Though it was a warm night, as I have said, the cold chills began to chase themselves up and down my back. What Hatch said was perfectly true. In the right-of-way scrap he was talking about, there had been a few wild shots fired, and one of them had found a P. & S. F. grade laborer. I don't believe anybody had ever really blamed the boss for it. He had given strict orders that we were only to make a show of force; and, besides, the other fellows were armed, too, and had armed first. But there had been a man killed.
While I was shivering, Clanahan said: "Well, what av it?"
"Norcross was responsible for that man's death. If he was having trouble over his right-of-way, his recourse was to the law, and he took the law into his own hands. Nothing was ever done about it, because nobody took the trouble to prosecute. A week ago we sent a man to Oregon to look up the facts. He succeeded in finding a brother of the dead man, and a warrant has now been sworn out for Norcross's arrest."
"Well?" said Clanahan again. "Ye have the sthring in yer own hand; why don't ye pull it?"
"That's where you come in," was the answer. "The Oregon justice issued the warrant because it was demanded, but he refused to incur, for his county, the expense of sending a deputy sheriff to another State, or to take the necessary steps to have Norcross extradited. If Norcross could be produced in court, he would try him and either discharge him or bind him over, as the facts might warrant. He took his stand upon the ground that Norcross was only technically responsible, and told the brother that in all probability nothing would come of an attempt to prosecute."
"Thin ye've got nothing on him, after all," the Irishman grunted.
"Yes," Hatch came back; "we have the warrant, and, in addition to that, we have you, Pete. A word from you to the Portal City police headquarters, and our man finds himself arrested and locked up—to wait for a requisition from the Governor of Oregon."
"But you said th' requisition wouldn't come," Clanahan put in.
Hatch was sitting back now and stroking his ugly jaw.
"It might come, Pete, if it had to: there's no knowing. In the meantime we get delay. There'll be habeas corpus proceedings, of course, to get him out of jail, but there's where you'll come in again; you've got your own man in for City Attorney. And, after all, the delay is all we need. With Norcross in trouble, and in jail on a charge of murder, the railroad ship'll go on the rocks in short order. The Norcross management is having plenty of trouble—wrecks and the like. With Norcross locked up, New York will be heard from, and Dismuke will step in and clean house. That will wind up the reform spasm."