e plain
sailing before us."

Two days later Tom Swift and Ned Newton were ushered into the private
office of the president of the H. & P. A. at the Hendrickton terminal.
The two young fellows from the East had got in the night before, had
become established at the best hotel in the rapidly growing Western
municipality, and had seen something of the town itself during the
hours before midnight.

Now they were ready for business, and very important business, too.

Mr. Richard Bartholomew sat up in his desk chair and his keen eyes
suddenly sparkled when he saw his visitors and recognized them.

"I did not expect you so soon. Your locomotive arrived yesterday, Mr.
Swift. How are you, Mr. Newton?"

He motioned for them to take chairs. His secretary left the room. The
railroad magnate at once became confidential.

"Nothing happened on the way?" he asked, pointedly. "There was a
freight wreck, I understand?"

"And we chanced to be right at hand when that happened," said Tom.

"So was your friend, Mr. Lewis," remarked Ned Newton.

"You don't mean to say that Montagne Lewis--"

"Was there. And Andy O'Malley," put in Tom.

Then he detailed the incident, as far as he and Ned knew the details,
to Mr. Bartholomew, who listened with close attention.

"Well, it might merely have been a coincidence," murmured the railroad
president. "But, of course, we can't be sure. Anyhow, it is just as
well if your servant, Mr. Swift, keeps close watch still upon that
locomotive."

"He will," said Tom, nodding. "He is down there in the yard with the
Hercules Three-Oughts-One, and I mean to keep Koku right on the job."

"Good! Let's go down and look at her," Mr. Bartholomew said, eagerly.

But first Tom wanted to go into the theoretical particulars of his
invention. And he confessed that thus far his tests of the locomotive
had not been altogether satisfactory.

"I have got to have a clear track on a stretch of your own line here,
Mr. Bartholomew, and under certain conditions, before I can be sure as
to just how much speed I can get out of the machine."

"Speed is the essential point, Mr. Swift," said the railroad man,
seriously.

"That is what I have been telling Ned," Tom rejoined. "I believe my
improvements over the Jandel patents are worthy. I know I have a very
powerful locomotive. But that is not enough."

"We have got to shoot our trains through the Pas Alos Range faster than
trains were ever shot over the grades before