To make
matters worse the roundhouse men and the hostlers caught the fever, and
out they went. Mr. Hebron was in a great pickle, but he didn't want to
acknowledge that he was beaten so he stood around hanging on in hopes
something would turn up to relieve the strain.
Now, it had occurred to me that I could run that engine. When I was
young and fresh in the railroad business, I had spent much of my spare
time riding around on switch engines, and once in a while I had taken a
run out over the road with an engineer who had a friendly interest in
me. One man, old Tom Robinson, who pulled a fast freight, had been
particularly kind to me, and on one occasion I had taken a few days' lay
off, and gone out and back one whole trip with him. Being of an
inquisitive turn of mind, I asked him a great many questions about
gauges, valves, oil cups, eccentrics, injectors, etc., and whenever he
would go down under his engine, I always paid the closest attention to
what he did. I used to ride on the right hand side of the cab with him,
and occasionally he would allow me to feel the throttle for a few
minutes.
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