CAPE MAT COUNTY TIMES. SEA ISLE CITY, N. 1.

THE WRECKERS

By FRANCIS LYNDE

THE WRECKING OF THE WRECKERS "She in married now, and her husband is still living." tor a little l couldn’t do anything but gape, like a chicken with Jbe pip It was simply fierce! / knew, as well as I knew anything. WM the boss was gone on Mrs. Sheila; that he had fallen in love. 7™ ^ °f her and then with her pretty face and a P. of her ; ond that the one b-g reason why he had let aV >, C * adm f i ' p * r8 J uade *o stay in Portal City was the fact that he had wanted to be near her and to show her how he could make a per/rrf/v good spoon out of the spoiled horn of the Pioneer Short

Tfc**«’* ‘TIit Wrecker*" ia ■

FraBci. Lrudoj that*. eno Ug h for . nyon .. Tk. "Bom’’ U > •n-.rouBd railroad man. "Mr.. Sheila" 1. .. .. ,he 7 make ’mb The Pioneer Short Lino i. alek road which ha. boon .b.n,.f u l! r mi. OMd h> .uceoMieo group, of Wall .treat .poculalor*. And Jimmi Dodd., who tell, the .tory in hi. own intmitabla way. i. the "Boi.V

•ecretar) and handyman.

railroad .tory by

CHAPTER I

—1—

At Sand Creek Siding A* • graeral prjpiMlttdn, I don't bm h In tho things called But there are exceptions rules, and we certainly uncovthfl biggest one o; the lot—the and I—tiie night we left Portthe good old Pacific coast, this way. We had finished construction work on the Oregon Midland; >.nd were on our way to the train, when 1 had one of those queer little premonitory chills you hear so much about and knew Just as w n ll ns could be that we were never going to pull through to Chicago without getting a Jolt of some sort. The reason —If you'll call It a reason—was that. Just before we came to the railroad station, the boss walked calmly under a ladder standing In front f a new . building; and besides that, tl was the ^ thirteenth day of the month, a Frl- ; day, and ruining like the very mls-

I chief.

1 Just to sort of toll us along, mnyRfce. the fates didn't begin on us that

|da?' i In b

quiet, breaking out once, in the meat course, to tell roe that he’d Just had a forwarded telegram from an old friend of his that would stop us off for a day or two In Portal City, the headquarters of the Pioneer Short Line. Farther along, pretty well Into the Icecream and black coffee, he came again to ask me If I bad noticed the young lady and the girl In the Pull man section next to ours. I told him I had, and toen. ■ennse I hud never known him to both bead for two minutes In succession nbout any woman, he gave shock; said they were ticketed to

Portal City—and to find

must have asked the train conductoradding that when we reached Portal It wonld be the neighborly thing for me to do to help them off with their hand-bags and see that they got

If they wanted one.

“Sure I will,” says I. “That the lady's husband Isn't there to them. Her suit case has her name. 'Mrs. Sheila Macrae, on it" The boss has a way of making two up-and-down wrinkles and a little

> reach

“There are times, Jimmie, when you see altogether too much," he said,

sort of gruff.

'"Macr. .' you say: that Is Scotch. And so is 'Sheila.’ Most likely the names, both of them, are only handdowns. She looks straight American "She Is pretty enough to look anything.” I threw in. Just to see how he

would take It

“Right you are. Jimmie," he agreed. “I've been lookinc R t the back of her neck all day. There are so many women • ho don't measure up to the promises they make when you see 'em from behind. Yon catch a glimpse of n pretty neck, and when you get around to the face you find out that the neck was only a bit of bluff." If I had been eating anything In the world but Ice cream I believe It would have choked me. What he said led up to the admission that he had been making these facc-nnd-neck comparisons for goodness knows how long, snd I couldn't surround that, all at once. You sec, he was such a picture of a man’s man lu every sense of the word; a tighter and a hard-hitter.

ly, and then proceeded to shove us I his ryes when he Is going

behind a freight-train wreck at ' Widner, Idaho, where we lost twelve hours. It looked as If that didn't amount to much, because we weren't due anywhere at any particular time. The boss was on his way home for a little visit with his folks In Illinois, and beyond that he was going to meet a bunch of Kngllshmen In Montreal, and mnyb'- let them make him general manager of one of the Canadian rail-

roads.

So Mr. Nnrcross was In no special hurry, and neither was I. I had been confidential clerk and shorthand i inn for the boss on the Midland construction. and he was taking me along parttse he knot's a cracking good ipher when he sees one, hut because I was dead anklous to anywhere he was going. If It hadn't been for that ve-hour lay-out we would have the Saturday night train on Cje Pioneer Short Line, Instead of the train Sunday morning, and there would have been no meeting with Mrs. Sheila and Matsle Ann; no telegram from Mr. Chadwick, bees Dae it g$l*#ii!dn't have found us; no hold-op at Sand Creek siding; in short, nothing ggffeuld have happened that did hap-

pen.

*. It was on Snnday that the Jolt bei ; *»” l» cet ready to land on us Right •OOn after break.ast, with the help of p ilittle Pullman berth table and me ■nd my typewriter. Mr Norcross torm'd our section Inton business office. I Maying that now we had a good quiet | day. we'd dean up the million or so j Odds and ends of ■•orreapondence he'd I btjNl letting go while we were tussling : C ’he Midland right-of-way through i

Oregon mountains.

BTFrom where he sat dictating to me boss was facing forward and now ■nd then an absent sort of look came ifato his eyes while he was talking off ■|Ietters. and It pnuled me bemuse J^V/isn't like him. One of the time* K he had given me a full grist of

: and nad gone off to smoke

while I typed a few thousand lines from my notes to catch up. I made J^micovc v There were two people »B Beet Ion Five Just ahead of us, a ytrorg woman and a girt of maybe fifteen or so. and the Pullman was the SHpshloncd kind, with low seatbaHfcs. 1 put It up that In those al pent-eyed Intervals Mr. Norcross had been studying the back cf the young woman's neck. I was measurably sure

It wasn't the little girl's,

pj Along in the forenoon I made an e\. i lose to go and get a drink of water •at of the forward cooler, and on the

way hack I took a good square look j Eve said wh

ft our neighbors in Number Five. The tMUng woman was pretty enough to ftart a stopped clock—only “pretty" Isn’t Just the word, either; there wasn't ray word, when you come right down to It And the little girl was limply a peach —a nice, downy, rosy peach; chunky, round-faced, sunnyhaired Jolly ; with a neat little turnedUp nose and big sort of boyish laughing eyes 'bat fairly dareu the world. At the second call to dinner Mr. Jforcross told me to strap up the mnChlte and put the files away In the grips sad »e'd go sat. He was pretty

thing around her neck, and her stocky, chunky little arms were elbow deep In a big pillow muff to match, though the April night wasn't even half-way

chilly.

The boss stepped out on the platform to close the side trap door which, with Uie railing gate on that side, had been left op< n by a careless rear flagman. Juki then the big "Pacific type ' that was pulling ns let out a whistle screech that would hare waked the dead, and the air-brakes went on with a Jerk that showed how beautifully reckless the railroading was on the Pioneer Short Line., Mr. Norcross was reaching for the catch on the floor trap and the Jerk didn't throw him. But It snapped the young woman and the girl away from the railing so suddenly that the little one nod to grab for hand-holds; and when she did that, of course the big muff went overboard. At this, a bunch of things happened, all In an eye-wink. The train ground and Jiggled ton stop; the girl squealed, "Oh, my muff!" and skipped down 'he steps to disappear In the gei eral direction of the Pacific coast; the young woman shrieked after her, "MaUie Ann !—come back here—you'll be left!” and then took her turn at disappearing by the harae route; and. on top of It all. the boss Jumped off and sprinted after both of them, leaving n string of large, man-sized comments on the foolishness of women as a sojc trailing along behind him as he flew. Right then It was my golden motnent to play safe and aane. With three of them off and lost 'n the gathering night, somebody with at least a grain of sense ought to have stood by to pull the emergency cord If the train should start. But, of course. I had to take n chance and spill the gravy all over the tablecloth. The stop was at blind siding in the edge of a mountain desert, and when I squinted up ahead and saw that the engine was taking water. It looked as If there were going to be plenty of time for a bit of promenade under the stars. So I swung off and went to Join the muff

hunt.

Amongst them, they had found the pillow thine before I had a chance to horn In. They were coming up the track, and the boss hod each of the two by an arm and was telling them that they'd be left to a dead moral certainty If they didn't run. They couldn't run because their skirts were fashionably narrow, and there were still three or four car-lengths to go tank spout went up with a clang and a clatter of chains nmj the old “Pacific type" gave a couple of ••■saes and a snort. ‘They're going!" gritted the boss, sort of between his teeth, and without another word ho grabbed those two hobbled women folks up under his arms, just as If they'd been a couple of sacks ot meal, ami broke

Into o run.

wasn't a morsel of use, you know. Old Hercules himself couldn't have very far oi very fast with the handicap the boss had taken on. and In less than half n minute the "Pact lie type" had caught her stride and he red tall lights of the train were anlshing to pin points In the night, vere beautifully and artisticully

left.

When he saw that It was no manner of use. the boss quit on the handicap race and put bis two armfuls down while he still had breath enough left to talk with. "Well." he said. In his b-st rustyhinge rasp, "you've done It! Why. In the name of common sense, couldn't you have let me go back after that muff iblngY' It was the young woman who answered the boss. "I—I didn't stop to think!” she fluttered, taking me blame as If she had been the one to head the procession. "Isn't there any way we can stop that train?" The boss said there wasn't, and 1 know the only reason why he didn't say a lot of other things was because he was too n.ucfc of n gentleman to say them In the presence of a couple

We trailed off together up the truck, two and two. the boss walking with the young woman.-After we'd counted a few of the cross-ties, the girl said: "Is your name Jimmie DoddsY' And when 1 admitted It: "Mine Is Malsle Ann. I'm Sheila's cousin on her mother's side. I think this is n great lark;

don't you?”

T can tell better after It's over.” I Wild. “Maybe we’ll have to stay here

all night."

T shouldn't mind." she came hack airily. “I haven't lieen up all night since I was a little kiddle and our house burned down." We reached the big water tank, and the boss picked out one of the square footing timbers for a sent. It seemed us If he were finding It n good bit harder to get acquainted with his half

rigid from the jump. And to a man of that sort women are u ttaliy no more than fluffy little side-issues, as

they told her she was made out of Adam's rib.

That ended the dining-car part of It. The sure-enough, knock-out round was fought at the rear end of our Pullman, which happened to be the last car In the train. As » • walked back after dinner Mr. Nor ross gave

me a cigar and raid we'd go out to ! I sn the observation platform to smoke, j her sk When we reached the door we found j "Yov the young lady and the girl standing j or ver at the rear ratling to watch the track j " "arin unroll Itself under the trucks. The are in young lady was wearing a coat with [ Is proti a storm collar, but the girl hud a fur Won in

S* far as we could see. the surt roundings consisted of a short side'rack, a spur running off Into the hltls. and the water tank. The siding switches had no lights, which argued that there wasn't even a pump-man at the tank—as there wn* not. the tank being filled automatically by a gravity pipe line running back to a natural reservoir in the mountains. By this time the boss was beginning to get a ’ittle better grip on himself

and he laughed.

“We've all earned the leather medal. I guess.” he chuckled. “It's done now.

and It can't be helped."

"But Isn't there anything we can do?" said the young woman. "Can't we walk somewhere to where there is a station or a town with people In

“Out of Sight—Quick, Jimmie!” Whispered. of the combination than I was with E, but after a little the young wothawed out a bit and made him talk—to help pass away the time, I took It—and the little Mrl nn d X sat and listened. When the young woman finally got him started, the boss told her all about himself, how he'd been rnllr adlng ever since he left college, and a lot of things that I'd never even dreamed of. It’s curious how a pretty woman con make a man turn himself Inside out that way. Just for her amusement. The boss asked her If she were warm enough, saying tlmt If site were not. he and I would scrape up some sage-brush or something and make a fire. She replied that she didn't care for a fire. Hint the night wasn't at all cold—which It wasn't. Then she showed that she was human, clear down to the tips of her pretty fingers. "You may smoke if you want ti she told the boss. “I sha'u't mind It In the least." The boss lighted bin clgnr. Then there was more talk. In which tt turned out that tlie young woman ami her cousin were to hove been met at Portal City by somebody she called "Cousin Basil," but there wouldn't be any scare, because she had written ahead to say that possibly they might stop over with some friends In one of the apple towns. Then Mr. Norcross ssld he wouldn't miss anything by the drop out but an appointment he had with an old friend, and he guessed that could wn.t. I listened, thinking maybe he would mention the mime of the friend, and after a while he did. The forwarded Portal City telegram the Ikms had gotten Just before we went to dinner in the dining-car was from "Uncle John" Chadwh-k. itie Chicago wheat king, end that left me wondering what the iu.^cbief Mr. Chadwick was doing away out In the wild nnd woolly western country where they raise more apples than they do wheat, nnd more Mining stock schemes than they do

either.

\V« had been marooned for nearly an hour when I struck a match and looked at my watch. Mr. Norcross

> dulni

a kill time for

young woman, and he was Just In the ex itlug part of a railroad story, telling up mt a right-of-way fight on the Midl:tnd. when the little girl grabbed my arm and said: "Listen!"

I did, and brake 1 think there'! The boss cut hu

we all listened. It seemed that 1 was wrong. The noise we heard was more ske an auto running with the cut-ont c en than a train rumbling. "What do you make It. JlmmleY' -ume from the boss' end of the tim-

romptly. “Exrain coming." ry short and

dot or <■

• I saM, pointing I

>ss look down at at the girl's, t ★alk very far * things you are I

ward t

tber direction."

My guess was right. In less than minute we saw the lights of the car. stopped a little way below the water stik and almut a hundred yards north f the track, or maybe less, and four icp came tumbling out at it. If I ml been aloiie on the Job 1 should rabably bare called to the men as

they came tramping over to the sidetrack. Rut Sir. Norcross had a different think coming. "tint of sight—quick, Jimmie I” he whispered, and In another second he had whipped the young woman over the big footing timber to n standing place under the tank among the braces, and I had done the same for the girt. What followed was ns mysterious as n chapter out of an Anna Katherine Breen detective story. After doing something to the switch of the unused spur track, the four men separated. One of them went back to the auto, and the other three walked down the main track to the lower switch of the short siding, which was on the same side of the main line as the spur. Here the fourth man rejoined them, nnd the girl at my elbow told us what he had gone back to the car for. "He Inis lighted a red lantern," she whispered. T saw It when he took It out of the auto." I guess it was pretty plain to all of us by this time that there was something decidedly crooked on the cards, but If we had known what It couldn't very well have done anything to prevent It. There were only two of us men to their four; and. besides, there wasn't any time. The Inntemcatrying man had barely reached th. switch when we heard the whistle of n locomotive. There was a train coming from the west, and n few onds later an electric headlight showed the long tangent beyond the

siding.

is a bandit hold-up, all right. One of the men stood on the track ing the red lantern; we could him plainly in the glare of the hi light. The-e wasn't much of a scrap. There were two or three pistol nnd then, as near as we could out. the hold-up men, or some of climbed Into the engine. Before you could count ten they had made a flying switch with the single car, kicking It In on the siding. Before the car had come fully to a stop, the engine was switched In behind It, coupled on, nnd the reversed train, with the engine pushing the car, rattled away on the old spur that led off Into the hills; clattered away and was lost to sight and hearing In less than n

minute.

It was not until after tho train was switched and gone that we discovered that two of the bandits had be-m iefi behind. These two reset the. switches for the main track, leavl’ig everything as they had found It, and then crossed over to the auto. I was Just thinking that all this mystery nnd kidnaping nnd pin playmust be sort of hard on the young woman nnd the girl. but. though my half of the allotment was shivering a little and snuggling up Just a grain closer to me. she proved thn she hadn't lost her nerve. "Did you see the name on that car when the engine went past to get In behind It?” she asked. "No," said the boss; and I hadn't,

either.

"I did." she asserted, showing that her eyes, or her wits, were quicker than ours. T had Just one little glimpse of It. The name is 'A-I-e-x-a.' ” spelling It out. Mr. Norcross started as If he had been shot. "The Alexa? That Is Mr. Chadwick's private car—they've kidnaped him I" Then he whirled short on me. "Jimmie, are you man enough to go with me nnd try n tackle on those fellows over there In that auto?" I said I was; but I didn't add what I thought—that it would probably- be a ease of double suicide for us two to go up against a pair of armed thugs with our hare hands. The young woman put in her word. "You mustn't think of doing such a thing!" she protested: and she was still telling him all the different reasons why he mustn’t, when we heard the creak and grind of the stolen engine coming back down the old spot. After that there was nothing to do but to wait and see what x»ns going > ■’ happen next. What did kn,jg, «tis as blind as at! the rest. The engine was stopped somewhere in the gulch hack of us and out of sight from our hiding-place, and pretty soon*1 he two men v ho had gone with her came hurrying across out of the hill shadows, making straight for the auto. A mlnm or two later they had climbed Into the machine, the motor had * uttered. rad the car was gone.

a question at the two women: "Will you two stay here with Jimmie while I go and see what I cun find In that gulchY' They both paid me the compliment of saying that they'd stay with me, but the young woman suggested that It might be just as well if we sb <uld all go up the gulch together, flu we piked out In the dark, the boss helping Mrs. Sheila to hobo along over the cross-ties of the spur, and the little girl stumbling on behind with me. We bad followed the spur track up the gulch for maybe a short quarter of a mile when we came to the engine. As we hud feared It might be. the big machine was crippled. Thera was a key gone out of one of the con-necting-rod crank-pin Straps; ono mis rabln little piece of steel, maybe eight Inches long and tapering one way, and half an Inch or so thick the other; but that was a-plenty. We couldn't make a move without It. I thought we were done for, but Mr. Norcross chased me up Into the cab for a lantern. With the light we begun to hunt around In the short grass. I had been sensible enough :o show the little girl the other connecting-rod key, so she knew exactly what to look for. ond It did me a heap of good when It turned out that she was tho one who found the lost bit of steel. Tve got '.t—I've got it!" she cried; and sure enough she had. The k people had merely taken It i thrown It aside on the extremely probable chance that nobody would be foolish enough to look for It so near at hand. or. looking, would be able to find It In the dark. It didn't take more .ban a minute or two, with a wrench from the engineer's box. to put the key back In place. Tnen. with one io boost and the other to pull, we got our two passengers up Into the high cub. I threw n few sbovel-fuls of coal Into the firebox nnd put the blower on; and when we were aft set. the boss opened the throttle nnd we went carofnlly nosing ahead over the old track, feeling our way up the gulch and keeping a sharp lookout for the Alexa ns we ground nnd squealed around tho curves. fc It must have been four or fix miles back In the hills to the place where we found the private car. pushed In on an old mine-loading track at the end of the spur. The other members of the crew were off nnd watting for us; and standing out on the back platform. In the full glare of the headlight as we nosed up for a coupling, there was n big. gray-halred nisn. bareheaded and dressed In rough-Iook-old clothes like a mining prospector. The big man was "Uncle John” Chadwick, and If be was properly dshed at seeing us »um up with his lost engine, he didn't let it interfere with our welcome. Mr. Chudxvidr seemed to know Mrs. Sheila ; at any rate, he shook hands with tier and called her by name. Then he grabbed he boss and fairly shouted at him: "Well. well. Graham!—of all tht^

CHAPTER II Mr. Chadwick’s Special. Of course, as soon a* the sklp-out of the four hold up men gave us a free hand we knew It xvas up to us to get busy and do something. It was a safe bet that the Alexa was carrying 1 er owner, and In that cage Mr. John Chadwick and mU train crew were somewhere back in the hills, without ra engine, and with a good prospect of stay ; •‘put" until somebody slionh! go and hunt them up. "We've got to find out what they've done with Mr. Chadwick." Mr N.>r cross broke out. And then: “It can't be very far to where they tmxe the engine, and If they haven't crip pled It—" He stopped short and slung

lucky things this side of Mesopotamia ! How the dev—how in thunder did yon manage to turn up here'/" And

all that, you know.

The explanat’ons. such us th»v were, car e later. A- a matter of course, the talk jumped first to the mysterious hold-up and kidnaping and the reason Why. There had been r.o violence— the platol shots had been merely tm-uiit to scare the trainmen—and there had been no attempt at robbery; for that matter. Mr. Chadwick hadn't wen seen he kidnapers, and ha-’*.* known what was going on until after

it was all nver.

‘‘I've changed my mind, Unle John—I'll take the job."