CHAPTER XIV

THE BROKEN TRAIN

"What is it?" asked Nat. "Any bad news? Can't you go camping?"

"It's a message from Mr. Gabel, Bill Williams' guardian," replied Jack. "He says he has a clue that Bill has gone out to a settlement on the Big Horn River, in Montana, and he wants me to tell him to go back to Hickville at once if I see him."

"But you're not likely to, are you? Is the Big Horn River near where we are going?" asked Bony.

"Not very, I guess," answered Jack. "The Big Horn starts in Wyoming, but I rather think the chances are a thousand to one against seeing Bill. Poor chap! He has a hard row to hoe. I wish I could help him, but if he's run away I don't see how I can."

"I wish we'd meet him out West," said Sam. "Wouldn't it be a joke if, after all, he could go camping with us and fool his mean old guardian?"

"Oh, what's the use discussing fairy tales?" asked Jack. "Are you fellows all ready? Don't leave anything behind, now."

"I guess we're all here--what there is of us," remarked Bony, cracking his finger joints.

Just then the whistle of an approaching train was heard.

"Gotchertickets?" asked Budge Rankin, taking in a fresh wad of gum.

"Hu! Do you think I left them until now?" inquired Jack. "I've got all the tickets. That's our train, fellows. Now we'll say good-by to Denton for a while, and live in the wild and woolly West. Here, Budge, you take that satchel, and I'll tote the dress-suit case. Try and get seats together, boys."

A little later they were on the train and being whirled rapidly away from Denton. They had a long journey before them, and as the first part of it contained no features of interest the lads spent all their time discussing what was before them.

"I want to get a big buck mule deer," remarked Jack as they were talking about what kind of game they would be likely to find.

"Me for a big-horn sheep," said Nat. "I want to get the head mounted and put it in my room. Then I'll put my rifle across the horns, and show it to every one who comes in."

"I s'pose you'll tell 'em you shot it, won't you?" asked Bony.

"Of course. I will shoot it."

"You won't if you haven't improved your aim any since we were camping this summer."

"I can shoot better than you can," retorted Nat.

"Like pie!" exclaimed Bony, discharging a whole volley of knuckle-bone shots.

"Why, you missed that big muskrat you aimed at, the day before Jack and I were kidnapped!" taunted Nat.

"Yes, but you joggled my arm."

"I did not."

"You did so."

"Hold on," interposed Jack in a quiet voice. "All the passengers are laughing at you two."

"I don't care," replied Nat. "I guess I can shoot as good as he can."

"Oh, I fancy there'll be game enough out there, so if you miss one thing you can hit another," consoled Sam. "What I want to see are the bad lands. Just think of thousands of small sandstone peaks, so much alike that they look like a stone forest, with sulphur springs here and there, and all sorts of queer-shaped rocks. It must be a great sight!"

"Yes, and it's easy to get lost among those same peaks," added Jack. "I read of a hunter who went out there, and he was so near camp that his friends could hear him shouting, but they couldn't locate him until he began to fire his gun, and then they had hard work because of the echoes. We'll have to keep together if we get in such a place as that."

"But there are some woods, aren't there?" asked Bony.

"Sure, woods, mountains, valleys, and all sorts of wild places," said Jack. "I fancy there'll be plenty of snow on the upper peaks, too, but it's likely to be nice and warm down below."

"What do you want to shoot, Budge?" asked Nat, for the gum-chewing youth had not said much.

"Hu! Guessarabbit'lldome."

"A rabbit," remarked Jack. "Maybe we'll be glad of a good rabbit stew, or one roasted, in case these mighty hunters don't bring down a buck or a bear."

Thus they talked for many miles, until they had to change cars, where they took another road leading more directly West. They arrived at Chicago the morning after the day on which they had started, and spent some time in the Windy City. Then they started off again.

"Two days more and we'll be in Wyoming," remarked Jack the next afternoon, as they were speeding through Iowa. "Then for a good time. Eh, fellows?"

"That's what!" answered Sam. "My, but I'm getting stiff. I'd like to get out and have a ball game."

"So would I," said Nat.

Their train stopped at a small station, and was held there for some time.

"Wonder what we're waiting for?" ventured Jack. "What's the matter?" he asked of a brakeman who passed through their car at that moment.

"Some block on the line ahead," was the reply. "We'll go in a few minutes."

There was some fretting among the passengers at the delay, but finally the train started off again. It proceeded slowly. Then followed some sharp whistles, and finally there sounded a report like a gun.

"It's a hold-up!" cried an excited man.

The boys and all about them leaped to their feet in alarm.

"That's what it is," went on the man. "It's a Wild West hold-up! Better hide your watches and money."

He began emptying his pockets of his valuables, and was thrusting them under his seat.

The train had come to a sudden stop.

"Do you s'pose it's train robbers?" asked Bony in some alarm.

"I don't know," answered Jack. "I guess----"

"Where'sthegunsan'we'llshoot'em!" exclaimed Budge, jumping up.

Just then a brakeman ran through the car, carrying a red flag.

"What's the matter? Is it a hold-up? Are they after our money?"

These questions were rapidly fired at him.

"A freight train has broken in two just ahead of us," explained the railroad man. "The engine's disabled," he went on. "We've got to back up to a switch so as to pass it. I've got to go back with a danger flag."

"Oh, dear!" exclaimed a woman. "But who got shot? I'm sure I heard a gun go off."

"That was a torpedo on the track, ma'am," explained the brakeman. "The freight crew put it there on a sharp curve, so we wouldn't run into the tail-end of their train. It's all right. There's no danger."

The brakeman hurried down the steps of the last car, in which the boys were riding, and began to run along the track. When he was about a hundred yards away the train began to back slowly up.

"I wonder how far back we have to go to reach the switch?" asked Jack.

"About two miles," answered a man across the aisle from the lads. "It's near Mine Brook Station, and it'll take us quite a while to get there."

"Why?" asked Bony. "Can't the train go fast backward?"

"Yes, but the engineer dare not run past the man with the flag. He has to keep a certain distance in the rear of the last car, to warn any other trains that may be approaching behind us. So we really can't back up any faster than the brakeman can run. I don't like this delay, either, as I have an important engagement. But something always seems to be happening on this road. I wish I'd come another route."

There were other grumbling remarks by the various passengers, but the boys were too interested in watching the brakeman to notice them. The train must have gotten too close to him, for it came to a stop, in obedience to a signal on the air whistle, and waited until the man with the red flag was out of sight around a curve. Then it began to back again.

This was kept up for some time, and finally the boys saw the brakeman come to a halt and wave his flag in a peculiar manner.

"He's at the switch now," remarked the man who had first spoken to the lads. "We'll soon be on our way again."

The train proceeded more slowly, and then the boys saw where a switch crossed from one track to another. The rear car was halted some distance from the cross-over, and a man came running up from the head end, carrying a key in his hand, with which to unlock the switch. He quickly turned it, and then began to wave his arm, as a signal for the engineer to back up. He continued to wave for several seconds, and then he exclaimed:

"He can't see me. Hey!" he called to a group of men on the back platform of the last car, "give him the whistle signal, will you?"

"What?" asked a man.

"Give him the whistle. Blow it three times, so he'll back up. Hurry! I can't leave this switch."

The men did not seem to know what to do. Some of them began looking inside the car for the old-fashioned bell cord, that used to run through the train to the engineer's cab. This is now displaced by a small red cord at one side of the car, and it operated a whistle connected with the air-brake system.

"Pull the cord. Give him three whistles, can't you?" cried the man at the switch. "We can't lay here all day."

"I don't see any whistle," murmured the man who had told the boys about the switch. "Let him come and pull it himself. This is a queer road, where they expect the passengers to help run it."

"Can't some of you pull that whistle cord?" demanded the man. "Hurry up."

Jack heard and understood. He had often seen the brakemen or conductor at the Denton station start the trains by pulling on something under the hood of the car, as they stood on the platform.

"I guess I can do it," he said as he worked his way through the crowd of passengers about the door.

He reached up, and his fingers encountered a thin cord. He pulled it slowly, as he had seen the railroad men do, for as the air pressure had to travel the entire length of the train it required some time, and a quick jerk would not have been effective.

Once, twice, three times Jack pulled the whistle cord, and he heard the hissing of escaping air that told of the signal sounding in the locomotive cab. An instant later came three blasts from the engine, and the train began to back up.

"Much obliged to you," called the man at the switch to Jack, as the rear car passed him. "I'm glad somebody knew how to work it."

"Is that where the whistle cord is?" asked a man. "I was looking for a bell cord."

The train backed across the switch, and was soon on another track, and one not blocked by a disabled freight.

"Say," remarked Nat to Jack, "you're getting to be a regular railroad man."

"Well, I'm in a hurry to get out to camp and take the trail," replied Jack. "That's why I'm helping 'em run this road."