The Taming of Red Butte Western

ved from the west on train 204, came into the superintendent's office with the light of discovery i

just now-about somebody taking a pot-shot at you last nigh

"Yes, it was Rufford, so Dawson says. I di

o see that he didn't get

brother a while back. The brother has been hanging about town and making threats eve

was Dougherty only putting on a few

thinking not so much of the narrow escape as of the fresh and hum

urself when you live in a gun country. I said I wouldn't do it, but I have done it, and I'll tell you right now,

le drawer in his desk which now contained

not afford to go armed? I am supposed to stand for law and order. What would my ex

get yourself comfortably shot up before you get through. But I didn't come up here to wrangle with you about your

Lidgerwood; "hav

's going to be another case of Rachel weeping for her ch

e discovered

ow it was done I couldn't imagine. There is a wagon-road paralleling the river over there at the Siding, as you know, and the first thing I did the

ey couldn't have been floated

perator at Little Butte twelve miles west, and the track-walker at Point-of-Rocks, whose boat goes down to within two or three miles of the Gloria bridge. Goodloe, at Little Butte, reports that th

more cheerful than you were last

on the bar three miles up the Gloria, but they knew nothing-or if they knew they wouldn't tell. That was the case with every man I talked to on our side of the river. But over across the Timanyoni,

d, when the engineer st

y like one. He says that about two o'clock in the morning of Saturday, two weeks ago, an engine and a single car backed down from the west to the Gloria bridge, and a crowd of men swarmed off the train, loaded those

e when he sa

t, and the engine had no headlight. But the loading gang had

rest at that?" said

ni and tackled the old prospector again. I wanted to check him up-see if he had forgotten any of the little frills and details. He hadn't. On the contrary, he was able to add what seems to me a very important detail. About an hour after the disappearance of the one-car train with my brid

hunting for saw-mill

nt that there is one, and that the thieves, whoever they were, lost no time in sawing my bridge-timbers up into board-lumber, and I'll bet a hen wo

u were looking for your bridge-timbers and saw-mil

r says he couldn't make out very well in the dark, but it seemed to him as if the engine

it could be hidden anywhere on so small a part of the Red Butte Western system as that covered by the comparatively short mileag

r all the line lying west of the G

le Butte; it's the one that used to serve Flemister's mine when the workings were on the eastern slope of the butte. I didn't go

point-rails had been taken out at Silver Switch-at both of the main-line ends of the 'Y',-but the last time I w

is chair, smoking his pipe, but at this

about five minutes," he said hurriedly. "Tell me half a dozen things in just about

N

ted him of being mixe

nough about him to

ommunicating with the outer

there; how is he mix

't kno

m, talking with Goodloe, I saw Flemister and Hallock walking down the new spur tog

that much, and he took half a day off Thursda

to know what th

He went at

string broken. Never mind;

r those bri

into. And before I get back I am going to know what'

had scarcely finished reading his mail, when McCloskey opened the door.

ced, insulated copper wire, and a dozen or more telephone sets, in the store-room. Mr. Cumberley had a notion of connecting up all the

ake it out upon the nearest man was still as strong

cted of him, "but nobody knows anything, of course. So far as I could find

as the

, the line-chief, has one

atient comment. "I hope you don't

eyes, and looked truculent enoug

s this time. He was in that store-room day before yesterday, or

t I think you are mistaken in your conclusion, I mean. Hallock has been making an inventory of material on hand for the past week or mor

on that fellow, something turns up to make it slip. But if I had my way about twe

d was smi

you dislike him, and probably you have good reasons. But have you stoppe

tell you one thing, Mr. Lidgerwood"-shaking an emphatic finger-"Flemister has just put a complete system of wiring and telephones in his mine, and if

unconvincing to

lock, Mac, as you will see when

any more. I suppose I've got to say it again: I'm all in,

at was deadheading from Red Butte to the Angels shops. He sought out Lidgerwood at once, and fling

u were right about the track connection at Silver Switch. It is in; Flemister put it in h

o up over

further, Lidgerwood, I'd like to ask you one question:

gest mine-owner or freight-shipper this side of the Crosswater Hills

een built to enclose them. The old spur runs through a gate in the stockade, and the gate was open; but the two toughs wouldn't let me go inside. I wrangled with them first, and tried to bribe them afterward, but it was no go. Then I started to walk around the outside of the stockade, which is only a high

hat did

and unpainted. Sizing them up from a distance, I said to myself that the lumber in them hadn't been very long out of the

ere was silence, and Lidgerwood had added many squares to

did you make any inquiries about rece

records show, Flemister has had no material, save coal, shipped i

ook your bridge-timbers and

the power-plant was running while I was up there to-day. The power is a steam engine, and if you'd stand off and listen to it you'd swear it was a locomotive

"Yes, on Flemister and some oth

y. Suppose we drop it until to-morrow. I'm afraid it means a fi

railroad yard. Benson's news had merely confirmed his own and McCloskey's conclusion that some one in authority was in

reparing to go to bed, he noticed that the tiny relay on the stand at his bed's head was silent. Afterward, when he tried to adjust the instrument, he found it ruine