Ralph, the Train Dispatcher: or, The Mystery of the Pay Car

CHAPTER XXII – HOLDING THE FORT

Ralph was a good deal startled at the statement of the man whom he had helped to some advantage, it seemed. He did not, however, show it. The man was grateful to him, and Ralph counted on his relating something further.

“I would be glad to have you tell me a little more about this business,” he said. “As I told you, I am a good deal interested in the welfare of Mr. Glidden.”

“Are, eh?” grinned the man. “So was I-in the wrong way. Just now it doesn’t matter one way or the other. The crowd Dorsett was working with has set me adrift, and I’ve got nothing to expect from them. What is it you want to know, guv’nor?”

“Just this,” answered Ralph-“any tricks they are up to that aren’t square.”

“Lots of those, guv’nor. Dorsett is bound to break up Glidden, if he can.”

“I know that; I understand he has bought up a big claim against Mr. Glidden and will put it into execution tomorrow if it isn’t paid.”

“That’s right.”

“And it will put Mr. Glidden to a lot of costs to redeem his plant.”

“Say, guv’nor,” here interrupted the man-“there’ll be no redeeming in the case.”

“Why not?”

“Because the money isn’t what Dorsett is after. He’s got lots of that. He simply wants to squeeze Glidden so close that he’ll holler and quit. He’s bent on rooting out the plant entire. Then when he’s got Glidden down in the mud, he expects he’ll sell him his secret chemical process for a mere song.”

“The scoundrel!” exclaimed Ralph hotly.

“I knew that long ago,” coolly chuckled the fellow. “If you’re interested, let me give you a tip.”

“I shall be thankful.”

“Get the lawyer to have some one stay all night at the plant.”

“There’s the foreman, Bartlett, I understand.”

“Yes, day times. You do as I say.”

“I’ll stay myself.”

“That might do. You are interested, aren’t you, mightily? Then so am I. Say, inasmuch as I’ve blabbed a part of it, out with the whole, say I. There’s going to be a raid on the factory, as I hinted to you, just after midnight.”

“A raid?”

“Exactly. To-morrow the time for Glidden to put up a bond or pay the four thousand dollars expires.”

“Yes,” replied Ralph, “and by ten o’clock, court time, it will be paid.”

“Too late.”

“Eh?”

“Hours too late-nigh on to half a day too late.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because it’s a fact.”

“In what way?”

The man screwed his eyes up shrewdly as if he enjoyed making a clever disclosure. Then he said:

“Dorsett has made an arrangement with a drunken justice of the peace in the next township to open office at one minute after twelve, midnight. The justice will issue an execution. Inside of an hour Dorsett and his men will be at the factory. They don’t have to wait for court time. They intend to levy on the machinery only. They won’t put a custodian in charge nor wait for redemption nor anything else. They’ll simply rip out all those valuable tank machines and piping that cost a fortune, bid the plunder in at old junk prices and gobble up everything else before Glidden or his lawyer are awake and out of bed.”

“My man,” spoke Ralph rapidly, and moved to indignation and excitement almost beyond control, “are you sure of what you say?”

“As I was, up to this morning, one of the men who was to help in wrecking the plant, I reckon I know what I’m talking about,” answered the man.

“I will pay you to take me up to the plant,” said Ralph, “as quickly as you can.”

“You’ll pay me nothing,” replied the other. “You needn’t be afraid of any trouble until midnight. Dorsett is too keen to overslip the law in any way. His men may hang around and dog your footsteps and spy about and all that, but they’ll do no harm until Dorsett has the power right in his hands. Then-look out.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Ralph reflectively.

His guide went with him until they came to the factory. Here he left Ralph, saying he was almost starved and must get a good meal.

The factory was a grim-looking, isolated, one-story stone building. One end was rounded with brick and had heavy iron shutters. The front was a kind of office. Behind it was an iron partition and a windowless stretch of factory room fully fifty feet in length.

Ralph tried the front door and found it locked. In a minute or two, however, a big, stalwart man with a face of considerable character came from the inner room. He did not open the door, but stood at a window and called out:

“What do you want?”

“Are you Mr. Bartlett?” inquired Ralph.

“That’s me.”

“I am a friend to Mr. Glidden, and I come here from his lawyer.”

“Where’s the proof of it? I don’t know you,” said Bartlett guardedly.

“That’s so,” said Ralph, “and I am glad to find you so particular. My name is Fairbanks, and I come from the brother of Mr. Glidden, at Stanley Junction. I have a good deal to tell you, and wish you would come out and talk with me or let me in to talk to you.”

“You say the lawyer knows you?” inquired Bartlett warily.

“No, he doesn’t, but his wife does.”

“We’ll see about that-wait a minute.”

Ralph was made aware of the fact that the factory connected with the town by telephone, as the foreman of the plant proceeded to an instrument and took down the receiver. He could not hear the conversation that ensued, but very shortly Bartlett came to the door and invited him in.

“You’re all right, and you’re bringing some mighty good news, I hear,” he said heartily. “Sit down. I fancy that blatherskite, Dorsett, won’t sail so high tomorrow.”

“I fancy not, if things are done straight,” said Ralph, “but I just learned something that worries me a good deal.”

“What is that?”

Ralph told his story in detail. He recited what his tramp acquaintance had imparted to him. The sturdy foreman knit his brows, but he did not scare a bit. He walked slowly over to a closet, took out a new Winchester rifle, laid it across the top of the desk, and said quietly:

“I’ve got orders to admit no one here without an order from the lawyer up to ten o’clock tomorrow morning. The man who gets in before that time on any other conditions will be a dandy, I can tell you that.”

Ralph requested permission to use the telephone. He got in communication with the lawyer’s wife and told her of his new discoveries. Her husband had not yet returned, but as soon as he appeared she told Ralph she would send him up to the plant. Ralph informed her that he would not leave the factory until he heard from the lawyer.

It was getting dusk when a small boy came to the office door. He carried a basket and a note, which, after due challenge, Bartlett took into his possession. The lawyer’s wife had sent them a steaming hot supper, and told Ralph in the note to hold the fort, as she felt certain that her husband would arrive at Derby on either the eight or ten o’clock train.

Half an hour later, after they had lighted up, the foreman approached the door cautiously as some one else knocked at it.

“Who’s there?” he demanded.

“No one you know. The young fellow in there knows me, though. Tell him to look out of the window.”

Ralph pulled aside the shade and peered out, recognizing his tramp acquaintance of the afternoon.

“It’s the man who told me about this plot of Dorsett’s,” he said.

“One of the same gang, eh? I dunno,” remarked Bartlett dubiously. “Ain’t he a dangerous customer to let inside here?”

“He seems friendly, and he may have something more to tell us,” responded Ralph. “I hardly think we’ll take much risk admitting him.”

“Well, it’s just as you say, then.”

“Yes, let him in,” directed Ralph.

He regarded his tramp friend with some surprise and curiosity as the foreman admitted him. The man had got a clean shave and his face patched up, and apparently had a very satisfactory meal inside of him, for he was blandly cheerful and complacent.

“Saw three of our friends on my way here,” he said to Ralph.

“You mean Dorsett’s friends?”

“Yes. Two of them were down by the turnpike, probably watching to see if the lawyer or others might come here. The other fellow I spied hanging around the furnace room. He was on the roof once, but he just sneaked away.”

“What did you come here for?” inquired Bartlett bluntly.

“Oh, I took a kind of fancy to this young fellow. He did me a kind turn, and I’d like to return the compliment. Thought maybe there might be a ruction later, and if there is, I’m on your side. So count on me.”

With a grin and chuckle the speaker bunched up a fist that resembled a huge knot of mahogany.

“I think I had better ’phone the lawyer’s wife again,” suggested Ralph after a moment of thought. “Those fellows lurking around here might do the lawyer some harm.”

Ralph went to the telephone. As he took down the receiver and applied it to his ear his expert knowledge of telegraphy gave him a quick intuition.

“Hello,” he said, “we’re off the circuit. Worse than that-the instrument is dead.”

“Is that so?” said the tramp. “Then it explains what that sneaking fellow was doing on the roof. They’ve cut the telephone wires.”

CHAPTER XXIII – ONE MINUTE AFTER TWELVE

The young railroader of Stanley Junction realized that he had assumed no ordinary risk or responsibility in acting the role of a trusted messenger in behalf of the old telegrapher in the train dispatcher’s office at headquarters.

The situation at Derby had become an exciting and a critical one. Here was Ralph, the factory foreman and this tramp acquaintance cut off from the town, isolated in a lonely spot and surrounded by desperate and dangerous men who were bent on a mission of wreck and ruin.

Bartlett looked a little blank. The tramp grinned as was his wont. He looked as if he would not be sorry to engage in the “ruction” he had talked about, to get even with his treacherous enemies.

Ralph had grown a trifle uneasy. If the lawyer did not put in an appearance, it was difficult to foresee how affairs would turn out. He did not rely much on Bartlett’s Winchester or the brawny fists of the tramp. The young train dispatcher had seen some pretty sharp and definite work done in the name of the law during a railroad strike, and from what he had heard of Dorsett he did not believe he would make a raid on the plant until he was very certain of successfully carrying out his wicked plans.

Ralph paced the floor of the little office lost in deep thought. The foreman watched him grimly from the corner of one eye. The tramp, lounging amid the unusual luxury of a big swivel chair, seemed enjoying hugely the comfort of the well-heated room and ready for anything that came along, now that he was no longer cold or hungry. He, too, watched Ralph, and as the latter with a kind of start: stopped in his walk and his face lightened up, the tramp drawled out:

“Something struck you, guv’nor-give it a voice.”

“You’re pretty sharp,” said Ralph, with a smile at the speaker. Then he walked over to the foreman. “Mr. Bartlett,” he continued, “I’d like to take a look through your plant here, if you’ve no objection.”

“None at all, only I wonder why?” submitted Bartlett, with a searching glance at Ralph.

“I was thinking of something,” explained Ralph-“how to beat those fellows who are coming here at midnight.”

“I hope you’ve hit it!” exclaimed the foreman eagerly.

“We shall see.”

Bartlett took a lantern, and leaving the tramp in the office he led Ralph into the large room adjoining. It was filled with long flat vats filled with some dark liquid. There was a sulphurous smell to the place. The foreman made no explanations until he reached the furnace room.

“You see those big tanks?” he spoke now. “Those are the melters. Mr. Glidden spent a great deal of money to get them right. Run up that ladder at the side and look over the rim.”

Ralph did so. The tank he looked into was filled with bars that looked like lead, with smaller fragments of a darker metal and great chunks that resembled resin. When he came down to the floor he opened the door of the furnace underneath and peered in. His face took on a satisfied look.

“See here,” said Bartlett, as they reëntered the big room on their way back to the office. “Those pipes running from each furnace convey the molten metal into those vats. There is a great hissing and bubbling, I can tell you. It’s a sort of red-hot cyaniding process. The fumes, though! No man could walk through this room when the pour is on and come out alive.”

“You don’t say so?” murmured Ralph. Then he went up close to the foreman and took him by lapel of his coat.

“Mr. Bartlett,” he said, “I see you are all ready to fire up.”

“At a minute’s notice,” replied the foreman, with a gleam of pride in his eye.

“I suppose within an hour, two hours, you could get those melters so hot they are red all through?”

“Pretty nigh, I tell you.”

“And you could fill this room here with fumes that would make a man hesitate about crossing the dead line, until you got ready to shut off the feeders?”

“You couldn’t hit it closer if you’d been brought up to the business,” declared the foreman with unction.

“Good. Now then-whisper.”

They were near the office door. Ralph talked rapidly in a low tone into the ear of his companion. The latter gave a great start. Then he grinned. Then, alive with animation, he clapped Ralph mightily on the back.

“Lad,” he cried with enthusiasm, “you’re better than the lawyer and the whole constable force of Derby put together.”

“What do you say about my plan?” inquired Ralph.

“Say-bully for you, that’s what I say!” almost shouted the factory foreman.

“If you start at eleven o’clock you’ll be ready when that gang arrives?”

“Ready, and time to spare. Say, but you’ve been thinking to some purpose.”

The foreman burst into a gay whistle as he reëntered the office. The tramp regarded him searchingly, and then looked at Ralph as if he half guessed that they were up to something. He was too indolent, however, to delve for the facts.

The lawyer did not put in an appearance, Ralph knew by the whistles just what trains were arriving at Derby. The 8 p. m. came and passed on its way. Then the 10:30. By five minutes of eleven Ralph decided that the lawyer must have missed connection in some way, for he did not arrive at the plant.

Just as the office clock struck eleven, Ralph arose from his chair and walked up in front of the tramp.

“Do you want to earn a few dollars?” he inquired.

“Sure, that’s me,” answered the man-“what doing?”

“Helping Mr. Bartlett here. It will be hot work, but he’ll do most of it, he tells me.”

“Oh, in the factory here.”

“Yes.”

“I’d rather stay here in the office and handle that Winchester when the mob comes,” observed the tramp.

“You can do ten times as much good doing what I want you to do.”

“Will it have anything to do with knocking out Dorsett’s plans?”

“Everything.”

The tramp arose to his feet like a jumping jack, his face wearing an eager grin.

“Guv’nor,” he said, “I’d trust you in most anything. I’d like to have a front seat out here to see the fun when the show begins, but if my being behind the scenes helps, depend on me.”

“I do,” said Ralph. “You go with Mr. Bartlett.”

Ralph sat down as the two men disappeared. He listened attentively to the sounds from the melting room. Soon the big blast chimney began to roar, and glancing out of the window Ralph could see fitful red gleams shoot out upon the snow.

There was a speaking tube running from the office to Bartlett’s post of duty. Soon it whistled, and the foreman announced:

“All ready.”

“So am I,” mused Ralph, as he counted the minutes roll away. He tried to imagine just what was going to happen and how he would meet the crisis when it arrived.

Midnight came, and one minute after twelve. Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed away. Then Ralph bent his ear. Some kind of a conveyance was coming down the turnpike. He could hear the ring of a horse’s hoofs and the hard wheels crunching the frozen snow.

Ralph picked up a newspaper and pretended to read it, looking as comfortable and unconcerned as possible.

“Whoa!” sounded a loud voice outside.

Then other voices mingled in confusion. Some one came to the window and peered in. There was a muffled consultation outside. Finally a thunderous knock sounded at the door, and a stentorian voice shouted out:

“Open-in the name of the law!”

CHAPTER XXIV – THE BATTLE OF WITS

Ralph instantly arose to his feet and unlocked the office door. He was about to open it when it was forcibly burst inwards in his grasp.

“We want to get in here,” vociferated a strident voice, and a consequential-looking little fellow, wearing his coat open so that a constable’s badge showed on his vest, swept over the threshold as if he was leading an army to an attack.

“Certainly,” said Ralph, with great politeness. “Come in, gentlemen-there’s a good fire and enough chairs, I guess.”

He was interested in quickly casting his eye over the marauding group. Six men had followed the constable in hot haste. One of them, who kept close to the officer, seemed to be his assistant. Four men, rough looking and with fiery breaths and faces, Ralph recognized as the group he had seen in the town that afternoon, two of whom had followed him to the lawyer’s house.

The real leader of the party, however, was a man whom Ralph had never seen before. He at once surmised that this was Dorsett. The latter pushed the others aside and stepped up to Ralph insolently.

“Who are you?” he demanded, with a scowl of suspicion and dislike.

“I represent the brother of Mr. Glidden.”

“Oh, you do?” sneered Dorsett. “I thought you was the office boy.”

“Representative, hey?” snapped out the constable quickly. “Stand aside, Mr. Dorsett. This is the very person I wish to see.”

The official made a great ado getting a bundle of papers out of his pocket. He selected one, flopped it open and fixed an imperious eye on Ralph.

“As agent de facto, ex officio, essettery, I present a demand against Henry William Glidden in the penal sum of four thousand one hundred and twenty-seven dollars and ninety-eight cents. Are you authorized to pay the same, deprosedendum, or forever hold your peace.”

“I have one thousand dollars at the home of the lawyer,” explained Ralph.

“Cash?” demanded the constable, licking his chops and blinking his eyes like a ravenous wolf at the mention of money.

“Yes, sir, and the balance will be here in Derby before court sits in the morning.”

“Court don’t sit any more in this case,” growled out Dorsett, who all along had regarded Ralph with a leery eye. “Here’s the court.”

“I say, Dorsett, the lad talks business. One thousand dollars ain’t to be sneezed at. So much on account, see? Just an appetizer. We’ll gobble the whole outfit finally. Um-m-m-” and his voice died away into a drone into the ear of Dorsett only, who shook his head with the forcible words:

“No. I won’t lose a minute. Get at your job instantly.”

“Ha-hum,” observed the constable, flapping the document in his hand importantly and again approaching Ralph. “Ipse dixit de profundis-you refuse to pay this just claim?”

“It will be paid within the legal limit of time,” answered Ralph.

“The legal limit of time has elapsed,” declared the constable, “as witness this document.”

“Then I suppose you take possession?” said Ralph. “That is all right. As soon as Mr. Glidden’s brother arrives he will put up the cash or a bond and redeem the plant.”

“That can’t be done,” observed the constable. “Practically we are already in possession. The plaintiff, however, has sued out a writ extraordinary. As assignee of the original seller of the melting tanks, which were purchased, not on open account but on contract, and the same held delinquent, he has here in this document a writ of replevin. We want those tanks. The balance will come later.”

“Very well, gentlemen,” said Ralph coolly, “if you are sure you are within your legal rights, go ahead.”

The constable’s assistant made a rush for the iron door.

“Only,” continued Ralph impressively, “don’t try it through that room.”

“Hey-why not?” demanded the constable, pricking up his ears.

“Because the corroding vats are in action, and one minute in that poisonous air would smother the last one of you.”

“Hah!” ejaculated the constable, “we shall see.”

He advanced to the iron door and lifted its hasped bar.

“Whew!” he gurgled, slamming it shut again, one whiff sending him reeling back as though he had been hit with a club.

“Tricked us, have you,” gritted Dorsett, darting a malevolent look at Ralph. “Get around to the rear, you four. Smash out those barred windows.”

“I submit,” interposed Ralph calmly, “that won’t do any good. The tanks are red hot and will remain so for many hours.”

“Baffled!” hissed the constable dramatically. “Dorsett, they’ve got the drop on you. No, no,” continued the official, lifting his hand as the infuriated Dorsett seemed about to dash out of the office bent on any destruction, so long as he carried out his evil designs, “law is law.”

“And you’ve got a writ to execute it, haven’t you?” yelled Dorsett.

“Not with violence, my dear sir-not with violence,” mildly intimated the constable. “I fear we have proceeded with undue haste. I assumed that the plant would be inactive.”

“It was, up to last evening.”

“On that hypothesis we took out a writ for immediate seizure of certain specified chattels. You may enter, seize, and distrain. You may stretch a point and force a door or smash a window, but you have no warrant to batter down a wall. If you did-red hot, see?” and with a rather sickly smile the speaker went through a pantomime of seizing and briskly dropping an overheated object.

“Then take possession,” commanded Dorsett stormily. “Get this young marplot out of here and let no more of his ilk in again.”

“Sorry,” retorted the constable, “but there again we have checkmated ourselves. Relying to your statements we took extreme measures to tear out the tanks and later put a custodian in charge. We cannot now legally enter here or remain here except on a new writ of possession.”

Now was Ralph’s hour of triumph and he could not refrain from smiling to himself. Dorsett noticed it and thrashed about like a madman. He did not assault the quiet unpretentious lad who held him and his scowling myrmidons at bay, but he looked as if he would like to have done so.

Finally Dorsett quieted down. He drew the constable to one side of the room and they held a rapid consultation. Then the constable’s assistant was beckoned to join them, and later two of Dorsett’s allies.

This trio left the office instructed by the constable to hasten to the magistrate in the next township who had issued the replevin writ, and secure a broader document for possession of the premises.

Calm fell over the place at their departure. Meantime the furnaces at the rear of the plant roared on merrily, and Ralph mentally calculated how long it would be before they cooled down and Dorsett got his itching fingers in play to cripple and destroy.

Perhaps an hour went by. The marauding party was lounging and dozing. Ralph bent his ear to listen as a locomotive whistle in the distance told of the passage of a train from the north.

The young dispatcher knew the schedule like a book. No train was due till daybreak. A second outburst of tooting signals informed and electrified him.

“A special!” he murmured, fired up magically. “Can it be possible-”

Ralph paused there, checking the wild thoughts, or rather hopes, that thronged his mind. He was thinking of the belated lawyer as well as of the old telegraph operator.

The office clock gave out three sharp strokes as there was a commotion. Some one tried the door. It was not locked and opened at the touch. Ralph jumped to his feet with an irrepressible cry of gladness.

Two men entered. One was the old headquarters dispatcher, Glidden. His companion, a peaked faced, shrewd eyed man, Ralph intuitively accepted as the Derby lawyer.

“Hello!” shot out the latter spicily-“visitors, friends. How’s this, Dorsett?”

“We’ve come to stay, that’s how it is,” growled out the man addressed.

“I think not,” spoke up Ralph quickly. “They have stolen a march on you, Mr. Glidden. They came with a replevin writ, found it of no effect, and have now sent to some renegade justice outside of the township for a writ of possession.”

“Have, eh?” said the lawyer. “Well, I fancy they won’t use it. Here, you, constable-what’s your authority?”

“Demand-four thousand one seventy-seven ninety-eight,” pronounced the official, waving a document.

“How is it, Mr. Glidden?” inquired the lawyer.

The old dispatcher rammed his hand in his shirt and drew out a formidable roll of bank notes.

“I’ve got thirty five hundred here,” he said. “Fairbanks has a thousand.”

“I left it in the safe up at your house,” explained Ralph to the lawyer.

“All right, I guess my check is good for that balance, eh, constable?”

“Yes, surely,” answered the officer obsequiously, thinking of further legal business.

“Cancel the judgment,” ordered the lawyer. “Now, then, Dorsett, I reckon we can dispense with your company.”

The baffled conspirators sneaked away with dark mutterings. The lawyer hailed through the speaking tube.

“I got so anxious I arranged for a special at Hillsdale,” explained Glidden to Ralph. “Just by luck I ran across the lawyer, waiting for a train.”

It was after Bartlett and the tramp had shut down the furnaces and appeared in the office room and the foreman explained Ralph’s clever plans of the night, that the lawyer approached the young train dispatcher and placed a friendly hand on his shoulder.

“Young man,” he said, “did you ever study law?”

“No, sir. Somewhere along the line I would like to, but just now railroading takes up my time.”

“H’m. Very good. Well, if you ever want to, I’ll give you a job.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Yes,” added the lawyer, with a bright admiring glance at Ralph’s face, “in fact, after your clever work to-night, I think I would be willing to take you into partnership.”