The Young Railroaders Part 41

"He sat down here, for some time, did he not?" Alex was pointing to a depression in the earth well under the car, between two ties, and to the marks of bootheels. The superintendent went to his knees and closely examined the impressions left by the heels.

"Good! Look here," he said with satisfaction. "The marks of spurs! Our 'tramp' was a horseman."

Alex turned to look about. "Where would he have kept his horse?"

Superintendent Finnan led the way beyond the cars into the open. A mile distant, and hidden from the boarding-train by the cars on the sidings, was a depression in the prairie bordered with low scrub. "We'll have a look there," he said.

Some minutes later they stood in the bottom of the miniature valley, beside the unmistakably fresh hoofprints of a hobbled pony.

The official was grimly silent as they retraced their steps toward the construction-train. They had almost reached it when Alex, who had been examining the fragments of burned shavings, broke the silence. "Mr.

Finnan, let me see the bit of shaving we found by the rear car, please."

There was a touch of excitement in Alex's voice, and the superintendent halted.

"What is it?" he asked as he produced the whittling.

Alex glanced at it, and smiling, placed it beside two of the charred fragments in his hand. "Look at these little ridges, sir! The same knife whittled them all. The blade had two small nicks in it.

"All we have to do now, sir, is to find the owner of the knife!"

"A bright idea, Ward! Splendid!" exclaimed the superintendent heartily.

"But," he added as they moved on, "how are we going to find him? We can't very well round up the whole Dog Rib country, and hold a jack-knife inspection."

They came within sight of the bleached-out dining-cars. Basking in the morning sun on the steps of one of the old coaches was the figure of a young Indian, who had come from no one knew where the first day of their arrival, and had attached himself to the kitchen department.

Alex laid his hand on the superintendent's arm. "Mr. Finnan, why not try Little Hawk?"

"It occurred to me just as you spoke. I will. Right now.

"You go on in to breakfast, Ward," he directed. "And say nothing of our suspicions or discoveries."

"Very well, sir."

The members of the telegraph-car party were leaving for the diner as Alex appeared.

"h.e.l.lo, Ward! Catch the early worm?" inquired one of the track-foremen jocularly.

"You mean, 'did he shoot it?'" corrected a time-clerk.

At this there was a general laugh, and glancing about for an explanation, Alex saw Elder, Superintendent Finnan's personal clerk and aide de camp, hastily remove a cartridge-belt and revolver from his waist and toss them into his bunk.

Elder was the one unpopular man in the telegraph-car. An undersized, aggressively important individual, just out of college, and affecting a stylish khaki hunting-suit, natty leather leggings and a broad-brimmed hat, he bore himself generally as though second in importance only to the construction superintendent himself. And naturally he had promptly been made the b.u.t.t of the party.

"But you know," gravely observed one of the inspectors, as they took their places about the plain board table in the dining-car, "some of these tramps are dangerous fellows. They'd just as soon pull a gun on you as borrow a dime. So there's nothing like being prepared. Particularly when one carries about such evidence of wealth and rank as friend Elder, here."

At the chuckles which followed the clerk bridled angrily.

"Well, anyway, Ryan," he retorted, "I am ready to fight if one of them interferes with me. I'll not stick up my hands and let him go through me, as you did once."

"Oh, you wouldn't, eh?"

"No, I wouldn't. In fact, I'd like to see anyone make me throw up my hands, even if I didn't have a revolver," Elder went on emphatically.

"I'd rather be shot--yes, sir, I'd rather be shot than have to think afterward that I'd been such a weak-kneed coward. And that's what I think of any man who would permit a low-down tramp to go through his pockets."

Loud applause greeted these remarks, clapping, banging of plates, and cries of "Hear, hear!"

"Go it, Elder!"

"Show him up!"

"It's on me. He has me labelled, OK," admitted Ryan with marked humility.

"But then, gentlemen, I protest it is hardly fair to compare an ordinary mortal to so remarkably courageous a man as Elder. I claim it is not given many men to be that fearless. Why, 'with half an eye,' as the old grammars say, you can see courage sticking out all over him."

"All right, laugh. But I never showed the white feather to a hobo," Elder repeated scathingly.

"No; but--what is it Kipling, or Shakespeare, says?--'While there's life there's soap?'" observed Ryan, a sudden twinkle appearing in his eye.

The inspector explained the meaning of his facetiously garbled quotation when Elder left the table. The proposal he made was greeted with enthusiasm.

Work had been started on the branch road itself that morning, and on returning to the telegraph-car at noon the superintendent's clerk found most of the party there before him, preparing for dinner. An animated debate which was in progress ceased as he entered, and someone exclaimed, "Here he is now. He'd soon straighten them up."

"What is the trouble, men?" inquired Elder, with the air of a sergeant-major.

"Our two head-spikers had a disagreement this morning, and have gone across the yards to settle it," explained one of the time-keepers through his towel. "Couldn't you go after them, and interfere? They may put each other out of commission. Refused to listen to me or the foreman."

"The childish idiots! Certainly," agreed Elder, turning back to the door.

"Which way did they go?"

"Straight across the yard. But hadn't you better take your gun?" the time-clerk suggested. "They are a pair of pretty tough customers."

"Well--perhaps I had, since you mention it," Elder responded. Going to his bunk, he secured and buckled on the belt, drew the revolver from its holster to examine it, and set forth grimly. As he disappeared the men in the car broke into barely-subdued splutterings of laughter, and crowding to the door, waited expectantly.

With an air of responsibility and determination the clerk made his way between the adjacent cars. There were six tracks filled with the long trains of construction material. He had pa.s.sed the fifth, and was stooping beneath the couplings of two flats beyond, when from the other side he heard footsteps.

One hand on the b.u.t.t of his revolver, he leaped forth. Uttering a choking cry he sprang back. Within a foot of his eyes were the barrels of two big Colt's-pistols, and looking over the tops of them was a villainous handkerchief-masked face.

"Hands up!" ordered the tramp hoa.r.s.ely.

Elder's hands flew into the air. Immediately, despite his fright, there returned a remembrance of his boast that morning. He half made as though to bring his hands down. Instantly the cold muzzles of the pistols were pressed close beneath his nose. With a wild flutter Elder's fingers shot upward to their fullest stretch.

"Come out!" ordered the tramp.

Quaking, and almost on tiptoes in his effort to keep his hands aloft, Elder obeyed. Lowering one of the pistols and thrusting it into his belt, the tramp reached forward and secured the clerk's revolver, dropping it to the ground beneath his feet.

"Now, Mr. Superintendent," he ordered gruffly, "hand over your roll!"

"Why, I'm not the superintendent," quavered Elder hopefully. "I am--only a clerk."