The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-11-02

Llng mountain, the crews settled them
selves for the shock.
AT such a moment there Is nothing
to be done. If anything goes wrong
eternity is too close to consider There
comes a muff1ed drumming on the
steam-chests-a stagger and a terrific
lmpact-and then the recoiI like ehe
stroke Of a trip hammer The snow
shoots into the air fifty feet and the
wind carries a cloud of fieecy con-
fusion over the ram and out of the
cut The cabs were buried in white
and the great steel frames Of the en-
gines sprung like knitting needles an
Ger the frightful blow.
Pausing for hardly a breath, the sig
mailing again began. Then the back
ing; up and UP and up the line; and
again the massive machines were
hurried screaming into the cut.
You're getting there, Georgia ex-
claimed Sankey, when the rolling and
could tell a thing about it, for it was
snow and snow; above and behind,
and ahead and beneath. Sinclair
coughed the fakes out Of his eyes and
nose and mouth like a baffled collie.
He looked doubtful of the claim until
the mist had blown clear and the
qulVerlng monsters were again recalled
for a dash. Then it was plain that
Sankey's instinct was right; they were
gaining.
Again they went in, lifting very
avalanche over the stacks. packing the
banks Of the cut with walls hard as
ice. Again as the drivers stuck they
raced in a frenzy, and into the shrek
of the wind went the unearthly scrape
of the overloaded safeties.
Slowly and sullenly the machines
We're backed again.
She's doing the work, George"
cried, Sanzey. For that kind
rotary. Look everything over
now while I go back and see how the
boys are standing it, Then Wen give
her one more. and give it the hardest
kind"
And they did give her one more
and another. Men at Santiago put up
no stouter fight than they made that
Sunday morning in the canyon of the
Blackwood. Once and twice more they
went in. And the second time the
humping drummed more deeply; the
drivers held, pushed, painted, and
gained against the white waII-heaved
and stumbled ahead-and with a yell
from Sinclair and Sankey and the fire.
man, the double header shot her nose
into the clear over the Blackwood
gorge. AS engine after engine few
past the divided walls. each cab took
up the cry-it was the widest shout
that ever crowned victory.
Through they went and half way
across the bridge before they could
check their monster catapult. Then at
a half full they shot it back at the
cut-it worked as we'll one way as the
oti
We thing is DONE" declared San
Then they got into position up
line for a final shoot to clean the
stern cut and to get the head for
dash across the bridge into the west
end of the canyon, where lay another
mountain of snow to split.
Look the machines over close
boys said Sankey to the engineers.
IF nOthing's sprung Wen take a full
head across the gOrge-the bridge will
carry anything-and buck the west cut
Then after we get No. through this
afternoon NeighbOr can get his baby
cabs in here and keep 'em chasing all
night; but it's done showing" he
added, looking into the leaden sky.
He had everything figured out for
the master mechanic-the shrewd,
kindly old man. There's no man on
earth like a good Indian; and for that
matter, none like a bad one. Sankey
knew by a military instinct just what
had TO be done and how to do il. If
he had lived he was to have been as
sistant superintendent. That was the
word which leaked from headquarters
after he got killed.
And with a vOlley of jokes between
the cabs and laughing and a yelling
between toOts. down went Sankey's
double header again into the Blackwood
gorge.
At the same moment, by an awful
misunderstanding of orders, down
came the big rotary from the west end
with a dozen cars of coal behind it.
Mile after mile il had wOrmed east
through the western cut of the Black
wood, crashed through the drift San
key was aiming for, and whirled then
out into the open, dead against him,
at forty miles an hour. Each train,
in order to make the grade and the
blockade, was straining the cylinders.
Through the swiriing snow which
half hid the bridge and swept between
the rushing ploughs Sinclair saw them
coming. He yelled. Sankey saw them
P fraction of a second later, and while
Sinclair struggled with the throttle and
the air, Sanlxey gave the alarm through
the whistle to the poor fellows in the
blind pockets behind. But the track
was at the worst. Where there was no
snow there We're whiskers; oil itself
couldn't have been worse TO stop on.
II was the old and deadly peril of
fighting blockades from both ends on
a single track
The great rams OF steel and fire had
done their work. and with their COM
mon enemy overcome. they dashed at
each other frenzied across the Black
wood gorge.
The fireman at the first cry shot out
the side. Sankey yelled at Sinclair to
jump. But George shook his head: he
never would jump Without hesitating
an instant, Sankey caught him in his
arms, tore him from the levers, planted
a mighty foot and hurled Sinclair like
a block of coal through the gangway
out into the gorge. The other cabs
We're already emptied: but the Instant
delay in front cost Sankey's life. Be
fore he could turn the rotary crashed
into the 566. They reared like noun
tain lions, and pitched headlong into
the gorge; Sankey went under them.
He could have saved himself; he
chose to save George. There wasn't
time to do both; ne had to choose, and
he chose instinctively. Did he, maybe,
think in that flash Of Meta and Of
whom she needed mOst-Of a young
and stalwart protector better than an
Old and a failing one2 I do not know;
I know only what he did.
Everyone who jumped got clear. Sin
clair lit IN twenty feet of snow and
they pulled him out with a rope; he
wasn't scratched: even the bridge was
not badly strained. No. l pulled
over it next day. Sanl1ey was right
there was no more snow; not enough to
hide the dead engines on the rocks: