“Where have you been to-day, Rock?” asked the engineer, as they were once more spinning along at a flying rate.

“Down to Fairfax to see if I could get a job.  You know I got turned off the section.”

“No—­you don’t mean it!  I’ll bet Gammon was at the bottom of it.”

“I am sure of it.  He has boasted I shouldn’t stay there long.”

“Zounds!  I’d like to shake the rascal out of his jacket.  He’s been wanting Gilly’s place; but he can’t get it.  What do you want?”

“To brake.”

“Get it?”

“Nothing certain.  I have little hope, for Donald Minturn will never let me get there if be can help it.”

“The old snake!  I never did like him.  So he isn’t over fond of you?”

“No; he is opposed to me on account of an old enmity he bears Mrs. Ingleside.”

“Rock, you deserve a place on this road.  Why, bless you, you are fit to take my place.  Not many trips did old Jack make without taking you with him.  I used to fire for him, you know.  He had a mat for you at his feet, and when too tired to keep awake longer you slept curled up on the footboard.  Ah, it was something such a night as this when poor Jack made his last trip!  It wasn’t quite so dark it may be, but he was behind time, as we are, and he was trying to make up.

“He was swinging down the long grade beyond Woodsville at a humming rate.  There was no station at the Hollow then, and he was counting on a clean sweep to Owls’ Nest.  Leaving the air-line grade he swooped around the curve, when right in his face and eyes he saw a string of loose cars, which had broken from the special on the highlands.

“He must have been going at the rate of fifty miles an hour, and the runaways were coming toward him at scarcely less speed.  I caught a gleam of his white face as he reversed, and then he was beside me at the brake.

“‘Stand by!’ he cried.  ‘We’ll die at our post.’

“The shock came the next moment.  I felt myself lifted into the air, and the next I knew I was lying at the foot of the embankment, a dozen yards from the place where we had met.

“Jack died at his post, and his sufferings could not have lasted long, for he was crushed beyond recognition.  Fortunately no other lives were lost, though the passengers were terribly shaken up, and two of the freight cars were piled up on the engine.

“Jack’s fidelity, I am sure, averted a worse catastrophe.  He met the fate of a hero, and it was always a mystery to me the company never did more for his family.

“Hey!  As I live, the Swan is falling into another ugly mood!”

They were rushing along at a tremendous rate, and an inexperienced eye would have seen nothing amiss.

In fact, the engineer himself could not.  The driving-rods were shooting back and forth in perfect play, while the large drivers were revolving with clock-like regularity.  Every now and then Jockey would give the lever a slight pressure, which would be instantly felt by the iron steed.