CHAPTER XX
“A LITTLE SLEEP”
SINCE Joshua Cole already was on vacation, he decided to extend his absence from work for one more day and hurry in the morning to Madge and her mother. He would at least be able to voice his sympathy over the catastrophe, though he realized this would help matters not at all.
Directly after breakfast he set out afoot, and covered the distance between the camps in a little over an hour. Mrs. Mundy he found in their home tent, but Madge was up at the works.
“I felt that it was coming, Joshua,” Elizabeth Mundy said wearily. “They say Demarest, Spruce and Tillou will have to take over our outfit in the end in payment for the help and materials they will have to supply us with to clear the tunnel. We haven’t much besides the outfit--that is, in the way of cash. If they are obliged to come to our aid we’re lost. You see, it will be just as if we were put on force account by the railroad company. When it becomes apparent that a contractor working directly for the railroad company--as are Demarest, Spruce and Tillou--is not going to make good on his contract, the company puts his outfit on force account. That means that the owner and his outfit are virtually hired by the day to do the work. He receives so much for each team, so much for each man’s wages, and so much for his own salary. And in the end, if he fails under this procedure, he is obliged to forfeit everything. With us, since we are sub-contracting from Demarest, Spruce and Tillou, we are responsible to them rather than directly to the company. So it will be they who will take everything from us if we can’t fulfill our contract. They’re nice gentlemen--all of them--but friendship won’t--mustn’t--stand in the way of their fulfilling what they have contracted to do. Poor Madge! She’s nearly distracted.”
“Is the situation entirely hopeless?” asked Joshua.
“I’m afraid so.”
They talked for an hour before Joshua left to go to the tunnel, and in the course of their conversation he told her of his prospective homestead.
“Joshua,” she said, “I’m going to tell you something that you mustn’t tell Madge. You’ll be astonished to know that, if we fail and lose the outfit, I shall be glad. I don’t want my daughter to follow railroad construction as her life’s work. I suppose I’m selfish and old-fashioned, but I can’t bring myself to feel that a girl was brought into this world to do work like that. So far as the outdoor life is concerned, I am delighted with that phase of railroading. But I’d prefer to be on a farm somewhere--or a ranch here in the West--and live a simpler life. Madge would like it too if she could be convinced that she was not deserting the ship by giving up contracting. She wants to carry on the work started by her father, who was just gaining a good foothold when he died. That is a pretty sentiment, but it is all wrong. If Madge were his son it would be a different matter. But I’m tiring you--and I know you understand my feelings. If only we could have one of those homesteads--that’s what I’m trying to work up to. Then Madge could still work off her surplus energy with implements and horses, which seems to be her delight. She would be right at home, and we would be free of forever running over the United States, from job to job. But she never would consent.”
Joshua remained thoughtful for a time before he said: “Why wouldn’t it be a good idea, Mrs. Mundy, for you to file on one of the claims without letting Madge know anything about it? Then if she fails on the job and loses the outfit, you’ll have something to fall back on. You won’t be required by the government to establish residence on the land until six months after you have filed. That would give you plenty of time to find out whether or not you are to lose everything. And if you do lose, you could surprise Madge and raise her spirits immeasurably. There would be something left, I imagine--some money and stock and tools to work your claim with?”
“Yes, they scarcely would be able to strip us down to nothing-- especially if we get out early. Joshua, I think you have given me good advice. Will you help me?”
“I’ll do anything I can, Mrs. Mundy.”
“Then if I can get out of the mountains for a few days without Madge suspecting that I have designs on her future, can you see me in Los Angeles and show me how to proceed?”
“First,” Joshua told her, “you will have to pick out your land. But that’s easy, and I can attend to it for you. The land that is to be thrown open lies in a semi-circular strip about the lake, and nearly every hundred-and-sixty extends out into the water. Mine doesn’t, for I chose the piece nearest to what California Bill has christened Spyglass Mountain. Mine is perhaps the poorest of all for agricultural purposes, but it’s just what I want. But what I’m trying to get at is that there is little choice, from a farming standpoint, among any of the hundred-and-sixties offered. So why not take the claim next to mine? It has as many trees on it as any of the rest, and is as picturesque in every detail. It extends out into the lake, so that you are always assured of a supply of water. If you’ll let me decide for you, I can give you the legal description right now. It will be easy to figure out since it adjoins mine. Then we can--”
Here Joshua paused and looked uncomfortable. “Well, I’ll have to be frank,” he said. “I can’t go to Los Angeles with you because I haven’t the money.”
“Don’t look so miserable about it, Joshua,” she laughed. “Why, we’ve been flat broke a hundred times, and know all about it. Would you let me pay your expenses?”
“I wouldn’t like to.”
“If I were a man you’d consent readily, since it is purely a business matter and there would be no reason whatever why you should give me your services free. Be sensible, Joshua.”
“Why not go alone and look up a land lawyer in the city?” he suggested. “He could give you better service than I can, and it probably would cost you less. That’s just the thing to do, it seems to me. You’ll be able to find the advertisement of one of these fellows in the liners section of any Los Angeles paper. I’ll give you the legal description at once. You’ll have no difficulty at all.”
“That does sound easy,” she agreed. “Give me the data, then, please, and I’ll have myself driven to Ragtown to-morrow morning and take the stage out of the mountains. Madge will think I’m deserting her in her hour of trouble, but I’ll plead sickness and strain and tell her I’m going to a friend of ours in the city for a day or two. Will the deception be justifiable, Joshua?”
“I’ll shrive you,” he smiled.
“Then we have a secret between us, Joshua. Not a hint to Madge, now!”
Joshua crossed his heart and “hoped to die,” and Elizabeth Mundy laughed like a girl.
“You’ve given me a new heart, my boy,” she said. “I feel a different woman since you came.”
“You must remember,” he warned, “that there is the possibility of our claims being rejected by the land office.”
“Oh, no! Not a chance in the world, Joshua. Fate could not be so unkind as that. Go on with your gloominess--go see Madge and cheer her up, while I pack my suitcase. A woman has to have at least a full day to pack for a three-days’ trip, you know.”
Work was in full swing when Joshua reached the mouth of the tunnel--but what a waste of energy! For fifty feet the walls and roof of the tunnel presented solid rock, then one reached the spot where Jawbone’s fatal shot had been fired. Here the roof and the timbers had been unable to stand the shock, and had given way. And the top of the mountain was literally sliding into the tunnel. Every cartload that was hauled away made room for another cartload to slide down in its place; and it was plain to be seen that, if no way was found to stop the gap, the entire top of the hill must be carried out through the tunnel’s mouth.
Madge was in the tunnel. With her were Demarest and Tillou and three engineers. Up on the hilltop, where the mud springs and magnesia waters gushed, were more engineers, studying the trend of the slide.
“Hello, Joshua!” Madge called as she saw him entering with his candle over his head. “You’ll have to excuse me to-day. I’m not at home. But it was kind of you to come. Just make yourself at home, and I’ll talk to you at dinnertime.”
Her tone was a brave attempt at cheerfulness, but even in the dim light cast by the candles in the tunnel Joshua noted the tired look about her eyes and the slight sag of her lower lip, which told him that she was about all in. He watched the men at work for a time, then went out and clambered to the hilltop.
The engineers foregathered here, lean brown men in neat outing suits and trim puttees, paid no heed to the man in overalls who went about looking over the ground. They were talking among themselves, and they all looked wise and dictatorial. Moseying here and there, Joshua studied the slide, and at last stepped close enough to overhear the conversation of the engineers.
“There’s only one way to go about it, I’m telling you,” he heard. “I saw a similar situation on the Denver and Rio Grande, when I was with old La Salle. There they hauled in hundreds of tons of baled hay and chucked it into the gap. And it held the slide back till they could timber up again and work beyond the hole in the roof. Now here it’s simpler than that. Baled hay costs money, but we’ve got a heavy forest all around us. It won’t take any time at all for a good timber crew to fell enough trees to stop that slide. In a week’s time everything will be moving along as before. Let’s put it up to the boss. I tell you I know she’ll work like a charm.”
“Provided,” thought Joshua, “that what remains of the tunnel’s roof will continue to stand the strain when they begin firing again.”
He did not see Madge again until noon, when he ate with her and her mother in their living tent. Usually Mrs. Mundy and her daughter dined with what is known in construction circles as “the royal family,” which consists of the contractors and their families, the walking boss, the commissary men and bookkeepers--almost every one in camp holding a position above that of common laborer. But to-day Joshua declined to eat with Mr. Demarest and Mr. Tillou, who were guests of the camp, in order to avoid a possible embarrassing situation. So Madge made excuses to her guests for herself and her mother, and ordered dinner for three served in the living tent.
Madge was quiet and thoughtful, with little lines of worriment at the corners of her mouth and eyes. Still, she was hopeful, for the young engineers had told her the essence of what Joshua had heard on the hilltop.
“Oh, we’ll pull out of it, all right,” she strove to assure herself.
Joshua said nothing to this. He was thinking deeply. He was afraid that, after the gap had been stopped with tree trunks, as soon as another shot was fired, no matter how light it might be, another cave-in would occur, and they would find themselves back where they started. But he said nothing of this to Madge, and tried to interest her in his homestead to take her mind from her worries.
He bade the mother and daughter good-by in the middle of the afternoon and returned to his own camp. Next morning he was swinging a hammer again in his old place, his mind full of many things.
A month passed, during which time he was unable to visit the Mundys again. He worked all day, and at night he wrestled with the problem of making his telescope in the blacksmith shop. His express shipment had long since arrived at Ragtown, and he had his notes to aid him, but he soon found out that it is easier to tell one how to make things than to actually do the work.
In that month he frequently heard gossip as to the situation at the camp of the Mundys. Slide after slide was taking place, though the forest about the camp was being denuded of its magnificent trees in an effort to stem the tide. A famous engineer from the East had been summoned, and he was on the job at an enormous salary; but still the rotten stone and mud continued to slide into the tunnel. And now, it was said, it was coming from three directions. Then the buzz went through camp that Demarest, Spruce and Tillou had offered twenty-five hundred dollars to the man who could stop that slide, regardless of the expense.
“Bluenose,” said Joshua to his fellow-workman when the foregoing report had been confirmed, “I’m going down there and figure out a way to stop that slide. I’ve one grand little idea in my head. I would have suggested it before, but thought I’d be butting in and couldn’t attract anybody’s attention--least of all the attention of those big engineers. But now it’s open to anybody, and I’m going down to-night. But keep it dark, will you? I don’t want to make a monkey out of myself until I’ve looked over the ground again.”
“Say, kid,” was Bluenose’s encouraging remark, “you’re absolutely nuts! _You_ stop that slide, when Emanuel Peters, one o’ th’ highest-paid engineers in the U. S. A., can’t cut th’ riffle! Gaw wan! Come outa yer pipe dream, ol’-timer. That offer ain’t meant for a stiff. It’s for old railroaders who know their job. What d’you know about engineerin’?”
“Nothing,” admitted Joshua. “And more than that, I have no head at all for figures. But I’ve got one asset, Bluenose, and I think it may win out for me. The trouble with these big engineers, it seems to me, may be that they’re too theoretical. They figure things out by rules and formulas. Why, in school we had a boy who could work almost any problem in mathematics, and he got his results with a method all his own. He never worked out a problem as it was supposed to be worked out, but he got correct answers every time. He used what I’m going to use down there at that slide.”
“What’d he use?” growled the unconvinced Bluenose.
“Horse sense,” said Joshua.
“You’re a goof,” Bluenose told him.
It was still quite light when Joshua set off after supper for the Mundys’ camp. He followed the trail that many feet had trod along the right-of-way, through darkening forest and grassy meadows. He was deep in his plans, walking with his eyes on the ground, when suddenly from the trees on his left, came the echoing bark of a rifle.
It startled him, and somehow he felt queer and weak. Then such pain as he never before had felt gripped his entire body, it seemed, and the forest began to rise and float off toward the clouds. There came another shot, but it seemed far away. Joshua sank slowly to his knees, then felt like lying down to sleep. He did not fall, but lowered both hands to the ground and eased himself down into a comfortable position. He knew that a stream of warm blood was running down his arm, but he did not mind. All he wanted was a little sleep, and then he would be going on to the Mundys. Ten minutes sleep--and then he would hurry on to Shanty Madge!