The Mountain Divide

by Spearman, Frank H

  “Yes,” returned Bob, meditatively. “I reckon an Indian did it, but you are the Indian.”

  “Come, stop your gabble, you boys!” blustered the doughty engineman, speaking to everybody and with a show of authority. “Bucks, notify the despatcher I’m in the river.”

  “Get back to your engine, then,” said Scott. “Don’t ask Bucks to send in a false report. And afterward,” suggested Scott, “you and I, Dan, can go over and clean the Indians out of the cotton-woods.”

  Baggs took umbrage at the suggestion, and no amount of chaffing from Scott disconcerted him, but after Bucks reported the catastrophe to Medicine Bend the wires grew warm. Baxter was very angry. A crew was got together at Medicine Bend, and a wrecking-train made up with a gang of bridge and track men and despatched to the scene of the disaster. The operating department was so ill equipped to cope with any kind of a wreck that it was after midnight before the train got under way.

  The sun had hardly risen next morning, when Bob Scott, without any words of explanation, ran into Bucks’s room, woke him hurriedly, and, bidding him dress quickly, ran out. It took only a minute for Bucks to spring from his cot and get into his clothes and he hastened out of doors to learn what the excitement was about. Scott was walking fast down toward the bridge. Bucks joined him.

  “What is it, Bob?” he asked hastily. “Indians?”

  “Indians?” echoed Bob scornfully. “I guess not this time. I’ve heard of Indians stealing pretty nearly everything on earth––but not this. No Indian in this country, not even Turkey Leg, ever stole a locomotive.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean Dan Baggs’s engine is gone.”

  Bucks’s face turned blank with amazement. “Gone?” he echoed incredulously. He looked at Scott with reproach. “You are joking me.”

  “See if you can find it,” returned Scott tersely.

  As they hastened on, Bucks looked to the spot where the engine had lain the night before. It was no longer there.

  He was too stunned to ask further questions. The two strode along the ties in silence. Eagerly Bucks ran to the creek bank and scanned more closely the sandy bed. It was there that the wrecked engine and tender had lain the night before. The sand showed no disturbance whatever. It was as smooth as a table. But nothing was to be seen of the engine or tender. These had disappeared as completely as if an Aladdin’s slave, at his master’s bidding, had picked them from their resting place and set them on top of some distant sand-hill.

  “Bob,” demanded Bucks, breathless, “what does it mean?”

  “It means the company is out one brand-new locomotive.”

  “But what has happened?” asked Bucks, rubbing his eyes to make sure he was not dreaming. “Where is the engine?”

  Scott pointed to the spot where the engine had lain. “It is in that quicksand,” said he.

  The engine, during the night, had, in fact, sunk completely into the sand. No trace was left of it or of its tender. Not a wheel or cab corner remained to explain; all had mysteriously and completely disappeared.

  “Great Heavens, Bob!” exclaimed Bucks. “How will they ever get it out?”

  “The only way they’ll ever get it out, I reckon, is by keeping Dan Baggs digging there till he digs it out.”

  “Dan Baggs never could dig that out––how long would it take him?”

  “About a hundred and seventy-five years.”

  As Scott spoke, the two heard footsteps behind them. Baggs and Delaroo, who had slept at the section-house, were coming down the track. “Baggs,” said Scott ironically, as the sleepy-looking engineman approached, “you were right about the Indians being in the cotton-woods last night.”

  “I knew I was right,” exclaimed Baggs, nodding rapidly and brusquely. “Next time you’ll take a railroad man’s word, I guess. Where are they?” he added, looking apprehensively around. “What have they done?”

  “They have stolen your engine,” answered Scott calmly. He pointed to the river bed. Baggs stared; then running along the bank he looked up-stream and down and came back sputtering.

  “Why––what––how––what in time! Where’s the engine?”

  “Indians,” remarked Scott sententiously, looking wisely down upon the sphinx-like quicksand. “Indians, Dan. They must have loaded the engine on their ponies during the night––did you hear anything?” he demanded, turning to Bucks. Bucks shook his head. “I thought I did,” continued Scott. “Thought I heard something––what’s that?”

  Baggs jumped. All were ready to be startled at anything––for even Scott, in spite of his irony, had been as much astounded as any one at the first sight of the empty bed of sand. It was enough to make any one feel queerish. The noise they heard was the distant rumble of the wrecking-train.

  In the east the sun was bursting over the sand-hills into a clear sky. Bucks ran to the station to report the train and the disappearance of the engine. When he had done this he ran back to the bridge. The wrecking-train had pulled up near at hand and the greater part of the men, congregated in curious groups on the bridge, were talking excitedly and watching several men down on the sand, who with spades were digging vigorously about the spot which Baggs and Delaroo indicated as the place where the engine had fallen. Others from time to time joined them, as they scraped out wells and trenches in the moist sand. These filled with water almost as rapidly as they were opened.

  Urged by their foreman, a dozen additional men joined the toilers. They dug in lines and in circles, singly and in squads, broadening their field of prospecting as the laughter and jeers of their companions watching from the bridge spurred them to further toil. But not the most diligent of their efforts brought to light a single trace of the missing engine.

  The wrecking crew was mystified. Many refused to believe the engine had ever fallen off the bridge. But there was the broken track! They could not escape the evidence of their eyes, even if they did scoff at the united testimony of the two men that had been on the engine when it leaped from the bridge and the two that had afterward seen it lying in the sand.

  The track and bridge men without more ado set to work to repair the damage done the track and bridge. A volley of messages came from head-quarters. At noon a special car, with Colonel Stanley and the division heads arrived to investigate.

  The digging was planned and directed on a larger scale and resumed with renewed vigor. Sheet piling was attempted. Every expedient was resorted to that Stanley’s scientific training could suggest to bring to light the buried treasure––for an engine in those days, and so far from locomotive works, was very literally a treasure to the railroad company. Stanley himself was greatly upset. He paced the ties above where the men were digging, directing and encouraging them doggedly, but very red in the face and contemplating the situation with increasing vexation. He stuck persistently to the work till darkness set in. Meantime, the track had been opened and the wrecking-train crossed the bridge and took the passing track. The moon rose full over the broad valley and the silent plains. Men still moved with lanterns under the bridge. Bucks, after a hard day’s work at the key, was invited for supper to Stanley’s car, where the foremen had assembled to lay new plans for the morrow. But Bob Scott, when Bucks told him, shook his head.

  “They are wasting their work,” he murmured. “The company is ‘out.’ That engine is half-way to China by this time.”

  It might, at least, as well have been, as far as the railroad company was concerned. The digging and sounding and scraping proved equally useless. The men dug down almost as deep as the piling that supported the bridge itself––it was in vain. In the morning the sun smiled at their efforts and again at night the moon rose mysteriously upon them, and in the distant sand-hills a thousand coyotes yelped a requiem for the lost locomotive. But no human eye ever saw so much as a bolt of the great machine again.

  * * *

  CHAPTER XIV

  The loss of the engine at Goose Creek brought an unexpected relief to Bucks. His go
od work in the emergency earned for him a promotion. He was ordered to report to Medicine Bend for assignment, and within a week a new man appeared at Goose Creek to relieve him.

  There was little checking up to do. Less than thirty minutes gave Bucks time to answer all of his successor’s questions and pack his trunk. He might have slept till morning and taken a passenger train to Medicine Bend, but the prospect of getting away from Goose Creek at once was too tempting to dismiss. A freight train of bridge timbers pulled across the bridge just as Bucks was ready to start. Pat Francis, the doughty conductor, who, single-handed, had held Iron Hand’s braves at bay, was in charge of the train. He offered Bucks a bench and blanket in the caboose for the night, and promised to have him in Medicine Bend in the morning; Bucks, nothing loath, accepted. His trunk was slung aboard and the train pulled out for Medicine Bend.

  The night proved unseasonably cold. Francis built a blazing fire in the caboose stove and afterward shared his hearty supper with his guest. As the train thundered and rumbled slowly over the rough track, the conductor, while Bucks stretched out on the cushions, entertained him with stories of his experiences on the railroad frontier––not suspecting that before morning he should furnish for his listener one of the strangest of them.

  Bucks curled up in his blanket late, but, in spite of unaccustomed surroundings and the pitch and lurch of the caboose, which was hardly less than the tossing of a ship in a gale, Bucks dozed while his companion and the brakeman watched. The latter, a large, heavy fellow, was a busy man, as the calls for brakes––and only hand-brakes were then known––were continual. There were no other passengers, and except for the frequent blasts of the engine whistle the night passed quietly enough.

  Bucks dreamed of fighting bears with Scuffy, and found himself repeatedly rolling down precipitous mountains without landing successfully anywhere. Then he quieted into a heavy, unbroken sleep and found himself among the hills of Alleghany, hunting rabbits that were constantly changing into antelope and escaping him. Fatigued with his unceasing efforts, he woke.

  A gray light, half dusk, revealed the outlines of the cab interior, as he opened his eyes, and a thundering, rumbling sound that rang in his ears and seemed everywhere about him cleared his mind and brought him back to his situation.

  It was cold, and he looked at the stove. The fire was out. On the opposite side of the cab the brakeman lay on the cushions fast asleep. Outside, the thundering noises came continuously from everywhere at once. It did not occur to Bucks that the caboose was standing still. It trembled and vibrated more or less, but he noticed there was no longer any lurching and thought they had reached remarkably smooth track. They were certainly not standing still, he assured himself, as he rubbed his eyes to wake up. But perhaps they might be in the yards at Medicine Bend, with other trains rolling past them.

  Somewhat confused he raised the curtain of the window near him. The sky was overcast and day was breaking. He rose higher on his elbow to look more carefully. Everywhere that his eye could reach toward the horizon the earth seemed in motion, rising and falling in great waves. Was it an earthquake? He rubbed his eyes. It seemed as if everywhere thousands of heads were tossing, and from this continual tossing and trampling came the thunder and vibration. Moreover, the caboose was not moving; of this he felt sure. Amazed, and only half-awake, he concluded that the train must have left the track and dropped into a river. The uncertainty of his vision was due, he now saw, to a storm that had swept the plains. It was blowing, with a little snow, and in the midst of the snow the mysterious waves were everywhere rising and falling.

  Bucks put the curtain completely aside. The sound of his feet striking the floor aroused the conductor, who rose from his cushion with a start. “I’ve been asleep,” he exclaimed, rubbing his eyes. “Where are we, Bucks?”

  “That is what I am trying to figure out.”

  “Where is the brakeman?” demanded Francis. As he asked the question he saw the big fellow asleep in the corner. Francis shook him roughly. “That comes of depending on some one else,” he muttered to Bucks. “I went to sleep on his promise to watch for an hour––he knew I had been up all last night and told me to take a nap. You see what happened. The moment I went to sleep, he went to sleep,” exclaimed Francis in disgust. “Wake up!” he continued brusquely to the drowsy brakeman. “Where are we? What have we stopped for? What’s all this noise?” Though he asked the questions fast, he expected no answer to any of them from the confused trainman and waited for none. Instead, he threw up a curtain and looked out. “Thunder and guns! Buffaloes!” he cried, and seizing his lantern ran out of the caboose door and climbed the roof-ladder. Bucks was fast upon his heels.

  The freight train stood upon a wide plain and in the midst of thousands of buffaloes travelling south. As far as their eyes could reach in all directions, the astonished railroad men beheld a sea of moving buffaloes. Without further delay Francis, followed by Bucks, started along the running boards for the head end of the train.

  The conductor found his train intact; but when he reached the head end he could find neither engine, tender, nor crew. All had disappeared. Running down the ladder of the head box-car, the conductor examined the draw-bar for evidence of an accident. The coupling was apparently uninjured but the tender and engine were gone. Francis, more upset than Bucks had ever seen him, or ever afterward saw him, walked moodily back to the caboose. What humiliated him more than the strange predicament in which he found himself was that he had trusted to a subordinate and gone to sleep in his caboose while on duty.

  “Serves me right,” he muttered, knitting his brows. “Brakeman,” he added sternly, “take your lantern and flags and get out behind. The minute the buffaloes get across the track, go back two hundred yards and protect us. I will watch the head end. While these buffaloes are crossing they will be protection enough. Soon as it is daylight we will find out where we are.”

  The snow continued falling and the buffaloes drifted south with the storm, which was squally. Every moment, as the sky and landscape lightened, Francis, whom Bucks had followed forward, expected to see the last of the moving herd. But an hour passed and a second hour without showing any gaps in the enormous fields. And the brighter the daylight grew, the more buffaloes they could see.

  Francis stormed at the situation, but he could do nothing. Finally, and as hope was deserting him, he heard the distant tooting of an engine whistle. It grew louder and louder until Bucks could hear the ringing of a bell and the hissing of the open cylinder cocks of a slow-moving locomotive. Gaps could now be discerned in the great herds of buffaloes, and through the blowing snow the uncertain outlines of the backing engine could dimly be seen. Francis angrily watched the approaching engine, and, as soon as it had cleared the last of the stumbling buffaloes on the track, he walked forward to meet it and greeted the engineman roughly.

  “What do you mean by setting my train out here on the main track in the middle of the night?” he demanded ferociously, and those that knew Pat Francis never wanted to add to his anger when it was aroused.

  “Don’t get excited,” returned Dan Baggs calmly, for it was the redoubtable Baggs who held the throttle. “I found I was getting short of water. We are just coming to Blackwood Hill and I knew I could never make Blackwood Siding with the train. So I uncoupled and ran to the Blackwood tank for water. We are all right now. Couple us up. If I hadn’t got water, we should have been hung up here till we got another engine.”

  “Even so,” retorted Francis, “you needn’t have been all night about it.”

  “But when we started back there were about ten million buffaloes on the track. If I had been heading into them with the cow-catcher I shouldn’t have been afraid. But I had to back into them, and if I had crippled one it would have upset the tender.”

  “Back her up,” commanded Francis curtly, “and pull us out of here.”

  Meantime there was much excitement at the despatchers’ office in Medicine Bend over the lost train. It had been rep
orted out of White Horse Station on time, and had not reported at Blackwood. For hours the despatcher waited vainly for some word from the bridge timbers. When the train reported at Blackwood Station, the message of Francis explaining the cause of the tie-up seemed like a voice from the tombs. But the strain was relieved and the train made fast time from Blackwood in. About nine o’clock in the morning it whistled for the Medicine Bend yards and a few moments later Bucks ran upstairs in the station building to report for assignment.

  * * *

  CHAPTER XV

  He found Baxter needing a man in the office, and Bucks was asked to substitute until Collins, the despatcher who was ill, could take his trick again. This brought Bucks where he was glad to be, directly under Stanley’s eye, but it brought also new responsibilities, and opened his mind to the difficulties of operating a new and already over-taxed line in the far West, where reliable men and available equipment were constantly at a premium.

  The problem of getting and keeping good men was the hardest that confronted the operating department, and the demoralization of the railroad men from the life in Medicine Bend grew steadily worse as the new town attracted additional parasites. When Bucks, after his return, took his first walk after supper up Front Street, he was not surprised at this. Medicine Bend was more than ten times as noisy, and if it were possible to add any vice to its viciousness this, too, it would seem, had been done.

  As was his custom, he walked to the extreme end of Front Street and turning started back for the station, when he encountered Baxter, the chief despatcher. Baxter saw Bucks first and spoke.

  “I thought you were taking your sleep at this time,” returned Bucks, greeting him.

  “So I should be,” he replied, “but we are in trouble. Dan Baggs is to take out the passenger train to-night, and no one can find him. He is somewhere up here in one of these dives and has forgotten all about his engine. It is enough to set a man crazy to have to run trains with such cattle. Bucks, suppose you take one side of the street while I take the other, and help me hunt him up.”