The Road Builders Part 23

Antonio, the watchman, sat on the edge of the eastern abutment and dangled his feet. He was so drowsy that he even stopped rolling cigarettes. He had chosen a comfortable seat, where a pile of timbers afforded a rest for his back. To be sure, there was the possibility of rolling off into the water and sand if he should really fall asleep; but elsewhere he would be exposed to the searching eyes of the engineer in charge, and those eyes were very searching indeed. He was thinking, in a dreamy way, of what he would do on the Sunday, with his week's pay in his pocket and the village of La Paz but twelve miles away.

Now and again his complacent eyes roved out across the river, which slipped by with such a gentle, swishing murmur. He could look over the tops of the four unfinished piers and the western abutment and see the trestle where it was continued on the farther side. These Americanos, what driving devils they were! And when they had built their railroad, what were they going to do with it? To go fast--Antonio shrugged his shoulders and resumed the cigarettes--it is very well, but to what purpose? When they have rushed madly across the continent, what will they find there? Perhaps they will then rush back again. These Americanos!

He let his eyes rest upon the row of piers--one, two, three, four of them. What labor they had caused--how the men had sweat, and muttered, and toiled--how the foremen had cursed! Four piers of masonry rising out of the ghostly river. Very strong they must be, for the La Paz was not always gentle. In the spring and fall it was savage; and then it had an ugly way of undermining bridges, as those other foolish Americanos had learned to their cost when they built the wagon bridge at La Paz. He smiled lazily. But suddenly he sat up straight. A long thin figure of a man was moving about among the piles of timber. It was the senor Flint--and such a prowler as he was, day and night, night and day. He lived this bridge, did the senor; he thought it, he ate it, he drank it, he talked it, he slept it,--and for why? It could not be that he believed it living to think and breathe bridge and only bridge. It could not be that man was made for this--to become a slave to this trestle structure which was slowly crawling, like some monster centipede, across the sands of the La Paz. It was very good for the trestle perhaps, and the bridge, but was it so good for the senor?

[Ill.u.s.tration: "... this trestle structure which was slowly crawling, like some monster centipede, across the sands of the La Paz."]

Antonio smiled again, and settled back; the senor was pa.s.sing on. He was getting into a boat. He was poling across the languid, dimpling river. He was getting out on the farther bank; he was walking up the long slope, keeping out of the moonlight in the shadow of the trestle-thing; he was peering up toward the embattled ridge beyond, where lay the redoubtable Flagg.

... The cigarette dropped from Antonio's unnerved fingers, and fell with a sizzling splash into the water below. He drew an involuntary quick breath, and the smoke in his nostrils went unexpectedly into his throat and made him cough. Then trembling a little, he got slowly to his feet and stood staring out there over the serene surface of the river. He rubbed his eyes and stared again. A shot,--two shots,--which was right? Two--no, one! And that insignificant little dark heap yonder in the moonlight--was that the senor? What a trouble!--and he had been so comfortable there on the abutment!

Antonio was frightened. He thought of running away from these fate-tempting Americans; but in that case he would lose his pay and those Sundays at La Paz. He waited a while. Perhaps he was dreaming and would make himself ridiculous. He walked about, and tried different points of view. And at last he went to rouse his foreman.

They got Flint in--Haddon, in night-shirt, bare legs, and shoes with flapping strings to them; the foreman of the pile-driver crew in night-shirt and hat, and two big-shouldered bridgemen. There was a ball somewhere in Flint, and there were certain complications along the line of his chronic ailment, so that his usefulness was, so to speak, impaired. And Haddon, during what was left of the night and during all of the following day, had distinctly a bad time of it.

While these things were going on, Paul Carhart was riding westward at a hot gallop with Dimond close behind. It was shortly after sunset that he reined up on the crest of the eastern ridge and looked out over the La Paz. The barren valley was flooded with light. The yellow slopes were delicately tinted rose and violet, the rock pillars stood out black and sharply defined, the western hills formed a royal purple barrier to the streams of color; and through this glowing scene extended the square-jointed trestle, unmistakably the work of man where all else was from another hand. Never in the progress of this undertaking which we have been following across the plains had the contrast been so marked between the patient beauty of the old land and the uncompromising ugliness of the structure which Paul Carhart was carrying into and through it. And yet the chief,--an intelligent, educated man, not wanting in feeling for the finer side of life,--though he took in the wonders of the sunset, looked last and longest at the trestle and the uncompleted bridge. Then he rode down, glancing, in his quizzical way, at the camp, which had been moved back behind a knoll, at the piles of stone and timber, at the corral, and at the groups of idle, gloomy workmen.

Fortunately the chief was prepared for surprises. News that the trestle had been burned to the ground would have drawn no more than a glance and a nod from him. His mind had not been idle during the ride.

He knew that the strongest defence partakes of an offensive character, and he had no notion of sitting back to await developments. Of several sets of plans which he had been considering, one was so plainly the simplest and best that he was determined to try it. It involved a single daring act, a sort of raid, which it would be necessary to carry through without a vestige of legal authority. But this feature of it disturbed him very much less than a mere casual acquaintance with this quiet gentleman might have led one to suppose. Perhaps he had, like the red-blooded Tiffany, a vein of "Scotch-Irish" down in the depths of his nature which could on occasion be opened up.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The cigarette dropped from Antonio's unnerved fingers."]

After looking out for the comfort of John Flint, and after conferring with Haddon and going thoroughly over the ground, Carhart sent for Dimond.

"How much more are you good for?" he asked.

Dimond grinned. "For everything that's going," he replied.

"Good. Do you know where the H. D. & W. is building down, a dozen or fifteen miles north of here?"

"I guess I can find it," said Dimond.

And with a fresh horse and a man or two, and with certain specific instructions, Dimond rode north shortly after nightfall of that same day. At eight in the morning he was back, hollow-eyed but happy. And Paul Carhart, when Dimond had reported, was seen to smile quietly to himself.

CHAPTER IX

A SHOW-DOWN

All was quiet at the main camp. Excepting that the division engineers were short-handed, and that Paul Carhart was away, things were going on with some regularity. Scribner rode in late on the second afternoon, and toward the end of the evening, when the office work was done, he and Young Van played a few rubbers of cribbage. The camp went to sleep as usual.

At some time between eleven o'clock and midnight the two young engineers tacitly put up the cards and settled back for a smoke.

"Do you know," said Young Van, after a silence, "I don't believe this stuff at all."

Scribner tipped back, put his feet on the table, puffed a moment, and slowly nodded. "Same here, Gus," he replied. "Fairy tales, all of it."

"You can't settle the ownership of a railroad by civil war."

"No; but if you can get possession by a five-barrelled bluff, you can give the other fellow a devil of a time getting it back."

"That's true, of course." They were silent again.

... "What's that!" said Scribner. Both dropped their feet and sat up.

"Horse," said Young Van.

"Devil of a way off."

"Must be. Lost it now."

"No--there it is again. Now, what do you suppose?"

"Don't know. Let's step out and look around."

Standing on the sloping ground in front of the tent, they could at first distinguish nothing.

"Gives you a queer feeling," said Scribner, "horse galloping--this time of night--"

"--just now," Young Van completed, "when things are going on."

"Coming from the east, too,--where Bourke is. Know him?"

"No--never met him. Heard of him, of course."

"He's a good one. Wish he was on our side."

"I guess Mr. Carhart can match him."

Scribner nodded. "This sort of a fight's likely to settle down into the plain question of who's got the cards. There'll come a time when both sides'll have to lay down their hands, and the cards'll make the difference one way or the other. Just a show-down, after all."

"I think myself Mr. Carhart's got the cards. He didn't look like a loser when he went off the other night."

"If he has," said Scribner, "you can bet he'll 'see' Durfee and Bourke every time."

... "Here's that horse, Harry."

"Big man--looks like--"

"It's Tiffany.--Good evening, Mr. Tiffany."

"How are you, boys? Paul here?"

"Why, no, Mr. Tiffany. He's up on 'mile 109.'"

"'Mile 109!'" Tiffany whistled. "What the devil! You don't mean that those--" he paused.