CHAPTER XIII

"HOLD THE LIMITED MAIL!"

Ralph pressed closer to his loophole of observation at the amazing announcement of Grizzly, the traitorous train dispatcher.

"A wreck, you say?" observed Mason, in a dubious and faint-hearted tone of voice.

"Oh, n.o.body will get hurt," declared Grizzly lightly. "What's the matter with you? Haven't you got any nerve? I said there was a thousand apiece in this, didn't I?"

"I know you did."

"So, don't weaken about the knees when I give the word, but do just as I tell you. This affair to-night is a mere flyspeck to what's coming along in a week."

"Suppose--suppose we're found out?" suggested Mason.

"We get out, isn't that all? And we get out with good friends to take care of us, don't we?"

"I suppose that's so," admitted Mason, but he shifted about in his seat as if he was a good deal disturbed.

Grizzly glanced again at the clock. Then he returned to his instrument.

In a minute or two his fingers worked the key. Ralph watched and listened with all his might. What the operator did was to notify the dispatcher at Wellsville that he might go off duty, signing headquarters. Before he did this he spoke a few quick words that Ralph did not catch. Mason had selected some tools from his bag, and at once went nimbly aloft among the cable wires.

Ralph heard Mason fussing among the wires. He could only surmise what the two men were up to. The way he figured it out was that Mason had cut the wires running from the north branch through the relay into headquarters. He had thus completely blocked all messages from or to the north branch.

Mason came back to the operating room looking fl.u.s.tered and nervous.

"Nothing open north?" inquired Grizzly.

"Not on the Preston branch."

"That's right. We can splice 'em up again after two o'clock. Things will do their happening between now and then, and we leave no trace."

"See here, Grizzly," pleaded Mason in a spasmodic outburst of agitation; "what's the deal?"

"What good will it do you to know?"

"Well, I want to."

"All right; there's to be a runaway. There's an old junk engine down beyond Wellsville doing some dredging work, with a construction crew.

She's to be fired along."

"What for?" inquired Mason, his eyes as big as saucers.

"For instance," jeered Grizzly, with a disagreeable laugh.

"Where's she to run to?"

The operator went to a map tacked to the wall. He ran his finger so rapidly over it that, the intent Mason standing between, Ralph could not clearly make out the route indicated.

"n.o.body hurt, you see," remarked Grizzly, in an offhanded way. "There isn't another wheel running on that branch this side of Preston."

"No, but the feeders and cut-ins? Along near Preston the Limited mail runs twenty miles since they've been bridging the main at Finley Gap."

"She must take her chances, then," observed Grizzly coolly. "Don't get worried, son. The men working this deal know their business, and don't want to get in jail."

"What--what is there for me to do." inquired Mason, acting like a man who had been persuaded to a course that had unnerved and distressed him.

"Set those wires back just as they were, when I give you the word."

"Say, if you don't mind, I'll go somewhere and get a bracer. I'm feeling sort of squeamish."

Grizzly regarded the speaker with a contemptuous look in his manifestation of weakness, but he made no remark, and Mason left the room. Ralph from his point of observation watched him descend the stairs and close the door after him as he went out into the storm, faced in the direction of the town.

The young railroader started down the cleat ladder, when Grizzly came out of the operating room. He looked thoughtful, as if he was uneasy at his comrade wandering off. As the lower door closed after him, Ralph decided that he was bent on joining Mason in his search for "a bracer,"

and that now was his chance.

There flashed through the brain of Ralph the situation complete. A wreck was to happen, why and exactly where he could only guess. Clearly outlined in his mind, however, was the route ahead and beyond. By a rapid exertion of memory he could place every train on the road now making its way through the storm-laden night towards Stanley Junction.

The Great Northern spread out in a quick mental picture like a map.

Ralph decided what to do, and he did not waste a second. He was down the cleat ladder and up the stairs and into the operating room in a jiffy.

His thought was to give the double danger signal to headquarters and call for the immediate presence of the head operator or the chief dispatcher himself, if on duty.

It took him a minute or two to get the exact bearings of the instruments. At headquarters he was entirely familiar with the rheostat, wheat-stone bridge, polarized relays, pole changers and ground switches, but the station outfit was not so elaborate, the in table being provided only with the old relay key and sounder. His finger on the key, tapping the double danger challenge for attention, Ralph felt himself seized from behind.

With a whirl he was sent spinning across the room and came to a halt, his back against the out table, facing Grizzly. The latter had returned to the operating room suddenly and silently. His dark, scowling face was filled with suspicion.

"What's this? Aha, I know you!" spoke the operator. "How did you come here?" and he advanced to seize the intruder. Ralph read that the fellow guessed that he was trapped. There was a dangerous gleam in his eyes, and the young railroader knew that he was in a dangerous fix.

One hand of Grizzly had gone to his side coat pocket, as if in search of a weapon. His shoulders egan to crouch. He was more than a match for Ralph in strength, and the latter did not know how soon his comrade Mason might return.

Ralph was standing with his back to the operating table. He put his hands behind him, quietly facing Grizzly, and let his right hand rest on the key. Carefully he opened the key and had clicked west twice when, quick as lightning, Grizzly jumped at him.

"Stop monkeying with that instrument!" he yelled. "You spy!"

There was a struggle, and Ralph did his best to beat off his powerful and determined opponent, but he tripped across a stool and went flat on his back on the floor. The operator was upon him in a moment. His strong hands pinned Ralph's arms outspread.

"You keep quiet if you know what's healthy for you," warned Grizzly.

"You're Fairbanks?"

"Yes, that is my name," acknowledged Ralph.

"And you've been watching us, and you was put up to it. Say, how much do you know and how many have you told about it?"

Ralph was silent. Just then there was a stamping up the stairs. Mason came bl.u.s.tering in.

"No lights ahead. I guess the stores are all shut up," he began, and intercepted himself with a stare at Ralph and a vivid: