“Not a one. Lucky, I call it. And only a dozen or so hurt to any amount.”
The hospital outfit that had come from Shadow Valley Station went by on a trot. Ralph was eager to leave his post and to go forward to satisfy himself about Cherry Hopkins, but he could not do this at once.
He could not pull the train forward, for the locomotive of Number 33 was across the westbound track. Finally, after some minutes of suspense, he was informed by wire from the station just passed that the delayed Flyer was to remain where it was until the rails were cleared. He could not have run it back, anyway, for the fire was now burning on both sides of the right of way.
Leaving Stilling in command of the locomotive, and with the conductor’s permission, Ralph finally got away and hurried around the curve to the scene of the eastbound train’s wreck.
The wrecking train from Oxford was on the scene, and a big crew was at work clearing the rails. But Ralph saw that he would be very late when he pulled into Hammerfest that morning.
He saw Frank Haley, and the detective told him that, without a doubt, the wreck had been caused by ghouls working in the pay of the wildcat strike leaders.
“They knocked out one of our guards, and he only came to after the accident had occurred. He is in the hospital car. He tells me a curious thing, Fairbanks.”
“What is that?” asked the young engineer.
“He says that at least one of the men who attacked him had his head and face muffled in a flour sack. He had cut a hole through it to see through. Didn’t that fellow at Hardwell report that the bandit that held him up and robbed the station the other night was masked in that way?”
“He did. I talked with Fiske myself,” Ralph agreed. “And I had my doubts then that the fellow was merely a robber. In this case it seems to be proved that he did not wreck the train to rob the passengers.”