ong in the morning sunshine. The engineer in charge
had made his round of inspection, and was standing idly on the false
work under the end-span. He was just over the street, and could look
down upon his own office, a hundred feet or so below. Every timber and
girder here was familiar to him. Rumbling along on the trestle track
came the big "traveler," its four booms groaning under their iron loads.
The "traveler" came on slowly, as befits a huge thing weighing one
hundred and fifty tons. The engineer was whittling a stick. The
"traveler" came nearer, with one of its booms swinging toward Bedell,
but lazily. He had plenty of time to step aside. One step to the right,
one step to the left, one step forward was all he need take. Of course,
he would not think of taking a step backward, for there was
destruction--there yawned the gulf. It was inconceivable to the man on
the "traveler" that his chief, who knew all about everything, would take
a step backward.

Still the engineer in charge did not move. The boom swung nearer. Still
he whittled at his stick. His thoughts were far away. The man on the
"traveler" shouted, and Bedell looked up. Now he saw, and the sudden
fear he had never known surged in his heart. He had still time to step
aside, but his mind could not act. The boom was on him. Up went his
right arm to clutch it, and back reeled his body. His right hand missed,
his left hand caught the stringer as he fell, caught its sharp edge and
held there by the fingers--the left-hand fingers--for five, six, seven
seconds or so, legs swinging in the void. Down sprang the man on the
"traveler," and leaped along the ties to his relief, and reached the
spot to find the fingers gone, to see far below on the stones a broken,
huddled heap that lay still. So died the man who had been kind to me (as
they say he was kind to every one), and who had warned me to "take it
easy and be careful."

Despite the constant peril of their days, the nights of bridge-builders
are often spent in gaiety. The habit of excitement holds them even in
their leisure, and many a sturdy riveter has danced away the small hours
and been on his swing at the tower-top betimes the next morning. They
are whole-souled, frank-spoken young fellows (there are few old
bridge-men), and to spend an evening at their club, on West
Thirty-second Street, is a thing worth doing.

On the street floor is a cafe, not to say saloon, where the walls are
hung with churches and