The Cowpuncher (3 page)

In the locomotive cab, the grizzled engineer, a veteran of half a dozen wrecks in the wild mountain country, fought with every trick he knew to save his train from that mighty surge. His fireman’s warning yell had been his first inkling of disaster ahead as the engine lurched around a curve. He slammed the throttle shut and threw on every ounce of pressure in his brake cylinders.

The screech of air through the port, the clanging of brake rigging and the grind of the shoes against the wheels added their pandemonium to the tumult of the avalanche. Back came the reverse lever, the old hogger jerked the throttle wide open.

The exhaust boomed again and the great drive wheels, working in reverse, howled their protest and ground flakes and ribbons of steel from the shivering rails. Back along the train clattered a prodigious banging of couplers and clanging of outraged steel.

But it was useless. The terrific shove of ten million pounds of freight traveling at sixty miles an hour hurled the train forward despite the grip of the brakes and the backward surge of the giant engine. With a prodigious crash the locomotive hit the towering wall of earth and stone, burrowing deep into the mass, thrown over on its side. Down
upon the hissing monster thundered tons of rock from the wavering crest.

The engineer died with one hand on the throttle, the other on the brake-valve lever. The fireman, jumping through the window an instant before the crash, was crushed to a pulp under the roaring mass of the avalanche. The head brakeman met death in the crushed cab, pinned against the hot boilerhead, screaming his agony as life was baked out of him. Jets of smoke and steam spurted through the crevices of the ghastly mound and wavered above the sullen funeral pyre like uncertain ghosts in the fading light.

The wreck was appallingly complete. Car after car left the iron to slide and roll down the steep slope on the off side of the right-of-way. Others piled up in a jumbled mass of splintered wood and twisted steel. Still others were turned sideways or lay with tangled brake rigging in the air. Everywhere were trucks torn loose from the bodies, beams, sills, scattered freight.

And hardly had the last screech of disrupted steel and the final grumble of the avalanche ceased to quiver on the air when, back toward the middle of the shattered train, an ominous glow began to redden the deepening dusk.

Huck Brannon had hardly time to yell a warning to his companions when he was thrown to the floor by the bucking of the car as the engineer slammed the automatic brake lever into the “big hole” and “dynamited” his train. He was still rolling about in the straw when the engine hit the slide.

Gripping, clawing, vainly trying to gain his
feet, he was hurled against the side of the car with terrific force. Over and about him rained the heavy firebrick. One grazed his forehead and for a crawling moment or two, everything went black.

He was dimly conscious of a mighty crashing and splintering and the horrible grinding groan of the overturned cars slithering down the slope. Vaguely aware, also, of yells and screams close at hand.

It was Mason’s booming voice that shook Huck back into full consciousness. His voice and the pound and scuffle of his brogans. Sick and dizzy, Huck reeled to a stance on a slanting surface. He coughed as something acrid and penetrating struck his throat and nostrils. Shaking the redstreaked blackness from his eyes he glared about.

The boxcar was ripped apart, unroofed, splintered. Overhead Huck saw the glint of stars in the darkening sky. All about him was swirling smoke through which beat a rising glow. Against the glow leaped and danced a huge figure.

The figure whirled suddenly and Huck saw it was Lank Mason. The big miner saw him at the same instant.

“Didn’t get you either, eh?” he shouted. “ ‘Fraid the rest of the boys are done for. Here’s Badeye with his head bashed in and Fatty’s damn nigh tore in two. Where’s the old man? We gotta get outa here pronto—that lantern smashed and set the straw afire. These splinters have caught, too. I tried to beat it out, but ain’t no use.”

At mention of Old Tom, Huck recollected the queer gasping sound which could still be heard. It
seemed to come from beneath what remained of one side of the smashed car. With Lank at his heels, he crawled over the wreckage in the direction of the sound.

Ripping the shattered planks away, they found Old Tom. He lay buried deep in the wreckage; a heavy beam, resting across his chest, pinned him down. One end of the beam was securely bolted to the long double timbers of a side sill. Upon the other end lay the huge steel center sill, a dead weight of more than a ton.

Gaylord was conscious and, it seemed to Huck, not fatally injured. The weight upon his chest made breathing very nearly impossible, and he was in pain, but the beam was so supported by the wreckage that it did not badly crush him.

Old Tom recognized them and gasped out words of satisfaction on their escape.

“We’ll get you out, oldtimer,” Huck assured him. “Is it hurting bad? Can you hold out while we get that damned sill off or until the wreck-train gets here?”

“Ain’t hurt bad,” panted Gaylord. “Weight don’t seem to be settlin’ no more. I can wait.”

“You can’t wait long,” growled Lank. “Fire’s eatin’ this way, and there ain’t no way we can put it out. C’mon, young feller, let’s get to work on that sill.”

They went after it, heaving and tugging. The sill did not budge an inch. Mason swore and mopped his beefy face. Huck ripped free a length of timber for them to use as a pry. Still the sill stubbornly held its ground. Again they put their strength to
the effort. The veins stood out on Huck’s forehead large as cords, black as ink. The big muscles of arm and back and shoulder swelled and knotted beneath his shirt. With a slithery sound, one sleeve split from elbow to wrist.

“Gawd, feller, but you got an arm on you!” panted Lank Mason. “I allus been rated a hoss, but I figger you as liftin’ half again as much as I am.”

“But not enough, blast it!” Brannon grated behind set teeth. “Mason, we’ve got to do something and damn fast or he’s a goner sure.”

“Fire won’t reach him for quite a spell,” Lank said. “See—it’s workin’ t’other way. Wind’s blowin’ in that d’rection, and most of the wood’s over there.”

“Yeah, and something else is over there, too,” Huck told him grimly.

“Eh?”

“Uh-huh, that car of blasting powder’s over that way, and the fire’s all over it right now. Any minute, she’s liable to let go.”

“Good Gawd!” the miner gasped. “When she does she’ll blow this mess clean to Utah!”

“And Old Tom with it—if we don’t get him out first,” Huck said quietly.

Growling, Lank leaped to the pry and bent his great shoulder to it. Then he suddenly straightened up, staring back along the wreck; a light was bobbing toward them from that direction.

“Here comes one of the train crew,” he muttered. “Mebbe he can help.”

A moment later the conductor of the freight came stumbling over the ties. There was blood on
his face and one of his eyes was swelled shut. He paused opposite the burning wreckage and glared at the pair with the one eye remaining open, as if they were responsible for the wreck.

“What the hell’s goin’ on
here?
” he demanded.

Huck told him briefly. Before he had finished, the conductor was slipping and sliding down the embankment. His practiced eye took in the situation at once.

“Gotta get that feller out in a hurry if he’s to be got out at all,” he declared. “Here, all t’gether now!”

He bent his back to the pry and the three tugged and strained until their faces were black.

“No use,” the conductor grunted. “We ain’t got the heft.”

He coughed spasmodically as acrid smoke swirled about them in thick clouds.

“Thank God the wind’s changed,” he gulped. “That’ll keep the fire ‘way from that powder a little while longer.”

“And bring it onto Old Tom a little sooner,” Huck pointed out.

“What in hell we gonna do?” Lank Mason wailed helplessly.

Huck Brannon’s gray eyes were roving over the wreckage lighted by the blazing wood. His gaze ran up the embankment, centered on the shining rails still securely spiked to the crossties, came back to the massive steel sill which held Old Tom prisoner. He estimated the distance, a deep furrow of concentration drawing his dark brows together.

Long-neglected engineering elementals were
coming back to him. He groped in his mind, trying to pin down an elusive memory, a memory that dealt with heavy timbers on an incline—timbers that were needed higher up the slope at a time when there was no windlass or hoist available, and insufficient man-power to move them by hand.

“We got those logs up, though,” he muttered. “Let’s see, now, there was a tree growing on top of the rise. We had—”

Suddenly he whirled to face the conductor, his eyes blazing with excitement.

“You got rope in your caboose?” he demanded.

“Shore,” the railroad man replied, “nigh onto a hundred feet of stout cord in the forward cushion box—chains, too; but what good’ll that do? Can’t pull that sill off with rope.”

“I’ll show you,” the cowboy barked, and scrambled up the slope.

“I gotta hustle to the head end and see what happened to the boys there,” the conductor bawled after him. “The rear man’s gone back to flag the Western Flyer. She’ll have telegraph instruments and can cut in on the wire and call the wrecker.”

Huck waved a hand to show he understood, and headed for the caboose at a dead run. He found it sagging crazily to one side, the front wheels off the track and its coupling twisted loose. He leaped up the steps, into the aisle and flung back the cushion seat that was hinged to the box.

The rope was there, neatly coiled. Huck hauled it out, shouldered it and staggered down the steps. It was a heavy weight and it was rough going through the dark; but he made almost as good time back to the burning wreckage as he had coming from it. He could see the conductor’s lantern bobbing about the dark mass of the avalanche; but Lank Mason still crouched beside Gaylord, coughing and choking in the smoke.

“Gettin’ hotter’n hell,” he panted as Huck came sliding down the embankment.

“That powder car’s blazin’ fine, too,” the cowboy grunted. “She’ll go any minute now.”

With swift, sure hands he looped one end of the rope about the steel sill.

“Get two strong beams, ten or twelve feet long,” he shouted back at Mason as he clambered up the slope again, trailing the rope.

To reach the track and secure the free end of the
rope to the outside rail took only minutes. The rope sagged down the slope with plenty of slack.

Huck found a spot halfway down the slope where a large flat stone provided secure footing.

“Bring those beams up here,” he called to Lank.

The miner panted up with them, mumbling questions which Huck didn’t have time to answer. He handed one to the cowboy, who stood the unsplintered end on the flat rock, thrusting the splintered end through a loop twisted in the slack of the rope.

“Hold it,” he grunted, took the other timber and thrust one end through the widened loop.

With Lank holding the upright beam steady, Huck gripped the far end of the horizontal beam and walked around the upright, winding the slack of the rope about the vertical beam. And now he had a crude Spanish windlass capable of exerting a tremendous pull on the sill that penned Old Tom.

“If the rope’ll hold, we’ll do it,” he told Mason. “You come and take the end of this—the upright will stand by itself now the rope’s taut. Wind her up slow and steady and pull the sill up the slope. I’m going to jerk Tom out soon as the weight’s off him.”

“If that powder let’s go, you won’t have a chance!” warned Mason. “Let
me
go down, son.”

“I’m faster on my feet and stronger,” Huck replied. “You’re better here. All right, steady, now.”

Swiftly he lunged back into the inferno of smoke and fire. The rope hummed with tension and as
Huck crouched beside Old Tom, the heavy steel sill began to slowly move up the sloping timber. As it moved, the lower end of the timber and the wreckage to which it was bolted raised slightly, easing the pressure on Gaylord’s chest.

The old man opened his eyes, coughed, shuddered, stared dazedly about him. His glance centered on the cowboy crouched beside him, shielding him with his own body from the withering heat of the fire which crept nearer and nearer. Understanding brightened his pain-glazed eyes.

“Get out, son,” he croaked. “Get out and leave me—it ain’t no use—that powder’s due to let go—get out and save yoreself while you can.”

Huck Brannon, his hair crisping and the clothes on his back smoking from the heat, grinned painfully.

“Go to hell, you old loafer,” he gasped. “Who’s doin’ this, anyhow?”

With a moan, Old Tom fainted again. Huck crouched lower, hands ready to grip the beam the instant the sill lifted.

He could hear Lank Mason grunting and cursing above the roar of the flames. A distant shout sounded as the conductor came stumbling back up the track. With a crash a whole side of the powder car fell away. Huck could see the squat containers and the tongues of fire reaching toward them. Stinging sparks showered his uncovered head. The smoke rolled about him in hot, choking clouds.

He blinked his streaming eyes and strained ears that were now beginning to ring queerly. He could
no longer see the moving sill and pitched his hearing to the crunching that would denote its passage from the beam to the rubble of the embankment.

Through a haze of pain he heard it, felt the sudden upward spring of the beam. He gripped the rough wood with blistered hands, felt the seared skin sluff off in a mist of white agony. With every atom of his sinewy strength he heaved at the beam, lifting till his sinews cracked and his swelling muscles threatened to crush his bones.

The beam creaked, groaned, resisted stubbornly, then gave with a rush. Huck hurled it aside, stooped over Old Tom Gaylord and lifted his limp body. He could hear Lank shouting anxiously. From the tracks above came the conductor’s warning bellow. Huck reeled about and staggered painfully up the embankment.

“Hightail, you fellers!” he shouted hoarsely, “she’s gonna let go! Hightail, you can’t help me—you’ll jest get in my way!”

Cursing insanely, they obeyed him. Lank topped the rise and pounded after the conductor. Flaming timbers fell full upon the powder containers as the end of the car gave way. The fire roared its triumph. Miles above him, dancing in a welter of smoke and agony, Huck could make out the lip of the embankment and the shining rails.

He strained toward it, reeling drunkenly, the slight body of Old Tom Gaylord an increasing weight with every wavering step. He slipped, fell to one knee and flung out a hand that touched the cold steel of the outer rail. He gripped the iron,
drew himself over the lip, reeled erect and lurched down the track. A dozen frenzied strides, a score, twice a score—

Behind him there was a mighty fluff of bluish smoke, a red blaze that paled the shrinking stars, a roar like the rending of creations. The mighty concussion flung the cowboy and the man he carried as by the thrust of a giant hand. He reeled, scrambled, tried to keep his balance, and plunged headlong. Dazzling white light blazed before his eyes as he struck the rough ties, then wave on wave of pain-streaked blackness hurled him into bottomless depths of chilling cold.

Huck Brannon awoke with his aching head on a pillow and his pain-racked body in a comfortable bunk. To his ears came a clanging and crashing and hissing interspersed by a metallic chattering and the shouts of men.

For a moment he lay staring up at a low, boarded ceiling. He sniffed the smell of boiling coffee and food cooking and realized that in spite of the pain that racked him, he was terrifically hungry. With a vast effort he turned his head—and looked straight into the face of an impressive-looking man he couldn’t remember ever having seen, who gazed down at him from a pair of frosty blue eyes of amazing keenness.

Their owner was well above middle height and massively and robustly built. His shoulders were of great breadth, his arms long and powerful. He had a craggy eagle’s beak of a nose above a wide, tightly clamped mouth whose sternness was relieved by the numerous quirkings of the corners.
A snowy bush of crinkly white hair frizzed back from a dome-shaped forehead. He nodded to Huck and spoke to him in a deep and resonant voice.

“Hmm! Decided to come out of it at last, eh? How you feel?”

“About as if I’d been dragged through a knothole and then hung on a barbed wire fence to dry,” Huck admitted. “Otherwise not so bad. Everything seems to be in working order.” He gingerly flexed his arms and legs and swiveled his head from side to side.

The big oldster grunted. “You’re lucky,” he said. “There were rocks and chunks of iron and big timbers piled all over the place where we found you. When you were knocked down, you sort rolled under the bulge of the cliff. Reckon that saved you.”

Huck sat up abruptly, despite the protests of a brand-new set of pains that his sudden movement stabbed through him.

“Old Tom—Old Tom Gaylord”—he panted, fighting the nausea that crawled around the pit of his stomach—“did he—”

“You can’t kill a hobo,” the old man growled. “He’s in the bunk up ahead of you with a couple of broken ribs and a badly bruised chest and back. Keep him laid up for a month or two, I guess. He owes you his life. I heard the whole story from the freight conductor and that miner-fellow.”

Huck sank back onto his pillow, much relieved. The old man gazed at him with those canny eyes.

“Where you heading, son?” he asked.

“The mines over to Esmeralda,” Huck replied,
remembering Lank Mason’s destination. “Expect to find work there,” he added, recalling abruptly that the lantern used by himself and his companions was responsible for the fire and subsequent explosion.

The old man might be a member of the railroad police and as such would doubtless act harshly toward wandering knights of the road with no legitimate destination in view. Honest workmen in search of employment he might regard in a less gloomy light.

The old man’s gaze fixed upon Huck’s sinewy right hand, the burns grease-smeared, which lay palm upward upon the rough blanket.

“Those callouses don’t look like the kind that come from a pick and shovel,” he remarked dryly, adding with meaning, “particularly those on the thumb and first finger.”

Huck’s gray eyes met the cold blue ones steadily.

“I haven’t anything to hide,” he said quietly. “Yeah, those across the palm were made by a grass rope, and that one on the thumb—well, because a man practices the draw doesn’t necessarily mean he’s a cow-thief or a dry-gulcher.”

“Not necessarily,” the old man agreed. “even if it is mighty unusual to find a cowboy riding a manifest freight and heading for a mining camp. Well, that’s your business, and what you did to save that old fellow was commendable—and smart.”

“Where am I—and where’s Lank?” Huck asked.

“You are in a wreck-train bunk-car,” the old man
replied. “And the big miner—that’s Lank, I guess—is helping the crew clean up the mess.

“We’ll be rolling in about half an hour, now,” he added, “and this outfit is headed for Esmeralda, the mining town. If you decide to stay there for a spell and—work, you might drop in and see me when I come back this way next month.”

Before Huck could form a question, the old man turned and passed through the end door of the car.

A moment later a capped and aproned Negro stuck a shining black face through the doorway and flashed a dazzling set of ivories at the cowboy.

“Howdy, boss, and how you feelin’?” he said. “Figurate you could do with a right smart helpin’ of po’k chops and fried ‘taters ‘bout now. Like to hab me bring the vittles in here to you?”

“I can make it to the table, thanks just the same,” Huck told him, swinging his feet stiffly to the floor and reaching for his clothes, which lay neatly folded on a nearby bench.

The darky grinned and bobbed his head.

“By the way,” Huck called as he turned back to the cook car, “who was the big feller who was talking to me just now?”

“Dat was de
big
feller, for sho’,” grinned the darky. “Dat gen’man was nobody else but Mistuh Jaggers Dunn, de gen’ral manager of dis whole railroad.”

“Jaggers Dunn?”

“Yassuh, dat’s what de boys call him when he ain’t ‘round—Jaggers—Mistuh James G. Dunn is
de sorta uppity proper way of his namin’, I perspaculate. He jest headed back to his private car, de
Winona,
what’s hooked onter de rear end of de Western Flyer standin’ in back of us. Ol’ Flyer’s ‘bout ready to pull out, now de track is cleaned up again. Yeah, dere she comes now, whackety-whack-in’ past de sidin’. We all will be headin’ for Esmeralda soon as she clears.”

However, two long coal drags rumbled past before the wreck train was given a clear block.

“They’re switchin’ them strings of black diamonds in front of the second section of the Western Flyer,” the wreck train foreman remarked to Huck. “That will delay the second section still more, but it can’t be helped. Coal is mighty important on this division—can’t take a chance on the supply gettin’ too low. Have to haul it a long ways to Esmeralda—that’s a division point for the C. & P., you know—and the big yards and shops are there.”

“Must be mighty expensive, making a long haul like that,” the cowboy observed.

“It is,” said the foreman, “but they ain’t nothin’ to do ‘bout it. No mines in this district, and you gotta have fuel to keep a railroad goin’. Coal bill for the Mountain Division is jest ‘bout double, mebbe more, what it costs on any other division. There she clears, and old Sam’s tootin’ two shorts. All ‘board for Esmeralda, gents!”