found a broken frame and was obliged to go to the house for
another locomotive. We were an hour late when we left that night,
carrying signals for the fast freight. As we left the limits of the
yard, Hubbard's headlight swung out on the main line, picked up two
slender shafts of silver, and shot them under our rear end. The first
eight or ten miles were nearly level. I sat and watched the headlight of
the fast freight. He seemed to be keeping his interval until we hit the
hill at Collinsville. There was hard pounding then for him for five or
six miles. Just as the Kaskaskia dropped from the ridge between the east
and west Silver Creek, the haunting light swept round the curve at
Hagler's tank. I thought he must surely take water here; but he plunged
on down the hill, coming to the surface a few minutes later on the high
prairie east of Saint Jacobs.

"Highland, thirty miles out, was our first stop. We took water there;
and before we could get away from the tank, Hubbard had his twin shafts
of silver under my car. We got a good start here, but our catch engine
proved to be badly coaled and a poor steamer. Up to this time she had
done fairly well, but after the first two hours she began to lose.
Seeing no more of the freight train, I turned in, not a little pleased
to think that Mr. Yank's headlight would not haunt me again that trip. I
fell asleep, but woke again when the train stopped, probably at
Vandalia. I had just begun to doze again when our engine let out a
frightful scream for brakes. I knew what that meant,--Hubbard was behind
us. I let my shade go up, and saw the light of the freight train shining
past me and lighting up the water-tank. I was getting a bit nervous,
when I felt our train pulling out.

"Of course Hubbard had to water again; but as he had only fifteen loads,
and a bigger tank, he could go as far as the Mail could without
stopping. Moreover, we were bound to stop at county seats; and as often
as we did so we had the life scared out of us, for there was not an
air-brake freight car on the system at that time. What a night that must
have been for the freight crew! They were on top constantly, but I
believe the beggars enjoyed it all. Any conductor but Jim Lawn would
have stopped and reported the engineer at the first telegraph station.
Still, I have always had an idea that the train-master was tacitly in
the conspiracy, for his bulletin had been a hot one delivered orally by
the Superintendent, whom