XIX
THE CHALLENGE
Lidgerwood was unpleasantly surprised to find that the president'sdaughter knew the man whom her father had tersely characterized as "aborn gentleman and a born buccaneer," but the fact remained. When hecame with Flemister into the circle of light cast by the smaller of thetwo fires, Miss Brewster not only welcomed the mine-owner; sheimmediately introduced him to her friends, and made room for him on theflat stone which served her for a seat.
Lidgerwood sat on a tie-end a little apart, morosely observant. It isthe curse of the self-conscious soul to find itself often at themeeting-point of comparisons. The superintendent knew Flemister alittle, as he had admitted to the president; and he also knew that someof his evil qualities were of the sort which appeal, by the law ofopposites, to the normal woman, the woman who would condemn evil in theabstract, perhaps, only to be irresistibly drawn by some of its purelymasculine manifestations. The cynical assertion that the worst of mencan win the love of the best of women is something both more and lessthan a mere contradiction of terms; and since Eleanor Brewster's manlyideal was apparently builded upon physical courage as its pedestal,Flemister, in his dare-devil character, was quite likely to be the manto embody it.
But just now the "gentleman buccaneer" was not living up to the fullmeasure of his reputation in the dare-devil field, as Lidgerwood was notslow to observe. His replies to Miss Brewster and the others were notalways coherent, and his face, seen in the flickering firelight, wasalmost ghastly. True, the talk was low-toned and fragmentary; desultoryenough to require little of any member of the group sitting around thesmouldering fire on the spur embankment. Death, in any form, insistsupon its rights, of silence and of respect, and the six motionlessfigures lying under the spread Pullman-car sheets on the other side ofthe spur track were not to be ignored.
Yet Lidgerwood fancied that of the group circling the fire, Flemisterwas the one whose eyes turned oftenest toward the sheeted figures acrossthe track; sometimes in morbid starings, but now and again with thehaggard side-glance of fear. Why was the mine-owner afraid? Lidgerwoodanalyzed the query shrewdly. Was he implicated in the matter of theloosened rail? Remembering that the trap had been set, not for thepassenger train, but for the special, the superintendent dismissed thecharge against Flemister. Thus far he had done little to incur themine-owner's enmity--at least, nothing to call for cold-blooded murderin reprisal. Yet the man was acting very curiously. Much of the time hescarcely appeared to hear what Miss Brewster was saying to him.Moreover, he had lied. Lidgerwood recalled his glib explanation at themeeting beside the displaced rail. Flemister claimed to have had thenews of the disaster by 'phone: where had he been when the 'phonemessage found him? Not at his mine, Lidgerwood decided, since he couldnot have walked from the Wire-Silver to the wreck in an hour. It was allvery puzzling, and what little suppositional evidence there was, wasconflicting. Lidgerwood put the query aside finally, but with a mentalreservation. Later he would go into this newest mystery and probe it tothe bottom. Judson would doubtless have a report to make, and this mighthelp in the probing.
Fortunately, the waiting interval was not greatly prolonged;fortunately, since for the three young women the reaction was come andthe full horror of the disaster was beginning to make itself felt.Lidgerwood contrived the necessary diversion when the relief-train fromRed Butte shot around the curve of the hillside cutting.
"Van Lew, suppose you and Jefferis take the women out of the way for afew minutes, while we are making the transfer," he suggested quietly."There are enough of us to do the work, and we can spare you."
This left Flemister unaccounted for, but with a very palpable effort heshook himself free from the spell of whatever had been shackling him.
"That's right," he assented briskly. "I was just going to suggest that."Then, indicating the men pouring out of the relief train: "I see that mybuckies have come up on your train to lend a hand; command us just thesame as if we belonged to you. That is what we are here for."
Van Lew and the collegian walked the three young women a little way upthe old spur while the wrecked train's company, the living, the injured,and the dead, were transferring down the line to the relief-train to betaken back to Red Butte. Flemister helped with the other helpers, butLidgerwood had an uncomfortable feeling that the man was always at hiselbow; he was certainly there when the last of the wounded had beencarried around the wreck, and the relief-train was ready to back away toLittle Butte, where it could be turned upon the mine-spur "Y." It waswhile the conductor of the train was gathering his volunteers fordeparture that Flemister said what he had apparently been waiting for achance to say.
"I can't help feeling indirectly responsible for this, Mr. Lidgerwood,"he began, with something like a return of his habitual self-possession."If I hadn't asked you to come over here to-night----"
Lidgerwood interrupted sharply: "What possible difference would thathave made, Mr. Flemister?"
It was not a special weakness of Flemister's to say the damaging thingunder pressure of the untoward and unanticipated event; it is rather acommon failing of human nature. In a flash he appeared to realize thathe had admitted too much.
"Why--I understood that it was the unexpected sight of your specialstanding on the 'Y' that made the passenger engineer lose his head," hecountered lamely, evidently striving to recover himself and to effacethe damaging admission.
It chanced that they were standing directly opposite the break in thetrack where the rail ends were still held apart by the small stone.Lidgerwood pointed to the loosened rail, plainly visible under thevolleying play of the two opposing headlights.
"There is the cause of the disaster, Mr. Flemister," he said hotly; "atrap set, not for the passenger-train, but for my special. Somebody setit; somebody who knew almost to a minute when we should reach it. Mr.Flemister, let me tell you something: I don't care any more for my ownlife than a sane man ought to care, but the murdering devil who pulledthe spikes on that rail reached out, unconsciously perhaps, but none theless certainly, after a life that I would safe-guard at the price of myown. Because he did that, I'll spend the last dollar of the fortune myfather left me, if needful, in finding that man and hanging him!"
It was the needed flick of the whip for the shaken nerve of themine-owner.
"Ah," said he, "I am sure every one will applaud that determination, Mr.Lidgerwood; applaud it, and help you to see it through." And then, quiteas calmly: "I suppose you will go back from here with your special,won't you? You can't get down to Little Butte until the track isrepaired, and the wreck cleared. Your going back will make nodifference in the right-of-way matter; I can arrange for a meeting withGrofield at any time--in Angels, if you prefer."
"Yes," said Lidgerwood absently, "I am going back from here."
"Then I guess I may as well ride down to my jumping-off place with mymen; you don't need us any longer. Make my adieux to Miss Brewster andthe young ladies, will you, please?"
Lidgerwood stood at the break in the track for some minutes after theretreating relief-train had disappeared around the steep shoulder of thegreat hill; was still standing there when Bradford, having once moreside-tracked the service-car on the abandoned mine spur, came down toask for orders.
"We'll hold the siding until Dawson shows up with the wrecking-train,"was the superintendent's reply, "He ought to be here before long. Whereare Miss Brewster and her friends?"
"They are all up at the bonfire. I'm having the Jap launder the car alittle before they move in."
There was another interval of delay, and Lidgerwood held aloof from thegroup at the fire, pacing a slow sentry beat up and down beside theditched train, and pausing at either turn to listen for the signal ofDawson's coming. It sounded at length: a series of shrillwhistle-shrieks, distance-softened, and presently the drumming ofhasting wheels.
The draftsman was on the engine of the wrecking-train, and he droppedoff to join the superintendent.
"Not so bad for my part of it, this time," was his c
omment, when he hadlooked the wreck over. Then he asked the inevitable question: "What didit?"
Lidgerwood beckoned him down the line and showed him the sprung rail.Dawson examined it carefully before he rose up to say: "Why didn't theyspring it the other way, if they wanted to make a thorough job of it?That would have put the train into the river."
Lidgerwood's reply was as laconic as the query. "Because the trap wasset for my car, going west; not for the passenger, going east."
"Of course," said the draftsman, as one properly disgusted with his ownlack of perspicacity. Then, after another and more searching scrutiny,in which the headlight glare of his own engine was helped out by theburning of half a dozen matches: "Whoever did that, knew his business."
"How do you know?"
"Little things. A regular spike-puller claw-bar was used--the marks ofits heel are still in the ties; the place was chosen to the exactrail-length--just where your engine would begin to hug the outside ofthe curve. Then the rail is sprung aside barely enough to let the wheelflanges through, and not enough to attract an engineer's attentionunless he happened to be looking directly at it, and in a good light."
The superintendent nodded. "What is your inference?" he asked.
"Only what I say; that the man knew his business. He is no ordinaryhobo; he is more likely in your class, or mine."
Lidgerwood ground his heel into the gravel, and with the feeling that hewas wasting precious time of Dawson's which should go into thetrack-clearing, asked another question.
"Fred, tell me; you've known John Judson longer than I have: do youtrust him--when he's sober?"
"Yes." The answer was unqualified.
"I think I do, but he talks too much. He is over here, somewhere,to-night, shadowing the man who may have done this. He--and theman--came down on 205 this evening. I saw them both board the train atAngels as it was pulling out."
Dawson looked up quickly, and for once the reticence which was hiscustomary shield was dropped.
"You're trusting me, now, Mr. Lidgerwood: who was the man? Gridley?"
"Gridley? No. Why, Dawson, he is the last man I should suspect!"
"All right; if you think so."
"Don't you think so?"
It was the draftsman's turn to hesitate.
"I'm prejudiced," he confessed at length. "I know Gridley; he is a worseman than a good many people think he is--and not so bad as some othersbelieve him to be. If he thought you, or Benson, were getting in hisway--up at the house, you know----"
Lidgerwood smiled.
"You don't want him for a brother-in-law; is that it, Fred?"
"I'd cheerfully help to put my sister in her coffin, if that were thealternative," said Dawson quite calmly.
"Well," said the superintendent, "he can easily prove an alibi, so faras this wreck is concerned. He went east on 202 yesterday. You knewthat, didn't you?"
"Yes, I knew it, but----"
"But what?"
"It doesn't count," said the draftsman, briefly. Then: "Who was theother man, the man who came west on 205?"
"I hate to say it, Fred, but it was Hallock. We saw the wreck, all ofus, from the back platform of my car. Williams had just pulled us out onthe old spur. Just before Cranford shut off and jammed on hisair-brakes, a man ran down the track, swinging his arms like a madman.Of course, there wasn't the time or any chance for me to identify him,and I saw him only for the second or two intervening, and with his backtoward us. But the back looked like Hallock's; I'm afraid it wasHallock's."
"But why should he weaken at the last moment and try to stop the train?"queried Dawson.
"You forget that it was the special, and not the passenger, that was tobe wrecked."
"Sure," said the draftsman.
"I've told you this, Fred, because, if the man we saw were Hallock,he'll probably turn up while you are at work; Hallock, with Judson athis heels. You'll know what to do in that event?"
"I guess so: keep a sharp eye on Hallock, and make Judson hold histongue. I'll do both."
"That's all," said the superintendent. "Now I'll have Bradford pull usup on the spur to give you room to get your baby crane ahead; then youcan pull down and let us out."
The shifting took some few minutes, and more than a little skill. Whileit was in progress Lidgerwood was in the service-car, trying topersuade the young women to go to his state-room for a little rest andsleep on the return run. In the midst of the argument, the door openedand Dawson came in. From the instant of his entrance it was plain thathe had expected to find the superintendent alone; that he was visiblyand painfully embarrassed.
Lidgerwood excused himself and went quickly to the embarrassed one, whowas still anchoring himself to the door-knob. "What is it, Fred?" heasked.
"Judson: he has just turned up, walking from Little Butte, he says, witha pretty badly bruised ankle. He is loaded to the muzzle with news ofsome sort, and he wants to know if you'll take him with you to An--" Thedraftsman, facing the group under the Pintsch globe at the other end ofthe open compartment, stopped suddenly and his big jaw grew rigid. Thenhe said, in an awed whisper, "God! let me get out of here!"
"Tell Judson to come aboard," said Lidgerwood; and the draftsman wastwisting at the door-knob when Miriam Holcombe came swiftly down thecompartment.
"Wait, Fred," she said gently. "I have come all the way out here to askmy question, and you mustn't try to stop me: are you going to keep onletting it make us both desolate--for always?" She seemed not to see orto care that Lidgerwood made a listening third.
Dawson's face had grown suddenly haggard, and he, too, ignored thesuperintendent.
"How can you say that to me, Miriam?" he returned almost gruffly. "Dayand night I am paying, paying, and the debt never grows less. If itwasn't for my mother and Faith ... but I must go on paying. I killedyour brother----"
"No," she denied, "that was an accident for which you were no more toblame than he was: but you are killing me."
Lidgerwood stood by, man-like, because he did not know enough to vanish.But Miss Brewster suddenly swept down the compartment to drag him out ofthe way of those who did not need him.
"You'd spoil it all, if you could, wouldn't you?" she whispered, in afine feminine rage; "and after I have moved heaven and earth to getMiriam to come out here for this one special blessed moment! Go anddrive the others into a corner, and keep them there."
Lidgerwood obeyed, quite meekly; and when he looked again, Dawson hadgone, and Miss Holcombe was sobbing comfortably in Eleanor's arms.
Judson boarded the service-car when it was pulled up to the switch; andafter Lidgerwood had disposed of his passengers for the run back toAngels, he listened to the ex-engineer's report, sitting quietly whileJudson told him of the plot and of the plotters. At the close he saidgravely: "You are sure it was Hallock who got off of the night train atSilver Switch and went up the old spur?"
It was a test question, and the engineer did not answer it off-hand.
"I'd say yes in a holy minute if there wasn't so blamed much else tiedon to it, Mr. Lidgerwood. I was sure, at the time, that it was Hallock;and besides, I heard him talking to Flemister afterward, and I saw hismug shadowed out on the window curtain, just as I've been telling you.All I can say crosswise, is that I didn't get to see him face to faceanywhere; in the gulch, or in the office, or in the mine, or any placeelse."
"Yet you are convinced, in your own mind?"
"I am."
"You say you saw him and Flemister get on the hand-car and pumpthemselves down the old spur; of course, you couldn't identify either ofthem from the top of the ridge?"
"That's a guess," admitted the ex-engineer frankly. "All I could seewas that there were two men on the car. But it fits in pretty good: Ihear 'em plannin' what-all they're going to do; foller 'em a good bitmore'n half-way through the mine tunnel; hike back and hump myself overthe hill, and get there in time to see two men--_some_ two men--rushin'out the hand-car to go somewhere. That ain't court evidence, maybe, butI've seen more'n on
e jury that'd hang both of 'em on it."
"But the third man, Judson; the man you saw beating with his fists onthe bulkhead air-lock: who was he?" persisted Lidgerwood.
"Now you've got me guessin' again. If I hadn't been dead certain that Isaw Hallock go on ahead with Flemister--but I did see him; saw 'em bothgo through the little door, one after the other, and heard it slambefore the other dub turned up. No," reading the question in thesuperintendent's eye, "not a drop, Mr. Lidgerwood; I ain't touched not,tasted not, n'r handled not--'r leastwise, not to drink any," and herehe told the bottle episode which had ended in the smashing ofFlemister's sideboard supply.
Lidgerwood nodded approvingly when the modest narrative reached thebottle-smashing point.
"That was fine, John," he said, using the ex-engineer's Christian namefor the first time in the long interview. "If you've got it in you to dosuch a thing as that, at such a time, there is good hope for you. Let'ssettle this question once for all: all I ask is that you prove up onyour good intentions. Show me that you have quit, not for a day or aweek, but for all time, and I shall be only too glad to see you pullingpassenger-trains again. But to get back to this crime of to-night: whenyou left Flemister's office, after telephoning Goodloe, you walked downto Little Butte station?"
"Yes; walked and run. There was nobody there but the bridge watchman.Goodloe had come on up the track to find out what had happened."
"And you didn't see Flemister or Hallock again?"
"No."
"Flemister told us he got the news by 'phone, and when he said it thewreck was no more than an hour old. He couldn't have walked down fromthe mine in that time. Where could he have got the message, and fromwhom?"
Judson was shaking his head.
"He didn't need any message--and he didn't get any. I'd put it up thisway: after that rail-joint was sprung open, they'd go back up the oldspur on the hand-car, wouldn't they? And on the way they'd be prettysure to hear Cranford when he whistled for Little Butte. That'd let 'emknow what was due to happen, right then and there. After that, it'd beeasy enough. All Flemister had to do was to rout out his miners over hisown telephones, jump onto the hand-car again, and come back in time toshow up to you."
Lidgerwood was frowning thoughtfully.
"Then both of them must have come back; or, no--that must have been yourthird man who tried to flag Cranford down. Judson, I've got to know whothat third man is. He has complicated things so that I don't dare move,even against Flemister, until I know more. We are not at the ultimatebottom of this thing yet."
"We're far enough to put the handcuffs onto Mr. Pennington Flemister anytime you say," asserted Judson. "There was one little thing that Iforgot to put in the report: when you get ready to take that missingswitch-engine back, you'll find it _choo-chooin'_ away up yonder inFlemister's new power-house that he's built out of boards made from Mr.Benson's bridge-timbers."
"Is that so? Did you see the engine?" queried the superintendentquickly.
"No, but I might as well have. She's there, all right, and they didn'tcare enough to even muffle her exhaust."
Lidgerwood took a slender gold-banded cigar from his desk-box, andpassed the box to the ex-engineer.
"We'll get Mr. Pennington Flemister--and before he is very many hoursolder," he said definitely. And then: "I wish we were a little morecertain of the other man."
Judson bit the end from his cigar, but he forbore to light it. The RedDesert had not entirely effaced his sense of the respect due to asuperintendent riding in his own private car.
"It's a queer sort of a mix-up, Mr. Lidgerwood," he said, fingering thecigar tenderly. "Knowin' what's what, as some of us do, you'd say themtwo'd never get together, unless it was to cut each other's throats."
Lidgerwood nodded. "I've heard there was bad blood between them: it wasabout that building-and-loan business, wasn't it?"
"Shucks! no; that was only a drop in the bucket," said Judson, surprisedout of his attitude of rank-and-file deference. "Hallock was theoriginal owner of the Wire-Silver. Didn't you know that?"
"No."
"He was, and Flemister beat him out of it--lock, stock, and barrel: justsimply reached out an' took it. Then, when he'd done that, he reachedout and took Hallock's wife--just to make it a clean sweep, was the wayhe bragged about it."
"Heavens and earth!" ejaculated the listener. Then some of the hiddenthings began to define themselves in the light of this astoundingrevelation: Hallock's unwillingness to go to Flemister for the proof ofhis innocence in the building-and-loan matter; his veiled warning thatevil, and only evil, would come upon all concerned if Lidgerwood shouldinsist; the invasion of the service-car at Copah by the poor dementedcreature whose cry was still for vengeance upon her betrayer. Truly,Flemister had many crimes to answer for. But the revelation madeHallock's attitude all the more mysterious. It was unaccountable saveupon one hypothesis--that Flemister was able to so play upon the man'sweaknesses as to make him a mere tool in his hands. But Judson was goingon to elucidate.
"First off, we all thought Hallock'd kill Flemister. Rankin was nevermuch of a bragger or much of a talker, but he let out a few hints, and,accordin' to Red Desert rulin's, Flemister wasn't much better than adead man, right then. But it blew over, some way, and now----"
"Now he is Flemister's accomplice in a hanging matter, you would say.I'm afraid you are right, Judson," was the superintendent's comment; andwith this the subject was dropped.
The early dawn of the summer morning was graying over the desert whenthe special drew into the Angels yard. Lidgerwood had the yard crewplace the service-car on the same siding with the _Nadia_, and nearenough so that his guests, upon rising, could pass across the platforms.
That done, and he saw to the doing of it himself, he climbed the stairin the Crow's Nest, meaning to snatch a little sleep before the laborsand hazards of a new day should claim him. But McCloskey, thedour-faced, was waiting for him in the upper corridor--with news thatwould not wait.
"The trouble-makers have sent us their ultimatum at last," he saidgruffly. "We cancel the new 'Book of Rules' and reinstate all the menthat have been discharged, or a strike will be declared and every wheelon the line will stop at midnight to-night."
Weary to the point of mental stagnation, Lidgerwood still had resilienceenough left to rise to the new grapple.
"Is the strike authorized by the labor union leaders?" he asked.
McCloskey shook his head. "I've been burning the wires to find out. Itisn't; the Brotherhoods won't stand for it, and our men are pulling itoff by their lonesome. But it'll materialize, just the same. Thestrikers are in the majority, and they'll scare the well-affectedminority to a standstill. Business will stop at twelve o'clock to-night."
"Not entirely," said the superintendent, with anger rising. "The mailswill be carried, and perishable freight will continue moving. Get everyman you can enlist on our side, and buy up all the guns you can find andserve them out; we'll prepare to fight with whatever weapons the otherside may force us to use. Does President Brewster know anything aboutthis?"
"I guess not. They had all gone to bed in the _Nadia_ when the grievancecommittee came up."
"That's good; he needn't know it. He is going over to the Copperette,and we must arrange to get him and his party out of town at once. Thatwill eliminate the women. See to engaging the buckboards for them, andcall me when the president's party is ready to leave. I'm going to restup a little before we lock horns with these pirates, and you'd betterdo the same after you get things shaped up for to-night's hustle."
"I'm needing it, all right," admitted the trainmaster. And then; "Wasthis passenger wreck another of the 'assisted' ones?"
"It was. Two men broke a rail-joint on Little Butte side-cutting for myspecial--and caught the delayed passenger instead. Flemister was one ofthe two."
"And the other?" said McCloskey.
Lidgerwood did not name the other.
"We'll get the other man in good time, and if there is any law in thisGod-f
orsaken desert we'll hang both of them. Have you unloaded it all?If you have, I'll turn in."
"All but one little item, and maybe you'll rest better if I don't tellyou that right now."
"Give it a name," said Lidgerwood crisply.
"Bart Rufford has broken jail, and he is here, in Angels."
McCloskey was watching his chief's face, and he was sorry to see thesudden pallor make it colorless. But the superintendent's voice wasquite steady when he said:
"Find Judson, and tell him to look out for himself. Rufford won'tforgive the episode of the 'S'-wrench. That's all--I'm going to bed."
The Taming of Red Butte Western Page 19