As a result of his communion with himself he began to talk again, and his words suggested that he had suspicions of the truth.
“Jus’ my luck,” said he bitterly. “Jus’ my luck. Allus same kind of luck. What’d I have to do wis Peto Mara—Mars—Marscheeno’s birthday? Nothing. Nothing ‘tall. ‘Twasn’t my fault. Jus’ my luck. Jus’ my——”
Shanley came to earth. Also his head came into contact with the unyielding steel of the left-hand rail, and as a result he sprawled inertly full across the right of way, not ten yards west of where the Glacier River swings in to crowd the track close up against the mountain base.
Providence sometimes looks after those who are unable to look after themselves. By the law of probabilities the lantern should have met disaster quick and absolute; but, instead, when it fell from Shanley’s hand, it landed right side up just outside the rail between two ties, and, apart from a momentary and hesitant flicker incident to the jolt, burned on serenely. And it was still burning when, five minutes later, above the swish of leaping waters from the Glacier River now a chattering, angry stream with swollen banks, above the moan of the wind and the roll of the thunder through the mountains, above the pelting splash of the steady rain, came the hoarse scream of Number One’s whistle on the grade.
Sanderson, in the cab, caught the red against him on the right of way ahead, and whistled insistently for the track. This having no effect, he grunted, latched in the throttle, and applied the “air.” The ray of the headlight crept along between the rails, hovered over a black object beside the lantern, passed on again and held, not on the glistening rain-wet rails—they had disappeared—but on a crumbling road-bed and a dark blotch of waters, as with a final screech from the grinding brake-shoes Number One came to a standstill.
“Holy MacCheesar!” exclaimed Sanderson, as he swung from the cab.
He made his way along past the drivers to where the pilot’s nose was inquisitively poked against the lantern, picked up the lantern, and bent over Shanley.
“Holy MacCheesar!” he exclaimed again, straightening up after a moment’s examination. “Holy MacCheesar!”
“What’s wrong, Sandy?” snapped a voice behind him, the voice of Kelly, Spider Kelly, the conductor, who had hurried forward to investigate the unscheduled stop.
“Search me,” replied Sanderson. “Looks like the Glacier was up to her old tricks. There’s a washout ahead, and a bad one, I guess. But the meaning of this here is one beyond me. The fellow was curled up on the track just as you see him with the light burning alongside, that’s what saved us, but he’s as drunk as a lord.”