He stood stupidly for a few moments, weaving back and forth. He aroused himself as his dull ears caught a familiar sound. A hand-car was being pumped down the grade. His mind cleared to supernormal lucidity. He saw his advantage. He had been brutally attacked and seriously wounded. The one man escaping would be charged with having stolen the money; they wrested it from him in the struggle. He had fought hard; he’d earned it. And yet, should he pull the lever close by his right hand, he could throw open the switch down the line and send Fresno Red crashing into the empty coal-cars on the siding.
“You’ll never get a better chance! It simply can’t be known and—”
“No!” he yelled, springing to the lever and pulling it back with his last ounce of strength.
“No, ⸺ you! No!”
Within the next minute he heard a dull crash and knew the yegg leader had collided with the coal-cars. Then he concluded the wet platform would be an ideal place for a red-hot body to rest on.
“For the love of Mike! Parsly down and out! One man groaning and another dead in the office, one stiff out here! Good Heavens!” exclaimed the horrified foreman as he held up the lantern. He had come because Parsly had failed to keep his promise as to the game of cribbage.
As he read the full story in the four prostrate forms he collected his wits and dragged Parsly into the office, meanwhile begging him to “Wake up,” and “Get back his nerve.”
“What’s the row?” feebly asked Parsly. Then he remembered.
“I’ve been shot. Find the instrument and see if the wires are O. K. Hold me up where I can reach it. I must send in the alarm. The leader is down on the siding somewhere. I shunted him off into the empties.”