But a medical man amongst the passengers was already jumping for Sammy Durgan; and MacMurtrey was clawing at the master mechanic's arm, stuttering out the tale of what had happened.
"And—and if it hadn't been for Timmy O'Toole there," stuttered MacMurtrey, flirting away the sweat that stood out in great nervous beads on his face, "I—it makes me sick to think what would have happened when the tank struck Number Three. Something would have gone into the cañon sure. Timmy O'Toole's a——"
"His name's Sammy Durgan," said Regan, kind of absently.
"I don't give a blamed hoot what his name is!" declared MacMurtrey earnestly. "He's a man with grit from the soles up, and a head on him to use it with. It was three-quarters of an hour ago that I sent him down, so he must have been near the top on his way back when he saw the tank-car coming—and he took the one chance there was—to try and beat it to the spur here to save Number Three; and it was so close on him, for it's a cinch he hadn't time to stop, that he had to jump for the switch with about one chance in ten for his own life—see?"
"A blind man could see it," said Regan heavily, "but—Sammy Durgan!" He reached uncertainly toward his hip pocket for his chewing—and then, with sudden emotion, the big-hearted, fat, little master mechanic bent over Sammy Durgan.
"God bless the man!" blurted out Regan. And then, to the doctor: "Will he live?"
"Oh, yes; I think so," the doctor answered. "He's pretty badly smashed up, though."
Sammy Durgan's lips were moving. Regan leaned close to catch the words.
"A steady job," murmured Sammy Durgan. "Never get a chance. But some day it'll come. I'll show 'em, Maria, and Regan, and the rest of 'em!"
"You have, Sammy," said Regan, in a low, anxious voice. "It's all right, Sammy. It's all right, old boy. Just pull around and you can have any blamed thing you want on the Hill Division."