"I'll see Reade!" announced Bellas stiffly. "That youngster is doing all the dirty work here. I'll go to him straight."

"I'll take you over to his office," nodded Foreman Payson.

"I'm going, too," announced another workman.

"So'm I," added another.

"One at a time, men," advised Payson. "I think Bellas feels that he's capable of talking for all of you."

The other foremen restrained the crowd, while Mr. Payson led Bellas over to the headquarters shack.

Tom looked up from a handful of old letters as the two men entered.

"See here, you!" was Bellas's form of greeting.

"Try it again," smiled Tom pleasantly.

"You're the man I want to talk to," Bellas snarled. "What do you mean by—"

"What's your name?" asked Reade quickly.

"None of your—"

"We can never do business on that kind of courtesy," smiled Reade. "Mr. Payson, show the man out and let him come back when he's cooler."

"There isn't anyone here who can show me out!" blustered Bellas, swinging his big arms and causing the heavy muscles to stand out.

"If you don't care to behave in a businesslike way, and talk like a man, we'll do our best to show you out," Tom retorted, still with a pleasant smile. "What are you here for, anyway?"

"Why have I been fired?" roared Bellas.

"Can't you guess?" queried Tom.

"Was it for going to town and being away all night?"

"Yes, and also for not being on hand this morning."

"There wasn't any work to do," growled Bellas.

"You expected to be paid for your time, and you should have been in camp, as your time belonged to the railroad by, right of purchase. Bellas, you have been drinking over in town, haven't you?"

"If I have, it's my own business. I'm no slave."

"Ben gambling, too?"

"None of your—"

"You're in error," Tom answered pleasantly, though firmly. "The gamblers over in Paloma are leagued with the dive keepers against us, Bellas. You know what they did out at the big sink of the Man-killer last night. Any man who goes away from camp and 'enjoys' himself for hours among those who are trying to put us out of business shows himself to be a friend to the enemies of this camp. Therefore the man who does that shows himself to be one of our enemies, in sympathy if not in fact."

"I'm no lawyer," growled Bellas sullenly, "and I can't follow your flow of gab."

"You know well enough what I'm saying to you, Bellas, and you know that I'm right. Since you've been away and joined our enemies we don't want you here. More, we don't intend to have you here. Mr. Payson has dropped you from the rolls, and that cuts you off from this camp. Now, I think you will understand that it is some of our business whether you have been over in town emptying your pockets, into Jim Duff's hat. If that is what you have been doing, then we don't want you here, and won't have you. If you haven't been hob-nobbing with our enemies, and paying all you had for the privilege, then we'll look into any claims of better conduct that you may make, and, if satisfied that you've been telling the truth, we'll reinstate you."

"Oh, you make me tired—you kid!" burst from Bellas's lips.

"This isn't an experience meeting," Tom replied, not losing his smile, "and I'm not interested in your impressions of me. Do you wish to make any statement advocating your right to be taken on the pay roll again?"

"No, I don't!" roared the angry fellow. "All I want to do is to show you my opinion of you, Tommy! I can do that best by rubbing your nose in the dirt outside."

Foreman Payson flung himself between the big, angry human bull and the young chief engineer.

"Don't waste any time or heat on him, Mr. Payson," Tom advised, slipping his handful of letters into his coat and tossing that garment to the back of the room. "If Bellas has any grudge against me, I don't want to stop him from making his last kick."

Tom took a step forward, his open hands hanging at his sides. He didn't look by any means alarmed, though Bellas appeared to be about twice the young chief engineer's size.

So prompt had been Reade's action that, for a moment, Bellas looked astounded. Then, with a roar, he leaped forward, swinging both arms and closing in.

Tom Reade had had his best physical training on the football gridiron. He dropped, instantly, as he leaped forward, making a low tackle and rising with both arms wrapped around Bellas's knees. Tom took two swift steps forward, then heaved his man, head first, out through the open doorway.

Bellas landed about eight feet away. He was not hurt, beyond a jolting, and leaped to his feet, shaking both fists.

"Not unless you really insist upon it," smiled Tom, shaking his head. "It's too warm for exercise to-day."

"You tricky little whipper-snapper!" roared Bellas, making an angry bound for the doorway.

Tom met his angry rush. Both went down, rolling over and over on the ground. Bellas wound his powerful arms about the boy, and would have crushed him. Though Tom hated to do it, there was no alternative but to choke the powerful bully. Bellas soon let go, dazed and gasping. Ere the big fellow came to his senses sufficiently to know what he was about, Reade had hoisted Bellas to one shoulder.

Down by the checker's hut the crowd of curious workmen gasped as they saw Tom Reade jogging along with this great load over one shoulder. Reaching the line, Tom gave another heave. Bellas rolled on the ground. He was conscious and could have gotten up, but he chose to lay where he had fallen and think matters over.

"Don't think I'm peevish, men," Tom called pleasantly. "I wouldn't have done that if Bellas hadn't attacked me. I had to defend myself. Now, while I'm here, does any man wish to make a claim for justice? Does any man feel that he has been discharged unfairly?"

Three or four men answered, though none of the Mexicans was among the number. When questioned as to whether they had spent the night among Jim Duff's friends all the speakers admitted that they had. Tom then made them the same explanation he had offered Bellas.

"That's about all that can be said, isn't it, men?" Tom asked in conclusion. "I am sorry for those of you who feel hurt, but while there is bad blood in the air every man must choose between one camp or the other. You men chose Jim Duff, and you'll have to abide by your choice."

"But we haven't any money," declared one of the men sullenly.

"Now you're just beginning to understand that Jim Duff won't be a very good friend to a penniless man. Didn't you know that when you shook all your change into his hat?"

"Are you going to let us starve?" growled the man.

"You won't starve, nor need you be out of work long," Tom retorted. "Any man who can do the work of a railway laborer in this country doesn't have to remain out of a job. Now, I'll ask you to get off the railroad's ground."

Tom turned and went back to the office, while Payson and the other foremen saw to it that the discharged men left the railroad's property. In less than half an hour the disgruntled ones were back in the worst haunts of Paloma, spreading the news of Tom Reade's latest outrage.

When Tom reached the office he found Mr. Ellsworth inside.

"I saw what you did, Reade, though you didn't know I was about. You handled it splendidly. You made it plain enough, too, to the men that they had joined the enemy and thereby declared against us."

"Message, Mr. Reade," called the operator from the doorway.

"The construction material train, the first one, will be here within two hours," cried Tom, looking up from the paper, his eyes dancing. "Now we can do some of the real work that we've been waiting to do!"



CHAPTER IX. THE MAN-KILLER CLAIMS A SACRIFICE

In the days that followed Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton were more continuously and seriously busy than they had ever been before in their lives.

Sometimes it happens that engineers come upon a quicksand that apparently has no bottom. It will be filled and apparently the earth on top is solid. After a few days there will follow either a gradual shifting away or a sudden cave in, and the quicksand must once more be attacked.

This condition had been experienced more than a dozen times with the Man-killer before Tom and Harry had been called to solve the problem.

There is no definite way of attacking a quicksand. Much must depend upon the local conditions. Where it is a small one, yet of seemingly considerable depth, it is sometimes quickest and cheapest to cross it with a suspension bridge, the terminal pillars resting on sure foundations. Some quicksands are overcome by merely filling in new sand or loam, patiently, until at last the trap is blocked and a permanently solid foundation is laid. There are many other ways of overcoming the difficulty.

The method hit upon by Tom and Harry, after looking over the situation, was one that was largely original with them.

It consisted of laying logs, of different lengths, from twelve to eighteen feet, in a transverse net work filling in earth on this and allowing the structure gradually to sink where the quicksand shifted or caved. The sideway drift, at some points, was overcome by hollow steel piles, driven in as firmly as might be, and then filled with cement from the top. A line of such piles when imbedded in the ground, helps to make an effective block to side drift.

At the outset a few feet of these steel piles were left exposed above the surface, their gradual settling serving as a reliable index to the evasive movements of the extensive quicksand underneath. At other points wooden piles were driven in for the same purpose.

General Manager Ellsworth did not spend all his time in camp. He could not do so, in fact, for he had many other pressing duties. However, he ran over frequently, and always appeared satisfied.

"Of course it's too early to talk confidently, Reade," said Mr. Ellsworth, one day when the work had been going on steadily for some weeks, "but I believe you have the only right method. I have so reported to our directors. You'll have disappointments, of course, but I hope you'll encounter none that you can't overcome."

"I shan't crow until I've seen the test applied to the roadbed over the Man-killer," Tom replied thoughtfully. "After I've seen that test applied a couple of times then I'm ready to go before any board and swear that the Man-killer has been tamed for all time."

"Speed the day!" replied Mr. Ellsworth, as he climbed into his private car to return. "By the way, you haven't heard anything lately from Jim Duff & Company?"

"Not a word," Reade replied. "I don't believe we're yet through with Rough-house camp, however. They're waiting only until our suspicions are allayed. Once in a while we lose one of our workmen to the enemy, and then we have to discharge the poor fellow. Some of our former men have gone away, but there are about thirty of them left in Paloma, and I imagine that they're ready to be ugly when the chance comes. The agent of the Colthwaite Company is still in Paloma. He has been here ever since we came."

"Agent of the Colthwaite Company?" repeated the general manager, opening his eyes. "What's his name?"

"Fred Ransom," Tom replied half carelessly.

"Ransom? Fred Ransom? I never heard of any Colthwaite agent of that name."

"He's one of the Colthwaite people's troublemakers," Tom went on, opening his own eyes rather wide.

"If you were sure of this why didn't you report it to me earlier?"

"Why, I supposed your railroad detectives knew all about it. And that you had heard of it long ago," Reade declared.

"I haven't heard a word of it," continued Mr. Ellsworth, coming down the steps of his car and standing on the ground once more. "What proof have you of Ransom's business here?"

"None whatever," Tom answered cheerfully, "but I had him spotted the first time I heard him talking. He was too entirely positive that we'd fail."

"That was no proof against him."

"No; but Ransom was also certain that the Colthwaite plan was the only one that could bring the Man-killer to time."

"Have you any other reason to suspect this main?" queried Mr. Ellsworth.

"Only the fact that Ransom and Jim Duff have been close friends."

"Where does Ransom stop?"

"At the Mansion House. He has a suite of rooms there, and entertains some kinds of people, including Duff, very lavishly."

"Keep your eyes on that crowd as much as possible, Reade," directed the general manager thoughtfully, as he once more climbed to the platform of his car.

"I will, sir; and it might not be a bad idea to have your detectives do something of the sort, also."

The general manager did not answer, except by a vague nod as his train pulled out from the outskirts of the railway camp.

Tom went back, called for his horse and rode to the westward for another look at the Man-killer. He found Harry, also in saddle, beneath the scanty shade of a struggling tree. Hazelton's quick eyes were taking in every detail of the work being done by the several large gangs of workmen.

"Tom, if we're away from here by Christmas, there's one present you needn't make me," smiled Hazelton wanly, as he caught sight of the camera hanging in its leather field case at his chum's side.

"What present is that?" Tom inquired.

"Don't make me a present of a photograph of this awful place. It's photographed on my brain now, and burned in and baked there. If we ever get through with the Man-killer, and get our money, I never want to see this spot again."

"I'm not thinking at all of the money," Reade retorted lightly yet seriously. "I don't care about the money at present. Nothing will ever satisfy me in life again until I've beaten the Man-killer fairly and squarely. It's the one thing I think about by day and dream of at night."

"I know it," sighed Harry half pityingly.

"Well, what else should we think about?" Tom demanded in a low voice. "Harry, we have the very job, the identical problem, that has thrown down nearly a dozen engineers of fine reputation. Why, boy, this place may be out on the blazing desert, and there may be a dozen discouragements every hour, but we've the finest chance, the biggest unsolved problem in engineering that we could possibly have. It's glorious."

Tom's eyes glowed.

"Go away," grinned Hazelton mischievously, "or I'll catch some of your enthusiasm."

"You don't need any of it," Reade retorted laughingly. "You've tons of enthusiasm stowed away for future use. You know you have."

"I suppose I have enough enthusiasm," Harry admitted, "but I should like to do some actual work. I ride out on the sands every day and sit looking on while the real work is being done. This problem of conquering the Man-killer is growing monotonous. I'm tired of pegging away at the same old task day in and day out."

"Not quite as bad as that," Tom declared. "There's always something a bit new. If you want work to do right now, ride over and show those teamsters where you want them to put the logs that they're bringing up."

This was far too little to satisfy Harry's longing for "doing things," but with a grunt he turned his horse's head and jogged away at a trot.

Tom moved in under the shade of the tree.

"Harry doesn't know enough to appreciate a good thing when he has it," softly laughed Tom, grateful for the scant bit of shade. "Neither does he yet know that often times the brain works best when the body is at rest."

Just then Tom heard a sudden shout from the distance, followed by a chorus of excited voices.

Instantly the young engineer's gaze turned toward the lately filled-in edge of the big sink.

A hundred feet beyond the light platform where some laborers had been working Reade beheld only the head and shoulders of one of the workmen.

"The foolish fellow—to go out so far beyond where the men are allowed to go!" gasped the young chief engineer, setting spurs to his horse.

In a few moments Tom had reached the edge of the sink.

"A rope!" he shouted, and seized the thirty-foot lariat that was handed him. With this, Tom, now on foot, ran within casting distance of the unfortunate, who was being rapidly enveloped by the quicksand.

"Come back, Mr. Reade!" bellowed Foreman Payson. "The drift is setting in on this side of you. Back, like lightning, or you're a doomed man! You'll be swallowed up by the Man-killer yourself!"

But Tom, intent only on saving the unfortunate laborer beyond, was wholly heedless of the fact that his own life was in as great danger.



CHAPTER X. HARRY FIGHTS FOR COMMAND

"Come back, Mr. Reade!" implored Foreman Payson.

For Tom, who had made two casts with the lariat and failed, was knee-deep in shifting sand himself.

"Keep cool!" the young chief engineer called over his shoulder. "I'll be back—both of us in a minute or two."

The hapless laborer was now engulfed to his neck in the quicksand.

"Save me! In Heaven's name get me out of this!" begged the poor fellow, frenzied by dread of his seemingly sure fate.

"I'm doing the best I can, friend!" Tom called, as he made a fresh cast.

This time the noose of the raw-hide lariat dropped over the laborer's head.

"Fight your hands free, man!" Tom called encouragingly. "Fight your hands and chest free, so that you can slip the noose down under your armpits. Keep cool and work fast, and we'll have you out. Don't let yourself get excited."

In the meantime Tom was wholly unaware that the engulfing quicksand was reaching up gradually toward his hips.

Foreman Payson had ceased to try to attract Tom's attention. Whatever was to be done to save the chief engineer must be done swiftly. There was not another lariat, or any kind of rope at hand.

Behind was a cloud of alkali dust. Harry Hazelton was riding as fast as he could urge a spirited horse.

In another moment Hazelton had reined up at the edge of the group, dismounting and tossing the reins to one of the workmen.

"My man, you get on that horse and fly for a rope!" ordered Harry.

This last Hazelton shot back over his shoulder, for he was pushing his way through the rapidly forming crowd to Payson's side. Another foreman had just come up.

"Mr. Bell," shouted Harry, "drive the men back who are not needed. We don't want to put a lot of weight on the soil here and cause a further cave-in."

By this time Harry was at the edge of the platform. In a twinkling he was out on the sand.

Grip! Mr. Payson had a strong hold on the collar of the assistant engineer.

"Let go of me!" commanded Harry.

"You can't go out there, Mr. Hazelton. No more lives are to be wasted."

"Let go of me, I tell you!"

"No, sir!" insisted Foreman Payson firmly.

"Let go of me, or I'll fight you!"

"You'll have to fight, then," retorted Payson doggedly, maintaining his grip on the lad's coat collar. "Comeback here!"

Aided by another man, the foreman dragged Hazelton back to the platform.

"Payson, I'll discharge you, if you interfere with me!" stormed Hazelton.

"Don't be a fool, sir. You can't help Mr. Reade. Be cool, sir. Keep your head and direct us like a man of sense."

"Be a man of sense, and see my chum going under the sands of the Man-killer?" flared Hazelton.

He made a bound, doubling his fists threateningly. Then three or four men, at a sign from Payson, seized the young assistant engineer and threw him to the ground.

"Tom," called Harry, "order these fools to let me go."

Reade, however, who had just pulled in all the slack of the rawhide lariat, and had made it fast about his own left arm, seemed wholly unaware of his own great peril.

Tom Reade was now submerged to his waistline in the engulfing sand.

Unless rescued within five minutes the young chief engineer was plainly doomed to be swallowed up in the treacherous sands of the Man-killer. Only a few seconds below the shifting level of the sand would be enough to smother the life out of him. Scores of strong men, powerless to help, watched hopelessly within a few yards of the two whose lives were being slowly but surely snuffed out.

The laborer, whose carelessness or ignorance had caused all the trouble, was now in the sand up to his mouth. The agonized watchers could see him gradually sinking further.

"Keep up your nerve, friend!" called Tom, in cool encouragement. "We'll soon have you out of that."

Gripping the lariat with both bands, Tom gave a strong, sudden wrench and succeeded in drawing the imperiled man out of the sand a few inches.

Then the poor fellow began to settle again moaning piteously as he saw a hideous death staring him in the face.

Tom Reade's own face was deathly white from a realization of the other's peril. Of his own danger the young chief engineer had not once stopped to think.

Harry Hazelton was again on his feet. That much Foreman Payson had permitted, but strong-armed laborers stood on either side of the boy, and their detaining grips were on his arm.

Out yonder the doomed man saw the engulfing sand creeping up on a level with his eyes. He tried to scream, but the sand shifted into his mouth. In pitiable terror the poor fellow closed his mouth in order to delay death for another moment. Even to call for help would now be swiftly fatal!

Behind came the thunder of hoofs.

"Ropes!" shouted the horseman on Harry's mount.

He rode past the groups of men, close to the platform. Then, leaping from the saddle, the rider tossed a small bundle of ropes at Harry's feet. All were ropes and lines—not a raw-hide among them.

"There he goes! He's gone!" roared a score of frantic voices, as the engulfed laborer sank out of sight in the sand.

Harry Hazelton feverishly uncoiled one of the ropes, gathering a few folds in his right hand.

"Catch, Tom!" Harry shouted, making a cast.

The line swirled through the air, then settled on the sands.

"O-o-o-oh!" groaned Hazelton, for the rope had fallen four feet to one side of Reade, and the latter, hemmed in as he was, could not reach it.

"Take your time and make a sure throw, Harry!" Tom called cheerily.

Again Hazelton made a throw—and failed.

"Let me, have that! My head's cooler," called Foreman Payson.

He made two quick, steady throws, but each shot wide of the mark.

"Let me have that!" screamed Harry, snatching the line away.

"There are lines enough. Two men might be making throws," spoke a quiet voice behind them.

Payson nodded, and bent over for another line.

All trace of the doomed laborer had now disappeared. As for Tom, the sand was reaching up under his arm-pits. The young chief engineer had had the presence of mind to keep his arms free, but soon they too must be swallowed up.

"Good throw—whoever sent it!" cheered Tom Reade, as a final cast—Harry's—sent a line within six inches of his face.

Tom could not see those back at the platform, for his back was turned to the eastward, and he could no longer swing his body about.

"Get it under your arms-quick, Tom, or you're done for, too!" screamed Harry.

"Keep cool, old chap!" came back the unconcerned answer. "It isn't half bad out here. The sand feels really cool about one's body."

"This is no time for nonsense!" ordered Hazelton hoarsely. "Have you the line fast?"

"Yes!" nodded Reade. "Haul away! Careful, but strong and steady!"

Under Foreman Payson's direction a score of men seized the other end of the line and then began to haul.

Harry danced up and down in a frenzy.

"Tom, you idiot," he gasped. "You haven't made the line fast about yourself."

"Not yet," came the cheery answer. "That wouldn't be fair play. Haul away on our friend out yonder."

Tom Reade had knotted the line fast to his end of the rawhide lariat that was tied under the shoulders of the engulfed laborer. It was magnificent, though seemingly a useless sacrifice of his own life for one who must already be dead.

From some of the workmen a faint cheer went up as the slowly incoming line hauled the head of the unconscious laborer above the sand. A foot at a time the body came toward them over the sand.

Harry, however, scarcely noted the rescue. He was frantically working with another line, knotting it in a sort of harness under his own shoulders.

"Come here, some of you men!" he called. "Bear a hand here! Lively!"

Foreman Payson was instantly at the side of the young assistant engineer.

"What are you trying to do, Mr. Hazelton?" he demanded.

"I'm going out on the sands," retorted Harry. "I'm going to reach Tom Reade. If I go under the men can aid me."

"But that isn't a rawhide line; it's hemp," objected Foreman Payson.

"It's strong enough," retorted Hazelton impatiently.

"I don't know about that."

"It will have to do," insisted Hazelton. "You men get a good hold. Also, one of you play out this other line that I'm taking with me for Tom Reade."

"Don't risk anything foolish, Harry!" called the voice of Tom Reade, who now felt the sand under his chin.

"I'm coming to you," Tom, shouted Harry.

"It's too dangerous. Don't!"

"I've got to come to you!"

"I tell you don't! Maybe I can get myself out."

"Yes, you can," jeered Hazelton. "Tom, if you went under, do you think I could ever go back to our native town?"

"Payson!" shouted Tom.

"Yes, sir!"

"Don't let Mr. Hazelton come—yet. Seize him!"

"I've got him, sir!"

Harry felt himself seized by the strong arms of the foreman.

"You don't go, sir," Payson insisted. "It's a criminal waste of life."

"Man, unhand me. Let me go, I tell you."

"I won't, sir. I've Mr. Reade's orders."

"He's helpless and no longer in command," Harry retorted.

"He's in command enough for me, sir."

"Payson!" Harry Hazelton's fierce gaze burned into the eyes of the foreman. "If Tom Reade dies out yonder, and you've hindered me from saving him—I'll have your life for forfeit!"

Before that burning look even Payson shrank back. Harry Hazelton, ordinarily the best natured of boys, was now in terrible earnest.

"That's right," muttered Hazelton. "Men, I take command here. You needn't heed any words from Reade. Now, you men on the lines watch close and listen keenly for my orders."

With that Hazelton darted out on the deadly, treacherous sands!



CHAPTER XI. CHEATING THE MAN-KILLER

For the first few yards the assistant engineer ran almost as well as though on a cinder track. Then his feet sank in. Soon he stumbled.

Then there came a time, within ten feet of Tom, when Harry felt his feet settling in the sand despite his efforts to pull himself out.

In the meantime the haulers on the other line had forgotten to pull the laborer nearer to safety.

"You men get your eyes on the job!" sternly commanded Payson, who seemed capable of having eyes everywhere.

Harry got out, somehow. He made a bound, landing within arm's length of Tom Reade.

"I'm here, old chum!" gasped Hazelton.

"I knew you'd be," returned Tom calmly, "if there were any way of doing it."

Harry pulled himself together and floundered still closer.

Nor was there a moment to be lost. Tom was already reduced to the choice between silence and having his mouth filled with sand.

Harry's hands worked with lightning speed. Feverishly he dug out the sand, until he had scooped away enough to bare Tom's shoulders and a few inches beneath.

Swoop! Down went the extra noose over Tom's lifted arms, and then down to a snug noose under his armpits.

From the platform a cheer went up, for the unconscious laborer had just been hauled to safety.

It was with a thrill of horror that Hazelton found his own legs firmly embedded in the sand well up to his thighs.

"Get Reade started first!" shouted the young assistant engineer. "Don't bother with me until I give the word."

How the line fastened to Tom tightened and strained! At times it seemed as though it must give way.

Presently Tom's shoulder and a part of his torso were free.

In the meantime Harry Hazelton had sunk in up to the waist line.

"We'll haul on you, too, now, Mr. Hazelton!" sounded the voice of Foreman Payson.

"Don't you dare do it until I give the word," thundered back the voice of the assistant engineer.

With a line securely about him, Harry felt that he could afford to take the slight chance of waiting his turn.

He saw Tom's knees coming up out of the sand before he called:

"Now, Payson, you can give me a little boost if you like. Don't pull me in ahead of Tom Reade, however."

Presently deafening cheers went up. Both young engineers were being slowly, surely hauled to safe ground.

Then Tom and Harry reached a spot where they could rise to their own feet and floundered. Tom started, then swayed dizzily.

"Steady, there, old Gridley boy!" mumbled Hazelton, slipping an arm around his recovered chum.

Then the two young engineers reached the platform and a fresh tumult of joyful cheering burst forth.

"Payson," exclaimed Harry, going up to the foreman, and holding out his hand, "will you accept my apologies for all I said to you? I had to use strong language, or you'd have held me back from Reade."

"I didn't believe he could be saved," returned the foreman, with a sickly smile, as he grasped Hazelton's outstretched hand.

Tom, too weak at first to stand, had dropped to his knees at the side of the unconscious laborer, over whom some of the bystanders were working in stupid fashion.

"This man must have medical attention at once!" Tom declared. "Some of you men lift him to your shoulders. Be careful not to jolt him, but travel at a jog all the way to the office building. Harry, can you sit on your horse?"

"Surely," said the young assistant.

"Lucky boy, then," smiled Reade. "I won't be able to sit in saddle for some minutes. Ride into camp and tell the operator to wire swiftly for a physician to come out and attend to that man."

"But you—"

"I'm here, am I not!" smiled Reade.

"I should say you are, Mr. Reade!" came a hoarse, friendly roar from one of the laborers.

Hazelton did not delay. He was soon speeding back over the desert.

As for Tom, there were many offers of assistance, but he explained that all he needed was to keep quiet and have a chance to get his breath back.

Payson, in the meantime, had started the work going again, though most of his men toiled with far less spirit than before the accident.

Ten minutes later Tom mounted his horse and rode slowly back toward camp. By the time he reached there he made out the automobile of a Paloma physician coming in haste.

Tom was still weak enough to tremble as Harry stepped outside and helped him to the ground.

"Harry," Reade remarked dryly, "I'm not going to bother to thank you for such a simple little thing as saving my life out yonder. I am well aware that you had the time of your life in doing it."

"I might have had the time of my life," returned Harry, with an imitation of his chum's calmness, "if there had been more excitement about it. It was all rather dull, wasn't it, old chap?"

Smiling, both stepped inside. Then Tom's face became grave when he saw that the rescued laborer had not yet recovered consciousness.

"Somewhere in the world," murmured Reade, as he dropped to one knee and rested a finger-tip on the laborer's pulse, "there's someone—a woman, or a child, or a white-haired old man—who wouldn't wish us to let this man die. What have you men been doing for him?"

Before the answer could be given a honk sounded at the door. Then a young doctor clad in white duck and carrying a three-fold medicine case, stepped inside.

"Sucked down by the sand and hauled out again, Doc," Tom explained.

The physician looked closely at his patient and Harry drove out the men who had no especial business there.

"A little pin-head of glonoin on his tongue for a beginning," decided the physician, opening his case. From one of the vials he took a small pellet, forcing it between the lips of the unconscious man. Then, with his stethoscope, he listened for the heart beats.

"Another glonoin, and then we'll start in to wake up our friend," said the young doctor in white duck, after a pause.

Two or three minutes later the laborer opened his eyes.

"You've been trying not to hear the whistle," laughed the doctor gently. "A big fellow like you must be up and doing."

Ten minutes later the doctor found Tom outside.

"The man will be all right now, with a little stuff that I'll leave for him," smiled the visitor. "Of course there's some man in camp who can look after a comrade to-night?"

"Doc, couldn't you do a better job if you had the man in Paloma under your own eyes tonight?" Tom questioned.

"Yes; undoubtedly."

"Can you take him?"

"Yes."

"Then do so. Give him all the attention he needs. Make out your bill to the A. G. & N. M. Hand it to me, and I'll O.K. it and send it in to headquarters for payment. If you think an automobile ride after dark will do the poor chap good, give him one and put that in your bill, too."

"Reade, I want to shake hands with you," said the physician earnestly. "I've looked after railroad hands before, but this is the first time I was ever asked to be humane to one. Have no fear but I'll send this man back to you strong and grateful. What's his name?"

"I don't know," returned Reade. "I don't even know to whose gang he belongs, though I think he's one of Payson's men."

Late the following afternoon the laborer was brought back to camp. The following morning he returned to his work as usual.

During the next two weeks Tom and Harry directed all their energies, as well as the labor of all of their men, to bridging over that bad spot in the Man-killer that had so nearly claimed two lives. One after another six different layers of log network were put down. The open box cars brought up thousands of tons of good soil, which was dumped down into the layers of interlaced logs.

"The old Man-killer must feel tremendously flattered at finding himself so persistently manicured," laughed Tom as he sat in saddle watching the men putting down the sixth layer.

Steel piles, hollow and filled with cement, were being driven here, the cement not going in until the top of the pile was but four feet above the level of the desert.

"Look out yonder," nodded Harry, handing his field glass to his chum. "You can just make out a glint on the sand. That's one of our steel piles being sucked under."

"The explorer of a few centuries hence may find a lot of these piles," laughed Tom. "If he does, he'll most likely attribute them to the Pueblo Indians or the Aztecs, and he'll write a learned volume about the high state of civilization that existed among the savages here before the white man came."

"I'm mighty glad, Tom, that General Manager Ellsworth isn't out here to see how many dozens of steel piles we're feeding hopelessly to the Man-killer."

"Not one of those piles is going down hopelessly," Tom retorted. "Some of the piles may disappear, and never be seen again, but each one will help hold the drift at some point, near the surface, or perhaps a thousand feet below the surface."

"Only a thousand feet below the surface!" Harry grunted. "Tom, I often feel certain that the Man-killer extends away down to the center of the earth and up again on the other side. Before I'm a very old man I expect to hear that several of our steel piles have shot up above the surface in China or India."

Hearing the noise of horse's hoofs behind him, Tom turned. He beheld Fred Ransom riding out to the spot on a mottled "calico" horse.

"Look who's here," Reade murmured to his chum.

"What are you going to do with him?" asked Hazelton, after a quick look. "Run him off the line?"

"I don't know," Tom answered slowly. "Ransom is trying hard to earn a living, you know."

Harry snorted. That sort of estimation of Ransom, even as a joke, was a little too much for him.

"Mighty hot day, Reade," called Ransom, as he reined in near the young engineers.

"Yes," said Tom slowly. "If I were enjoying myself beside a bottle of cold soda on the Mansion House porch I don't believe I'd have the energy to call for a horse and ride all the way out here in the heat."

"Am I intruding?" demanded Ransom, with a swift, keen glance at the young chief engineer.

"Oh, no, indeed!" came Tom's response. "You're as welcome as the flowers in spring."

"Thank you. It's a fine job you're doing out here."

"Now it's my turn to extend my thanks to you," Tom drawled. "Your praise is all the more appreciated as coming from a competitor."

"A competitor!" asked Ransom quickly, and with a half scowl. "I'm not an engineer."

"Your people are ranked as pretty fair engineers," Reade rejoined.

"My people? What do you mean, Reade? There isn't an engineer in our family."

"No; but the Colthwaite Company employs a good many engineers," Tom suggested.

"Colthwaite?" repeated Ransom, now on his guard. "I have nothing to do with that concern."

"No?" asked Tom, as though greatly astonished. "Why, that's strange."

"Why is it strange?"

"Why," Tom Reade rejoined amiably, "everyone connected with the A. G. & N. M. who knows anything at all about you credits you with being a member of the Colthwaite Company's gloom department."

"Gloom department?" gasped Ransom, with a wholly innocent-looking face. "Oh, all right. I'll bite. What is a gloom department, anyway?"

"It's a comparatively recent piece of business apparatus," smiled Tom. "It is employed by big corporations as a club with which to hit smaller crowds that want some of the business of life. The gloom department might be called the bureau of knocking, or the hit-in-the-neck shift."

"Is that what you accuse me of doing for the Colthwaite Company?" asked Fred Ransom, his scowl deepening.

"Oh, the accusation isn't all mine," Tom assured him unconcernedly. "Some of it belongs elsewhere."

"Your suspicions are utterly unwarranted," retorted Ransom, choking slightly.

"It's a lot of comfort to hear you say so," Tom rejoined, as smilingly as ever.

"You're on the wrong track this time, anyway," Ransom asserted boldly. "Still, I don't suppose you want me out here."

"On the contrary, I greatly enjoy seeing you here," Tom declared. "I'm very grateful for the praise you offered me a moment ago."

"You're welcome," returned the Colthwaite agent, trying hard to smile. "However, I won't take up your time. Good afternoon."

"Good afternoon, then," nodded Tom. "Drop in again, won't you? Any time within working hours."

"Confound that fellow Reade!" muttered Ransom angrily as he rode back to Paloma. "He knows altogether too much—or suspects it. I shall have to call Jim Duff's attention to him!"

"Why did you string the fellow so?" asked Harry when the chums were alone once more.

"I didn't," Reade retorted. "I came very close to giving him straight information."

"Now he'll be more on his guard."

"That won't do him any good," Tom yawned. "He has been on his guard all along, yet we found him out. For that matter, any man who lives regularly at the Mansion House these days is open to our suspicion."

For the Mansion House, ever since Tom's having been ordered away, had been a losing proposition. Now and then a traveling salesman stopped there, though not many.

"By the way, Harry," predicted Tom, as the chums were riding back to Paloma at the close of the afternoon, "look out, in about three of four days, for a new and permanent guest at the Cactus House."

"Who's coming?" inquired Hazelton.

"Whatever man the Colthwaite Company decides to send to the Cactus House as soon as headquarters in Chicago receives Ransom's report. I think we'll know that new chap, too, when he shows up. Also, you'll find that the new man is either an avowed enemy of Ransom, after a little, or else he won't choose to know Ransom at all."

"That's pretty wild guessing," scoffed Harry Hazelton.

"Wait three or four days, and see whether it's guessing or one of the fine fruits of logic," proposed Reade. "Incidentally, the Colthwaite people will wonder why it didn't occur to them before to send one of their gloom men to live at the Cactus. Fact is, I've been looking for the chap for more than a fort-night."



CHAPTER XII. HOW THE TRAP WAS BAITED

It was the evening of the day after Harry, who had insisted on trudging up and down the line all day, instead of using his horse, had a touch of heat headache.

He was not in a serious condition, but he needed rest. He dropped into one of the chairs on the Cactus House porch and prepared to doze.

"Is there anything I can get for you, or do for you, old chap?" inquired Tom, coming out on the porch after supper and looking remarkably comfortable and contented.

"No; just let me doze," begged Harry. "I feel a trifle drowsy."

"Then, if you're going to give a concert through your nose," smiled Tom, "I may as well protect myself by going some distance away."

"Go along."

"I believe I'll take a walk. Probably, too, the ice cream man will be richer when I get back."

Tom went down into the street and sauntered along. He had walked but a few blocks when he met another young man in white ducks.

"Doc, I'm looking for the place where the ice cream flows," Reade hinted. "Can I tempt you?"

"Without half trying," laughed Dr. Furniss the young physician who had gone out to camp to attend the Man-killer victim.

As they were seated together over their ice cream, Dr. Furniss inquired:

"By the way, do you ever see my one-time patient nowadays?"

"The fellow we exhumed from the Man-killer?"

"The same."

"I see him every morning," laughed Tom. "Really, I can't help seeing him, for the man puts himself in my way daily to say good morning. And as yet I haven't learned his name."

"His name is Tim Griggs," replied Dr. Furniss. "He's a fine fellow, too, in his rough, manly way. He's wonderfully grateful to you, Reade. Do you know why?"

"Haven't an idea."

"Well, Tim's sheet anchor in life is a little girl."

"Sweetheart?"

"After a fashion," laughed the young doctor. "The girl is his daughter, eight years old. She's everything to Tim, for his wife is dead. The child lives with somewhat distant relatives, in a New England town. Tim sends all his spare money to her, and so the child is probably well looked after. Tim told me, with a big choke in his voice, that, if the Man-killer had swallowed him up, it would have been all up with the little girl, too. When money stopped coming the relatives would probably have set the child to being household drudge for the family. Tim has a round dozen of different photos of the child taken at various times."

"Then I'm extra glad we got him out of the Man-killer," said Tom rather huskily.

"I knew you'd be glad, Reade. You're that kind of fellow."

"Tim Griggs, then, is probably one of our steady men," Tom remarked, after a while.

"Steady! Why the man generally sends all of his month's pay, except about eight dollars, to his daughter. From what he tells me she is a sharp, thrifty little thing. She pays her own board bill with her relatives, chooses and pays for her own clothes, and puts the balance of the money in bank for herself and her father."

"Does Tim ever go to see her?"

"Once in two years, regularly. He'd go east oftener, but it costs too much money. He'd live near her, but he says he can earn more money down here on the desert. Tim even talks about a college education for that idolized girl. She looks out just as sharply for her daddy. Whenever Tim is ready to make a trip east, she sends him the money for his fare. The two have a great old time together."

"Tim may marry again one of these days, and then the young lady may not have as happy a time," remarked Tom thoughtfully.

"I hinted as much to Griggs," replied Dr. Furniss, "but he told me, pretty strongly, that there'll be no new wife for him until he has helped the daughter to find her own place in life."

"Say!" muttered Tom, with a queer little choke in his voice. "The heroes in life generally aren't found on the high spots, are they?"

"They're not," retorted the doctor solemnly.

Half an hour later, after having eaten their fill of ice cream, Dr. Furniss and Engineer Reade parted, Tom strolling on alone in the darkness.

"I can It get that fellow Griggs out of my mind," muttered Tom. "To think that a splendid fellow like him is working as a laborer! I wonder if he isn't fitted for something better—something that pays better? Look out, Tom Reade, you old softy, or you'll be doing something foolish, all on account of a primary school girl in New England whom you've never seen, and never will! I wonder—hello!"

As Tom had walked along his head had sunk lower and lower in thought. His sudden exclamation had been brought forth by the fact that he had bumped violently into another human being.

"Cantch er look out where you're going?" demanded an ugly voice.

"I should have been looking out, my friend," Tom replied amiably. "It was very careless of me. I trust, that I haven't done you serious harm."

"Quit yer sass!" ordered the other, who was a tall, broad-shouldered and very surly looking fellow of thirty.

"I don't much blame you for being peevish," Reade went on. "Still, I think there has been no serious harm done. Good night, friend."

"No, ye don't!" snarled the other. "Nothing of the slip-away-easy style, like that!"

"Why, what do you want?" I asked Tom, opening his eyes in genuine surprise.

"Ye thick-headed idiot!" rasped the surly stranger. "Ye—"

From that the stranger launched into a strain of abuse that staggered the young engineer.

"Say no more," begged Reade generously. "I accept your apology, just as you've phrased it."

"Apology, ye fool!" growled the stranger.

"That won't do. Put up your hands!"

"Why?"

"So ye can fight, ye—"

"Fight?" echoed Tom, with a shake of his bead. "On a hot night like this? No, sir! I refuse."

Tom would have passed peaceably on his way, but the stranger suddenly let go a terrific right-hander. Had Tom Reade received the blow he would have gone to the ground. But the young engineer's athletic training stood by him. He slid out, easily and gracefully, but was compelled to wheel and face his assailant.

"Don't," urged Tom. "It's too hot."

"I'm hot myself," leered the stranger, dancing nearer.

"You look it," Tom admitted. "If you don't stop dancing, you'll soon be hotter. It makes me warm to look at you."

"Stop this one, ye tin-horn!" snarled the stranger.

"Certainly," agreed Tom, blocking the blow. "However, I wish you wouldn't be so strenuous. One of us may get hurt."

This last escaped Reade as he blocked the blow, and again displayed a neat little bit of footwork.

"Let's see you stop this one!" taunted the bully.

"Certainly," agreed Tom, and did so.

"And this one. And this! Here's another!"

By this time the blows were raining in fast and thick. Tom's agile footwork kept him out of reach of the hard, hammer-like fists of the stranger.

Tom had been bred in athletics. He was comparative master of boxing, but before this interchange of blows had gone far the young engineer realized that he had met a doughty opponent.

What Tom didn't know was that his present foe was an ex-prizefighter, who had sunk low in the scale of life.

What the lad didn't even suspect was that the man had been hired to pick a fight with him, and that the fight was for desperate stakes.

"Have you pounded me all you think necessary?" asked Tom coolly, after more than a minute's hard interchange of blows in which neither man had gained any notable advantage.

"No, ye slant-eared boob!" roared the assailant. "Ye—"

Here he launched into another stream of abuse.

"You said all that before," remarked Tom, with a new flash in his eyes. Then fully aroused, he went to work in earnest, intending to drive his opponent back and down him.

The fighting became terrific. There was little effort now to parry, for each fighter had become intent on bringing the other to earth.

Tom was soon panting as he fought, for his opponent was heavier, taller and altogether out of the youth's fistic class.

"If I can only reach his wind once, and topple him over!" thought Reade.

A blow aimed at his jaw he failed to block. The impact sent the young engineer half staggering. Another blow, and Tom dropped, knocked out.

At that very instant a street door near by opened noiselessly.

"I've got him," leered the bully, bending over the senseless form of Tom Reade.

"Bring him in!" ordered a voice behind the open doorway.



CHAPTER XIII. TOM HEARS THE PROGRAM

Throwing his arms around Tom, the bully lifted him and bore him inside, dropping him on the floor in the dark.

"He's some tough fighter," muttered Tom's assailant. "I didn't know but he'd get me."

"No; he couldn't," replied the other voice. "I was just opening the door so I could slip out and give him a clip in the dark."

"He's coming to," muttered the bully. "Ye'll have to tell me what you want done with him."

The speaker had knelt by Tom, with a hand roughly laid against the young engineer's pulse. Neither plotter could see the boy, for no light had been struck in the room.

"Pick him up," ordered the one who appeared to be directing affairs. "If he comes to while you're carrying him you can handle him easily enough, can't you?"

"Of course. Even after he knows pie from dirt he'll be dazed for a few minutes."

"Come along with him."

"Strike a light."

For answer the director of this brutal affair flashed a little glow from a pocket electric lamp.

The way led down a hallway, through to the back of the house, and thence down a steep flight of stairs into a cellar.

The man who appeared to be in charge of this undertaking had brought a lantern, holding it ahead of the man who carried Tom's unconscious form.

"Dump him there," ordered the man with the lantern.

"He's stirring," reported the fighter, after having dropped young Reade to the hard earthen floor.

"Take this then," replied the other, who, having hung the lantern on a hook overhead, had stepped off beyond the fringe of darkness. He now returned with a shotgun, which he handed to the fighter who had attacked the young chief engineer in the street.

"Do you want me to shoot him?" whispered the other huskily.

"If you have to, but I don't believe it will be necessary. The cub will soon understand that his safety depends entirely on doing as he is told."

"Say," muttered Tom thickly. He stirred, opened his eyes, then sat up, looking dazed.

"Don't move or talk too much," advised the man with the shotgun. As he spoke, he moved the muzzle close to Reade's face.

"Hello!" muttered Tom, blinking rather hard.

"Hello yourself. That's talking enough for you to do," snapped the bully.

"Was that the thing you hit me over the head with at the finish?" inquired the young engineer curiously.

"Careful! You're expected to think—not talk," leered his captor. "If ye want something to think about ye can remember that I have fingers on both triggers of this gun."

"I can see that much," Tom assented. "Why do you think that it's necessary to keep that thing pointed at me? Have you got me in a place where you feel that facilities for escaping are too great?"

The word "facilities" appeared too big for the mind of the bully to grasp.

"I don't know what ye're talkin' about," he grumbled.

"Neither do I," Tom admitted cheerily. "My friend, I'm not going to irritate you by pretending that I know more than you do. In fact, I know less, for I have no idea what is about to happen to me here, and that's something that you do know."

"No; I don't," glared his captor, "and I don't care what is going to happen to you."

Back of the fringe between light and darkness steps were heard on the cellar stairs. Then someone moved steadily forward until he came into the light.

"Hello, Jim!" Tom called good-humoredly.

"Don't try to be too familiar with your betters, young man!" came the stern reply.

"Oh, a thousand pardons, Mr. Duff," Tom amended hastily. "I didn't intend to insult your dignity. Indeed, I am only too glad to find you resolved to be dignified."

"If you try to get fresh with me," growled the gambler, "I'll knock your head off."

"Call it a slap on the wrist, and let it go at that," urged Tom. "I'm very nervous to-night, and a blow on the head might make me worse."

"Nothing could make you worse," growled, Duff, turning on his heel, "and only death could improve you."

"Then I'm distinctly opposed to the up-lift," grinned Tom, but Duff had disappeared into a darker part of the cellar and the young engineer could not tell whether or not his shaft had reached its mark.

"Ye wouldn't be so fresh if ye had a good idea of what ye're up against to-night," warned the bully with the gun.

"I fancy a good many of us would tone down if we could look ahead for three whole days," Tom suggested.

Other steps were now heard on the stairs. The newcomers remained outside the illuminated part of the cellar until still others arrived.

"Now, gentlemen," proposed the voice of Jim Duff, "suppose we have a look at the troublemaker."

"They can't mean me," Tom hinted to his immediate captor.

"Shut up!" came the surly answer.

Fully a dozen men now moved forward. With the single exception of Duff, each had a cloth, with eye-holes, tied in place over his face.

"My, but this looks delightfully mysterious!" chuckled Tom.

"You be still, boy, except when you answer something that calls for a reply," ordered Jim Duff, who had dropped all of the surface polish of manner that he usually employed. "This meeting need not last long, and I'll do most of the talking."

"Won't these other gentlemen present be allowed to do some of the talking?" the young engineer inquired.

"They don't want to," Duff explained gruffly. "That might lead to their being recognized."

"Oh, that's the game?" mused Tom Reade aloud. "Why, I thought they had the handkerchiefs over their faces because—"

"Shut up and listen!" warned Jim Duff.

"...because," finished Tom, "they wanted me to feel that everything was being done regularly and in good dime-novel form. My, but they do look like some of the fellows that Hen Dutcher used to tell us about. Hen used to waste more time on dime novels than—"

"Shut up!" again commanded Duff. "These gentlemen feel that there is no need of their being recognized."

"Then why didn't Fred Ransom, of the Colthwaite Company, cover up the scar on his chin?" retorted Reade. "Why didn't Ashby, of the Mansion House, invent a new style of walking for the occasion?"

Both men named drew hastily back into the shadow. Tom chuckled quietly.

"I could name a few others," Tom continued carelessly. "In fact—I think I know you all. Gentlemen, you might as well remove your masks."

"Club him with the butt of the gun, if he talks too much," Duff directed the bully, who had stepped back a few paces as the men formed a circle around the young engineer.

"Did you ever try to stop water from running down hill, Duff," Tom inquired good-humoredly.

"What has that to do with—" began the gambler angrily.

"Nothing very much," Tom admitted. "Only it's a waste of time to try to bind my tongue. The only thing you can do is to gag me; but, from some things you've let drop, I judge that you want me to do some of the talking presently."

"We do," nodded Duff, seeking to regain his temper. "However, it won't do you any good to attempt to do your talking before you've heard me."

"If I've been interfering with your rights, then I certainly owe you an apology," Tom answered, with mock gravity. "May I beg you to begin your speech?"

"I will if you'll keep quiet long enough, boy," Jim Duff retorted.

"I'll try," sighed Reade. "Let's hear you."

"This committee of gentlemen—" began the gambler.

"All gentlemen?" Tom inquired gravely.

"This committee," Duff started again, "have concerned themselves with the fact that you have done much to make business bad here in Paloma. You have prevented hundreds of workmen from coming into Paloma to spend their wages as they otherwise would have done."

"Some mistake there," Reade urged. "I can't control the actions of my men after working hours."

"You've persuaded them against coming into town," retorted Duff sternly. "None of the A. G. & N. M. workmen come into Paloma with their wages."

"I'm glad to hear that," Tom nodded. "It's the effect of taking good advice, not the result of orders."

Some of the masked listeners stirred impatiently.

"It's all the same," Jim growled. "Your men don't come into town, and Paloma suffers from the loss of that much business."

"I'm sorry to hear it."

"So this committee," the gambler went on, "has instructed me to inform you that your immediate departure from Paloma will be necessary if you care to go on living."

"I can't go just yet," Tom declared, with a shake of his bead. "My work here at Paloma isn't finished."

"Your work will be finished before the night is over, if you don't accept our orders to leave town," growled Duff.

"Dear me! Is it as bad as that?" queried Reade.

"Worse, as you'll find! What's your answer, Reade?"

"All I can say then," Tom replied innocently, "is that it is too bad."

Clip! Jim Duff bent forward, administering a smart cuff against the right side of the sitting engineer's face.

"Don't do that!" warned Tom, leaping lithely to his feet. He faced the gambler coolly, but the lad's muscles were working under the sleeves of his shirt.

Duff drew back three steps, after which he faced the boy, eyeing him steadily.

"Reade, you've heard what we have to say to you. That you can't go on living in Paloma. Are you ready to give us your word to leave Paloma before daylight, and never come back?"

"No," Tom replied flatly.

"Then," sneered the gambler, fixing the gaze of his snake-like eyes on the young chief engineer, "I'll tell you what we have provided for you. We shall take you to the edge of the town, at once, and there hang you by the neck to a tree. After you've ceased squirming we'll fasten this card to you."

From another man present Jim snatched a printed card, bearing this legend:

"Gone, for the good of the community!"



CHAPTER XIV. THE COUNCIL OF THE CURB

"How soon are you going to carry out your plans?" Reade demanded.

"Then you won't leave Paloma?"

"I certainly won't—as far as my own decision goes," Reade replied firmly. "Furthermore, I should feel the utmost contempt for myself if I allowed you to drive me away from here before my work is completed."

"You're a fool!" hissed Duff.

"And you're a gambler," Tom shot back. "If you won't change your trade, why should you expect me to change mine?"

"I reckon, gentlemen," said Duff, turning to the others present, "that there's no use in wasting any more time with this fellow. He'd rather be hanged to a tree than take good advice. If the rest of you agree with me, I propose that we take the cub to his tree at once."

Several spoke in favor of this plan. Tom, seeing this, felt his heart sink somewhat within him, though he was no more inclined than before to accede to the demands of the rascals.

"Grab him! Throw him down; tie and gag him," were the gambler's orders.

Two men nearest the young engineer sprang at him.

"We'll play this game right through to the finish, then!" burst from Tom's lips, and there was something like fury in his voice.

Biff! Thump!

Two of the townsmen of Paloma, wholly unprepared for resistance, went down before the engineer's telling blows.

"Your turn, Duff!" rumbled Reade's voice, as he sprang forward and launched a terrific blow at the gambler.

Duff went down, almost doubling up as he struck. He had been hit squarely on the jaw with a force that made even Tom Reade's hardened knuckles ache.

"Shoot him!" rose a snarl, as others moved toward the boy.

"All right!" assented Tom, his voice ringing cheerily despite his anger. "Be cowards, as comes natural to you. Yet, if you have the courage of real men I'll agree to fight my way out of this place, meeting you one at a time."

"What's that noise up in the street?" suddenly demanded Ashby, in a tone of sudden fear.

"Run up and find out, if you want to know," proposed Tom, who stood poised, ready for another assailant to come within reach of his fists.

Stealthily, on tip-toe, the bully who had first engaged Reade in the street fight, was now trying to get up behind the young engineer. The bully held the shotgun ready to bring down on the lad's head.

"There's some row up there," continued Ashby. "There, I heard shots!"

"Brave, aren't you?" jeered Tom.

Three or four of the masked cowards started for the steep stairway.

Even the bully with the clubbed shotgun must have been seized with fear; for, though in position to strike, he quickly lowered the weapon and listened.

Bump! smash! sounded, though not directly overhead.

Then from the hallway above came the noise of the treading of many feet, while a voice roared hoarsely:

"Spread through the house, boys! If they've done anything to Mr. Reade, then break the necks of every white-livered rascal you can find!"

"Fine!" chuckled Tom, while the masked faces in the cellar turned even whiter than the cloths covering them. "That voice sounds familiar to me, too."

Over the hubbub of voices above sounded some remonstrating tones, as though others were urging a less violent course.

"It's the workmen from the camp!" guessed Hotelman Ashby, in a voice that shook as though from ague.

"Sounds like it," chuckled Tom. "Cheer up, Ashby. If it's our railroad crew I'll try to see to it that they don't do more than half kill you!"

Then, raising his voice, Tom called gleefully:

"Hello, there! You'll find us in the cellar."

"Why don't you kill that fool!" muttered Jim Duff, who, still dazed, struggled to sit up.

"Hush, man, for goodness sake!" implored the badly frightened Ashby.

Duff, with rapidly returning consciousness, now leaped to his feet, drawing his pistol and springing at Reade.

"Hold on!" Tom proposed coolly. "You're too late!"

The sudden flooding of light into the place and the rush of hobnailed shoes on the stairs recalled even the gambler's scattered senses.

"There they are!" yelled a voice. "Grab 'em! Be careful you don't hit Mr. Reade."

In another instant the cellar was the center of a wild scene. Railway laborers flooded the little place. While some held dark lanterns that threw a bright glow over the scene, others leaped upon the masked ones, tearing the cloths from their faces.

"Serve 'em hot!" roared the same rough voice.

"Stop!" commanded Tom Reade, leaping forward where the light was brightest and into the thick of the struggling mass of humanity.

"Stop, I tell you!"

His commands fell upon deaf ears. It was impossible to restrain these men.

Here and there the lately masked men drew pistols, though not one of them had a chance to use his weapon ere it was wrested from him.

Pound! slam! bang! A medley of falling blows filled the air, nor was it many seconds later when cries of pain and fear, and appeals for mercy were heard on all sides.

Tom had recognized his own railroad workers, and was throwing himself among them, doing his utmost with hands and voice to stop the brief but wild orgy of revenge on the part of the workmen who idolized him. In their present rage, however, Tom could not at once restrain them. Time and again he was swept back from reaching Tim Griggs, who was easily the center of this volcanic outburst of human passion.

"Boys!" roared Tim. "We'll want to know these coyotes to-morrow. Black the left eye of each rascal. I'll black both of Jim Duff's."

Two heavy, sodden impacts sounded during a brief pause in the noise, attesting to the fact that the gambler had been decorated.

"Stop all this! Stop!" roared Tom Reade. "Men, we're not savages, just because these other fellows happen to be! Stop it, I tell you. Are there no foremen here?"

"I'm trying to reach you, Mr. Reade," called the voice of Superintendent Hawkins. "But this is a heavy crush to get through."

In truth it was. There were more than a hundred laborers in the cellar, while the stairs were blocked by a mob of enraged workmen.

"Stop it all, men!" Tom again urged, and this time there was silence, save for his own strong voice. "We don't want to prove ourselves to be as despicable as the enemy are. Bring 'em up to the street, but don't be brutal about it. We'll look the scoundrels over so that we'll know them to-morrow. Come along. Clear the stairs, if you please, men!"

Tom was now once more in control, as fully as though he had his force of toilers out on the desert at the Man-killer quicksand.

So, after a few minutes, all were in the street. Here fully two hundred more of the railroad men, many of them armed with stakes and other crude weapons, held back a crowd of Paloma residents who swarmed curiously about.

"Let me through, men. Let me through, I tell you!" insisted the voice of Harry Hazelton, as that young assistant engineer struggled with the crowd.

Then, on being recognized, Harry was allowed to reach the side of his chum.

"Mr. Reade!" called a husky-toned voice, "won't you order your men to let me through to see you? I want to talk with you about tonight's outrage."

Tom recognized the speaker as a man named Beasley, one of Paloma's most upright and courageous citizens.

"Let Mr. Beasley through," Tom called. "Don't block the streets, men. Remember, we've no right to do that."

A resounding cheer ascended at the sound of Tom's voice. In the light of the lanterns Tom was seen to be signaling with his hands for quiet, and the din soon died down.

"Mr. Reade," spoke Beasley, in a voice that shook with indignation, "the real men of this town would like an account of what has been going on here to-night. If Duff and his cronies have been up to anything that hurts the good name of the town we'd like the full particulars. You men there—don't let one of the rascals get away. Jim Duff and his gang will have to answer to the town of Paloma."

"Men," ordered Reade, "bring along the crew you caught in the cellar. Don't hurt them—remember how cowardly violence would be when we have everything in our own hands."

"The men of Paloma will do all the hurting," Mr. Beasley announced grimly.

Tom's own deliberate manner, and his manifest intention of not abusing his advantage impressed itself upon the decent men of Paloma, who now swarmed about the frightened captives from the cellar.

"I know 'em all," muttered Beasley. "I'll know 'em in the morning, too. So will you, friends!" he added, turning to the pressing crowds.

"Start Jim Duff on his travels now!" demanded one angry voice.

"By the Tree & Rope Short Line!" proposed another voice.

Jim was caught and held, despite his straggles. Active hands swarmed over his clothing, seeking for weapons.

"Gentlemen! Gentlemen!" appealed Tom sturdily, making his resonant voice travel far over the heads of the throng. "Will you honor me with your attention for three or four minutes?"

"Yep!" shouted back one voice.

"You bet!" came another voice.

"Go ahead and spout, Reade. We'll have the hanging, right after!"

There was nothing jovial in these responses. Tom Reade knew men well enough to recognize this fact. Moreover, Tom knew the plain, unvarnished, honest and deadly-in-earnest men of these south-western plains well enough to know the genuine fury of the crowd.

Arizona and New Mexico have long been held up as states where violence and lynch law prevail. The truth is that Arizona and New Mexico have no more lynchings than do many of the older states. An Arizona lynching can only follow an upheaval of public sentiment, when honest men are angered at having their fair fame sullied by the acts of blackguards.

"Friends," Tom went on, as soon as he could secure silence, "I am a newcomer among you. I have no right to tell you how to conduct your affairs, and I am not going to make that mistake. What you may do with Jim Duff, what you may do with others who damage the fair name of your town, is none of my business. For myself I want no revenge on these rascals. They have already been handled with much more roughness than they had time to show to me. I am satisfied to call the matter even."

"But we're not!" shouted an Arizona voice from the crowd.

"That's your own affair, gentlemen," Reade went on. "I wish to suggest—in fact, I beg of you—that you let these fellows go to-night. In the morning, when the sun is up, and after you have thought over the matter, you will be in a better position to give these fellows fair-minded justice—if you then still feel that something must be done to them. That is all I have to say, gentlemen. Now, Mr. Beasley, won't you follow with further remarks in this same line?"

Mr. Beasley looked more or less reluctant, but he presently complied with Reade's request. Then Tom called upon another prominent citizen of Paloma in the crowd for a speech.

"Let the coyotes go—until daylight," was the final verdict of the crowd, though there was an ominous note in the expressed decision.

In stony silence the crowd now parted to let Jim Duff and his fellows go away.

Within sixty seconds the last of them had run the gauntlet of contempt and vanished.

"Someone told me," scoffed Beasley, "that a gambler is a man of courage, polish, brains and good manners. I reckon Jim Duff isn't a real gambler, then."

"Yes, he is!" shouted another. "He's one of the real kind—sometimes smooth, but always bound to fatten on the money that belongs to other men."

"Jim can leave town, I reckon," grimly declared another old settler. "We have savings banks these days, and we don't need gamblers to carry our money for us."

"Speech, Reade! Speech!" insisted Mr. Beasley good-humoredly.

From some mysterious place a barrel was passed along from hand to hand. It was set down before the young chief engineer, and ready hands hoisted him to the upturned end of the barrel.

"Speech!" roared a thousand voices.

Tom, grinning good-humoredly, then waved his arms as though to still the tumult of voices. Gradually the cheering died down, then ceased.

Bang! sounded further down the Street, and the flash of a rifle was seen.

Tom Reade, his speech unmade, fell from the barrel into the arms of those crowded about him.



CHAPTER XV. MR. DANES INTRODUCES HIMSELF

Daylight found Jim Duff and some of his cronies of the night before either absent from Paloma, or else securely hidden.

Fred Ransom, the Colthwaite Company's representative, had also vanished.

Proprietor Ashby, of the Mansion House, was reported to be skulking in his hotel, as he did not show his face on the streets.

Morning also brought calmer counsel to the real men of Paloma. They were now glad that they had not sullied themselves by acts of violence.

No one, when daylight came, entertained the belief that Tom Reade would suffer from any further attempts at violence, for now the little coterie of so-called "bad men" in the town were thoroughly frightened.

Tom had not been hit by the rifle shot. He had fallen as a matter of precaution, fearing that a second shot would speed on the heels of the first.

The fellow who had fired that shot at Tom had not lingered long enough to place himself in risk of Arizona vengeance. Even before some of the men in the crowd had had time to discover that Reade, unhurt, was laughing over his escape, a score or more had darted down the street, only to find that the unknown whom they sought was safely out of the way.

"We'll search the town from one end to the other," one excited citizen had proposed.

"We'll make a night of it."

"Don't do anything of the sort," Tom had urged. "You'll terrorize hundreds of women and children, who have no knowledge of this affair. Jim Duff's little evening of celebration is ended and now the wisest thing for you to do is to return to your homes. Mr. Hawkins!"

"Here, sir," answered the superintendent of construction.

"Get our men together and return to camp. They'll need sleep against the toil of to-morrow. Let every man who wants to do so sleep an hour or two later in the morning. Men of the A., G. & N. M., accept my heartiest thanks for the splendid manner in which you turned out to help me, though as yet I'm ignorant of how it all came about."

Nor was it until the next day that Tom Reade learned from Hazelton just what had caused the laborers to tumble out of their beds and rush into town to serve him.

That night Tim Griggs had been prowling about the streets of Paloma, suspicious of Reade's enemies, and watching for the safety of the young chief engineer who had saved him from the savage appetite of the Man-killer quicksand.

It had chanced that Tim had caught a glimpse of the finish of the fight on the street, and was just in time to see the young chief engineer lifted and carried into that unoccupied house, the property of the hotel man, Ashby.

Tim's first instinct had been to seek help in town—in that very neighborhood. Tim was suspicious, and afraid that he might by mistake appeal to some of Tom's enemies.

So, while running through the streets searching for Hazelton, Tim had espied an automobile standing idle in front of a house. Having some acquaintance with automobiles, Tim had cranked up and leaped into the vehicle, speeding straight to camp, where he gave the alarm. Men answered by hundreds, Mendoza keeping his Mexicans in camp to watch the property there.

Harry was aroused by the tumult, for he had just gone to his room, intending to turn in.

Having roused the camp, Tim ran the car back to town at the head of the swarming little army and returned to the spot where he had seized the automobile.

"It's all over now, old fellow," Tom declared to his chum cheerily, rising from his office chair as one of the whistles blew and the men knocked off for their noonday meal. "What happened last night won't happen again."

"Just the same, Tom, I almost wish you'd carry a pistol after this," Harry remarked, as the two engineers went to their horses, mounted and started toward town for their own meal.

"Bosh!" almost snapped Tom. "You know my opinion of pistols. They are for policemen, soldiers and others who have real need to go armed. Only a coward would pack a pistol day by day without needing it."

So the matter was dropped for the time being.

At the hotel Tom and Harry went to their accustomed seats in the dining room. Their food was brought and the two young engineers fell to work cheerfully. Just then a well-dressed man of perhaps thirty years entered the dining, room, spoke to one of the waiters, and came over to the engineers' table.

"Messrs. Reade and Hazelton?" he inquired pleasantly.

"Yes," Harry nodded.

"May I make myself known?" asked the stranger. "My name is Danes—Frank Danes."

Harry in turn gave his own name and that of Tom.

"I wonder if you would think it intruding if I invited myself to join you at this table?" the stranger went on.

"By no means," Tom responded cordially. "We'll be glad of your company. It will stop Hazelton and myself from talking too much shop."

"Oh, by all means talk shop," begged Danes, as he slipped into a chair at one side of the table. "I shall enjoy it, for I am interested in you both. In fact, I took the liberty of asking the waiter to point you gentlemen out to me."

"So?" Tom inquired.

Danes had the appearance of being a well-to-do easterner, and announced himself as a resident of Baltimore.

For some minutes the three chatted pleasantly, Harry, however, doing most of the talking for the engineers. When Tom spoke it was generally to put some question.

"Do you ever permit visitors to go out to the Man-killer?" Danes inquired toward the end of the meal.

"Sometimes," Tom answered.

"I shall be very grateful if you will accord me that privilege."

"We shall be very glad to invite you out there some time," Tom answered pleasantly.

"To-day?" pressed the stranger. "I have nothing to do this afternoon."

"Some other day would suit better, if you can arrange it conveniently," Reade suggested, as he rose.

Then they left Danes, securing their horses and riding back over the scorching desert.

"How do you like Danes?" Harry asked, after they had ridden some distance. "He seems a very pleasant fellow."

"Very pleasant," Tom nodded.

"Why didn't you let him come along?"

"Because I don't like Danes' employers."

"His employers?" Harry repeated, puzzled.

"Yes; he is employed by the Colthwaite Company."

"What?" Hazelton started in astonishment. "How do you know that, Tom?"

"I don't know it, but I'm sure of it, just the same," was Reade's answer.

"It maybe so," Harry agreed. "What makes you suspect him?"

"Well, in the first place, Danes, if that's his name—said he hailed from Baltimore. Yet he had none of that soft, delightful southern accent that you and I have noticed in the voices of real southern men. Danes uses two or three words, at times, that are distinctly Chicago slang. Moreover, I'm certain that the man knows a good deal about engineering work, though he won't admit it."

"We'll have to watch him, then," muttered Harry.

"We don't need to tell him anything, nor do we need to bring him out here to see how we are filling in the Man-killer. If we don't tell Danes much he may not last long. The Colthwaite people ought soon to grow tired of keeping agents here who don't succeed in hindering our work."

"Whew! I shall be glad of a sleep to-night, after all the excitement of last night," declared Hazelton, as the young engineers rode into Paloma at the close of the day's work.

On the porch, lolling in a reclining chair with his feet elevated to the railing, sat Frank Danes.

"Back from toil, gentlemen?" was his pleasant greeting.

"Long enough to get sufficient sleep to carry us through to-morrow," was Tom Reade's unruffled response.

"You do look tired," assented Danes, rising and coming toward them. "Yet I hear that, personally, you don't have hard work to do."

"We don't work at all, if you take that view of it," Harry retorted. "Yet there's a thing called responsibility, and many wise men have declared that it takes more out of a man than hours of toiling with pick and shovel."

"Oh, I can believe that's so," agreed Danes. "Going into dinner now?"

"After a bath and a change of clothing," Tom replied.

"Then, if you really don't mind, I'll wait and dine at the same table with you."

"If you can wait that long we shall be charmed to have your company," Tom assured him as the young engineers stepped inside.

Frank Danes half started as they left him.

"Reade's tone sounded a bit peculiar," muttered the newcomer to himself. "I wonder why? Perhaps I have forced myself a little too much upon him and Reade has taken a dislike to me."

If Tom had taken a dislike to the newcomer, Danes could not be sure of it from the young chief engineer's manner at table. Harry Hazelton, too, was almost gracious during the meal.

"They're a pair of half-smart, half-simple boobs," decided Danes, as he smoked a cigar alone after dinner.

"Tom, I think your great intellect has gone astray for once," remarked Hazelton, in the privacy of their room upstairs.

"I never knew that I had any great intellect," Reade laughed. "However, I was born to be suspicious once in a while. I suppose you were referring to Frank Danes."

"Yes; and he appears to be a mighty decent fellow."

"I'm sure I hope he is," yawned Tom. "I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm going to bed, Harry. What do you say?"

Hazelton was agreeable. Within twenty minutes both young engineers were sound asleep.

It was after midnight when cries of "fire!" from the street aroused them.

Tom Reade threw open the door to be greeted by a cloud of stifling smoke.

"Hustle, Harry!" he gasped, making a rush to get into his clothing. "We can get out, I think, but we haven't any time to spare. This old trap is ablaze. It won't last many minutes!"

Trained in the alarms and the hurries of camp life, the young engineers all but sprang into their clothes.

"Come on, Harry!" urged Tom, throwing open the door. "We can make it."

They started, when, from the floor above, a woman's frantic appeals for help reached them. Children's cries were added to hers.

"Get to the street, Harry!" shouted Tom. "I'm going upstairs. There'd be no satisfaction for me in reaching the street if I abandoned that woman and her babies to their fate. One of us can do the job as well as two!"



CHAPTER XVI. DANES SHIVERS ON A HOT NIGHT

Almost immediately after the cries of "fire" the bell at the fire station pealed out.

Paloma's volunteer fire department turned out quickly, running to the scene with a hand engine, two hose reels and a ladder truck.

By this time, however, the whole of Paloma appeared to be lighted up with the brisk blaze. Tongues of flame shot skyward from the burning hotel, while small blazing embers dropped freely into the street.

"Is everyone out? Everyone safe? Anyone missing?" panted Carter, the young proprietor of the Cactus House.

The disturbed guests ranged themselves about Carter, who looked them over swiftly.

"Where are Mrs. Gerry and her two babies?" demanded the hotel man, his cheeks blanching.

None answered, for no one had seen the woman and her children.

"They must be in the house," cried Carter.

At that instant a woman's face appeared, briefly, at a window on the third floor. Her piercing cry rang out, then her face vanished, a cloud of smoke driving her from the open window.

"Hustle the ladders along!" begged the hotel man hoarsely. "We must rescue that woman and her children. Her husband will be here in morning. What can we say to him if we allow his wife and children to perish in the flames?"

In a few moments a long ladder had been hauled off the track and brave men rushed it to the wall, two men starting to ascend the moment it was in place.

In another moment they came sliding down, balked. Flames had enveloped the upper end of the ladder. It had to be hauled down, buckets of water being dashed over the blazing sides.

"You can't get a ladder up on any part of that wall to the third floor," called the chief of the fire department hoarsely, as he broke through a thick veil of smoke. "You'll have to try the rear."

"Where are Reade and Hazelton?" called a voice.

"Reade!"

"Hazelton!"

There was no answer. A hundred men turned, looking blankly at their nearest fellows.

"They've gone down in the flames!" called another voice.

"Reade and Hazelton have lost their lives!"

"That'll make their enemies happy!" groaned one man, and other voices took it up.

"Carter," shouted one big man, running to the proprietor, "if this blaze is the work of a fire-bug, then look for Reade and Hazelton's enemies. They have the most to gain by the death of those young fellows!"

A hoarse yell went up from the crowd. All of a sudden it seemed plain to every man present that the hatred for Tom and Harry in certain quarters fully accounted for the fire.

"Get a rope! Lynch somebody!" shouted one voice after another.

"First of all, let's find a way to get that woman and her babies out!" Carter appealed, frantically.

Scores of voices took up this cry, and numbers of men hastened around to the rear of the little hotel in the wake of the laddermen.

"We must find Reade and Hazelton, too," shouted others.

"Then we'll lynch someone for this night's business!"

The cry was taken up hoarsely.

Two ladders were quickly hoisted at the rear. Almost before they had begun to hoist, the laddermen and spectators felt that it was a useless attempt.

Nor did the doors and passages seem to offer any better avenue of escape.

Chug, chug, chug! sounded a touring car close at hand. An automobile stopped, Dr. Furniss jumping out.

"Anyone in danger!" shouted the young doctor.

"Yes; a woman and her children. Also Reade and Hazelton!"

"It's all right, then," nodded Furniss, looking relieved. "Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton have gone to the aid of the woman."

"If I could only believe that!" gasped Proprietor Carter. "We've tried the ladders, and we've tried the corridors of the house. It's a raging furnace in there."

Dr. Furniss looked on rather calmly.

"I'm merely wondering on which side of the house those two engineers will appear with the woman and her children," he declared.

For the fourth time a ladder was being vainly raised at the rear. Suddenly a shout rang out. In the basement a window was unexpectedly knocked out from the inside.

Through the way thus cleared leaped a young man so blackened with smoke as to be unrecognizable, though it was Hazelton.

Before those who first espied the young man recovered from their surprise, a pair of arms from the inside handed out the body of a child to Hazelton.

Then came another child. Next the senseless body of a woman was handed out.

Dr. Furniss was the first to recover, from delighted amazement. In a bound he was on the spot, taking care of one of the children himself and bawling to others to bring the rest of the family.

Tom Reade, looking more like a burnt-cork minstrel in hard luck than like his usual self, sprang through the window way and followed.

"Here, you people—stand back!" roared Tom, elbowing his way along. "Dr. Furniss and his patients want room and air. Stand back!"

"It's Reade!" yelled a dozen men in delight.

"Well, what of it?" asked Tom coolly, as he followed Furniss. "Was there anyone here who expected that I'd be lost?"

"Hurrah! Where's Hazelton?"

"Who wants me?" demanded the other unrecognizable, smoke-blackened figure.

"They're both safe!"

"Oh—cut it out," begged Tom good-humoredly. "You can't lose an engineer or even kill him. Doc, what's the report?"

"All three are alive," replied Dr. Furniss, "but they'll need care and nursing. Here, help me place them in my car. Someone get in and ride with me—I'll need help. You, Reade!"

"No," responded Tom with emphasis, as he looked down at his discolored self. "If the lady saw me when she opened her eyes, she'd faint again. I'd scare the kiddies into convulsions. A bath for me!"

A man from the crowd quickly stepped into the tonneau of the car, ready to care for the woman and her children while the physician drove his car home.

"Hello, Reade! My congratulations on your getting out. 'Twas a brave deed, too, to save that poor woman and her children."

Frank Danes pressed through the crowd about the car, reaching out to seize Reade's hand.

Into Tom's face flashed a sudden look that few had ever seen there.

It was a look full of contempt that the young chief engineer bent on the man who had greeted him.

"Your hand!" cried Danes, in a voice ringing with admiration.

"Don't you touch me!" warned Reade, his voice vibrating with anger.

"Why—what—" began Danes, then reached his own right hand for Tom's.

"Make way for this 'gentleman' to fall!" roared Reade, then swung a crushing blow that landed squarely in Danes's face.

The latter went down in a heap.

There had been no explanation of the seemingly unprovoked blow, but the crowd surged forward, snatching Danes's body up as though he were something of which these men were anxious to be rid.

"Did he set the hotel afire?" demanded one man in husky tones.

"Did he?" chorused the crowd.

"Lemme through! Here's a rope!"

Then followed wild sounds that could not be distinguished as words. These men of Paloma seemed bent upon fighting for the possession of Frank Danes, who, having now recovered his senses, emitted shrill appeals for mercy.

"Here's the fire-bug! Here's the human match!"

"To the nearest tree!"

"I've got the rope ready!"

In another thirty seconds Frank Danes would have been dangling from a limb of the nearest tree. Again Reade and Hazelton sprang into action.

"Stand back, men—please do!" begged Tom, fighting his way through the thinnest side of the crowd. "Don't kill any man without a trial."

"You know that this tenderfoot fired the hotel, don't you?" asked one man hoarsely.

"I've reason to suspect that he did—"

"That's enough for us!" roared a hundred voices.

"But I've no positive proof of Danes' guilt," Tom insisted.

"To the tree with him!"

"Not while I've breath left in my body!" Tom blazed forth desperately. "Come, Harry!"

Hazelton sprang to his chum's side, the two fighting desperately to drive away the men who held Frank Danes captive.

"Wait a few hours at least, men!" Tom appealed earnestly. "Don't do anything now that you'll be sorry for to-morrow."

Other men of calm judgment began to see the force of Reade's remarks.

Tom and Harry were swiftly backed by such reinforcements that the trembling wretch was torn from his would-be destroyers.

"Reade," sobbed Frank Danes, "as long as I live I'll never forget your splendid conduct."

"Shut up!" retorted Tom roughly. "I don't want to have to knock you down again. It might start a riot that no man could quell."

"Pass the skulking tenderfoot out to us!" implored some of the men on the edge of the crowd, among whom was the man with the spare rope.

"No! We won't disgrace the town with a lynching," Tom shot back. "Wait until cool judgment has had time to do its work."

"Bear a hand there!" roared Harry. "Help the firemen to save the next building. Follow me!"

Thus led, the fickle crowd started to the aid of the firemen.

"Come with me, Danes," whispered Tom hoarsely, sternly. "Keep your distance, however, or I shall lay violent hands on you."

Once out of the glare of light cast by the burning of the hotel, Tom Reade pointed down a dark side street.

"There's your way, Danes," whispered Reade. "Skip! Be far from Paloma by daylight—or nothing will save you."

"Do you consider me responsible for that fire?" faltered Danes.

"Hazelton and I went through that fire," Tom retorted sternly. "We had a hard fight to save that woman and her babies, and were nearly choked with the fumes of the coal oil with which the fire was kindled. I couldn't swear, in court, Danes, that you started the blaze, but your coat and your hands have the odor of coal oil."

Dane's face turned pale, his legs shaking under him.

"So, you see," continued Tom savagely, "you'll do well to escape before anyone else notices the smell of coal oil on you."

"You've been mighty good to me—and I—" chattered Danes.

"Shut up, as I advised you before!" rasped Tom Reade. "I've been as good to you as I'd be to a rattlesnake. Get out of Arizona before the men of this town suspect—understand—you?"

"I will," Frank Danes agreed, his teeth chattering.

"Don't ever show your face again in this part of the world."

"I won't, Reade. Again, my thanks—"

"Shut up!" Tom insisted. "Thanks from you would make me feel like a traitor to the community. Skip! Carry word to the Colthwaite Company, however, that their latest scheme against us has failed like the others!"

At mention of the Colthwaits, Danes turned and fled in earnest.

"That was their second attempt," muttered Tom grimly, as he turned back to where the flames still held dominion. "I wonder if I shall be as lucky when the third attempt against me is made?"



CHAPTER XVII. TIM GRIGGS "GETS HIS"

In another hour the spot where the hotel had stood was marked only by a shapeless mass of smoking embers.

The citizens of the town went back to their beds. Mrs. Gerry and her children had recovered consciousness and had found a friendly lodging for the night.

The rescue performed by Tom and Harry had been a simple enough achievement.

Shut off from every other means of escape, they remembered the dumbwaiter that ran from the kitchen up to the floors above.

The two little children were sent down on the dumb-waiter, Harry riding on the top of the wooden frame. Mrs. Gerry's rescue was delayed until Harry could send the dumb-waiter up to the third floor, where she and Tom awaited its return. Aided by Tom, she descended to the kitchen without accident; then Tom followed, sliding down the rope. It was but the work of a moment to break through the basement window and pass the woman and her children out to safety.

Morning found Proprietor Carter somewhat resigned to his loss. True, the hotel had been destroyed and the embers must be removed, but both building and contents had been fairly well insured.

"I'm a few thousand out," said the hotel man philosophically, "but I have my ground yet, and, the insurance money will allow me to rebuild., and put up a more modern hotel. Of course I'll be a few thousand dollars in debt, to start with, but after a short while I'll have earned the money that I've lost."

"Why did you smile when poor Carter was talking about his loss?" demanded Harry, as the chums strolled away in search of breakfast.

"Did I?" asked Tom, looking suddenly very, sober.

"There was a broad grin on your face?"

"Carter didn't see it, did he?"

"I don't know; but why, the grin, Tom?"

"I'll tell you after I see what answer I receive to a telegram that I've sent."

"Tom Reade, you always were provoking!"

"Now I'm doubly so, eh?"

"Oh, well, I don't care," muttered Harry. "I can wait; I'm not very nosey."

By noon General Manager Ellsworth arrived on the scene of the labors of the young engineers, out at the site of the big quicksand.

"You can run the work here this afternoon, Harry," Tom declared. "I shall want to put in my time with Mr. Ellsworth."

"Was he the answer to your telegram?"

Tom offered no further information, but hurried away to meet the general manager, who had come out to camp in an automobile hired at Paloma. Manager and chief engineer now toured slowly toward town, Harry watching them as long as they were in sight.

"Tom has something big in the wind," muttered Hazelton. "It must be something about the hotel fire. What can it be? At any rate, I'll wager it's something that pleases my chum wonderfully."

Nor did Tom return until late in the afternoon. He came back alone.

"Well?" demanded Harry.

"Yes," nodded Tom. "It's well."

"What is?"

"The game."

"What is the game?"

"When you hear about it—" Reade began.

"Yes, yes—"

"Then you'll know."

"Tom Reade, do you know, I believe I'm quite ready and willing to thrash you?" cried Harry in exasperation.

"Please don't," Tom begged.

"Then tell me what you've been so mightily mysterious about."

"I will," returned Reade. "I'd have told you hours ago, Harry, only I'm afraid you would have been demoralized with disappointment if the thing had failed to go through. Harry, to-day I've been meddling in other people's business. Congratulate me! I put it through without getting myself thumped or even disliked, by anyone. Both sides to the deal are 'tickled to death,' as the saying runs."

"You said you were going to tell me," remarked Hazelton, trying hard to restrain his curiosity for a minute or two longer.

"Sit down and listen," Tom urged his chum, handing him a chair in their little shack of an office.

Then, indeed, Tom did pour forth the whole story. As Harry listened a broad grin of contentment appeared on his face, for one of Hazelton's lovable weaknesses was his desire to see other people get ahead.

Just as Tom finished, a figure darkened the doorway.

"I'm ready to go, sir," announced Tim Griggs.

"Go where?" inquired Harry.

"I've fired Griggs," observed Tom Reade.

"What! After all that he did for you the other night?" demanded Hazelton, aghast. "After the man saved your—"

"Oh, I'm quite satisfied to be fired, Mr. Hazelton," Tim Griggs broke in. "In fact, I'm very grateful to Mr. Reade. He has certainly given me a big boost forward in the world."

"What are you going to do now, Griggs?" Harry asked.

"You'd better address him as 'Mr. Griggs,' Harry," Tom hinted. "He is a foreman now, at six dollars a day, and entitled to his Mister."

"Foreman?" Harry repeated, while Gregg's grin broadened.

"Yes," Tom continued. "Mr. Griggs is to be foreman on the new job that I've just been telling you about in town. After this, if Mr. Griggs is careful to behave himself, he's likely always to be a foreman on some job or other for the A., G. & N. M."

Harry sprang forward, seizing the hand of Tim Griggs and shaking it with enthusiasm.

"Bully old Griggs! Lucky old Griggs!" Hazelton bubbled forth. "Mr. Griggs, you'll believe from now on what I've always believed—that it's a great piece of luck in itself to be one of Tom Reade's friends."

"It surely has been great luck for me, sir," Griggs answered. "The best part of all," he added, with a husky note in his voice, "is what it means to that little girl of mine. When I get into town to-night I in going to sit down and write that little daughter a long letter all about the grand news. She'll be proud of her dad's good luck! She's only eight years old, but she's a great little reader, and she writes me letters longer than my own."

"If you'll wait a minute, Mr. Griggs," proposed Tom, "we'll be able to give you a ride into town. The general manager gave me authority to rent and use an automobile after this. It's out there waiting now."

The new foreman gratefully accepted the invitation. Within five minutes the chauffeur had stopped the car in Paloma and Tim Griggs got out to go to his new boarding place in the town.

"God bless you, Mr. Reade!" he said huskily, holding out his band. "You've done a lot for me—and my little girl!"

"No more than you've done for me," smiled Tom. "Anyway, you haven't received more than you deserve, and you never will in this little old world of ours."

"I don't know about that," replied the new foreman, a sudden flush rising to his weather-beaten face. "It all seems too good to be true."

"You'll find it to be true enough when you draw your next pay, Griggs," laughed Tom. "Then you'll realize that you aren't dreaming. In the meantime your dinner is getting cold at your boarding place. Don't let your new job spoil your appetite."

When Tom and Harry rode into town at noon the following day they beheld a scene of great activity at the site of the destroyed Cactus House. All the blackened debris had been carted away during the morning by a large force of men. Now, derricks lay in place, to be erected in the afternoon. A steam shovel had been all but installed and a large stationary engine rested on nearly completed foundations.

George Ashby, proprietor of the Mansion House, who had dared, during the last two days, to show himself a little more openly on the streets of Paloma, halted just as Tom and Harry stepped out of the automobile to look over the scene of Foreman Griggs's morning labors.

"Looks as if the Cactus House might be rebuilt," remarked Ashby, burning with curiosity.

"No," said Tom briefly.

"Carter is going to change the name?" inquired Ashby.

"No. Carter doesn't own this land any more."

"He doesn't own the land?" Ashby asked. "What's going to be put up here, then? A business block?"

For a moment Ashby thrilled with joy. Of late the Cactus House had seriously cut in on the profits of the Mansion House. Ashby had, in fact, been running behind. Now, if the Mansion House were to be henceforth the only hotel in town, Ashby saw a chance to prosper on a more than comfortable scale.

"Ashby," Tom went on, rather frigidly, "I won't waste many words, for I'm afraid I don't like you well enough to talk very much to you. The A., G. & N. M. has bought this land from Mr. Carter. The railroad is going to erect here one of the finest hotels in this part of Arizona. It will have every modern convenience, and will make your hotel look like a mill boarding house by contrast. When the new hotel is completed it will be leased to Mr. Carter. With his insurance money, and the price of the land in bank, Carter will have capital for embarking in the hotel business on a scale that will make this end of Arizona sit up and do some hard looking."