Careers of Danger and Daring Part 33

"That's possible," said Big Arthur. "A man can feel how fast he's going.

He's _got_ to judge big speed by feeling, for there ain't any speed-recorder that's much good, say above ninety miles an hour."

At the first opportunity I explained to Big Arthur and his friend that I would very much like to draw upon their experience for some thrilling incidents in engine-driving.

"Tell him about the time you went in the river," suggested Big Arthur.

"That was 'way back in '69," said the other, "when I was firing for 'Boney' Ca.s.sin, the brother of Denny. It was in winter, a bitter cold day, and the Hudson was so gorged with ice that part of the jam had squeezed over the bank and torn away our tracks. So pretty soon, when we came along with twenty-three cars of a train of merchandise, why in we went, and the old engine 'Troy' just skated ahead on her side into the river, smash through the ice, down to the bottom, and pulled thirteen cars after her.

"You couldn't see a piece of that engine above water as big as your hand, and how I got out alive is more than I know. Guess I must have jumped. Anyhow, there I was on the broken floe, and I could hear the old Troy grinding away in the river, churning up water and ice like a crazy sea-serpent. She struggled for nearly a minute before her steam was cold and her strength gone. Then she lay still, dead.

"I looked around for Boney; and at first I didn't see him. I thought he'd gone down sure, and so he had; but just as I was looking I saw a big black thing heave up through the ice, and I heard a queer cry. Well, that was Providence, sure! It seems the engine had ripped her cab clean off as she tore through the ice, and here was the cab coming up bottom side first, with Boney inside hanging on to a brace and almost dead. I hauled him out, and then we scrambled ash.o.r.e over the wrecked cars. They were full of flour, and the barrels were all busted open, so by the time we reached the bank we looked like a twin Santa Claus made of paste, and three quarters drowned at that."

"But Boney stuck to his throttle," I remarked.

"Yes," said the other, "he stuck to his throttle. The boys generally do."

After this I asked Big Arthur for a story, but he a.s.sured me he couldn't think of anything special.

"Tell about that woman on Eleventh Avenue," said his friend.

"Yes," said I, "tell about her."

"Oh," said Big Arthur, "that wasn't much. I was pulling a freight train down Eleventh Avenue one day, going slow through the city, and at Thirty-fifth Street a woman turned down the track ahead of me. I whistled, but she never heard me. She was going marketing, and couldn't think of anything else. I saw I'd strike her sure--there wasn't time to stop--so I ran along the boiler-side to the pilot, and got there just as we were on her. Another second and she'd have been under the wheels. I braced myself and made a jump at the woman, and struck her back of the neck with a shove that sent her sprawling off the track, with me after her. You see, I had to jump hard or I'd have stayed on the track myself and gone under the engine."

"Did it end in a romance?" I asked.

"Romance nothing!" exclaimed Big Arthur. "That woman got up so mad--why, she called me names and clawed the skin off my face until--well, I couldn't get shaved for three weeks afterward. In about a minute, though, she cooled off, and somebody told her I'd saved her life--which I had--and then, sir, blamed if she didn't go down on her knees and try to kiss my feet, and pray I'd forgive her. Say, that's the only time I ever got prayed to."

Here Big Arthur's fireman whispered something to him, and the engineer nodded. "That's so, that's a good story," and then he told how an old lady of seventy-five saved a New York Central express some years ago at Underhill Cut, about a mile south of Garrisons.

"She's a relative of my fireman, so I know the thing's true; besides that, the company gave her three hundred dollars. You see, it all happened one winter night, and this Mrs. Groves--that's her name--was the only person near enough to do anything. She lived in a little house beside Underhill Cut, and about four o'clock in the morning she heard a frightful crash, and there was a freight train wrecked right in the cut, and cars piled up three or four deep over the tracks! She knew the express might come along any minute, and of course it was a case of everybody killed if they ever struck that smash-up. So what does she do, this little old lady, but grab up a red petticoat and a kerosene lamp, and run out as fast as she could in her bare feet,--yes, sir, and nothing on but her night-gown,--right through the snow. That's the kind of a woman _she_ was.

"Well, she went down the track until she heard the express coming, and then she took her red petticoat and held it up in front of the lamp so as to make a red light. And, what's more, it worked! The engineer saw the danger signal, slammed on his brakes, and stopped the train a few car-lengths from the wreck. Yes, sir, only a few car-lengths!"

Big Arthur nodded thoughtfully, and climbed into the cab. It was time to go.

In ending this chapter now, and with it the present series, I venture the opinion that the men who follow these Careers of Danger and Daring--the divers, steeple-climbers, and the rest--are very little different from their fellow-men, except as they have developed certain faculties by their exercise, and established in themselves the _habit of courage_. They were not born with any longing to do these daring acts, nor with any particular apt.i.tude for them. They have been guided nearly always by the drift of life and by opportunities that presented. As to fear, they have the same capacity for it that we all have, and are serene in their peril only because they feel themselves, by their patience and skill, well armed against it. The steeple-climber would be afraid to go down in a diving-suit, the lion-tamer would be afraid to go up in a balloon, the pilot would be afraid to swing on the flying-bars, and so on.

I will even go further, and say that the average good citizen who is sound of body has as great capacity for courage as any of these men. He could develop it if he cared to; he would develop it if he had to. That is the main point, after all: these men _must_ be brave, they _must_ conquer their fear, and the only trouble with the average man is that nothing ever occurs to show him and those who know him what fine things he could do if the pressure were put upon him. Yet any day the test may come to any one of us--pain to bear, losses to bear, bereavement to bear. And then the _great_ test.

Well, perhaps these humble heroes whose lives we have glanced at may give us a bit of their spirit for our own lives, the brave and patient spirit that will keep us unflinchingly at the hard thing, whatever it be, until we have conquered it. And perhaps we too may feel impelled to cultivate the habit of courage. That would be a fine inspiration indeed, and I can only hope that my readers may feel it.