Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1908-12-01

the One-car train was we'll out of
the Denver yards there was jolting
fstop. and the flagman came in TO re-
port that the engine had dropped
| from the end of an open switch
blocking the main line.
Ford got out and directed the re
enrailment of the 1916. carefully re
framing from bullying the big Swede,
whose carelessness must have been
accountable. 1t was the simplest of
accidents, with nothing broken Or
disabled Under ordinary conditions.
| fifteen minutes should have covered
| the loss OF time. But the very haste
with which the men wrought was
fatal. Enrailing frogs have a way Of
turning ever al the critical instant
when the wheels are climbing, and
iack-screws bottomed on the tie-ends
do not always hold.
| Eight several times were the jack
screws adjusted and the frogs clamp
/ ed into position; but not until the
ninth trial could the perverse wheels
be induced to roll workmanlike up
the inclined planes and into place on
the rails. Ford looked at his watch
/
switches and Olson was speeding up
on the first long tangent With the
chase still in its opening mile, Mr..
North's lead had been increased from
seven hours to eight.
Leaving Denver on the spur of the
/ moment. Ford had necessarily left
many things at a standstill; and his
first care. after he had assured him
self that the race was fairly begun,
was to write out handful of tele-
| grams designed to keep the battle
alive during his enforced absence
from the firing line. The superinten-
dents desk was Hospitality unlocked
and for a busy half-nour Ford filed
blank after blank, steadying himself
against the pounding swing of the
heavily ballasted car with left-hand.
ed grip on the desk end. When there
remained no one else to remind, he
wrote out message to Adair, fore.
casting the threatened disaster, and
urging the necessity of rallying the
reconstructionists on the board of di
rectors.
THAT ought to stir him up he said
to himself, punching Adair's telegram
with the others to be sent from the
first stop where the Western Union
wires could be tapped Then he
whirled around in the swing chair and
scowled up at the little dial in the
end Of the car; scowled at the speed
recorder. and went to the door to
summon the f1agman.
Whats the matter with Olson?" he
~ Ill To- I, =. -
run since he left the Plug Mountain
Climb up over the coal and tell him
that forty miles an hour won't do fol
me tonight"
The fiagman picked up his Lantern
and went forward; and in minute OF
two later the index finger Of the
speed-recorder began to mount slowly
toward the ffties. At fifty-two miles
to the hour, Ford. sitting in the OBJ
servation. end of the car where he
could see the ghostly lines of the rails
Keeling backward into the night
smelled smoke-the unmistakable
odor Of burning oil. In three strides
he had reached the rear platform, anc
a fourth to the right-hand railing
showed him one of the car-boxes blaz
ing to heaven.
4 He pulled the cord of the air-whistle
and after the stop stood by in soul
silence while the. crew repacked the
hot box. Since he had made the
car inspectors carefully overhaul
the truck gear in the Denver
station there was no one to swear at
Olson bossed the job, did 1t neatly
and in silence, and no one said any
thing when the fireman, in his haste
to be useful, upset the dope,kettle ant
got its contents we'll sanded before
he had overtaken it in its rollins
flight down the embanklnent
+ Ford turned away and climbed int
his car at the dope-kettle incident
There are times when retreat is tn,
only recipe for self-restraint and il
Imagination he could see the gen
eral managers special ticking off thu
miles to the eastward while his owl
men were sweating over the thrice-ac
cursed journal-bearing under the col
Now, as every one knows, hot boxes
besides being preversely incurable
are the sworn enemies of high -sneed