“Tell me now, won’t you? I’d like to hear about it.”
“All right,” said Jack, and told the story. Here it is:
Six years before, Reddy Magraw had been one of the labourers at the big coal-chute which towered into the air at the eastern end of the yards; just an ordinary labourer, working early and late, as every labourer for a railroad must, but then, as always, happy and care-free.
It was one afternoon in June that a message flashed into the despatcher’s office which sent the chief despatcher headlong into the office of the superintendent.
“The operator at Baker’s just called me up, sir,” he gasped, “to report that second Ninety-seven ran through there, going forty miles an hour, and that the engineer dropped a message tied to a wrench saying his throttle-valve had stuck, and his brakes wouldn’t work, and that he couldn’t stop his engine!”
The superintendent started to his feet, his face livid.
“They’ll be here in eight minutes,” he said. “Where’s Number Four?”
“Just past Roxabel. We can’t catch her, and the freight will run into her sure if we let it through the yards.”
“We won’t let it through the yards,” said the superintendent, and went down the stairs three steps at a time, and sped away in the direction of the coal-chute.
He had reflected rapidly that if the freight could be derailed at the long switch just below the chute, it could be run into a gravel bank, where it would do much less damage than farther up in the yards, among the network of switches there. He ran his swiftest, but as he reached the chute, he heard, far down the track, the roar of the approaching train. Evidently it was not yet under control. Reddy Magraw heard the roar, too, and straightened up in amazement. Why should a freight approach the yards at that speed? Then he saw the superintendent tugging madly at the switch.