Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1908-12-31

Gus. HIS aim was true to q handS
breadth: bullet from Adair's pistol
have done no more. With Cry that
was fairly shogged out of him by the
impact of the iron missile, the man
flung away his burden, dropped in his
tracks and lay groaninS.
They looked for another storm Of
| lead to follow this and Rugged the floor
| in readiness for it. When it did NOT
come. Ford crept to the hole in the
| car floor and listened long and IN
tently. Half an hour he had given
Frisbie to get his track-layers together
and to cover the eight miles of rough
laid rails with the construction train.
What was delaying him?
You said Gallagher ditched you.
car: did it block the track?" he asked
of Adair
! "It did, didn't it, Brissac?" was the
answer, and the assistant confirmed it.
"Then that is why Frisbie can't get
to us. Was Gallagher's engine still
on the rails?"
1T was"
Ford sat up and nursed his knees.
dick will make way if he can't fad
one ready made. But it may take
hours Meanwhile, if these devils
have scouts out
! "Yes?" saia Adair.
They'll bring the warning, and
there won't be much more time wasted
in experiments. They can do us UP,
/ if they get right down to business"
What are they doing now" Ada'r
asked of Prissac who was on watch
on the commissary side.
I'll be hanged II know. 1t looks
| like a young cannon and it's pointed
this way BY George. it's coming
coming by it's all alone. too
By this time they were all watching
| the new menace. 3rissac's descrip-
ton fitted it accurately; cylindrical
object mounted upon a pair of small
/ wheels taken from the commissary
store room truck. 1t came toward the
Nadia by curious surges-a rush for
ward and pause-trailing what APP
peared to be long iron rod behind it.
Ford hit upon the explanation. The
cylindrical thing was another gas pipe
bomb; the iron tail was a smaller
pipe containing and armoring the fuse.
and serving also as the means of pro-
pulsion They were coupling on adj
ditional lengths of the fuse carrying
pipe as they were needed: hence tho
jerking advances and pauses.
Adair's low laugh was as care free
as ever.
"A practical Illustration of the tail
wagging the dog" he remarked. But
the dog will wag us good and plenty
when they get him where they want
him You can't fish that thing up
through the hole with your wire-G!'
crop the tall
"No; it's run for it this time said
Ford, rising and stripping his coat.
But Brissac was pointing to three
or four men lodging from shadow 10
shadow under the masthead lights and
Acircling wide to tighten the line OF
! decentralization.
I'VE shan't run very far he com
mented.
1t seemed a hair-graying age to the
watchers at the Nadia's windows be
. fore the men behind the commissary
barricade got their internal machine
placed to thei. liking. They stared at
, it, all three of them, fascinated. deal
and blind to all else. A minimizaG
, shudder as of drumming wheels Of
. escaping steam was in the air when
, thew saw the flare Of the match tina;
! betokened the firing of the fuse, but
no one of three heard it.
1t was when the spluttering line o.
fire had buried itself in it's tube thai
: they became suddenly alive to the uri
= belieyable fact that locomotive wa:
laundering down the yard on the Nh
dia's track A rife cracked: then an
other and third; but the engine came
5 on as if its driver bore a charme;
life.
Surely Michael Gallagher must hav'
prayed to the saints that night HI
( did not know that the very second;
| had become priceless: he knew ono
I that Frisbie had sent him on ahead t.
:, snake the presidents car out of tbs
: Horse Creek yard as quickly as pos
9 sible. Yet if he could have seen tn
= ! bomb and the suffering fuse. N
3 could not have slowed more deity t.
n let the automatic couplers clutch eacl
other, nor at the touch and CLAMP
F: could he have reversed and gathere'
Il Roadway with greater skill:
:, The three occupants OF the Nadi
= staggered to their feet as the privai
,. car lunged ahead in the grasp of TIL
,, big engine. increasing speed with ey
: cry wheelturn Mechanically, and a
= one man. they rushed to the rear pla
= form. The mock cannon stood wher
. lit had been thrust: but in the cam
y, street handful of men were wres
:. ling madly with the pipe fuse-carriel
:, breaking it. wrenching it i'll piece
; and stamping futilely upon the snak,
;, like thing kissing and splitting unde
II their feet.
d Look" sobbed Adair .They kno'
y they've discovered that boX-car! OF
e why in the name OF the pitiful Chris
don't they drop it and run.
V. This from the man who had laug!
l. ed, and aimed and fired and laughe
n again. in the heat OF battle. b.
Ford's reioinder was the. bitter ma!
;s diction of the defeated industry ca
~ tain. Damn their worthless lives
!, he stormed in the next half minut
+. the Pacific Southwestern stands
lose a quarter of million dollars
It was but vanishing glimpse TIL
y, they had of the handful of NADINE
"a stamping and dancing under the mas