Harry walked restlessly up and down the little office, but Tom threw himself down at full length on a cot in the corner. Within two minutes he was sound asleep.
“Humph!” growled Hazelton, as soon as he saw his chum's unconcern. Then he went outside to finish his tramp.
It was toward the close of the afternoon when Mr. Ellsworth returned. Harry was out of sight as the general manager stepped directly into the office.
“Reade,” he began. Deep breathing from the corner greeted him. General Manager Ellsworth gazed down at the sleeping form, and a new light of admiration dawned in his eyes.
“So that's the young man whom they're talking of shooting, poisoning or blowing into the next world with dynamite?” he thought. “A lot this young man appears to think about his enemies! There's real courage in this young man. Reade, wake up—if you can spare the time.”
Tom opened his eyes, rubbed them, then sat up, next springing to his feet.
“Not having any real work to do makes me sleepy,” laughed Tom good-naturedly. “I trust you didn't have to call me many times, Mr. Ellsworth?”
The general manager held out his hand.
“Reade, I've just learned in town what a plucky thing you did, and how coolly you went through it all. A young man with your courage and purpose simply can't be fool enough to be very far wrong.”
“Then you learned that the real Arizona people over in Paloma don't find any fault with what I did?” queried Tom.
“Reade, what I discovered is that you have a lot of the finest manhood in Arizona just wild with respect for you,” declared Mr. Ellsworth. Then the general manager lowered his voice before he resumed:
“At the same time, Reade, I've also learned that you've stirred up such an evil nest of rattlers that you'll be fortunate if you escape with your life. Candidly, if you feel that you'd like to leave here—”
“Do you want me to quit, sir?” demanded Tom, looking steadily into his chief's eyes.
“I don't,” declared Mr. Ellsworth promptly. “If you and Hazelton were to quit me now I don't know where I could get another pair of men who could put into the work all the skill and energy that you two employ.”
“Did you have dinner in town, sir?” Tom asked.
“No, for I came out to take you two young men in. Hawkins will also be with us at dinner this evening. He has told me about the Mansion House affair, so the Cactus House shall be the railway house hereafter. That fellow Ashby is uneasy; I think he will be more than uneasy after a while.”
The dinner party motored back to town. Dinner was more like a reception that evening, for the news of Tom's plucky fight against the rough element had spread through the town. Nearly two score of men representing the better part of the population of Paloma called at the hotel to shake hands with the young engineers.
“They don't seem to care a hang about me, these men, do they, Hawkins?” laughed the general manager, as he and the superintendent stood in the background of the picture.
“That's because they're Arizona men, sir,” replied Hawkins. “Their interest is in the man who has done the thing, not in the boss.”
“I can understand why President Newnham, of the S. B. & L., recommended these young men so extravagantly. They're full of force and absolutely free from self-conceit.”
Finally the party motored back towards the camp. As it was after dark now, some of the citizens who had visited them escorted the slow moving car as far as the edge of the town, but none of Jim Duff's followers appeared on the streets through which they passed.
“Why are we going back to camp, anyway?” demanded Mr. Ellsworth. “Why not sleep at the hotel to-night?”
“Why, I think it may be better for you to go back to the hotel, sir,” Tom proposed. “As for Harry and myself, after what has happened in town to-day, it may be as well if we are on hand at the camp to-night. There may be some attempt to stampede our men. The crowd in Paloma are capable of offering our men free drink, just to do us mischief. We've a lot of strong men in our force, but there are some weak vessels who would be caught by a free offer, and some of our work gangs would be demoralized to-morrow.”
Mr. Ellsworth thereupon decided to return to the camp also, and, arriving there, dismissed the car. A tent was pitched for him close to the office, and a cot rigged up in it.
Then the party sat up, chatting, after most of the workmen had turned in for the night.
“I'll be thankful when the material gets here,” sighed Tom. “I'm tired of loafing.”
“It seems to me that you have been doing anything but loafing,” smiled the general manager.
“I want to get to work on the Man-killer. Besides, idleness is costing the road a lot of money in wages for these men.”
“I wired this afternoon,” stated Mr. Ellsworth, “to have the material trains rushed forward on express schedule as soon as the stuff strikes our lines.”
“Then—” began Hawkins slowly.
His next words were drowned out by a booming explosion to the westward of the camp.
“The scoundrels!” gasped Tom Reade, leaping up. “This is more of our friends' work! They have dynamited the most ticklish part of the work on the Man-killer!”
“The scoundrels!” cried General Manager Ellsworth.
He was a man who believed in working along easy lines when possible. His career as a railroad man had taught him the value of meeting other people half way. Now the general manager's white face and flashing eyes revealed the fighter in him.
From off to the south, beyond the quicksand, came a chorus of sharp, shrill, gleeful whoops.
“There go the curs!” flared Harry.
Another volley of jeers reached the camp officials.
“They are mounted on horses,” spoke Tom judicially. “They couldn't travel as fast on foot and yell at the same time.”
A third taunting chorus traveled over the desert. But Tom and his friends, in the darkness of the night, could not make out the horsemen nor judge how many there were of them.
“You'd better turn out the camp, Mr. Hawkins,” directed Tom in a calmer voice.
The superintendent ran over to where a night engineer almost dozed at his post beside a stationary engine.
Half a minute later a series of shrill blasts rang out over the camp. Laborers came tumbling out of the tents. Many of them had slept so soundly that even the noise of dynamiting they had regarded only as a part of their dreams. But the whistle meant business.
“Get the torches out, Mr. Rivers,” called Tom, as one of the foremen reported on a run.
To Foreman Payson, Harry gave the order to marshal a hundred of the men to remain in and around the camp, alertly watchful.
“That's a good idea,” nodded Mr. Ellsworth. “The explosion may be only a trick to, empty the camp, as a prelude to further mischief.”
Scores of torches flared in the darkness as the workmen hurried westward. At the head of all went Tom Reade and the general manager.
Less than half a mile away they came upon the scene of mischief.
“It's just what I expected,” nodded Tom, as the leading party halted under the flare of the torches. “You see, sir, here was the point of greatest cave and drift in the quicksand. It's where your former engineers found such a morass of the shifty stuff that they declared the Man-killer never could have its appetite satisfied with dirt. There was a good log and concrete foundation laid down there, and for thirty-six hours the sand had not shifted a particle as far as the eye could discover. Now, look at it!”
Before them the top layer of desert sand had sunk away, revealing a well or sink, one hundred and fifty feet across and the bottom at least forty feet below the general level.
“I always wondered why a suspension bridge wouldn't solve the problem more easily and cheaply than any other construction,” muttered Mr. Ellsworth, after he had gotten over his first indignation.
“To avoid every possibility of lurking quicksand the suspension bridge would have to be more than a mile long,” Reade answered. “Beyond, there are other treacherous little patches of quicksand. It would cost the road millions to put up a suspension bridge that would hold.
“A short bridge would look all right and doubtless serve all right, for a while. Then, some fine day, part of the structure would give, and a trainload of passengers would be sucked down and out of sight by the shifting sands of the Man-killer.”
Mr. Ellsworth turned aside with a shudder.
“I'm glad I'm not an engineer,” he said earnestly. “The responsibility for safety of life at this point is all yours, Reade.”
“And I'm willing enough to take it, sir, if you don't run trains over the Man-killer until the new roadbed has stood tests that I'll put upon it.”
“It'll cost at least ten thousand dollars to repair the mischief that the scoundrels have done to-night,” figured Harry Hazelton thoughtfully.
“Then, if we can find out the guilty wretches for certain, we'll see that they earn more than that amount by enforced labor in prison,”' retorted the general manager grimly.
“Mr. Bell!” called Tom briskly.
“Here, sir,” reported the foreman, coming forward..
“Mr. Bell, I wish you'd pick out twenty-one good men. Make the brightest of the lot head of the new force of night watchmen. Place the other twenty under his orders. Your gangs will come into play here later than the others, so I'll let your shift of men have the first chance at night-watchman duty.”
“All right, sir,” nodded Foreman Bell. “Any further orders?”
“None, except that your watchmen will do their best to guard both the line of roadbed and the camp. Further, tell the night engineer to be sure to have steam up so that he can blow a lot of signals at anytime in the night.”
“Very good, sir,” and the foreman hurried away.
“I'm disgusted with myself for having been caught in this fashion,” Tom admitted to Mr. Ellsworth. “But I hadn't an idea that Paloma held any dynamite. I can't imagine how a frontier town on the alkali desert needs dynamite.”
“It will probably be found that someone shipped it in a hurry,” suggested Mr. Ellsworth.
“But how? Any fellow would be detected who had it brought in on our trains. There has been no time to I stage I it from any other point since the row with Duff started.”
“It's a puzzle,” admitted Mr. Ellsworth.
“It is, but it won't be for long,” Reade declared confidently. “There are ways of finding out how that dynamite got into Paloma, there must be ways of finding out who caused it to be brought in.”
Then, suddenly, Tom's eyes grew wider open and brighter.
“Mr. Ellsworth, I believe that dynamite was brought in before the trouble opened.”
“But who would have wished to bring dynamite here until the trouble started?”
“Anyone might be interested in doing it who wanted to see trouble start.”
“I'm afraid I don't follow you, Reade,” observed the general manager, frowning slightly.
“There were others who wanted the job of blocking the Man-killer,” Tom went on earnestly. “They wanted a lot more money for the job than we thought was necessary. I don't want to accuse anyone, but I am just a trifle suspicious that the concern of Chicago contractors—”
“The Colthwaite people!” broke in Mr. Ellsworth.
“Yes; if they were bad people, and ugly business rivals—”
“How would the Colthwaite people be able to foresee that you were going to have a fight with Jim Duff?” interposed Mr. Ellsworth.
“I'm going after the answer, if there is one. I hope to be able to tell you the answer one of these days.”
Tom and Harry made two trips each, in different directions, to make sure that the watch men were awake and alert. It was nearly eleven o'clock when the general manager and his engineers turned in for a night's rest—“subject to the approval of Jim Duff,” as Tom dryly stated it.
No more interruptions followed during the night, however. At daylight the watchmen sought their tents and the day force began to stir soon after.
After the steam whistle bad blown the breakfast call, Reade slipped away from his friends to inspect the laborers at the meal.
“There are some of your men absent, Mr. Mendoza,” Tom murmured to the Mexican foreman.
“Yes, Senor. Some of my men slipped away in the night.”
“Went off to Paloma, eh?”
Mendoza shrugged his shoulders.
“Gambling, drinking—both,” nodded Tom.
“Undoubtedly, Senor.”
“Get the names of your absent Mexicans, and report to me with them.”
Reade then went to the other foremen, with the same orders.
Before Tom had seated himself at his own meal, with Harry and Mr. Ellsworth, the foremen appeared, lists in their hands. Tom rapidly ran his finger down the lists.
“Twenty-eight Mexicans and fourteen Americans absent from camp,” he muttered. “Foremen, when these men come back you may tell them that they are no longer needed.”
All four of the gang bosses looked somewhat astonished.
“Merely for leaving camp in the night time?” Mendoza inquired.
“Yes, under the circumstances,” nodded Tom. “If any of these men declare that they were properly absent, and did not visit the gambling and the drinking dives, then such men may be reinstated after they have satisfied Mr. Hazelton, Mr. Hawkins or myself of the truth of their statements.”
“Some of these men will be very ugly when they find that they are discharged, Senor,” suggested Mendoza.
“But you are loyal to us?”
“Can you doubt it, Senor?” asked Mendoza proudly.
“Then you will know how to handle your own fellow-countrymen. The other foremen will be able to handle the rest of the disgruntled ones. However, as I have told you, if any man claims that he is unjustly treated, send him to headquarters for a chance at reinstatement.”
General Manager Ellsworth had heard the conversation, but had not interfered. As soon as the young engineers were alone he joined them at table, saying:
“Aren't you afraid, Reade, that these discharged men will hasten to join our enemies?”
“That is very likely, sir,” Tom answered. “These missing men, however, have shown their willingness to become our enemies by leaving camp and seeking their pleasures in the strongholds of the scoundrels who are fighting to break us up.”
“That's another way of looking at the matter,” assented the general manager.
“I'd much rather have our enemies outside of camp than inside,” Reade continued. “If we took these absentees back after they've been in the company of rascals, then we wouldn't have any means of knowing how many of the absentees had agreed to do treacherous things within the camp. It would hardly be a wise plan to encourage the breeding of rattlesnakes within the camp limits.”
It was nearly noon when the first batch of laborers, some American and some Mexican, returned to camp. These men started to go by the checker's hut at a distance, but keen-eyed Superintendent Hawkins saw them and ordered them around to the hut.
“You'll have to wait here until your foremen are called,” declared the checker.
“Say, what's the trouble here!” demanded one American belligerently.
“Who's your foreman?” asked the checker, a young fellow named Royal
“Payson—if it's any of your business.” replied the workman roughly.
The others, seeing him take this attitude, were willing to let him talk for all. Superintendent Hawkins had rounded up the foremen, and now sent them to the checker's hut to deal with the men.
“Some of you are my men,” said Payson, looking the lot over. “You're discharged.”
“What's that?” roared the same indignant spokesman, a big, bull-necked, red-faced fellow.
“Discharged,” said Payson briefly. “All of you who belong to my gang. Checker, I'll call their names off to you.”
While Payson, and then the other foremen, were calling the names, the workmen stood by in sullen silence. When the last name had been entered the same bull-necked spokesman flared up again.
“Have we no rights?” he demanded. “Is there no such thing as the right of appeal in this camp, or are we under a lot of domineering, petty tyrants like you?”
“I'm a poor specimen of tyrant,”' laughed Payson good-naturedly. “All I'm doing, Bellas, is following orders. Any man who feels that he was justified in being away, and that he ought to be kept on the pay rolls here, may make his appeal to Mr. Hawkins, Mr. Hazelton or Mr. Reade.”
“I'll see Reade!” announced Bellas stiffly. “That youngster is doing all the dirty work here. I'll go to him straight.”
“I'll take you over to his office,” nodded Foreman Payson.
“I'm going, too,” announced another workman.
“So'm I,” added another.
“One at a time, men,” advised Payson. “I think Bellas feels that he's capable of talking for all of you.”
The other foremen restrained the crowd, while Mr. Payson led Bellas over to the headquarters shack.
Tom looked up from a handful of old letters as the two men entered.
“See here, you!” was Bellas's form of greeting.
“Try it again,” smiled Tom pleasantly.
“You're the man I want to talk to,” Bellas snarled. “What do you mean by—”
“What's your name?” asked Reade quickly.
“None of your—”
“We can never do business on that kind of courtesy,” smiled Reade. “Mr. Payson, show the man out and let him come back when he's cooler.”
“There isn't anyone here who can show me out!” blustered Bellas, swinging his big arms and causing the heavy muscles to stand out.
“If you don't care to behave in a businesslike way, and talk like a man, we'll do our best to show you out,” Tom retorted, still with a pleasant smile. “What are you here for, anyway?”
“Why have I been fired?” roared Bellas.
“Can't you guess?” queried Tom.
“Was it for going to town and being away all night?”
“Yes, and also for not being on hand this morning.”
“There wasn't any work to do,” growled Bellas.
“You expected to be paid for your time, and you should have been in camp, as your time belonged to the railroad by, right of purchase. Bellas, you have been drinking over in town, haven't you?”
“If I have, it's my own business. I'm no slave.”
“Ben gambling, too?”
“None of your—”
“You're in error,” Tom answered pleasantly, though firmly. “The gamblers over in Paloma are leagued with the dive keepers against us, Bellas. You know what they did out at the big sink of the Man-killer last night. Any man who goes away from camp and 'enjoys' himself for hours among those who are trying to put us out of business shows himself to be a friend to the enemies of this camp. Therefore the man who does that shows himself to be one of our enemies, in sympathy if not in fact.”
“I'm no lawyer,” growled Bellas sullenly, “and I can't follow your flow of gab.”
“You know well enough what I'm saying to you, Bellas, and you know that I'm right. Since you've been away and joined our enemies we don't want you here. More, we don't intend to have you here. Mr. Payson has dropped you from the rolls, and that cuts you off from this camp. Now, I think you will understand that it is some of our business whether you have been over in town emptying your pockets, into Jim Duff's hat. If that is what you have been doing, then we don't want you here, and won't have you. If you haven't been hob-nobbing with our enemies, and paying all you had for the privilege, then we'll look into any claims of better conduct that you may make, and, if satisfied that you've been telling the truth, we'll reinstate you.”
“Oh, you make me tired—you kid!” burst from Bellas's lips.
“This isn't an experience meeting,” Tom replied, not losing his smile, “and I'm not interested in your impressions of me. Do you wish to make any statement advocating your right to be taken on the pay roll again?”
“No, I don't!” roared the angry fellow. “All I want to do is to show you my opinion of you, Tommy! I can do that best by rubbing your nose in the dirt outside.”
Foreman Payson flung himself between the big, angry human bull and the young chief engineer.
“Don't waste any time or heat on him, Mr. Payson,” Tom advised, slipping his handful of letters into his coat and tossing that garment to the back of the room. “If Bellas has any grudge against me, I don't want to stop him from making his last kick.”
Tom took a step forward, his open hands hanging at his sides. He didn't look by any means alarmed, though Bellas appeared to be about twice the young chief engineer's size.
So prompt had been Reade's action that, for a moment, Bellas looked astounded. Then, with a roar, he leaped forward, swinging both arms and closing in.
Tom Reade had had his best physical training on the football gridiron. He dropped, instantly, as he leaped forward, making a low tackle and rising with both arms wrapped around Bellas's knees. Tom took two swift steps forward, then heaved his man, head first, out through the open doorway.
Bellas landed about eight feet away. He was not hurt, beyond a jolting, and leaped to his feet, shaking both fists.
“Not unless you really insist upon it,” smiled Tom, shaking his head. “It's too warm for exercise to-day.”
“You tricky little whipper-snapper!” roared Bellas, making an angry bound for the doorway.
Tom met his angry rush. Both went down, rolling over and over on the ground. Bellas wound his powerful arms about the boy, and would have crushed him. Though Tom hated to do it, there was no alternative but to choke the powerful bully. Bellas soon let go, dazed and gasping. Ere the big fellow came to his senses sufficiently to know what he was about, Reade had hoisted Bellas to one shoulder.
Down by the checker's hut the crowd of curious workmen gasped as they saw Tom Reade jogging along with this great load over one shoulder. Reaching the line, Tom gave another heave. Bellas rolled on the ground. He was conscious and could have gotten up, but he chose to lay where he had fallen and think matters over.
“Don't think I'm peevish, men,” Tom called pleasantly. “I wouldn't have done that if Bellas hadn't attacked me. I had to defend myself. Now, while I'm here, does any man wish to make a claim for justice? Does any man feel that he has been discharged unfairly?”
Three or four men answered, though none of the Mexicans was among the number. When questioned as to whether they had spent the night among Jim Duff's friends all the speakers admitted that they had. Tom then made them the same explanation he had offered Bellas.
“That's about all that can be said, isn't it, men?” Tom asked in conclusion. “I am sorry for those of you who feel hurt, but while there is bad blood in the air every man must choose between one camp or the other. You men chose Jim Duff, and you'll have to abide by your choice.”
“But we haven't any money,” declared one of the men sullenly.
“Now you're just beginning to understand that Jim Duff won't be a very good friend to a penniless man. Didn't you know that when you shook all your change into his hat?”
“Are you going to let us starve?” growled the man.
“You won't starve, nor need you be out of work long,” Tom retorted. “Any man who can do the work of a railway laborer in this country doesn't have to remain out of a job. Now, I'll ask you to get off the railroad's ground.”
Tom turned and went back to the office, while Payson and the other foremen saw to it that the discharged men left the railroad's property. In less than half an hour the disgruntled ones were back in the worst haunts of Paloma, spreading the news of Tom Reade's latest outrage.
When Tom reached the office he found Mr. Ellsworth inside.
“I saw what you did, Reade, though you didn't know I was about. You handled it splendidly. You made it plain enough, too, to the men that they had joined the enemy and thereby declared against us.”
“Message, Mr. Reade,” called the operator from the doorway.
“The construction material train, the first one, will be here within two hours,” cried Tom, looking up from the paper, his eyes dancing. “Now we can do some of the real work that we've been waiting to do!”
In the days that followed Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton were more continuously and seriously busy than they had ever been before in their lives.
Sometimes it happens that engineers come upon a quicksand that apparently has no bottom. It will be filled and apparently the earth on top is solid. After a few days there will follow either a gradual shifting away or a sudden cave in, and the quicksand must once more be attacked.
This condition had been experienced more than a dozen times with the Man-killer before Tom and Harry had been called to solve the problem.
There is no definite way of attacking a quicksand. Much must depend upon the local conditions. Where it is a small one, yet of seemingly considerable depth, it is sometimes quickest and cheapest to cross it with a suspension bridge, the terminal pillars resting on sure foundations. Some quicksands are overcome by merely filling in new sand or loam, patiently, until at last the trap is blocked and a permanently solid foundation is laid. There are many other ways of overcoming the difficulty.
The method hit upon by Tom and Harry, after looking over the situation, was one that was largely original with them.
It consisted of laying logs, of different lengths, from twelve to eighteen feet, in a transverse net work filling in earth on this and allowing the structure gradually to sink where the quicksand shifted or caved. The sideway drift, at some points, was overcome by hollow steel piles, driven in as firmly as might be, and then filled with cement from the top. A line of such piles when imbedded in the ground, helps to make an effective block to side drift.
At the outset a few feet of these steel piles were left exposed above the surface, their gradual settling serving as a reliable index to the evasive movements of the extensive quicksand underneath. At other points wooden piles were driven in for the same purpose.
General Manager Ellsworth did not spend all his time in camp. He could not do so, in fact, for he had many other pressing duties. However, he ran over frequently, and always appeared satisfied.
“Of course it's too early to talk confidently, Reade,” said Mr. Ellsworth, one day when the work had been going on steadily for some weeks, “but I believe you have the only right method. I have so reported to our directors. You'll have disappointments, of course, but I hope you'll encounter none that you can't overcome.”
“I shan't crow until I've seen the test applied to the roadbed over the Man-killer,” Tom replied thoughtfully. “After I've seen that test applied a couple of times then I'm ready to go before any board and swear that the Man-killer has been tamed for all time.”
“Speed the day!” replied Mr. Ellsworth, as he climbed into his private car to return. “By the way, you haven't heard anything lately from Jim Duff & Company?”
“Not a word,” Reade replied. “I don't believe we're yet through with Rough-house camp, however. They're waiting only until our suspicions are allayed. Once in a while we lose one of our workmen to the enemy, and then we have to discharge the poor fellow. Some of our former men have gone away, but there are about thirty of them left in Paloma, and I imagine that they're ready to be ugly when the chance comes. The agent of the Colthwaite Company is still in Paloma. He has been here ever since we came.”
“Agent of the Colthwaite Company?” repeated the general manager, opening his eyes. “What's his name?”
“Fred Ransom,” Tom replied half carelessly.
“Ransom? Fred Ransom? I never heard of any Colthwaite agent of that name.”
“He's one of the Colthwaite people's troublemakers,” Tom went on, opening his own eyes rather wide.
“If you were sure of this why didn't you report it to me earlier?”
“Why, I supposed your railroad detectives knew all about it. And that you had heard of it long ago,” Reade declared.
“I haven't heard a word of it,” continued Mr. Ellsworth, coming down the steps of his car and standing on the ground once more. “What proof have you of Ransom's business here?”
“None whatever,” Tom answered cheerfully, “but I had him spotted the first time I heard him talking. He was too entirely positive that we'd fail.”
“That was no proof against him.”
“No; but Ransom was also certain that the Colthwaite plan was the only one that could bring the Man-killer to time.”
“Have you any other reason to suspect this main?” queried Mr. Ellsworth.
“Only the fact that Ransom and Jim Duff have been close friends.”
“Where does Ransom stop?”
“At the Mansion House. He has a suite of rooms there, and entertains some kinds of people, including Duff, very lavishly.”
“Keep your eyes on that crowd as much as possible, Reade,” directed the general manager thoughtfully, as he once more climbed to the platform of his car.
“I will, sir; and it might not be a bad idea to have your detectives do something of the sort, also.”
The general manager did not answer, except by a vague nod as his train pulled out from the outskirts of the railway camp.
Tom went back, called for his horse and rode to the westward for another look at the Man-killer. He found Harry, also in saddle, beneath the scanty shade of a struggling tree. Hazelton's quick eyes were taking in every detail of the work being done by the several large gangs of workmen.
“Tom, if we're away from here by Christmas, there's one present you needn't make me,” smiled Hazelton wanly, as he caught sight of the camera hanging in its leather field case at his chum's side.
“What present is that?” Tom inquired.
“Don't make me a present of a photograph of this awful place. It's photographed on my brain now, and burned in and baked there. If we ever get through with the Man-killer, and get our money, I never want to see this spot again.”
“I'm not thinking at all of the money,” Reade retorted lightly yet seriously. “I don't care about the money at present. Nothing will ever satisfy me in life again until I've beaten the Man-killer fairly and squarely. It's the one thing I think about by day and dream of at night.”
“I know it,” sighed Harry half pityingly.
“Well, what else should we think about?” Tom demanded in a low voice. “Harry, we have the very job, the identical problem, that has thrown down nearly a dozen engineers of fine reputation. Why, boy, this place may be out on the blazing desert, and there may be a dozen discouragements every hour, but we've the finest chance, the biggest unsolved problem in engineering that we could possibly have. It's glorious.”
Tom's eyes glowed.
“Go away,” grinned Hazelton mischievously, “or I'll catch some of your enthusiasm.”
“You don't need any of it,” Reade retorted laughingly. “You've tons of enthusiasm stowed away for future use. You know you have.”
“I suppose I have enough enthusiasm,” Harry admitted, “but I should like to do some actual work. I ride out on the sands every day and sit looking on while the real work is being done. This problem of conquering the Man-killer is growing monotonous. I'm tired of pegging away at the same old task day in and day out.”
“Not quite as bad as that,” Tom declared. “There's always something a bit new. If you want work to do right now, ride over and show those teamsters where you want them to put the logs that they're bringing up.”
This was far too little to satisfy Harry's longing for “doing things,” but with a grunt he turned his horse's head and jogged away at a trot.
Tom moved in under the shade of the tree.
“Harry doesn't know enough to appreciate a good thing when he has it,” softly laughed Tom, grateful for the scant bit of shade. “Neither does he yet know that often times the brain works best when the body is at rest.”
Just then Tom heard a sudden shout from the distance, followed by a chorus of excited voices.
Instantly the young engineer's gaze turned toward the lately filled-in edge of the big sink.
A hundred feet beyond the light platform where some laborers had been working Reade beheld only the head and shoulders of one of the workmen.
“The foolish fellow—to go out so far beyond where the men are allowed to go!” gasped the young chief engineer, setting spurs to his horse.
In a few moments Tom had reached the edge of the sink.
“A rope!” he shouted, and seized the thirty-foot lariat that was handed him. With this, Tom, now on foot, ran within casting distance of the unfortunate, who was being rapidly enveloped by the quicksand.
“Come back, Mr. Reade!” bellowed Foreman Payson. “The drift is setting in on this side of you. Back, like lightning, or you're a doomed man! You'll be swallowed up by the Man-killer yourself!”
But Tom, intent only on saving the unfortunate laborer beyond, was wholly heedless of the fact that his own life was in as great danger.