He Omitted The “Extra” by James Norman Shreve Read online

  Railroad Man’s Magazine, December, 1909

  He Omitted The “Extra”

  by James Norman Shreve

  HE timekeeper struggled feverishly for dots and dishes from the white, deft fingers of several moments to catch at least a few Alfred Winter, second-trick despatcher of the T of the letters that were sprayed out in Pecos Valley Lines.

  what seemed to him a hysterical blur of Finally a breath of the cool June night

  Railroad Man’s Magazine 2

  breeze from the open window behind him paper. “This is a precious thing. In future years I doubled over the sheet of clip he was writing shall look upon its frayed and worn edges and on, and he lost track of the meanings. He shook say to one K. Browning, still a struggling his head, threw down his pencil, and leaned operator tolerated in my office, ‘Young man, back, watching admiringly the swift work of the remember that? Why, oh, why haven’t you despatcher.

  taken a leaf out of my book?’”

  In a moment the latter closed his key, He handed over the match. “Well, I gotta looked up at the clock, and jotted down “10.20

  go to bed. ’Night, both. Bet you I dream of P.” on the train-sheet. Then he smiled thinly at head-end collisions; No. 202 in the ditch; forty the timekeeper. “Get any?” The timekeeper people passed in their checks—and me asleep at grinned sheepishly. “Oh, some. I got ‘C. & E.’

  the key!”

  all right, and an ‘assist.’ and ‘extra’ and-1et’s The night operator at Canadian sat for a see— ‘over all’ and ‘trains.’ Gee! You must moment staring at the train-order pad before have gone at a sixty-a-minute hike.”

  him, a shaggy frown roofing his tired, pleasant

  “Hardly that. About forty-five. eyes.

  Farquehar, at Canadian, isn’t a fast man. Here

  “Humph! Funny business, that. ‘ All he comes with the repeat. Try it. He sends trains,’ hey? Oh, all right, all right. Reckon they slow.”

  know what. But all the same—” He tore off the The timekeeper grabbed his pencil and top sheet and limped to the door.

  again bent over his pad. When the despatcher Pusher 292 stood on the passing track, handed the train-order copy-book over the long breathing deeply and evenly, as if gathering glass partition to Korby Browning, his young strength for the stiff climb up Glazier Hill night operator, the timekeeper walked around behind the thirty-seven loads of Extra 18 that and peered over Korby’s shoulder. For a waited on the main line ahead, just beyond the moment he compared his slip with the book.

  switch. A stalwart, black-capped figure, torch in Then he slapped his leg explosively.

  hand, overalled, and jacketed in grease-smeared

  “By gracious!” His voice was faded blue, was leisurely oiling round, now triumphant. “Look-a here!”

  stooping a little to peer back of the big drive-He shoved the paper under Korby’s

  wheels, now reaching over with long-scouted nose.

  oil-can to satisfy some thirsty cup.

  “What do you think of that now! Say,

  “Hi, Redding! You Belvedere, you!

  only whisper to me, friends—only whisper. I Come here and get your orders!”

  see your finish, Korby. Me for your job, all The black-cap faced about and the

  right, all right. Say the word, Alfred, and you flaring torch showed clear eyes set in clean-can have me.”

  looking whites, cheeks that, even in the yellow, The despatcher threw his thin, ungenial smoky light, were pink as a girl’s—what you smile at the operator. “Get it, did he?”

  could see of the natural color—and strong white Korby nodded. “Sure thing. All except teeth in an amiable grin at the operator’s pet the date.” He got up and offered his chair to the classical allusion when speaking to this timekeeper. “Here you are, Shervin. I resign.

  particular black-cap.

  You’re it. When you get Alfred’s job, there, Frank Redding knew nothing of Apollo, gimme mine back, will you?” He reached for his or Hercules, or Mercury, or Venus, except, pipe. “Got a match?”

  perhaps, as euphonistic titles to sundry Pullman Shervin carefully folded his sheet of sleepers that he aspired to whip around curves

  He Omitted The “Extra”

  3

  behind him.

  If he had had even a faint knowledge, can’t I see him blush, and jump for his cab, and swear fluently from the safe retreat of his cushion, where the spluttering hiss of dripping water-cocks and the subdued roar of fire-box would drown all answering retorts to the operator?

  At the door he caught the little lame man by the elbows, carried him over to the desk, and plumped him gently down into the rickety armchair.

  “You stop your ‘Belvy-dearing me, or I’ll tell your wife you’re thinking of some other girl.”

  It was an old threat that always brought a chuckle from Farquehar—a chuckle a trifle puzzling to the young engineer, indicative somehow of amusement at his expense.

  One hour later Redding whistled “good

  “Gimme that order.” He bent down close by.” He and his fireman watched the caboose to the dingy station-lamp. In a moment he had fade out of the headlight’s ken, and the green straightened up and looked quickly at the eyes of the rear lanterns grow smaller and operator. “Sam Hill! Why, this says—say, you nearer together and suddenly blot out altogether sure you got this right?”

  as the train swept around a curve.

  “Sure thing. A. W., O. K.’d my repeat.”

  Redding pulled back the reverse, but Redding studied the sheet a full minute before opening the throttle once more referred longer.

  to the thin waxy sheet of the train-order.

  “Humph! We’re the moguls tonight. I

  “Can’t make anything else out of it. Can suppose if the old man himself was out in a you, Carl?” He handed it over to the fireman, at special we’d be over him, too—what?”

  the same time gently pulling at the throttle. As An impatient screech from far up the the steam dropped hissing into the cylinders and track made him thrust the order into an inside the drivers grumbled into sullen, clanking; pocket.

  motion, the fireman shook his head and passed

  “Well, see you later. Friend Josiah’s the paper back. “Nope. We’re the folks tonight.”

  saying ‘What the deuce!’”

  “All right. Here goes.”

  He ran out to his engine and swung up He glanced out along the track, slipping the steps. A clang or two of the bell, a quick sluggishly under them through the thick yellow snort of the whistle, a few soft expulsions of the light from the rear of the tender, braced himself exhaust, and 292 moved slowly up the siding, comfortably against the window-jamb, and with out across the switch, and coupled neatly onto right hand on air-brake lever, opened the throttle the rear end of Extra 18.

  wider for the slight incline to the top of Glazier Hill. The engine lurched to the crest, then, with steam shut off, started on the five-mile coast

  Railroad Man’s Magazine 4

  downward.

  A fourth mile whipped past, blurredly, The hand of the indicator jerked steadily blotchily, streakily, and over sixty feet of low to thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty, sixty, trestle they roared splittingly into the fifth. Now seventy, and stayed there. The right wind the damp wind slapped their faces. Somewhere whistled shrilly through the cab, whipping the ahead was the Canadian River. Redding pressed bell-cord viciously against the roof, and over ever so little the brass lever under his right swaying the bell itself till it protested hand. Straightway a high, thin wail cut into the plaintively. The headlight case, sharply outli
ned harsher sound chaos, and the cab felt a slight against the fan of light beyond, described tremor.

  unsteady arcs as the tender swung this way or He pressed farther. The wail rose to a that; while at every lurch the iron apron between scream, the tremor to a shudder. The driver tender and engine scraped and rasped and brake-shoes clamped closer and the big wheels, clattered truculently.

  fretted hot, struggled impotently to shake off The telegraph-poles to the right of the that relentless embrace. Back dropped the hand track, grimly cross-armed far ahead against the of the indicator, sixty, fifty, forty, thirty, and at star-shot velvet of the prairie sky, lengthened the bridge, fifteen.

  swiftly to the dim outer edge of the light-shaft, The headlight speared a stretch of black hurtled gigantic through it, were swallowed sluggish water, sullenly menacing, where it had voraciously by the hungry night.

  cut deep into the bank at the farther end of the Ragged splotches of mesquit, left un-bridge, just where the track elbowed in a sharp scarred by fire-guards beyond the right of way, curve.

  lumbered gloomily past, while now and then, Redding looked back as the engine took still farther out, a tufted Yucca, cleanly this curve. He spat contemplatively. “The silhouetted from the summit of some gentle rise, treacherous son-of-a-gun!”

  paced slowly to the rear.

  For half a mile beyond the bridge the A mile was gone! Two miles! A third.

  track was on a flat level. Then it took a slight Through Huelger’s Cut a swirl of fine gravel dip and swerved around The Council—a group stormed the cab. “Look what you done!” yelled of ragged rocks quaintly up-tossed to form a Carl, ducking his head.

  circle of squatting figures. From there on the Redding roared, spitting vigorously, “I rise in the land, unevenly sand-duned and forgot!” Then he grinned, and with his free hand hillocked, was such as to conceal for a full mile put thumb to nose and wiggled his fingers the bed of the railroad.

  amiably at his fireman. “Wouldn’t that gravel Half-way to the dip the fireman

  you!”

  suddenly jerked himself upright and stared The latter got off his seat, spat on his wildly out into the night—not down the track, hands, and made certain according-to-code but across the space bound by the coming curve.

  motions as to what he wanted to do to His face whitened under the coal-dust and somebody’s head. Happening to glance at the grease. Hi rubbed his eyes—then swung off his steam-gage, he grabbed the chain and jerked cushion with a shrill yell.

  open the furnace-door, shooting in a couple of

  “There’s 202's light! For Heaven’s sake, shovelfuls of coal with such gusto and self-jump, Frank!”

  evidence as to whom he wished they were, that The last word was hardly past his lips he climbed again onto his seat, smiling, and before he was out on the cab-step. He hung a took a fresh chew of tobacco.

  fraction of a second by the handrail, and then

  He Omitted The “Extra”

  5

  launched himself frantically out toward the feet away, then dropped. He stumbled, rolled off white line of sand ten feet from the track.

  into the ditch, and sat up just as 292 bumped Redding had dropped to his feet. He

  into the other engine.

  peered out. From beyond the faint outline of a There was a splintering of wood from a rounded hummock a long thin shaft of mellow shattered pilot, a clang of both bells, a tinkle of light pierced the night’s blackness.

  smashed headlight glass. No. 202 shoved the pusher forward a few feet and came to a standstill. Not so 292.

  Redding rubbed his eyes. Then he

  remembered, and leaped to his feet. He had thrown over the reverse-lever, and full steam was on!

  The exultant wheels, with the help of 202, had at last come into their own. Still slipping at times in a blur of spokes, they clung enough to the rails to send the engine forward faster with every stormy, sputtering breath from the cylinders.

  Redding raced silently at the side of the

  “He’s right. It’s 202!”

  cab-step, but, strain as he might, his Snap! The lever shot to the emergency outstretched hand could not touch the rail that notch, but the grinding, furious, upheaval for would offer him grip. More frequently the huge which he braced himself tautly did not occur!

  drivers bit sure, and the rocking engine gathered For the first time in her life, 292's air speed.

  would not work!

  The panting young engineer saw

  Only one thing to do. He slammed

  pictures. He saw the half-mile stretch of forward the reverse lever, and, as a shower of straight, smooth track ahead. No. 292 would end slivered sparks shot from under the wrenched it at seventy-five miles an hour. He saw the drivers, opened the throttle to its widest.

  sharp swing to the track as it met the bridge.

  Then he ripped the mild summer night When his engine struck this—Heaven! What a back and across and up and down with a misery thing to see! A black, raging thing of the night of sound from the raucous throat of the whistle.

  in a flying leap—up, out, down, down into that Straightway it was answered, and bottomless hole, into arms patient a hundred Redding knew what could be done was being years for this! He saw himself, his hopes—her!

  done by 202. His own engine was all atremble A thick, dry sob wrung from his lips. Then his with the battle of the drivers to grip the rails and toe struck a tie and he was hurled sprawling—to the thunder of the unshackled steam.

  reach at length the hand-rail. His fingers The gage showed eight miles an hour as snapped tight. His legs were whipped across the 292 skidded down the dip at The Council and, rough ties for a few yards, then he drew himself rounding the curve, shivered into the full glare up into the cab.

  of the east-bound passenger’s headlight.

  With steam shut off, and new-gained

  Redding saw they must come together, freedom lost, the engine slowed sullenly to a but felt that no serious damage would be done.

  clanking, grumbling, curse-the-luck stop. A He hung on to the cab handrail till but a score of scared voice spoke from out the darkness.

  Railroad Man’s Magazine 6

  “Frank! You there? What’s happened!”

  Redding reached for his wallet, and took A white, scratched face peered up into out a thin, crumpled sheet. “My copy. See what the cab. Bits of cinder and sand clung to the it says.”

  yellow foretop.

  The timekeeper smoothed it out flat.

  The engineer looked down. He solemnly put thumb to nose and wiggled his fingers.

  6-7.

  10.20

  P.

  “Wouldn’t that gravel you!”

  C. & E, No. 18. Engineer, Engine 292.

  C. & E, all trains east.

  The timekeeper was playing his usual Engine 292 will assist No. 18, Canadian afternoon game of solitaire, sorting time-slips.

  to Glazier, and will run extra Glazier to The door opened and a big-shouldered, spruce Canadian with right over all east-bound trains.

  figure entered.

  W

  “Hallo, Frank—Mr. Redding, I should

  . G. D.

  say. Why, is to-day the big day? Didn’t know it was so soon!”

  “Well?”

  The pink cheeks grew somewhat pinker,

  “Why,” slipping it back into his wallet, but the teeth gleamed in the usual wide, “Farquehar left out the one word that cut the attractive grin.

  mustard— ‘extra.’”

  “Shucks! Naw! Can’t a fellow wear a

  The timekeeper rumpled his hair. “Oh—

  new pair of pants once in a while?” He laid a he did, did he!”

  cigar on the desk. “That’s for my time. Gimme

  “Sure. Mr. Winter’s record shows that, it. Last month’s, I mean.”

  he says. But I’m sorry for Farquehar. He’s got

  “Huh! When is the day, then?”

&nbsp
; some dandy kids. And his wife ain’t very The engineer again protested. “Honest!

  strong. Well, I gotta go up-stairs and see the Just want to take a lay-off. Since night before chief. Have that for me when I come down?”

  last my—er—nerves have been—er—upset, The timekeeper nodded and opened the doncherknow.”

  record. But for some time he stared down The timekeeper grunted, but reached for unseeing at the figures. “Farquehar! What’ll he his engineers’ record. “Explanation’s bum. But, do now?”

  seriously, I heard about your doings. Close He spread out his own particular scrap shave, wasn’t it.”

  of clip—his “precious thing.” Word for word, it

  “Yep. I’m in the clear all right, though.

  read as Redding’s copy.

  But poor Farquehar has got the can, I hear. I’m The timekeeper struck the desk a loud sorry. He’s decent. But he made a bad bust.”

  blow with his clenched fist.

  “Bull the order, did he?”

  “Curse A. W., for a rotten, cowardly

  “Um-hm. Got it ‘right over all east-

  sneak! Oh, he’ll get his, all right; he’ll get his!”

  bound trains’ instead of ‘east-bound extra He began furiously to write out the

  trains’.”

  engineer’s time-check.

  The other turned quickly. “What’s that?”

 

 

  Monte Herridge, He Omitted The “Extra” by James Norman Shreve

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