Page:Cy Warman--The express messenger and other tales of the rail.djvu/26

14 cañon they came to the torn end of the track, and knew for a surety that no train would come up the gulch that day.

The silent leader made no show of disappointment, but quietly dismissed his men and watched them ride away toward the sunset, with their broad hats tipped sidewise, and their ever ready rifles resting across their saddles. For himself he would have no rifle. "Only a coward or bungler," he used to say, "will carry a cannon to do the work of a forty-five."

When the others had passed out of sight, the dark man reined his own horse down the canon, intending, since he was so near, to visit his wife at the junction. The recent washout had left the bed of the gulch almost impassable, and it was not until after midnight that the lone traveller came to the abandoned train, lying like a living thing that had fallen asleep on its own trail. Finding the express car locked, he opened one of the doors with a coal pick which he found on the engine. The little iron safe was securely locked. Having removed all the explosives from the car, this experienced mountaineer quietly blew up the safe with a few