erves awhile. We didn't need him," said the
assistant, accounting for the engine-man's disappearance.

Ballard let the investigation rest for the moment, but later, when
Bromley was working the contractor's gang on the track obstructions
farther along, he lighted a flare torch at the fire some of the men had
made out of the wreck kindling wood, and began a critical examination of
the derailed and debris-covered locomotive.

It was a Baldwin ten-wheel type, with the boiler extending rather more
than half-way through the cab, and since it had rolled over on the
right-hand side, the controlling levers were under the crushed wreckage
of the cab. None the less, Ballard saw what he was looking for;
afterward making assurance doubly sure by prying at the engine's
brake-shoes and thrusting the pinch-bar of inquiry into various
mechanisms under the trucks and driving-wheels.

It was an hour past midnight when Bromley reported the track clear, and
asked if the volunteer wrecking crew should go on and try to pick up the
cripples.

"Not to-night," was Ballard's decision. "We'll get Williams and his
track-layers in from the front to-morrow and let them tackle it.
Williams used to be Upham's wrecking boss over on the D. & U. P. main
line, and he'll make short work of this little pile-up, engine and all."

Accordingly, the whistle of the relief train's engine was blown to
recall Fitzpatrick's men, and a little later the string of flats,
men-laden, trailed away among the up-river hills, leaving the scene of
the disaster with only the dull red glow of the workmen's night fire to
illuminate it.

When the rumble of the receding relief train was no longer audible, the
figure of a man, dimly outlined in the dusky glow of the fire,
materialised out of the shadows of the nearest arroyo. First making sure
that no watchman had been left to guard the point of hazard, the man
groped purposefully under the fallen locomotive and drew forth a stout
steel bar which had evidently been hidden for this later finding. With
this bar for a lever, the lone wrecker fell fiercely at work under the
broken cab, prying and heaving until the sweat started in great drops
under the visor of his workman's cap and ran down to make rivulets of
gray in the grime on his face.

Whatever he was trying to do seemed difficult of accomplishment, if not
impossible. Again and again he strove at his task, pausing now and then
to take breath or to rub his moist hands in