Read Ebook: The White Mail by Warman Cy

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Ebook has 707 lines and 37866 words, and 15 pages

"Leave him to me," said the station-master, "he's no whit tougher than I was at his age."

When Tincher, the agent's under-study, went out to look for Tommy, to apprise him of what he had overheard, the boy was not to be seen. Of course he could not be expected to sit quietly in the sun for nearly an hour, and he had not. He had climbed to the top of the grain elevator, he had mixed salt with U. P. Burns's tobacco, and pinned a "lost" notice to his father's coat that hung on the handle-bar of the hand car. Then he had scattered shelled corn for the miller's pigs. He had discovered the agent's marking pot, and was now lying flat on his stomach, reaching over the edge of the platform, making zebras of all the white pigs in the drove.

The widow laughed and cried when Tommy told her how it had all been arranged, and Tommy's mother, to his surprise, actually kissed him. Even Denis McGuire was able to feel a pardonable pride in the boy. Mrs. Dutton said she was glad to "see th' brat thryen to make suthen uv hissilf." The priest promised to pray for him. "I'll stand good for him here, father," the agent had said to the priest, "if you'll stand good hereafter," and the priest had promised.

Mr. Collins, the foreman of the bridge carpenters, had built a bunk in the little shanty, and Mrs. McGuire and the widow had come down to fix the bed for Tommy. The enthusiastic boy gave Jack little time to hug his grief, but kept talking of the future, of their importance to the company and to Jack's family. His plans were not quite perfect in his own mind, but he felt that in some way he must contribute to the support of the widow's family. He had no need of money for himself. He had never had any or cared to have, unless it would be to buy a target rifle like Anderson's boy had, or maybe some firecrackers for the Fourth, and for Christmas. But poor little Jack would not enthuse. As often as Tommy looked up he found his companion staring at him as if half afraid.

"Whatcher skeered about, Jack Connor?" demanded Tommy, boxing the boy's cap off.

"When ye goin' to bed?" asked Jack, his wild eyes growing wider as he pictured to himself the loneliness of the place when Tommy should go to sleep.

"Aw, shucks," said Tommy, "I'm not goin' t' bed at all; come outside an' le's build a bonfire to keep th' skeeters off."

They made such a fire of dry brush and driftwood that when the Midnight Express came round the curve at Hagler's tank the engineer thought the bridge was burning, and shut off. But a moment later little Jack was at the end of the bridge moving the white light up and down, as he had seen his father do, and the driver opened the throttle again. Despite the fact that Tommy was close behind him, the timid boy began to tremble and draw back as the headlight glared in his face. Tommy seized the signal lamp and stood smiling in the face of the driver as the great engine struck the bridge and roared past, shaking the earth for rods around. Away the wild steed went, out toward the morning. She had started fresh and clean from the Mississippi, she would slake, for a brief moment, her burning thirst at the Ambraw, and at dawn drink of the waters of the Wabash.

When the red lights on the rear of the flying train had drawn close together and finally dropped over the bridge, Tommy turned to find little Jack crouching at the door of the shanty.

"'Smatter uv you, Jack Connor?" demanded the freckled boy. "Guess I better tie you under th' bridge till yo' git ust to the cars."

They put the white light down on the floor, and began to practise their writing lesson; learning to write their names so they could sign the pay rolls when the car came up the road again. Tommy started to sing, "The Hat Me Father Wore," but remembering suddenly that this was the only song Jimmie Connor had ever tried to sing, he changed off to "Jerry Ile the Kayre,"--

"Wid a big soljer coat Buttoned up to me troat, All danger I would dare Thin jint ahead an' cinter back; Oh! Jerry go ile th' Kayre."

But try as he would Tommy could not keep the clouds away from the face of his friend. The poor lad seemed half dazed by the dreadful scenes through which he had passed. It was nearly morning. The bonfire had burned down to gray ashes, and the boys were sleepy.

Tommy took the red light, shook it, and turned it up. A lost dog over by the saw-mill set up that awful unearthly howl that boys are wont to connect in some way with abandoned farms and funerals. A hoot-owl hooted on the top of the tank, and little Jack began to cry.

THE FLOOD

WHEN the White Mail came out of the east, carrying signals for the sun on the following morning, the driver looked down on a pair of very dirty faces at the end of West Creek bridge. The white flag fluttered in the morning breeze, and little Jack's arm shook like an aspen branch as the big engine struck the bridge and thundered by. Tommy, who feared nothing, day or night, stood near him, pushing him encouragingly as he shrank from the flying train. When they had walked across the bridge and back, to see that no sparks had fallen from the quivering ash-pan, they returned to the pump. The old mule had been harnessed before it was light, from the new platform that Tommy had designed and the boss carpenter had built. He had stopped short and fallen dead asleep the moment the boys left him to flag the fast mail. He was now rudely awakened by Tommy, who hit him a sharp cut with the long whip, as he climbed to his place on the platform.

In a little while the sun came up over the tree-tops and touched the water tank. Little Mary Connor came down the track, bringing breakfast for the boys, and they were glad to see her. When she had fixed the plates and poured the hot, black coffee into the bright tin cups, she allowed Tommy to lift her onto the platform, where she encouraged the mule while the boys had breakfast.

"Say, Jack, old man; this is great," said Tommy, taking a long pull at the bracing beverage. Jack gave his companion a furtive glance, but deigned no reply--not even a smile. "Jimminy-crismus, why don' yo' eat?" shouted Tommy. Jack was staring at his sister, who looked so weird and ghost-like in her black frock, with eyes that seemed too large for her, and her white face hiding in a heap of hair.

The boys were much refreshed by the hot breakfast, and when Tommy helped little Mary from the platform he was in a humor to tease her. He even went so far as to pull her ear gently and to pinch her cheeks,--to put life in 'em, as he expressed it. Mary smiled and colored slightly: the first faint flush of little girlhood. She liked Tommy, and he liked her. Rough and boisterous with boys, he was always gentle and thoughtful with the little girls, and Mary, to his mind, was the belle of Lick Skillet.

When Tommy had helped Mary over the bridge, dropped the spaniel into the water for his morning bath, and shied a few stones at the kingfisher on the top of a telegraph pole, he pushed Jack from the platform, ordered him to bed, and began to tickle the mule with the long lash. Little Jack declared that he was not sleepy. "I'm boss o' th' day shif', Mr. Jack," said Tommy, "an' my talk goes,--you're th' night hawk,--sabe?"

Jack went reluctantly to the bed that had been fixed for the other boy, but had not been used, and Tommy continued to larrup the mule and watch the marker crawl down the figure-board as the water crept toward the top of the tank. At the end of an hour little Jack came from the shanty, declaring that he was not sleepy.

"Well," says Tommy, "if yo' won't sleep, yo' kin work," and he gave Jack the whip. "This ole giraft aint had no breakfast, an' I guess he'll want some time th' tank's full."

A half hour later Tommy returned with a big feed of oats in a bag. When he reached the west end of the bridge he stopped, put down the bag, and made the woods ring with his boyish laughter.

The old mule was lying peacefully in the endless path, while little Jack, curled up like a bird dog on the platform, was sound asleep.

Tommy took off his coat, fixed it under Jack's head for a pillow, and then cautiously wakened the mule. He dared not use the lash now, but, following close behind the mule, prodded him persistently with the whip-handle. Round and round they went, the marker crawled down, the water up, and little Jack snored like a saw-mill.

"I give yo' fair warnin', Mr. Jack Connor," said Tommy, swimming on his back, "if yo' don' skin off yer duds an' git in here I'll come up there an' trow yo' off d' bridge, duds an' all."

"I don' feel like ut, Tommy," said Jack, "t' mar' I'll go in, maby."

Tommy and the dog took a few dives from the bridge, when Jack, who had been standing guard, shouted to his companion to "hustle on his duds" for Mary was coming down the track with the dinner.

Tommy, properly attired, was waiting at the narrow foot-bridge that lay across the ditch from the grade to the little shanty. He took the basket and the jug of buttermilk, and Mary, young as she was, felt and appreciated these little attentions from the young gallant. She spread a newspaper on the little pine table and put down the plates.

"Watcher doin' uv three plates, Mary?" asked Jack.

"Mamma said I could hev dinner wif you'uns," said Mary, shyly.

"'S matter uv yo', Jack Connor? Think girls never gits hungry?" demanded Tommy, tumbling over his companion and rolling him in the high grass.

There was no fried chicken, no green peas, no radishes, nor corn, nor bread and butter; there was nothing--not even chicken bones--when the banquet was over, for the dog had eaten the bones.

Mary picked up the dishes and the empty jug, and when Tommy had climbed up in the old sugar tree to see if the young birds were out, she swept the little shanty and gathered a bouquet of wild flowers and placed them in a tomato can on the little table.

When Tommy had helped her over the bridge the boys put the mule out to grass. They tied his long reata to the rope that hung from the water tank--the rope the fireman pulls when the engine stops for water--and then sat under the tank, playing mumblety-peg, while the mule regaled himself on the luxurious grass. Jack soon grew tired of the sport, put his head on the oat-bag and fell asleep. In a little while Tommy followed him, for they were exceedingly comfortable and content with the big tank full of water and their own little tanks full of wholesome food and buttermilk. They had scarcely begun to dream, however, when an extra west came creeping up over the ridge. The engineer was fanning them down the long slope in order to be able to lift them over the hill at Hagler's tank, when he observed the old pump mule slowly crossing the track beyond the bridge. He sounded the whistle and the mule stopped, with his hind legs not far from the outer rail. The whistle screamed frantically, and the brakeman climbed out of the caboose to the top of the cars to be near the brakes in case of danger. The boys slept peacefully under the tank. The mule raised his head and looked at the locomotive. He had a placid contempt for screaming locomotives, whose very breath of life was drawn from tanks which he, and his kind, were forced to fill. The travel-worn engine had ceased its screaming and was now driving madly, and with malice aforethought, toward the mule. At the last moment--not from fear of the machine, but because he hated it--the mule moved a space away. This move on the part of the mule tightened the rope slightly, so that the pilot of the engine picked it up and stretched it across the front end of the flying locomotive. A moment later the mule, at one end of the rope, received a jerk that turned him over, and the tank valve, at the other end of the rope, was pulled wide open. A great stream of water, as big around as one of the boys, now shot down against the side of the passing train, and, rebounding, spread out under the tank. The boys, thus suddenly awakened by the cold flood, which, before they could get to their feet, began to roll them over and almost smothered them, thought they must be in the midst of a cloud-burst. The roar of the train was so deafening they could not call to each other. If they stood up, the weight of the falling water knocked them down again. When the train had gone by the noise grew less terrific and Tommy fought his way to the open air. A glance at the surroundings showed him what had happened, and he hastily dragged little Jack, drenched, half drowned, and thoroughly frightened, from under the tank. One end of the broken rope had wrapped around the water-spout and held the valve open. Tommy climbed upon the tank-ladder, extricated the rope, and that closed the valve.

The old mule, which had caused all the trouble, was hitched up again and started 'round on his endless journey to put up the few hundreds of barrels of water that had been wasted.

Tommy and Jack stretched themselves on the platform to encourage the mule and dry their clothes.

TOMMY'S REQUISITION

"Ahn a winter's mornin' whin the wind was blowin' At a staid an' stiddy gai-at, Did a Kayre sit sail wud a kayrgo laden Out of siction siventy-eight."

U.P. BURNS stopped on the bridge and cocked his ear. He knew the song and the singer. It was U.P.'s day to walk the track, and he was now inspecting the bridge in an officious manner, not altogether pleasing to the young gentlemen who held themselves responsible for that structure--day and night.

"Hay, there! ol' flatobacker!" cried Tommy McGuire, from the top of a waving elm, "d' yo' know the trains are all over-due this morning?"

"I know they're all on time."

"I say they're all over-due," insisted the pump boy.

"Well, what make ye tink so, Tommy?"

"'Cause they bin out all night--ha, ha, ha--yo'le bum; that's th' time yo' tuck th' pin hook." And Tommy climbed still higher to be out of reach of the rocks and sticks that the track-walker sent up after him.

This was the day following the "cloud-burst" under the water tank: the morrow of the second night's watch. Little Jack, thoroughly exhausted, was sleeping like a weary soldier, regardless of mosquitoes, heat, ticks, and red-ants. Tommy had filled the tank long before the sun came up over the tree-tops. The engineers, having heard of the struggles and hardships of the young railroaders, were taking water at Highland and Hagler's whenever it was possible to do so, in order to save the water at Silver Creek.

Tommy and Mary waited dinner for nearly an hour under the old elm that day.

They waited until Tommy declared that he could eat his whiskers, if he had any to eat, and Jack was still asleep. At two o'clock the watchman came out, bathed his mosquito-bitten face in the river, had dinner--what was left of it--and declared himself ready to relieve his companion. But Tommy would not go to sleep. He flagged a work-train and went up to St. Jacobs.

"I want yo' to write a request to the roadmaster," said Tommy.

"Ah! Tommy," said the agent, "a requisition for supplies so soon?"

"Well, things got t' be fixed up a little down there 'f we stay on d' job."

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