Stilling ran ahead. The conductor came forward, worried about the delay. The violent stopping of the train had awakened many of the passengers and the Pullmans, he said, were buzzing.
“Let ’em buzz,” replied Ralph carelessly.
Stilling’s lantern flitted on like a firefly’s light. Ralph’s gaze was fixed upon it. He hoped to see the sign given by the lamp that the way was clear.
But when Stilling reached the long curve that began nearly an eighth of a mile beyond the point where the Flyer had been brought to a stop, he halted—they could see that by the motion of the lantern—and then went on slowly. By and by he signaled:
“Come ahead—slow.”
There was something wrong. The conductor knew this as well as the young engineer. The former’s lantern signaled a question back to his flagman. The latter brought in his lantern from the other curve, signaled “All aboard!” and Ralph started forward.
There was just slant enough to the roadbed here to make it necessary for the engineer to keep some pressure of brakes on the wheels. The heavy train slid down to the place where Stilling had stopped.
When the train again came to a halt the headlight did not show the rails for more than ten yards. But it picked out the beginning of a short trestle by which the rails were carried over a deep ravine.
Stilling walked back beside the huge boiler of the locomotive and spoke no word until he was directly under Ralph’s window. He was pale. His lips writhed before he could speak, and what he said was in a voice so husky that the listeners could scarcely understand him.
“One pillar’s been blown out—blown to pieces. The rails are sagging—have to be braced before anything can get over. Great guns! if we’d come down here at the usual speed, the old mill and every wagon in the string would have been piled in a heap down there in the Devil’s Den!”