The Young Section-Hand

by Burton Egbert Stevenson

“She’s going down, boys!” he cried, rising with beaming face. “She’s gone down half an inch. We’re going to win this fight!”

But how slowly the water receded! It seemed to Allan, at times, that it was rising again; but the crest of the flood had passed, and by the next day the danger was quite over. The embankment had to be rebuilt where it had been badly washed; and it was rebuilt more strongly than ever, and guarded by a wall of riprap, but never for an hour was the traffic of the road interrupted.

So October passed and November came. Always there was the track demanding attention,—an endless round of work which would never be completed. Always there were the trains rushing over it in endless procession,—the luxurious Limited, sending every other train headlong into a siding out of the way; the slower “accommodation,” which stops at every station along the road and is very popular with the farmers and dwellers at crossroads; the big through freight, drawn by a mighty giant of an engine, hauling two thousand tons of grain or beef or coal to the great Eastern market.

And the through freight is the greatest of them all, for it is the money-maker. The Limited, glittering with polished brass and rare woods and plate-glass, is for show,—for style. It makes the road a reputation. It figures always in the advertisements in big type and on the back of folder and time-table in gorgeous lithograph. Its passengers look out with aversion at the dingy, ugly freight, standing on the siding, waiting for it to pass. But it is the freight that is meat and drink to the road; it enables it to keep out of the receiver’s hands, and sometimes even to pay dividends.

For Allan, the days passed happily, for one serious cloud was lifted from his life. Dan Nolan had disappeared. He had not been seen for weeks, and every one hoped that he would never be seen in that neighbourhood again. Jack had taken good care to spread the story of the fallen rock, and Nolan was wise to keep out of the trainmen’s way.

“He thinks I saw him that day,” remarked the foreman, “an’ he’s afeard of a term in th’ penitentiary. Well, he’ll git it; if not here, somewheres else.”

One trouble still remained, for Reddy showed no sign of improvement. His aversion to all his old friends seemed rather to increase, and he would wander away for days at a time. With this development of vagrant habits, he fell naturally in with other vagrants; played cards with them under the big coal-chute, rode with them in empty box-cars,—in a word, degenerated utterly from the happy, industrious Reddy of other days. Still, he showed no disposition to harm any one, so his friends deemed it best to let him go his way, hoping against hope that time might work a cure. His wife had been given the position of janitress of the depot building, and so provided for the family.

Physically, Allan had never been in such splendid condition. Constant work in the open air had hardened his muscles and tanned his face; he was lean and hard, his eyes clear, his nerves steady. He was always ready for his bed at night, and always ready for his work in the morning. He felt within himself an abounding health and vitality, that brought him near to nature, and made him love her great winds and tempests. The only things he missed were the books to which he had always been accustomed. He was usually too tired in the evening to do more than read the newspaper; but he was gaining for himself a first-hand experience of life more valuable than any reflection of it he could have caught from the printed page. The foundations of his education had been well laid; now he was laying the foundations of experience. Somehow, for the time being, books seemed to him strangely useless and artificial. He was drinking deep of life itself.

And as the days passed, Allan grew to know the trainmen better. He was admitted to the freemasonry of their fellowship, and sat with them often in the evenings at roundhouse or yardmaster’s office, listening to their yarns, which had a strange fascination for him. It was at the roundhouse that engineers and firemen met, summoned by the caller to take their engines out; at the yardmaster’s office, conductors and brakemen reported. And the boy found all of them alike prepared for what might befall, ready, instinctively, without second thought, to risk their lives to save the company’s property or to protect the passengers entrusted to their care.

A great admiration for these men grew into his heart. They were like soldiers, ready at a moment’s notice to advance under fire,—only here there was not the wild exhilaration of battle, of charge and sortie, but only a long, cold looking of danger in the face.