The Green Forest tribune., 1909-02-12

| of sitting behind the first electric head | light ever placed on one of our en zines. My fireman and I were very proud of it, and were anxious to set how it would work. After we hat made 60 miles and noted how mucf stronger the light was, and how much plainer and farther we could see by this light than by the old lamp, I said
 John, tonight we can get a better view of what flags us in No. A.
 "The night was dark, and as we climbed up the mountains evidence o1 heavy rains was apparent, and a mis- hung over everything. All went wei | till we were signaled down to a deac stop, and lost 30 minutes, while land slide was removed from the track.
 Fifty miles an hour was our regu lar schedule and anything that hat heretofore got out of our way would not have as much time tonight for in making up lost time, I was pushing the 525 at 70 miles when we stuck hel nose into No. 4.
 '' Now for our figure in whitei'
 Will she get out of our way-get ir the clear?'
 As we dashed through every nerve was at it's highest tension, my eyes were riveted along the beam of cleo tric light.
 We neared the exit We reached it! q looked over at John, as much al to ask:
 What has become of the figure in white?"
 When in answer to my mental question he jumped from his seat clutched my arm and shouted:
 For Gods sake-stop Wonder she stands in the bridge but now-now she's in black
 Looking ahead I saw what made my heart leap, for, sure enough, there stood a quivering black object in the center of the bridge, only one-quarte1 of mile away. Quick as thought knocked the throttle in, turned on air and reversed her-coming to stoI less than 200 yards from the bridge By this time our conductor, lantern in hand, was out by the side of the train and l called for him to come forward and showed him what had caused me to stop
 What's that crazy woman doing out there tonight? Do you suppose there's anything wrong with the bridge? Let's go ahead and seer
 Come on, John, and go with us
 "On the way I had all kinds of thoughts. The past and the present were enough to make a fellow think.
 "As we neared the river we could hear it roaring, when John, who was ahead, suddenly stopped with the startling information
 The bridge is gone
 Sure enough it was, but not so with the black, quivering signal It still stood there, silent and ominous warn ing-stood there above the roaring wa ter with no more support than the air itself
 So we left it.
 AS we walked back to the train we all tried to explain who what, or which it was, but evidently to no ones satisfaction. Several times we stopped and looked back to see if it had gone Each time we saw the same black whatever it was-that had saved all our lives
 AS we neared the engine we saw a white object lying on the pilot John rushed forward, picked it up, and held it out at arms length:
 "A snow-white pigeon!
 Naturally, I glanced upward, and as I did so my eyes fell upon an ob ject sticking on the very center of the glass of the headlight.
 John, said, climb up there and ! see what that is'
 .He hurriedly did so, and holding il up, said
 Its a white feather out of that pigeon we've struck and killed
 Put that feather back there,' ex citedly called the conductor.
 Sticking it back on the glass, which was wet from heavy mist, John said:
 There you are; what about it?
 Look toward the bridge from the conductor.
 There stood the warning figure in black.
 Now take the feather away
 'It was removed
 Now look toward the bridge
 
 "The figure in black had disap. peared.
 For months we had frightened that white pigeon from her roasting place in the tunnel. She had flown out ahead of us till struck, and killed, by oul electric headlight when one white feather cast black shadow-when white turned black"