“Bime-by,” he would say to himself, “I’ll have er muscle on me like Jim, an’ den I’ll yank dis cussed ol’ car right out in der middle of der crik,” and he examined the small bunch on his arm critically a dozen times every day.
Meanwhile, his hero and idol was outdoing the human in his exertions. The effort he put forth would have killed an ordinary man. He fought the stubborn earth as though it were an enemy. Stripped to the waist, bent over in the low tunnel, hour after hour Jim plied the pick and shovel with the regularity and power of a machine. There was at once something fascinating and heroic in the rippling glide of the muscles over his broad back, and in the supple swing that sent the pick to join the packed dirt.
It all looked so easy. It was as if the dirt were very soft, and not the striker very strong. Nevertheless, fourteen hours a day of this, varied occasionally by cutting timbers and carrying them by hand to the tunnel—some of them a weight enough for a horse, others not adequate, “just as they came” being careless Jim’s motto—told even on his engines.
They had a certain mark on the cañon side—a wild-cat’s hole it was—and when the sun threw the shadow of the western wall upon the mark, the day’s work was finished.
Ches used to watch this with attention. “Yer move along all right till yer gits half way up, den yer jus’ crawls, yer ol’ beggar!” was his standing remark on the progress of the shadow. Still, he always gave good measurement.
Toward the last of the month Jim grew an interest in their clock.
“Where’s the blame thing now, Ches?” would come hollowly out of the tunnel.
“Three more cars away, Jim,—jus’ tippin’ the white rock.”
Then the cheery shout of “All over!” and the worker stepping out into the fresh air, soft and cool in the twilight, hooking the sweat from his forehead, and wishing that supper would cook itself. Sometimes the wild-cat looked down upon them from his eyrie.
“Ches,” said weary Jim, “if that lad thinks at all, he must think we’re awful fools.”