The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1899-05-11
but it's Boston, father. Tell them

Mohave wastes, but this was no grade
for speed. That would come later. The
heat of the desert followed the heat of
the hills as they turned east to the
Needles and the Colorado river. The
car cracked in the utter drought and
glare, and they put crushed ice to Mrs.
Cheyne's neck and toiled up the long,
long grades, past Ash Fork, towards
Flagstaff, where the forests and quar-
ries are. under the dry, remote skies.
The needle of the speed Indicator
flicked and wagged to and fro; the
cinders ratified on the roof, and a whirl
of dust sucked after the whirling
wheels The crew of the combination
sat on their hunks, painting in their
shirt sleeves, and Cheyne found himself
among them shouting old, old stories OF
the railroad that every trainman knows.
above the roar of the car. He told them
about his son, and how the sea had
given up its dead. and they nodded and
spat and rejoiced with him; asked after
''her, back there" and whether she
could stand it if the engineer "let her
out piece" and Cheyne thought she
could. Accordingly the great fire horse
was '1et out" from Flagstaff to Wins
low, till division superintendent pro-
tested.
But Mrs. Cheyne, in the boudoir state
room, where the French maid, sallow-
white with fear, clung to the silver door
handle, only moaned a little and begged
her husband to bid them hurry" And
SO they dropped the dry sands and
moon-strAck rocks of Arizona behind
them and grilled on till the crash of
the couplings and the wheeze of the
brake hose told them they were at
Coolidge by the continental divide.
Three bold and experienced men
cool, confident and dry when they be-
gan; white, quivering and wet when
they finished their trick at those ter
rible wheels-swung her over the great
lift from Albuquerque to Glorietta and
beyond Springer, up and up to the
Ration tunnel on the state line, whence
they dropped rocking into La Junta,
had sight of the Arkansaw and tore
down the long slope to Dodge City,
where Cheyne took comfort once again
from setting his watch an hour ahead.
There was very little talk in the car.
The secretary and typewriter sat to-
gether on the stf ped Spanish leather
cushions by the TAte glass observation
window at the rear end, watching the
surge and ripple of the ties crowded
back behind them, and, it is believed,
making notes of the scenery. Cheyne
moved nervously between his own eX-
travagant gorgeousness and the naked
necessity of the combination, an unlit
cigar in his teeth, till the ptying crews
forgot that he was their tribal enemy
and did their best to entertain him.
AT night the punched electrics lit up
that distressful palace of all the lux
uries, and they Jared sumptuously,
swinging on through the emptiness of
abject desolation. Now they heard the
swish of water tank and the cultural
voice of a Chinaman, the clink-clink of
hammers that tested the Krupp steel
wheels and the oath of a tramp chased
off the rear pia form; now the solid
crash of coal shot into the tender: and
now beating back of noises as they
flew past waiting train. Now they
looked out into great abysses, trestle
purring beneath their tread, or up to
rocks that barred out half the stars.
Now scaur and ravine changed and
rolled back to jagged mountains on the
horizons edge, and now broke into hills
lower and lower, till at last came the
true plains.
AT Dodge City an unknown hand
threw in copy of Kansas paper con-
tanning some sort of an interview with
Harvey, who had evidently fallen in
with an enterprising reporter, tele-
graphed from Boston. The joyful jour
nalese revealed that it was beyond ques-
ton their boy, and it soothed Mrs.
Cheyne for awhile. Her one word
hurry" was conveyed by the crews to
the engineers at Nickerson, Topeka and
Marceline, where the grades are easy,
and they brushed the continent behind
them. Towns and villages were close
together now and man could feel here
that he moved among people.
- can't see the dial. and my eyes ache
so. What are we doing?"
The very best we can, mamma.
There's no sense in getting in before
the limited. We'd only have to wait"
81 don't care. ] want to feel we're
moving. Sit down and tell me the
miles"
Cheyne sat down and read the dial
for her (there were some miles which
stand for records to this day. but the
70-foot car never changed it's long
steamer-like roll, moving through the
heat with the hum of giant bee. Yet
the speed was not enough for Mrs.
Cheyne; and the heat, the remorseless
August heat, was making her giddy:
the clock hands would not move, and
when, oh, when would they be in Chi
cago?
II is not true that. as they changed
engines at Fort Madison, Cheyne passed
over TO the Amalgamated Brotherhood
of Locomotive Engineers an endow-
ment sufficient to enable them to fight
him and his fellows on equal terms for