THE SHORT LINE TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

Western Star, 22 December 1911, Page 3

THE SHORT LINE TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

go?.ii-’Liori: . i

BY MORRIS WADE

The hoy 1 am going to call Rob in dus story is now a man nearly forty years of age, and one of the most expert electricians in the country. He knows almost as much as Edison about electricity, for he has concentrated all his thought and energy on that subject ever since he was a boy. We were boys together in a small town in the West, and I remember that, more than twenty years ago Rob predicted that electricity would soon lie used ts a motive power, and that cars would be run by it and it would be used iu ways in which it was not used at that time. Rob gained for himself the reputation of being “ kind of queer,” because of his constant talk about electricity, and because of some *)f the experiments he had made with it.

The little railway station in the town in which we lived had a great fascination for Rob, because the telegraph office was in the station, and Rob was never happier than when he was “ fooling around the batteries ” as big Jack Rusling, the station agent expressed it. Jack was thoroughly good-natured, and he was, moreover, a relative of Rob’s, therefore he allowed Rob the free run of the station • and telegraph office. When Rob was fifteen he could receive and send messages over the wires almost as well as Jack himself.

j “ And if anything gets out of kilter with the batteries or any of the rest xof the electrical outfit of the office, that boy Rob seems to just know by instinct what’s up and how to fix it,” Jack said. ‘‘ He’ll make a dandy good telegraph operator if ; he keeps on.” j But Rob had ambitions not to be. I satisfied by becoming even one of the ” dandiest ” of telegraph operators, and those ambitions were realised long ago. With all his fondness for the study of electricity, Rob was a real boy when it came to having fun, and he was one of the merriest as well as I one of the moit popular boys in the ! town. He and I were very chummy, and one day Rob came over to my house full of a new scheme for havI ing “ slathers of fun.” “ Now, I’ll tell you what we will 1 do, Roger,” he said. “ We’ll organ- , ize the Short Line Telegraph Com- ■ pany. I nominate myself for pre- ! sident. All in favour of that motion say ‘l!’ There ! lam duly e l ected. You can he secretary or ! treasurer, whichever one you'd i rather. Now, my plan is to rig up ' a little telegraph line running from the station to my house, and from my house to your house, and perhaps to the houses of one or two of the other hoys. Joe Tinley wants to learn to he a telegraph operator, and it would he fine for him to have the line run over to his house, and we could send messages to and fro. It would he the best kind of practice for him. My cousin Jack, down at the station, is the soul of good nature, and I think that he would let us connect the line with the station. I know all about how to rig • up the batteries and there’s a great ' pile of old telegraph poles down by ! the station that no one would object ■to us using. Good scheme, isn’t it ?”

I said it was, and Bob added : “ It will be great fun talking over the wires to each other, and we can learn a lot about electricity in the bargain. It’s a good thing to know about for it’s going to revolutionise a good many things in the future, you see if it don’t. No one knows yet all that there is in electricity. Let us go right over to the station and see what Jack says about the Short Line Telegraph Company.” Jack listened to Rob’s explanation of his scheme and then he said ; “ I never see such a boy as you are, Rob Lawrence. You’d rather fool about with electricity than eat. But then you might be wasting your time oh something far less interesting and useful. Go ahead and rig up your line, and I' will aid and abet you all I can. Where are you going to get your instruments ?”

“ Well. I know where I can get a very good second-hand set cheap, and Joe Tinley has a set that he got to practice on at home, and Roger can get a set somewhere. The wire won’t cost such a groat deal, and—well, we’ll find some way of pushing the thing through, see if we don’t,’’

Hob was one of those boys who hiring things to paS.> when uiey unVd decided on doing so. He clung tenaciously to an idea, and there was no such word as fail in bis lexicon. Other boys would have given up the short line telegraph scheme because of the obstacles that presented themselves when we began to carry out Rob’s plan, but the grit that has made him the immensely successful man that he is to-day was strong in Rob even in his boyhood, and within four weeks of the day when Rob unfolded his scheme to me the line was in full operation. Rob’s home was within three blocks of my house. Joe Tinley lived two blocks further down the street. The line began at the railway station and ended at Joe Tinley's house. When the line was completed, it created a good deal of comment in the little town. I remember that old Mrs. Bagg, one of the village gossips, said to my mother :

“ I wonder what that Hob Lawrence will think of next. ? I should think you would be sheered to have a telegraph wire running into your bouse. It alius seemed to he that the bad man had something; to do with this 'loctricity bizyness and this

r.« e ra lii-r seems in ’ e some ag’in’ nater. I don’t think that eh.; good Lord ever intended that folks should make use of electricity the way they do. i tell you I wouldn’t have any of it runniu’ into my houae. I’d be afeered something about it would hu’st or give way or break out in some way and kill me in my bed.” Our parents did not share any of Mrs. Bagg’s prejudices or fears and they regarded the short line telegraph experiment with a good deal of interest and amusement.

I did not have anything like Rob’s lightness of touch in sending messages, and I could not receive them unless they were sent so slowly that Rob sometimes got quite out of patience with me. I remember that one day when I was even more stupid than usual this brief and pointed message came to me over the wires at a speed of about a letter or two letters a minute ;

By comparing the dots and dashes with the copy of the telegrapher’s alphabet before me, I discovered that Rob’s message consisted of the single word “ Blockhead;” and I had just made this discovery when Rob himself dashed impetuously into my room and said : ‘‘You are slower than cold molasses when it comes to taking and receiving messages ! What’s the matter with you ? A great telegraph operator you’d make ! I wanted to ask you by wire if you would go over to the swimming hole with me this morning, but I could go there and have a swim and get back while you are trying to telegraph to me that you would go.” “ Well, I get all baulked up on these dots and dashes,” I said, weakly. ' ‘‘ I should think so ! Why, boy, it’s as easy as falling off a log to icarn them. But let’s go and have a swim and perhaps that will stir you up so that you can send or receive three words a minute.” While we were on the waj to the swimming-hole Rob said : “ I want to tell you that Jack has allowed me to connect our wire with the wire running over to Coalfield and now we can talk with Lute Robinson.”

A switch three mil«s in length ran from our t own out to a mining town of about six hundred inhabitants. The town was made up almost entirely of coal miners. Lute Robinson a young fellow of but nineteen years of age, was the telegraph and station agent at Coalfield. He was a warm friend of ours, and we were delighted at the prospect of being able to talk with him over our wire. Lute had quite a responsible position for a boy of his years, and he was station agent, telegraph agent, and express agent at Coalfield, but he was a bright and ambitious fellow who had thus far filled the position to the satisfaction of the railway and express company. As there was no hotel, and not even a decent boarding-house in Coalfield, Lute slept on a cot in the station, and took his meals at the home of one of the store-keepers in the town. One) Saturday when we had had our line in operation about three months, Rob came to my house, and said ; “ Say, chum, my folks are all going over to my uncle Dan’s, in Woodville this afternoon to stay over Sunday, and I want you to come and stay with me the two nights they will be away. I don’t want to go with them, for it is so dreadfully dull over there, and father and mother are very glad to have me stay at home and look after the house. You come and stay with me and we will manage to have some fun in some way." I readily agreed to this proposition. Hob’s parents had told him that he might have two or three other boys come in and spend Saturday evening with us, and we had a merry time playing games, and popping corn and telling stories. The boys went home at about ten o’clock after trying to make us believe that we were sure to be visited by burglars before morning ; but their predictions were not verified, for no one came near us, and we slept " like logs ” from the time we went to bed until the sun began to stream in at our windows in the morning. Sunday night promised to be equally uneventful, and we went to bed earlier than usual. As we had done our own cooking during the absence of Rob’s parents, and as Mrs. Lawrence had given us the free run of her pautry, cellar, a nd preserve closet, it was not to be wondered at that Rob and I did not feel altogether well at the close of the second day.

“ I think that dish of strawI i.err-y jam, with so much rich cream j over it, and hfth slaU of frujt cake, were a little too much fur even my goat-like digestive powers,” said Rob, when we were undressing for bed. ” I feel a kind of an ‘ unpleasantness to my sturamick,’ as old Mrs. Bagg would say. What is the state of your inner feelings ?” ‘‘ Well, 1 wish now that I had /aten but two instead of four doughnuts for supper ; and I thinki that I would be happier if I had not gorged myself with that deadly cheese thing you called a Welsh rabbit, or rarebit, or whatever it was.” “ That cup of coffee I was fool enough to make and drink at supper time is going to be of assistance to tiie jam and pie and cheese I ate in keeping me awake half of the night. You’d better be ready to go for the doctor at any moment.” It was nearly midnight when 1 became aware of the fact that Rob was sitting up in bed.

“ Why, Hob !” I said ; but before I could say anything else be had laid his hand over ray mouth and had said : 'Sh~'sh— I M Thoroughly rousiad, I sat up In

, ..Hi cum I ni'ard the .nril-i <-J the I.L'ia, h instnimeiu, n '‘jo h.i •. room clicking away softly. I w rt s not expert enough to be able t•> make out all of the message that was coming into Rob’s room over our wire, but I made our. the worms “ burglars ” and “ come.” When the sounder was silent Hob jumped out of bed saying as he did ho ; Get out o’ there like lightning boy ! That was a message from Lute Robinson, and he says thai there are burglars in the oiiice m’.-i in Coalfield and he wants ns to. get help and come.” ‘‘ Why does he send away over here fur help ?” “ Oh, this is no time to ask questions ! Something is wrong over there in the Coalfield oiiice. We’ll find out later what it is. We must rout Joe Nichols the 'town marshal, out and get him to take help with him and hustle • over to C-mlmd 1. 1 know that something is wrong over there.” Joe .Nichols lived in the very next house. Hi.s wife kept boarders, and among them were several big, strong railway bauds, who always spent Sunday in onr town. In less than live minutes Hob had Joe up, and in a few minutes he routed two of the train-men out. and the live of ns set out for Coalfield in a light waggon drawn by a fleet horse r.hat Joe owned.

“ We’l! hitf.li the horsy here,” said Joe when we wore still some distance from tho station. “If there are really light-fingered gentry at word on the safe in the express office we don’t want to drive near enough foj them to hear eho sound of cm wheels. To-morrow is pay-day r.t the mines and it is likely that there is a lot of monej in the safe of. the express office. I happen to know that the money for the pay-roll went over to Coalfield by express last evening. It may he that Rob has brought us here on a wild-goose chase, but no one would be in the Coalfield telegraph office sending such messages for a johe at this timo of night.”

The little railway station was on the outskirts of the tow n, ami quite a long distance from auy other bouse, There was a clump of trees near th« station, and in among these trees was a light buggy with a horse hitched to it.

‘‘That looks suspicious,” says Joe in a whisper. He bade us stay under cover of the trees while he approached the station. In about three minutes ho came back to us and said in a whisper : “ There are two fellows in there boring and working away on the safe by the' light of a dark lantern. I doubt if they are experts, or they would have had it open by this time. Both of them have on masks, I don't see anything of Lute, but I thought I heard someone groaning in the nest room. Gome on.” Joe and the two trainmen had pistols.

| “ You two boys had better stay here,” said Joe when Rob and I started forward with the men. You can’t be of auy assistance to us and you might get hurt in the scrimmage that is likely to come oli'iu a few minutes. You stay here until i call you.” I was entirely willing to obey this order, and Rob was wise enough to see that it was best for us to stay where we were. The three men went towards the*station by themselves, and a few minutes later we heard a single outcry followed by a scuffling sound, and then two pistol shots were fired. Lights suddenly gleamed from the station windows, and then . we heard Joe call out : j “ Come on, boys !” | We ran swiftly forward and found j two men still struggling to free i themselves from the handcuffs and ropes that confined them. One of them was swearing frightfully, and malting fearful threats. We found Lute hound and gagged, jin another room of toe station. This was his story. 11 I was asleep on my cot in the telegraph office at the time. The men bound me and tried to force me to open the safe for them, even threatening to kill me if I did not do so. They beat me and used me mighty rough. Then they hound and gagged me and went to work on the safe themselves. I managed to get my right hand free, and crawled over to the instrument, and sent that message over the wire with but little hope that it would be received by any one because of its being Sunday. I sent the message as softly as I could, but just as I had clicked out the last word the men in the next room heard me, and they <1 ragged me away and half killed me. One said that they luvmrt'”’''■ .Worry because the line was closed on j Sunday and no one would get any" thing 1 may have sent over the wire. 1 Then they tried again to get me to open the safe and when I would not they kicked and beat me and tlu-y threatened to ‘ finish me up ’ if they could not open the safe themselves in a few minutes.” Lute’s bleeding face and bruised body bore cruel proof of the manner in which he had been beaten. There was a doctor in the little town and we soon had him in attendance on 1,11 to. The two burglars were taken over to out town by Joe and locked up in the town gaol, from which they were sent to prison for fifteen years each, it having be*n dwscoveml that'both of IJieui had aiready "dons time ” for oilier crirrees.

Before the woo* wae o«rt an a*ewt of the expre«a immi.tvßy o«u»e to or.c town an’ prfa<v,L.*:i Uor. *?*i hvs with fifty .K.ilnrs each, ter v*ss fj*n hast hail in < aptunny IV. >■«■»%:>»>'» srd thereby saving ilia (xvopuny Ur-fd sum of money.— ■• rtM, fimts-nt.."

“Will t'.*> I 100*