rs were sent in different directions to try again.
And the engineers went out once more to attack their problem. Success
did not attend the efforts of either party, and at sunset, when all had
wearily returned to camp, Larry King was still absent. Then he was given
up for lost.

But before dark the tall cowboy limped into camp, dusty and torn,
carrying Neale's long tripod and surveying instrument. It looked the
worse for a fall, but apparently was not badly damaged. King did not
give the troopers any satisfaction. Limping on to the tents of the
engineers, he set down the instrument and called. Boone was the first
to come out, and his summons brought Henney, Baxter, and the younger
members of the corps. General Lodge, sitting at his campfire some rods
away, and bending over his drawings, did not see King's arrival.

No one detected any difference in the cowboy, except that he limped.
Slow, cool, careless he was, yet somehow vital and impelling. "Wal, we
run the line around--four miles up the gorge whar the crossin' is easy.
Only ninety-foot grade to the mile."

The engineers looked at him as if he were crazy.

"But Neale! He fell--he's dead!" exclaimed Henney.

"Daid? Wal, no, Neale ain't daid," drawled Larry.

"Where is he, then?"

"I reckon he's comin' along back heah."

"Is he hurt?"

"Shore. An' hungry, too, which is what I am," replied Larry, as he
limped away.

Some of the engineers hurried out in the gathering dusk to meet Neale,
while others went to General Lodge with the amazing story.

The chief received the good news quietly but with intent eyes. "Bring
Neale and King here--as soon as their needs have been seen to," he
ordered. Then he called after Baxter, "Ninety feet to the mile, you
said?"

"Ninety-foot grade, so King reported."

"By all that's lucky!" breathed the chief, as if his load had been
immeasurably lightened. "Send those boys to me."

Some of the soldiers had found Neale down along the trail and were
helping him into camp. He was crippled and almost exhausted. He made
light of his condition, yet he groaned when he dropped into a seat
before the fire.

Some one approached Larry King to inform him that the general wanted to
see him.

"Wal, I'm hungry--an' he ain't my boss," replied Larry, and went on with
his meal. It was well known that the Southerner would not talk.

But Neale talked; he blazed up in eloquent eulogy of his lineman; before
an hour had passed away every one in