rails which he had been helping all the way west
after midnight was then at Castle Springs, and Bucks gave its crew an
order to meet the eastbound passenger train at Point of Rocks. It was
three o'clock when a message came from the operator at Point of Rocks,
saying the rail train had passed westbound. Bucks seized a key and
silencing the wires asked for the passenger train. Nothing had been
seen of it. He called up Bitter Creek, the first telegraph point west
of Point of Rocks with an order to hold the passenger train. But the
train had already gone.

The new dispatcher sprang up from the table frantic. Then, racing
again to the key, he made the operator at Castle Springs repeat the
order and assure him it had been delivered. Of this there could be no
question. The freight crew had ignored or forgotten it, and were now
past Point of Rocks running head-on against the passenger train. If
the heavens had fallen the situation would have seemed better to
Bucks. A head-on collision on the first night of his promotion meant,
he felt, his ruin. As he sat overwhelmed with despair, trying to
collect his wits and to determine what to do, the door opened and Bob
Scott appeared.

The scout, with his unfailing and kindly smile, advanced and held out
his hand. "Just dropped in to extend my congratulations."

Bucks looked at him in horror, his face rigid and his eyes set. Scott
paused and regarded his aspect with surprise. "Something has
happened," he said, waiting for the despatcher to speak.

"Bob!" exclaimed the boy in desperation, "No. 9 has run past her
meeting order at Point of Rocks with No. 2. They will meet head-on and
kill everybody. My God! what can I do?"

In the dim light of the shaded oil lamp, Bucks, looking at the scout,
stood the picture of despair. Scott picked up the poker and began to
stir the fire and asked only a few questions and said little. However,
when Bucks told him he was going to wake Stanley, whose sleeping-room
adjoined his office at the end of the hall, Scott counselled no.

"He could do nothing," said Scott reflecting. "Let us wait a while
before we do anything like that," he added, coupling himself with the
despatcher in the latter's overwhelming anxiety. "The first news of
the collision will come from Bitter Creek. It will be time enough then
to call Stanley. Give your orders for a wrecking crew, get a train
ready, and get word to Doctor Arnold to go with it."

Bucks, steadying himself under