had been repaired; public opinion to the contrary notwithstanding,
an engineer does not run "wild" when he can help it.

The engineer of the third section had come out of the night operator's
office disappointed, and was climbing to his engine to pull out, when he
heard, or thought he heard, the dull rumble of a train racing down the
canyon. It came in sight while he listened, and the yellow flare told
him that it was either Gallagher or Folsom doubling back on one of the
construction engines. What startled him was the fact that the coming
train appeared to be running itself; there was no warning whistle shriek
and no slackening of speed.

Graham was a Scotchman, slow of speech, slow to anger, methodical to the
thirty-third degree. But in an emergency his brain leveled itself like a
ship's compass gimballed to hang plumb in the suddenest typhoon. Three
shrill whistle calls sent a sleepy flagman racing to set the switch of
the siding. With a clang the reversing lever came over and the steam
roared into the cylinders.

The Scotchman had the grade to help him, which was fortunate. When he
had the string of empties fairly in retreat, the beam of Gallagher's
headlight was shining full in his face and blinding him. For a
heart-breaking second he feared that the opposing train would follow him
in on the siding; there was but an instant for the flicking of the
switch. But by this time the sleepy flagman was wide awake, and he
jerked the switch lever for his life the moment Graham's engine had
cleared the points. It was the closest possible shave. Gallagher's cab
ticked the forward end of the other engine's running board in passing,
and if Graham had not been still shoving backward with the throttle
wide open, the "01," being wider than its piloting engine, would have
had its side ripped out.

Graham had a glimpse into the cab of the 956 as it passed and saw
Gallagher, sitting erect on his box with wide-staring eyes. He knew the
symptoms, and feared that he had only postponed the catastrophe. The
siding was a short one, and he knew that in backing down he must
inevitably have shoved the rear end of his train out upon the main line
at the lower switch. Once again the level brain righted itself to the
emergency. Four sharp shrieks of the whistle for switches, a jamming of
the whistle lever to set the canyon echoes yelling in the hope of
arousing Gallagher, and Graham slammed his engine into the forward
motion without pausing