The U. P. Trail Part 23

The President of the United States and Congress had their own troubles at the close of the war, and the Government could do but little money-raising with land-grants and loans. But they offered a great bonus to the men who would build the railroad.

The first construction company subscribed over a million and a half dollars, and paid in one-quarter of that. The money went so swiftly that it opened the company's eyes to the insatiable gulf beneath that enterprise, and they quit.

Thereupon what was called the Credit Mobilier was inaugurated, and it became both famous and infamous.

It was a type of the construction company by which it was the custom to build railroads at that time. The directors, believing that whatever money was to be made out of the Union Pacific must be collected during the construction period, organized a clever system for just this purpose.

An extravagant sum was to be paid to the Credit Mobilier for the construction work, thus securing for stockholders of the Union Pacific, who now controlled the Credit Mobilier, the bonds loaned by the United States Government.

The operations of the Credit Mobilier finally gave rise to one of the most serious political scandals in the history of the United States Congress.

The cost of all material was high, and it rose with leaps and bounds until it was prodigious. Omaha had no railroad entering it from the east, and so all the supplies, materials, engines, cars, machinery, and laborers had to be transported from St. Louis up the swift Missouri on boats. This in itself was a work calling for the limit of practical management and energy. Out on the prairie-land, for hundreds of miles, were to be found no trees, no wood, scarcely any brush. The prairie-land was beautiful ground for buffalo, but it was a most barren desert for the exigencies of railroad men. Moreover, not only did wood and fuel and railroad-ties have to be brought from afar, but also stone for bridges and abutments. Then thousands of men had to be employed, and those who hired out for reasonable money soon learned that others were getting more; having the company at their mercy, they demanded exorbitant wages in their turn.

One of the peculiar features of the construction, a feature over which Neale grew impotently furious, was the law that when a certain section of so many miles had been laid and equipped the Government of the United States would send out expert commissioners, who would go over the line and pa.s.s judgment upon the finished work. No two groups of commissioners seemed to agree. These experts, who had their part to play in the bewildering and labyrinthine maze of men's contrary plans and plots, reported that certain sections would have to be done over again.

The particular fault found with one of these sections was the alleged steepness of the grade, and as Neale had been the surveyor in charge, he soon heard of his poor work. He went over his figures and notes with the result that he called on Henney and absolutely swore that the grade was right. Henney swore too, in a different and more forcible way, but he agreed with Neale and advised him to call upon the expert commissioners.

Neale did so, and found them, with one exception, open to conviction.

The exception was a man named Allison Lee. The name Lee gave Neale a little shock. He was a gray-looking man, with lined face, and that concentrated air which Neale had learned to a.s.sociate with those who were high in the affairs of the U. P.

Neale stated that his business was to show that his work had been done right, and he had the figures to prove it. Mr. Lee replied that the survey was poor and would have to be done over.

"Are you a surveyor?" queried Neale, sharply, with the blood beating in his temples.

"I have some knowledge of civil engineering," replied the commissioner.

"Well, it can't be very much," declared Neale, whose temper was up.

"Young man, be careful what you say," replied the other.

"But Mr.--Mr. Lee--listen to me, will you?" burst out Neale. "It's all here in my notes. You've hurried over the line and you just slipped up a foot or so in your observations of that section."

Mr. Lee refused to look at the notes and waved Neale aside.

"It'll hurt my chances for a big job," Neale said, stubbornly.

"You probably will lose your job, judging from the way you address your superiors."

That finished Neale. He grew perfectly white.

"All this expert-commissioner business is rot," he flung at Lee. "Rot!

Lodge knows it. Henney knows it. We all do. And so do you. It's a lot of d.a.m.n red tape! Every last man who can pull a stroke with the Government runs in here to annoy good efficient engineers who are building the road. It's an outrage. It's more. It's not honest... That section has forty miles in it. Five miles you claim must be resurveyed--regraded--relaid. Forty-six thousand dollars a mile!...

That's the secret--two hundred and thirty thousand dollars more for a construction company!"

Neale left the office and, returning to Henney, repeated the interview to him word for word. Henney complimented Neale's spirit, but deplored the incident. It could do no good and might do harm. Many of these commissioners were politicians, working in close touch with the directors, and not averse to bleeding the Credit Mobilier.

All the engineers, including the chief, though he was noncommittal, were bitter about this expert-commissioner law. If a good road-bed had been surveyed, the engineers knew more about it than any one else. They were the pioneers of the work. It was exceedingly annoying and exasperating to have a number of men travel leisurely in trains over the line and criticize the labors of engineers who had toiled in heat and cold and wet, with brain and heart in the task. But it was so.

In May, 1866, a wagon-train escorted by troops rolled into the growing camp of North Platte, and the first man to alight was Warren Neale, strong, active, eager-eyed as ever, but older and with face pale from his indoor work and hope long deferred.

The first man to greet him was Larry King, in whom time did not make changes.

They met as long-separated brothers.

"Red how're your horses?" was Neale's query, following the greeting.

"Wintered well, but cost me all I had. I'm sh.o.r.e busted," replied Larry.

"I've plenty of money," said Neale, "and what's mine is yours. Come on, Red. We'll get light packs and hit the trail for the Wyoming hills."

"Wal, I reckoned so... Neale, it's sh.o.r.e goin' to be risky. The Injuns are on the rampage already. You see how this heah camp has growed. Men ridin' in all since winter broke. An' them from west tell some hard stories."

"I've got to go," replied Neale, with emotion. "It's nearly a year since I saw Allie. Not a word between us in all that time!... Red, I can't stand it longer."

"Sh.o.r.e, I know," replied King, hastily. "You ain't reckonin' I wanted to crawfish? I'll go. We'll pack light, hit the trail at night, an' hide up in the daytime."

Neale had arrived in North Platte before noon, and before sunset he and King were far out on the swelling slopes of plainland, riding toward the west.

Traveling by night, camping by day, they soon left behind them the monotonous plains of Nebraska. The Sioux had been active for two summers along the southern trails of Wyoming. The Texan's long training on the ranges stood them in good stead here. His keen eye for tracks and smoke and distant objects, his care in hiding trails and selecting camps, and his skill and judgment in all pertaining to the horses--these things made the journey possible. For they saw Indian signs more than once before the Wyoming hills loomed up in the distance. More than one flickering camp-fire they avoided by a wide detour.

Slingerland's valley showed all the signs of early summer. The familiar trail, however, bore no tracks of horses or man or beast. A heavy rain had fallen recently and it would have obliterated tracks.

Neale's suspense sustained the added burden of dread. In the oppressive silence of the valley he read some nameless reason for fear. The trail seemed the same, the brook flowed and murmured as of old, the trees shone soft and green, but Neale sensed a difference. He dared not look at Larry for confirmation of his fears. The valley had not of late been lived in!

Neale rode hard up the trail under the pines. A blackened heap lay where once the cabin had stood. Neale's heart gave a terrible leap and then seemed to cease beating. He could not breathe nor speak nor move. His eyes were fixed on the black remains of Slingerland's cabin.

"Gawd Almighty!" gasped Larry, and he put out a shaking hand to clutch Neale. "The Injuns! I always feared this--spite of Slingerland's talk."

The feel of Larry's fierce fingers, like hot, stinging arrows in his flesh, pierced Neale's mind and made him realize what his stunned faculties had failed to grasp. It seemed to loosen the vise-like hold upon his muscles, to liberate his tongue.

He fell off his horse.

"Red! Look--look around!"

Allie was gone! The disappointment at not seeing her was crus.h.i.+ng, and the fear of utter loss was terrible. Neale lay on the ground, blind, sick, full of agony, with his fingers tearing at the gra.s.s. The evil presentiments that had haunted him for months had not been groundless fancies. Perhaps Allie had called to him again, in another hour of calamity, and this time he had not responded. She was gone! That idea struck him cold. It meant the most dreadful of all happenings. For a while he lay there, prostrate under the shock. He was dimly aware of Larry's coming and sitting down beside him.

"No sign of any one," he said, huskily. "Not even a track!... Thet fire must hev been about two weeks ago. Mebbe more, but not much. There's been a big rain an' the ground's all washed clean an' smooth ... Not a track!"

It was the cowboy's habit to calculate the past movements of people and horses by the nature of the tracks they left.

Then Neale awoke to violence. He sprang up and rushed to the ruins of the cabin, frantically tore and dug around the burnt embers, and did not leave off until he had overhauled the whole pile. There was nothing but ashes and embers. Whereupon he ran to the empty corrals, to the sheds, to the wood-pile, to the spring, and all around the s.p.a.ce once so habitable. There was nothing to reward his fierce energy--nothing to scrutinize. Already gra.s.s was springing in the trails and upon spots that had once been bare.

Neale halted, sweating, hot, wild, before his friend. Larry avoided his gaze.

"She's gone!... She's gone!" Neale panted.

"Wal, mebbe Slingerland moved camp an' burned this place," suggested Larry. "He was sore after them four road-agents rustled in heah."

"No--no. He'd have left the cabin. In case he moved--Allie was to write me a note--telling me how to find them. I remember--we picked out the place to hide the note... Oh! she's gone! She's gone!"