e and a
dozen cars, and there were no casualties--the report about the
involvement of the two enginemen being due to the imagination of the
excited flagman who had propelled himself on a hand-car back to Little
Butte to send in the call for help.
Since Gridley was on the ground, Lidgerwood and McCloskey stood aside
and let the master-mechanic organize the attack. Though the problem of
track-clearing, on level ground and with a convenient siding at hand for
the sorting and shifting, was a simple one, there was still a chance for
an exhibition of time-saving and speed, and Gridley gave it. There was
never a false move made or a tentative one, and when the huge
lifting-crane went into action, Lidgerwood grew warmly enthusiastic.
"Gridley certainly knows his business," he said to McCloskey. "The Red
Butte Western doesn't need any better wrecking-boss than it has right
now."
"He can do the job, when he feels like it," admitted the trainmaster
sourly.
"But he doesn't often feel like it? You can't blame him for that.
Picking up wrecks isn't fairly a part of a master-mechanic's duty."
"That is what he says, and he doesn't trouble himself to go when it
isn't convenient. I have a notion he wouldn't be here to-day if you
weren't."
It was plainly evident that McCloskey meant more than he said, but once
again Lidgerwood refused to go behind the returns. He felt that he had
been prejudiced against Gridley at the outset, unduly so, he was
beginning to think, and even-handed fairness to all must be the
watchword in the campaign of reorganization.
"Since we seem to be more ornamental than useful on this job, you might
give me another lesson in Red Butte geography, Mac," he said, purposely
changing the subject. "Where are the gulch mines?"
The trainmaster explained painstakingly, squatting to trace a rude map
in the sand at the track-side. Hereaway, twelve miles to the westward,
lay Little Butte, where the line swept a great curve to the north and so
continued on to Red Butte. Along the northward stretch, and in the
foot-hills of the Little Timanyonis, were the placers, most of them
productive, but none of them rich enough to stimulate a rush.
Here, where the river made a quick turn, was the butte from which the
station of Little Butte took its name--the superintendent might see its
wooded summit rising above the lower hills intervening. It was a long,
narrow ridge, more like a hogback than a true mountain, and it hel
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