Galesburg--nine minutes wasted for
the two, and the gale blowing harder. Our schedule makes allowance for
no stops; every moment from our actual going is so much "dead time" that
must be fought for, second by second, and made up. Drive her as he will,
with all the cunning of his hand, Bullard can score but small gains
against the wind. And some of these he loses. At Mendota we have made up
seven minutes, but we pull out thirteen minutes late. At Princeton we
are fifteen minutes late, at Galva fourteen minutes, at Galesburg eight
minutes, but we pull out twelve minutes late. Then we make the last
forty-three miles, including bridges, towns, grades, and curves, in
forty-four minutes, and draw into Burlington at 1.22 A.M.--on time to
the dot. This because Bullard had sworn to do it; also because the road
beyond Galesburg runs west instead of southwest, and it is easier for a
train to bore straight through a gale, head on, than to take it from the
quarter.

We took the big, steady curve at Princeton, a down-grade helping us, at
a hundred miles an hour--so Bullard declares and what he says about
engine-driving I believe. Indeed, these great bursts can be measured
only by the subtle senses of an expert, since no registering instrument
has been devised to make reliable record. Across the twin high bridges
that span the Bureau creeks we shot with a rush that left the
reverberations far back in the night like two short barks. And just as
we rounded a curve before these bridges I saw a black face peering down
from the boiler-top, while a voice called out: "Wahr--wahr--wahr--wahr!"
To which startling apparition Bullard, undisturbed, replied:
"Wahr--wahr--wahr--wahr!" Then the head disappeared. Dan, from his side,
was telling Bullard that he had seen the safety-light for the bridges,
and Bullard was answering something about hitting it up harder. How
these men understand each other in such tumult is a mystery to one with
ordinary hearing, but somehow they manage it.

Half way between Kewanee and Galva a white light came suddenly into view
far ahead. I knew it for the headlight of a locomotive coming toward us
on the parallel track. Already we had met two or three trains, and swept
past them with a smashing of sound and air. But this headlight seemed
different from the others, paler in its luster, not so steady in its
glare. The ordinary locomotive comes at you with a calm, staring yellow
eye that grows until it gets to be a huge f