"Don"t waste any soft soap on me, Reade," he said slowly, and with many pauses. "The Doc is a fool. I"m going to get well, and there will be just one happiness ahead of me. That will be to find you, wherever you may be, and to what I tried to do to you to-night."
"Can"t you forget that sort of thing, Duff?" asked Tom gravely. "Not that I"m afraid of you; you"ve seen enough of me to-night to know that I"m not afraid of you. But I"m afraid for you. You"re close to eternity, Duff, and I"d like to see you go to your death with a calm, hopeful, decent mind. I"d like to see you go with a hope of a better life hereafter."
"Don"t give me any of your canting talk, Reade," snarled the gambler weakly.
"I"m not going to do so," sighed Tom, rising. "I"m afraid it would be useless. Try to remember, Duff, that I allow myself to have no hard feelings against you. If you possibly can recover I shall be glad to hear that you"ve done so."
Then Tom stepped over to Dr. Furniss" side, whispering to him:
"Doc, you"ll see to it that some clergyman is called, won"t you? Any clergyman that is the most likely to reach the heart and the soul of a hardened fellow like Jim Duff."
Dr. Furniss nodded. Men appeared with an old door that was to be used as a stretcher. On this the gambler was placed, and the physician gave him such immediate attention as could be supplied on the sidewalk, for Jim Duff had been shot through the right lung. Then the bearers lifted the door, bearing the gambler back to the now gloomy Mansion House, the doctor following. Ashby, who had been strangely quiet after the shooting, was taken to the local police station and placed in a cell.
Just after the two had been taken care of, and while the crowd still lingered, a young man pushed his way through to the center of the crowd.
"I heard that Jim Duff had returned to town," began the young man. The speaker was Clarence Farnsworth, the foolish young easterner who had been sadly fleeced by the gambler.
"Yes; Duff came back," said Mr. Hawkins, quietly.
"Where is he?" asked Farnsworth. "I must leave in the morning, and I owe Duff seven hundred dollars. I want to pay it to him."
"Money you lost gambling with Duff?" questioned Hawkins.
"It"s a debt of honor that I owe Mr. Duff," Farnsworth replied, flushing considerably.
"Son, take one little hint from me," continued Hawkins. "No money ever lost to a gambler in card playing is a debt of honor. It"s merely the liability of a chump and a fool. No gambler ever uses any real honor.
Men of honor work for the money that they need or want. Duff had a smooth way of talking, an agreeable manner with his profitable victims, but he never had a shred of honor. It isn"t possible to be a gambler and a man of honor. If you"ve seven hundred dollars that you lost to Duff at cards, put it in your pocket and get out of Paloma as soon as you can.
Duff won"t need the money, anyway. He"s down at the Mansion House, dying of a bullet wound that he got through his last piece of trickery. I hate to speak harshly of a dying man, but I"d like to see you get a grain or two of common sense into your head, boy."
Again Farnsworth flushed, but three or four seasoned Arizona men who stood near by added their advice, in line with that of Mr. Hawkins.
Clarence soon edged away.
An hour after daylight Jim Duff died. Dr. Furniss and the others who were with the gambler at the last were unable to state that Duff had offered any expression of regret for his evil life, or for his last wicked acts.
Jim Duff died as he had lived.
George Ashby was sent to an asylum and his property sold for his benefit. After a year he was discharged as cured. He has vanished, swallowed up in some other community, and nothing more has been heard of him.
Trailed by detectives of a fire insurance company, Frank Danes was soon caught and brought back to Arizona. He was fairly convicted of having set the old Cactus House on fire, though he could not be persuaded to admit himself an agent of the Colthwaite Company. Fred Ransom, the other agent, is believed to be still in the employ of the Colthwaite Company"s "gloom department."
Mr. Hawkins is still in the employ of the A., G. & N. M. So are foremen Bell, Rivers and Mendoza.
Tim Griggs proved himself so thoroughly while foreman at the building of the new rail-road hotel in Paloma, that he has gone on to other and better work. Griggs is now a prosperous man, and, best of all, he has his little daughter with him.
Lessee Carter has flourished in the new railroad hotel. Rafe Bodson and Jeff Moore are his clerks.
The day came when Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton were able to apply the final and most severe test to the roadbed that ran across the Man-killer quicksand. Their work was finished, and finished splendidly, adding another great triumph to their record as young engineers.
"These hot countries are fine, for a while," grunted Harry Hazelton, as the young engineers left Paloma in a special Pullman car that General Manager Ellsworth had sent for their use.
"They are fine, in fact; but one gets tired of working on a blistering desert. I hope our next long undertaking will be in a country where ice grows as one of the natural fruits."
"Greenland, for instance?" smiled Tom Reade.
"Alaska, at all events," responded Harry hopefully.
"Do you know where I"m figuring on making my next stop?" Tom inquired.
"Where?"
"In good old Gridley, the town where we were born, boy! I"m fairly aching for a sight of the good old town. Will you go with me?"
"For a few weeks, yes," Harry agreed. "But after that little rest?"
"After our visit to the good old home town," Tom Reade replied, "we"ll go anywhere on earth where a good, big chance for engineering offers.
Harry, we"ve yet nearly all of our work ahead of us to do if we"re ever going to be real, Cla.s.s A engineers!"
That our young engineers found still greater work awaiting them will be discovered in the next volume in this series, which is published under the t.i.tle, "The Young Engineers in Nevada; or, Seeking Fortune on the Turn of a Pick."
In this narrative we find our young friends wholly away from railroad work, but engaged in an even greater undertaking. The adventures awaiting them were more exciting than any they had yet encountered. Fame and fortune, too, offered a greater opportunity. How the young engineers embraced the opportunity will be made plain to our readers.
THE END