“It’s a heavy cutting; twelve or fourteen feet deep on the high side, I should say, and considerably over a hundred feet long. We couldn’t get near enough to make an estimate in cubic yards; but I’d say they have a week’s work there, at the very least.”
“Better yet,” said the chief. “In a week’s time we ought to be leaving them well behind.”
“But when we come to their track here in this valley, they’ll block the crossing for us, won’t they?” Dick asked.
“No doubt they will try to. Whether they will succeed or not is another matter. Now I want you two to do another little scouting stunt. Follow our line up the valley and post yourselves somewhere near the O. C. track. Stay there for the remainder of the night and be prepared to report on what you’ve seen.”
Reluctant as they were to miss any part of the joyous work battle, the two “scouts” obeyed the new order cheerfully, trudging out ahead of the track-layers and soon leaving the most advanced guard of the workers behind. It was a clear night, or rather early morning, with the stars shining brightly to show the ghostly shadows of the surrounding mountains rising like the sides of a great bowl to enclose the shut-in valley. A few turns among the hills served to efface even the sounds of the work battle, and the wilderness stillness, after the clamor and din, was almost deafening.
“What do you reckon the chief wants us to find out, particularly?” Dick asked as they plodded along.
“Everything that goes on, I guess,” Larry answered. “The O. C. people know that we’re coming; they’ve found it out long before this time; and they’ll be rushing material out ahead as fast as they can. Because, you see, if they block the track for us, they’ll have to block it for themselves, as well.”
That was a good guess, for, even as he made it, they heard the rattle of a train, and by sprinting a bit they reached the crossing point in time to see it go thundering past. There were three flat-cars loaded with ties ahead of the pushing engine, and by the light of Dick’s pocket flashlamp Larry noted the fact in his memorandum book—the fact and the time.
Beyond this they had little to do save to record the passing of an occasional train; loaded ones going to the front, and empties returning. In the idle intervals they had a chance to study the lay of the land at the point where the clash, if there should be one, would occur. The crossing place was in a small level flat surrounded by the sandstone hills. As nearly as they could determine, the crossing would be practically at right angles; the O. C. track running nearly north and south and the Short Line east and west. From studying the lay-out they began to speculate as to how the crossing would be made; whether the O. C. rails would have to be sawn in two, or a regular set of crossing-frogs put in.
“Frogs, I’d say,” asserted Larry, who was the mechanical end of the partnership. “It would take too long to saw the rails; and the other way all we’d need to do would be to build the frogs to fit a gap in their line, take up two of their rails, and drop the made-up crossing into place. That wouldn’t take more than a few minutes, if we were all ready for it beforehand.”