The daily banner. (Cambridge, Md.) 1897-2008, 1914-12-14
CHAPTER xxxVl.
Detail.


Across the plain purple shadows
were sweeping, close-ranked, like some
vast dark army invading the land,
pouring on over the rampant Of noun.
tains in the east.
Within the rim Of hills that ringed
fange of a titanic saucer, silence
brooded and solitude held sway
dwarfing the town of Detail that oc-
cupied the approximate middle of the
sagebrush waste, to proportions even
less significant than might be inferred
from the candor of it's christening.
A platform, siding, water tank, q
Wells-Fargo office and telegraph and
ticket Office, backed by three rough
frame buildings; that is Detail item.
lied completely.
Shortly after nightfall the steel rib
bons of the Santa Fe began to hum. A
headlight peered suspiciously round a
shoulder of the eastern range, took
heart of courage to find the plain still
wrapped in peace, and trudged stolid-
ly toward Detail, the engine whose
eye it was pulling after it a string of
freight cars, both fiat and box.
At Detail the train paused. Its
crew alighted and engaged in ami
mated argument Detail gathered that
the excitement was due to the unac-
countable disappearance of the ca
boose; none seemed to have any no
ton as to how it could have broken
loose; yet missing it conspicuously
was.
In the pause that followed, while a
report was telegraphed to headquar-
tiers and instructions returned to pro-
coed without delay, one Of the train
men spied boyish figure lurking in
the open door of an empty box car.
Cunningly boarding this car from the
opposite side, the trainman caught
the skulker unawares and booted him
vaingloriously into the night.
As the figure alighted and took to
its heels, losing itself in the darkness,
1t uttered cry Of panied surprise and
protest which drew a wrinkle of as
constituent between the brows of the
trainman.
Sounded like a woman's voice." he
unused; then dismissed the suggestion
as obviously absurd.
1t was not.
Shortly after the freight train had
gone on its way-before, indeed, the
glimmer of its rear lights had been
lost among the western hills-a Sec
ond headlight appeared in the east,
swept swiftly ACROSS the lain and in
turn stopped stssail. D
Tle second III u-Oas iSs1sss.sso
to be a locomotive drawing a single
cara Pullman.
Hardly had it run past the switch,
however, when the brakeman dropped
down, ran quickly back to the switch
and threw it open.
Promptly the train backed on to the
siding.
AS the Pullman jolted across the
frogs the brakeman, interposing him
self between it and the tender, re-
leased the coupling.
By the time that the Pullman had
come to full stop on the siding, the
locomotive was swinging westward
like a scared krabbit-though no
such milk-and-watery Characterization
Of the traitor passed the lips of any
one of the three men who presently
appeared on the Pullman's platform
and shook impotent fists in the direc-
ton taken by the fugitive engine.
When the last of these had run tenn
porarily out of breath and blasphemy,
a brief silence fell, punctuated by
groans from each, and concluded by
the sound of voice calling from the
interior of the cara voice as strange
iy sonorous of tone as it was curiously
querulous of accent.
The three men Immediately ran back
into the car and presented themselves
with countenances variously apollo