But Larry, cooler-headed, still had some portion of his wits about him. He saw at once that there was no hope of trying to catch the runaway on foot. And it was not for nothing that his boyhood had been spent on and around locomotives with his engineer father, or that, as a shop and round-house helper, he had had more or less chance to learn the handling of engines under steam.
“Take a grip on yourself!” he shouted at Dick. “There’s only one chance—get over here and be ready to jump off and set the switch for me! We’re going to chase that car!” And taking Dick’s help for granted, he snapped the 717’s reversing-lever into the backward motion and let the air whistle into the relieving pipe of the tender brakes.
The engine responded quickly to the pull of the down-grade. Dick hung on the right-hand step, ready to drop off and run on ahead to the switch. Instead of a “three-way” where the two sidings came in together, there were two separate switches, one for each side-track; a “split” or safety switch for the left-hand lead, and an ordinary “cut-rail” for the right-hand. The Pullman had already gone out over the safety switch, its great weight crowding the split rail over as it passed. But the air brakes were still retarding it a little.
Larry saw Dick drop from the engine step, run for the switch, and jerk the lever over to the outlet position for the 717. He had a fleeting hope that Dick would stay where he was; one life was enough to be risked in the perilous chase ahead. But as the engine was passing, Dick swung on.
“Let’s go!” he cried; and Larry, releasing the brake, let the light engine shoot away in chase of the vanishing Pullman.
As both of the boys well knew, success hung upon the slenderest of chances. Would the slipping Pullman brakes hold long enough to enable them to overtake the derelict and couple on? Or would they let go entirely and so send the big car rocketing to certain destruction at a speed that the handlers of the pursuing engine would not dare to equal?
That remained to be seen. From much riding back and forth over the line on the material trains Larry knew pretty well what down-dropping speed could be taken, and he was giving the 717 every wheel-turn he dared on the uneven, crooking track. At the second reversed curve he got a glimpse of the runaway careening around the next curve ahead. It was enough to show him that the leaking brakes were still holding—partially.
“We’ll make it yet!” he shouted at Dick. Then: “Crawl out on the tender and look down at our coupling—see if the knuckle is open!”
This was vitally important. When a coupling is to be made, if either of the two knuckles of the standard car-coupler is left standing open the couplings will engage and lock when they come together. But if both the coupling on the Pullman and that on the 717 were closed, it would be impossible to make the coupling hitch at a mere touch in mid flight. And the touch would be all they could count upon in the mad chase.
Dick made his journey over the jumping, lunging tender, got his glimpse of the coupling drawhead, and came sliding back over the coal.