At the bank above the switch-yard he paused, keeping in a shadow, and looked here and there. Flat cars and box cars stood on the tracks in great numbers, most of them closed and sealed—some partly open. He heard a car door grate as it was closed. He slipped down the bank and crept on his hands and knees. He was halfway down the line of cars when he heard a voice. It came from car 7887, C. B. & Q.
“Run all the breath out of me,” said the voice in a wheeze.
“Well, did you get it?” whispered another voice.
“Sure I got it! Got something, anyway. Strike a match, Bill, and let’s see if he put up a job on us. If he did, we’ll blow him up to-morrow night, hey?”
“That’s right. We got a can o’ powder left under the pile by the laylocks. How much is it?”
“We tol’ him one thousand, didn’t we? Same as he give the Law and Order to help grab us. Now, listen! You take half of this and go one way, an’ I’ll take half an’ go the other. We can get away with five hundred apiece.”
“And we got the five hundred apiece we got for doin’ the dynamite job, too. Say, I never thought to have a thousand dollars at once in me life. What’s that?”
It was Philo Gubb, slipping the car door latch over the staple and hammering home the hasp with a rock. It was the engine, backing against the long row of cars to make a coupling, and then moving slowly forward toward Derlingport as the heavy train got under way. The two rascals hammered on the side of the car with their fists. They swore. They kicked against the doors. Philo Gubb drew himself into the next open car as the train moved away.
About the same time, Officer Purcell entered the Marshal’s office, where Wittaker and Billy Getz sat awaiting the coming of Philo Gubb. Purcell led John Gutman, the town half-wit.