The Washburn leader. [volume] (Washburn, McLean County, N.D.) 1890-1986, 1890-08-16
A NIGHT WITH A CORPSE
AN EXPRESS MESSENGERS ADVENT
URE IN THE WILD WEST.

Ohc in l0C WILL WG0Is
Half Crazcd by the Sight of a Big Pine
Box-Made Nervous by Having $780,
900 Entrusted to His Cnrc-The Body
in tho Coffin Comes to Life.
In an alley which By m easy descent
leads from lower Broadway to the inferno
of drays, ferries and gamins on North
! river q chop house burrows beneath the
confusion OF that quarter. In the little
! basement room are cobwebs, tallow can
dies, pewter tobies, 'alf-and-'alf and steaks
of "hung' and "high" meat in the ap-
proved English fashion.
There, late one night, sat a half dozen
workmen from Il big express building near
by and the interloper who sets down This
record.
The talk had sunk to the matter of
corpses, which often travel by express,
though never by invitation of the express
messenger.
During the winter of 1886" said a burly
man with a shock of black hair, II was in
the Wells-Furgo service between Kansas
City and San Francisco. The run was
made upon the Atchison, Topeka and
Sante Fe and Southern Pacific railways,
that join at Deming. On Christmas eve,
bearing eastward, with the journey SO far
done from Frisco, the train drew out OF
Yuma, facing the Arizona desert in the
midst of al astonishing storm Of slcet and
rain. Yuma marks the California line,
and there, as we took on the stage com
pany's strong box, l counted Upon the last
disturbance of the night. Until daybreak
the journey lay through alkali stretches,
where at every 100 miles the train rushes
shrieking through a poor, monumental
cluster of huts and halts long enough for
the locomotive to take on water.
"Unscheduled stops, however, were not
infrequent at that time, and there hung
within the car Il rack of repeating car
bines, charged and primed.
TRAVELLING WITH 100000.
SIN taking account of the Yuma strong
box, weighing nearly two hundred pounds
and 'vouchered' to contain $50, 900 in gold,
I glanced at the carbines. l looked again
when | remembered that the safe contained
as much more.
"Joachim Murilla burned me out of the
car for less than half that, and gave me
the bullet that lanes my back" said the
burly maj with a smile. 81 had hardly Il
dollar in the car the night ] stood off the
rustlers at Dodge City. l reflected, what
will the company expect now with 100000
on my shoulders?
II assorted cXpressage, listed bills and
overhaulcd the carbines as the train flew
and the storm beat. 1 knew the route SO
well that l could call the towns and tanks
as the engine whistled or stopped.
"'Toltcc,' l thought, as ut midnight the
| l~~-,1 - L. I1,.,,H ~, r,,syl tNNn rnnco
her with a ''howdy." No, by George! we're
going to STOP
II opened the door enough to see u Ian
tern swaying at a small station and a little
group on the platform surrounding a box
and evidently preparing to put it on board.
"'Tumble it in quick l said.
":A little slow, partner replied a man
on the platform. It's IL coffin
GA moment later I was alone with the
corpse in a prison as secure as a tomb,
while the wheels roared beneath and tie
storm raved outside.
"Somehow l was nervous and couldn't
keep my eyes off that coffin. I fancied that
it moved and was slowly rising up on end,
or that it was preparing an onslaught;
then that it was about to disclose the dead.
''The last of these notions-that the oc-
cupant of the coffin might liberate herself
got hold of me and l couldn't shake it
off. The box was of unusual size and cx-
ceptionally ill made. The wood was rough,
warped and filled with knots and knot
holes. All this might easily have been due
to the limited facilities of a desert town.
I don't know why, but 1 couldn't resist
turning it over, face down.. 1t seemed to
me to roll horribly.
"Then imagined I heard a noise at the
car door and at the same moment a move
ment in the coffin. I knew it was foolish,
but I rolled the stage %colnpany's strong
box, with it's 200 pounds of gold. to the
coffin and set it upon the lid toward the
larger end.
SHOOTING AT A BOX.
s'ThenI lighted my pipe. Noticed after
ward, though I didn't think of it at the
time, that most of the knotholes toward
the head of the coffin were covered and
sealed by the flat iron bottom of the strong
box.
"Several minutes passed, and the engine
had blown its view halloa!' at a wayside
cattle town, when suddenly sounds began
to issue from the box. There was nodoubt
about it this time. There was a scuff1ing,
a grooming, u kicking against thes sides.
ITO say that 1 was Mortified doesn't X
press it. The struggle in the box continued.
I staggered to the gun rack, tore down a
carbine, cooked, aimed and fired it through
the box ten feet away.
"Muf1ed shrieks now mingled with the
humping and threshing in the box. Ifired
again. The shrieks were redoubled. l be-
came frantic and shrieked like a lunatic
myself. while I fred again and again at the
box until the magazine was exhausted, and
then I rushed to get another.
"But the pine box was split and torn;
the iron box was slowly crushing it down;
through gaps in the wood blood was
streaming and no sounds whatever issued
from the coffin.
"Nnally a long, deep groan escaped from
the box. Plainly it was a mans voice. !
managed to tear away the shattered lid.
There was no coffin inside, but only the
body of a man torn with a dozen terrible
wounds. Iii.