Sprague stood up and yawned sleepily.
“Perhaps, a little later on, we can throw a scare into this Mr. Parker Higginson,” he suggested. “Just now, I’m for the hotel and a few winks of much-needed sleep. Tarbell, you go up to my office and get Murtagh. Have him locked up on a charge of—oh, any old charge will do; breaking into my office to-night, if you can’t think of anything better. If we can manage to hold onto him for a while, we may be able to keep this Mr. Higginson quiet while Maxwell is straightening out his booze-fighters. Let’s go.”
“Hold on, just a minute,” pleaded Maxwell. “There are three of us here who have seen the wheels go round, and I don’t forget that I was the one who said there weren’t any wheels. How in the name of all that is wonderful have you been able to work this puzzle out in less than twelve hours, Sprague?”
The big chemistry expert sat down again and locked his hands behind his head.
“My gosh!” he said; “have I got to open up a kindergarten for you fellows when I’m so sleepy that I don’t know what I’m going to have for breakfast to-morrow morning? It was easy, dead easy. Half an hour with those delayed train crews at Angels this morning showed me that the discipline strings were all off; one of the freight conductors even offered me a nip out of his pocket-flask when I intimated that I was thirsty. With that for a pointer, I had my eyes open at the wreck, and what I saw there you all know. Moreover, I noticed that the pocket-flasks were all alike, as if they’d all been handed out over the same bar. All straight, so far?”
“Go on,” said Maxwell.
“I got my first pointer on Bascom at the wreck, too. I saw that the men in the trainmaster’s gang didn’t drink when the boss was looking, a condition which didn’t apply in the other crew. Again, I noticed that Bascom took his track-clearing privilege with a large and handsome disregard for the salvage. He didn’t care how much property was destroyed in the process, and once I saw him give the signal to the crane engineer to drop a car loaded with automobiles—which was promptly done and the autos properly smashed.”
“The cold-blooded devil!” growled the superintendent.
“When we reached town, Tarbell here promptly confirmed my guess about the whiskey; and in the evening Calmaine helped some more by going with me over the pay-rolls for new names, and over the cost-sheets for increases. Naturally, we dwelt longest upon the motive-power and repair department, with its huge increases, and it so happened that my eye fell upon the various charges for vitriol in carboys. I asked Calmaine what use a railroad shop had for so much sulphuric acid, and he told me it was used to pickle castings. Afterward I sent Tarbell out to bring me samples of water from the tanks of the crippled locomotives on the shop track and of the oil in their cylinder-cups. Analyses of both, which I made on the spot, showed the presence of sulphuric acid in the water, and also in the oil.”
“Still, you didn’t have any cinch on Bascom,” Starbuck put in.