The Indian troubles were thought to be quieted. A big treaty council had been held, and another was to follow, between the Sioux and Cheyennes and the United States. At any rate, the job of riding the line and visiting the near grading-camps was not so dangerous as it might have been earlier in the season. Also, it was very pleasant, when Cheyenne and the Home Cooking restaurant drew nearer to end o’ track.
The rails were marching on. Thirty miles to Cheyenne, twenty miles to Cheyenne, fifteen miles to Cheyenne, and ten, and five and two—and one more day’s work and there they’d be.
There they were, on November 13, this 1867: planting mile-post 517, and welcomed by a great crowd, and a band, and a lot of flags and bunting, with the Lincoln car carrying the Government inspectors pressing after and accepting the track as far as mile-post 490, only some twenty-five miles behind. Yes, it was a well-built road.
This evening Terry guided his father up-town, and another reunion occurred, celebrated with plenty of pie and hot doughnuts.
Into the new terminal station the telegraph poles advanced. The pay-car moved up, bringing the eager George. Then came the procession: Casement Brothers’ take-down warehouse and offices, and the gamblers’ tents and the side-shows and saloons, which had been only waiting, at Julesburg. Cheyenne rapidly swelled to 3,000 people, for now the news had passed that it was to be the winter quarters of the railroad. The Overland Stage changed its terminal, also, to keep with the gang, and put on a run between Denver and Cheyenne.
There was nothing but the station left at Julesburg, the five months “wickedest town in America”: nothing but the station and a mess of cans and other rubbish. Cheyenne, the “Magic City of the Plains,” had swallowed it.
On the very next day after the arrival of end o’ track, the passenger trains began to roll in. The first brought a brimming excursion from the East. This meant another jollification, with speeches by the mayor and by Mr. Sidney Dillon, president of the U. P. board of directors, and by little General Casement, “champion track-layer of the continent,” and others. Town lots that the company had sold for $150 were being resold for as high as $2,500.
The end o’ track did not pause here long. As soon as switches and side-tracks enough had been laid the rails hastened onward, for the Black Hills.
“We’ll ate our Christmas dinner atop, boys,” Pat cheered. “An’ from yon, 8,000 feet in the air, we’ll shake our fists at the Cintral haythen, over beyant in Californy. ’Twill be better that, than shakin’ ’em under each other’s noses here in this new roarin’ town which is like to be the greediest yet after your money.”
The work grew harder. The winds of November and December blew fiercely, sweeping the sand and gravel and snow into the men’s faces; Crow Creek froze, the water had to be hauled from holes chopped through the ice, there were days when the laying had to quit entirely, until the grade was scraped clear. And the climb and curves and cuts would have slowed the march even in summer.