"What news?"
"Shure yez hed a boost. Gineral Lodge hisself wor tellin" Grady, the boss, that yez had been given charge of Number Ten."
"Yes, that"s correct."
"I"m dom" glad to hear ut," declared the Irishman. "But yez hev a h.e.l.l of a job in thot Number Ten."
"So I"ve been told. What do you know about it, Casey?"
"Shure ut ain"t much. A fri"nd of mine was muxin" mortor over there. An"
he sez whin the crick was dry ut hed a bottom, but whin wet ut shure hed none."
"Then I have got a job on my hands," replied Neale, grimly.
Those days it took the work-train several hours to reach the end of the rails. Neale rode by some places with a profound satisfaction in the certainty that but for him the track would not yet have been spiked there. Construction was climbing fast into the hills. He wondered when and where would be the long-looked-for meeting of the rails connecting East with West. Word had drifted over the mountains that the Pacific division of the construction was already in Utah.
At the camp Colonel Dillon offered Neale an escort of troopers out to Number Ten, but Neale decided he could make better time alone. There had been no late sign of the Indians in that locality and he knew both the road and the trail.
Early next morning, mounted on a fast horse, he set out. It was a melancholy ride. Several times he had been over that ground, once traveling west with Larry, full of ardor and joy at the prospect of soon seeing Allie Lee, and again on the return, in despair at the loss of her.
He rode the twenty miles in three hours. The camp of dirty tents was cl.u.s.tered in a hot valley surrounded by hills spa.r.s.ely fringed with trees. Neale noted the timber as a lucky augury to his enterprise. It was an idle camp full of lolling laborers.
As Neale dismounted a Mexican came forward.
"Look after the horse," said Neale, and, taking his luggage, he made for a big tent with a fly extended in front. Several men sat on camp-chairs round a table. One of them got up and stepped out.
"Where"s Blake and Coffee?" inquired Neale.
"I"m Blake," was the reply, "and there"s Coffee. Are you Mr. Neale?"
"Yes."
"Coffee, here"s our new boss," called Blake as he took part of Neale"s baggage.
Coffee appeared to be a sunburnt, middle-aged man, rather bluff and hearty in his greeting. The younger engineer, Blake, was a tanned, thin-faced individual, with a shifty gaze and constrained manner. The third fellow they introduced as a lineman named Somers. Neale had not antic.i.p.ated a cordial reception and felt disposed to be generous.
"Have you got quarters for me here?" he inquired.
"Sure. There"s lots of room and a cot," replied Coffee.
They carried Neale"s effects inside the tent. It was large and spare, containing table and lamp, boxes for seats, several cots, and bags.
"It"s hot. Got any drinking-water?" asked Neale, taking off his coat.
Next he opened his bag to take things out, then drank thirstily of the water offered him. He did not care much for this part of his new task.
These engineers might be sincere and competent, but he had been sent on to judge their work, and the situation was not pleasant. Neale had observed many engineers come and go during his experience on the road; and that fact, together with the authority given him and his loyalty to, the chief, gave him cause for worry. He hoped, and he was ready to believe, that these engineers had done their best on an extremely knotty problem.
"We got Lodge"s telegram last night," said Coffee. "Kinda sudden. It jarred us."
"No doubt. I"m sorry. What was the message?"
"Lodge never wastes words," replied the engineer, shortly. But he did not vouchsafe the information for which Neale had asked.
Neale threw his note-book upon the dusty table and, sitting down on the box, he looked up at the men. Both engineers were studying him intently, almost eagerly, Neale imagined.
"Number Ten"s a tough nut to crack, eh?" he inquired.
"We"ve been here three months," replied Blake.
"Wait till you see that quicksand hole," added Coffee.
"Quicksand! It was a dry, solid stream-bed when I ran the line through here and drew the plans for Number Ten," declared Neale.
Coffee and Blake stared blandly at him. So did the lineman Somers.
"You? Did YOU draw the plans we--we"ve been working on?" asked Coffee.
"Yes, I did," answered Neale, slowly. It struck him that Blake had paled slightly. Neale sustained a slight shock of surprise and antagonism. He bent over his note-book, opening it to a clean page. Fighting his first impressions, he decided they had arisen from the manifest dismay of the engineers and their consciousness of a blunder.
"Let"s get down to notes," Neale went on, taking up his pencil. "You"ve been here three months?"
"Yes."
"With what force?"
"Two hundred men on and off."
"Who"s the gang boss?"
"Colohan. He"s had some of the biggest contracts along the line."
Neale was about to inquire the name of the contractor, but he refrained, governed by one of his peculiar impulses.
"Anybody working when you got here?" he went on.
"Yes. Masons had been cutting stone for six weeks."
"What"s been done?"
Coffee laughed harshly. "We got the three piers in--good and solid on dry bottom. Then along comes the rain--and our work melts into the quicksand. Since then we"ve been trying to do it over."
"But why did this happen in the first place?"
Coffee spread wide his arms. "Ask me something easy. Why was the bottom dry and solid? Why did it rain? Why did solid earth turn into quicksand?"
Neale slapped the note-book shut and rose to his feet. "Gentlemen, that is not the talk of engineers," he said, deliberately.
"The h.e.l.l you say! What is it, then?" burst out Coffee, his face flushing redder.