The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1907-01-12

for the penitentiary. What can l do?'
All the while the station agent, panic
stricken, ratified on Sinclair was look
ing at his watch, casting it up. charting
it all under his thick, gray, grizzled
wool. fast as thought could compass.
No. headed for Acton, and her pace
was a hustle every mile of the way
three cars Of coal bowling down on
her, how fast he dared not think. and
through it all he was asking himself
what day 1t was. Thursday? Up!
Yes, George, his boy, was on the fiier
No. l. 1t was his day up. If they met
on a curve
"Uncouple herr roared Dad Sinclair
in giant tone.
What are you going to doT"
Burns" Numbered Dad to his fire
man, give her steam, and quick, boyl
Dump in grease, waste, OIL everything!
Are you clear there?" he cried, open
ing the throttle as he looked back.
The old engine, pulling clear of her
coaches, quivered as she gathered her
self under the steam. She leaped ahead
with a swish. The drivers churned in
the sand, bit into it with gritting tires
and forged ahead with a suck and a
hiss and roar. Before Reynolds had
fairly gathered his wits Sinclair, leav-
ing his train on the main track in front
of the depot, was Gathering over the
switch after the runaways. The wind
was terror. and they had too good q
start. But the way Soda Water Sal
took the gait when she once felt her
feet under her made the wrinkled en-
gineer at her throttle set his mouth
with the grimness of a gamester. 1t
meant the runaways-and catch them
or the ditch for Soda Water Sal, and
! the throbbing old machine seemed to
know it, for her nose hung to the steel
| like the snout of a pointer.
He was a man Of q hundred even
then-Burns-but nobody knew it then.
We hadn't thought much about Burns
before. He was a tall, lank Irish boy,
with an open face and a morning
smile. Dad Sinclair took him on be-
cause nobody else would have him
Burns was so green that Foley said
you couldn't set his name af1re. He
would, so Foley said, put out hot box
Just by blinking at it,
But every mans turn comes once
and it had come to Burns. 1t was Dick
Burns chance now to show what man
ner of stuff was bred in his long Irish
bones It was his task to make the
steam-if he could-faster than Dad
Sinclair could burn it. What use tC
grip the throttle and scheme if Bcrns
didn't furnish the power, put the life
into her heels as she raced the wind
the merciless, restless gale sweeping
over the prairie faster than horse could
fly before it?
Working smoothly and swiftly into {
dizzy whirl, the monstrous drivers tool
the steel In leaps and bounds. Dad Sin
clair, leaning from the cab window
gloatingly watched their gathering
speed, pulled the bar up notch afte
notch, and fed Burns fire into the OLE
engines arteries fast and faster thar
she could throw it into her steel hoofs.
That was the night the West En-
knew that a greenhorn had cast hi
chrysalis and stood out man-knev
that the honor roll of our frontier di
vision wanted one more name. ant
that 1t was big Dick Burns. Sinclai
hung silently desperate to the throttle
! his eyes straining into the night ahead
and the face of the long Irish boy
streaked with smut and channelet
with sweat, lit every minute with th
glare of the furnace as he fed tn
: white hot blast that leaped and curle
and foamed under the crown sheet o
Soda Water Sal.
There he stopped and sweat an
swung as she slowed and lurched an
jerked across the fish plates. Carefully
nursingly, ceaselessly he pushed tn
: steam pointer higher, higher, higher o
; the dial-and that despite the tremer
: dous drafts Of Dads throttle
T Never glance to the right or th
: left, to the track or the engineer. Fror