He had never seen deep water before, and shivered as the flat drew away and left his bogies within six inches of the black, shiny tide.-Page 145 perishable, fragile, immediate-that's me! sey, said that he hadn't any locomotives to Slong." "Split my tubes if that's actin' polite to a new member o' the Brotherhood," said Poney. "There wasn't any call to trample on ye like that. But manners was left out when Moguls was made. Keep up your fire, kid, an' burn your own smoke. Guess we'll all be wanted in a minute." Men were speaking rather excitedly in the round-house. One man, in a dingy jer waste on the yard. Another man, with a piece of crumpled paper in his hand, said that the yard-master said that he was to say that if the other man said anything he, the other man, was to shut his head. Then the other man waved his arms and wanted to know if he was expected to keep locomotives in his hip-pocket. Then a man in a black Prince Albert, without a collar, came up dripping, for it was a hot August night, But .007 had caught one glimpse of the superb six-wheel-coupled racing locomotive who hauled the pride and glory of the road-Page 146. The yard-master never even looked up from his bundle of freight receipts.-Page 145. and said that what he said went; and between the three of them the locomotives began to go, too-first the Compound; then the Consolidation; then .007. Now, deep down in his fire-box, .007 had cherished a hope that as soon as his trial was done, he would be led forth with songs and shoutings, and attached to a green and chocolate vestibuled flyer, under charge of a bold and noble engineer, who would pat him on his back, and weep over him, and call him his Arab steed. (The boys in the shops used to read wonderful stories of railroad life while .007 was being built, and .007 expected things to happen as he had heard.) But there did not seem to be many vestibuled fliers in the roaring, rumbling, electric-lighted yards, and his engineer only said: "Now, what sort of a fool sort of an injector has Eustis loaded onto this rig this time," and he put the lever over with an angry snap, crying: "Am I supposed to switch with this thing, hey?" The collarless man mopped his head and replied that, in the present condition of the yard, the engineer would switch and keep on switching till the cows came home. .007 pushed out gingerly, his heart in his headlight, so nervous that the clang of his own bell nearly made him jump the track. Lanterns waved or danced up and down before and behind him; and on every side, six tracks deep, sliding backward and forward, with clashings of couplers and squeals of hand brakes, were cars more cars than .007 had dreamed of. There were oilcars, and haycars, and stockcars full of lowing beasts, and orecars, and potatocars with stovepipe ends sticking out in the middle; cold storage and refrigerator cars dripping icedwater on the tracks; ventilated fruit and milk cars; flat-cars with truck wagons full of market-stuff; flatcars loaded with reapers and binders, all red and green and gilt under the sizzling electric lights; flatcars piled high with strong scented hides, pleasant hemlock-plank, or bundles of shingles: flat-cars creaking under the weight of thirtyton castings, angle irons, and rivetboxes for some new bridge; and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of boxcars loaded, locked and chalked. Menhot and angry-crawled among and between and through and under the wheels; men took flying jumps through his cab, when he halted for a moment; men sat on his pilot as he went forward, and on his tender when he went back, and regiments of men ran along the tops of the box-cars beside him, screwing down brakes, waving their arms and saying curious things. He was pushed forward a foot at a time; whirled backwards, his rear-drivers clinking and clanking, a quarter of a mile; jerked into a switch (yard switches are very stubby and unaccommodating), bunted ""Twere a into a Red D, or Merchant's Transport car, and, without any hint of the weight behind him, started up again. As soon as his load was fairly on the move, three or four cars would be cut off, .007 would bound forward, only to be held hiccupping on the brake. Then he would wait a few minutes, watching the whirled lanterns; deafened with the clang of the bells, giddy with the vision of the sliding cars, his brakepump panting. forty to the minute, his front coupler lying sideways on his cow-catcher, like a tired dog's tongue in his mouth; and the whole of him covered with half burnt coal-dust. ""Tisn't so easy switching with a straight-backed tender," said his little friend of the roundhouse, bustling by at a trot. But you're comin' on pretty fair. 'Ever see a flyin' switch? No? Then look at me." 46 He was in charge of a dozen heavy flat cars. Suddenly he shot away from them with a sharp "Whut!" a switch opened in the shadows ahead; he turned up it like a rabbit, as it snapped behind him, and the long line of twelve-foot-high lumber jolted on into the arms of a full-sized road loco, |