I had become thoroughly proficient and more frequently than ever Borroughs would let me "spell" for him for a while each day. Be it said to his credit, however, he was always within hearing, when I was doing any of his work. He was carefulness personified, and the following incident only serves to show what unaccountable errors will be made by even the best of men.

One cold morning in January, I started to the office as usual. The air was so still, crisp and biting that the air-pumps of the engines had that peculiar sharp, snappy sound heard only in a panting engine in cold weather. They seemed almost imbued with life. As I went into the office at eight o'clock to go to work, the night man remarked that I must be feeling pretty brash; my spirits seemed so high. And in fact, that was no joke; I was feeling fine as silk and showed it all over. But as I said good morning to Borroughs, I noticed that he seemed rather glum, and I asked: "What's the matter, Dad? Feeling bad this morning?"

He snapped back in a manner entirely foreign to him, "No, but I don't feel much like chaffing this day. I feel as if something was going to happen, and I don't like the feeling."

I answered, "Oh! bosh, Dad. You'll feel all right in a few minutes; I reckon you've got a good old attack of dyspepsia; brace up."

Just then the wires started up, and he gruffly told me to sit down and go to work and our conversation ceased. That was the first time he had ever used anything but a gentle tone to me, and I felt hurt. The first trick is always the busiest, and under the stress of work the incident soon passed from my mind. Pat remarked once, that the general superintendent was going to leave Chaminade in a special at 10:30 A. M., on a tour of inspection over the road. That was about all the talking he did that morning. His work was as good as ever, and in fact, he made some of the prettiest meets that morning I had ever seen.

About 10:35, I asked Borroughs to allow me to go over to the hotel to get a cigar. I would be gone only a few minutes. He assented, and I slipped on my overcoat and went out. I wasn't gone over ten minutes, and as I stepped into the doorway to come upstairs on my return, I heard what sounded like a shot in the office. I flew upstairs two steps at a time, and never to my dying day will I forget the sight that met my gaze. Borroughs, whom I had left but a few moments before full of life and energy, was half lying on the table, face downwards, dead by his own hand. The blood was oozing from a jagged wound in his temple, and on the floor was the smoking pistol he had used. Fred Bennett, the chief despatcher, as pale as a ghost, was bending over him, while the two call boys were standing near paralyzed with fright. It was an intensely dramatic setting for a powerful stage picture, and my heart stood still for a minute as I contemplated the awful scene. Mr. Hebron, the division superintendent, came in from the outer office, and was transfixed with horror and amazement when he saw the terrible picture.

Bennett turned to me and said, "Bates, come here and help me lift poor Borroughs out of this chair."

Gently and carefully we laid him down on the floor and sent one of the badly frightened boys for a surgeon. Medical skill was powerless, however, and the spirit of honest Pat Borroughs had crossed the dark river to its final reckoning.

Work in the office was at a standstill on account of the tragic occurrence, but all of a sudden I heard Monte Carlo calling "DS" and using the signal "WK," which means "wreck." Bennett told me to sit down and take the trick until the second trick man could be called. I went over and sat down in the chair, still warm from the body of my late friend, and wiping his blood off the train sheet with my handkerchief, I answered.

It would be impossible to describe the state of my feelings as I first touched the key; I had completely lost track of trains, orders and everything else. However, I gradually pulled myself together, and got the hang of the road again, and then I learned how the wreck had occurred. About a minute after I went out, Borroughs had given a right-of-track order to an express freight from Monte Carlo to Johnsonville, and had told them to hurry up. Johnsonville is on the outskirts of Chaminade, and Borroughs had completely forgotten that the general superintendent's special had left there just five minutes before with a clean sweep order. That he had known of it was evident from the fact that it was recorded on the train sheet. Two minutes after the freight had left Monte Carlo, poor Pat realized he had at last made his mistake. He said not a word to any person, but quietly ordered out the wrecking outfit, and then reaching in the drawer he took out a revolver and—snuffed out his candle. He fell forward on the train sheet, as if to cover up with his lifeless body, the terrible blunder he had just made. Many other despatchers had made serious errors, and in a measure outlived them; but here was a man who had grown gray in the service of railroads, with never a bad mark against him. Day and night, in season and out, he had given the best of his brain and life to the service, and finally by one slip of the memory he had, as he thought, ruined himself; and, too proud to bear the disgrace, he killed himself. He was absolutely alone in the world and left none to mourn his loss save a large number of operators he had helped over the rough places of the profession.

The wreck was an awful one. The superintendent's son was riding on the engine, and he and the engineer and the fireman were mashed and crushed almost beyond recognition. The superintendent, his wife and daughter, and a friend, were badly bruised, but none of them seriously injured. The second trick man was not to be found immediately, so I worked until four o'clock, and the impression of that awful day will never leave me. Pat's personality was constantly before me in the shape of the blood stain on the train sheet. It was a long time before I recovered my equanimity.

The next afternoon we buried poor Pat under the snow, and the earth closed over him forever; and thus passed from life a man whose character was the purest, whose nature was the gentlest: honest and upright, I have never seen his equal in the profession or out. I often think if I had not gone over to the hotel that morning, the accident might have been averted, because, perhaps, I would have noticed the mistake in time to have prevented the collision. But, on the other hand, it is probable I would not have noticed it, because operators, not having the responsibility of the despatchers, rarely concentrate their minds intensely on what they are taking. A man will sit and copy by the hour with the greatest accuracy, and at the same time be utterly oblivious of the purport of what he has been taking. There can be no explanation as to why Pat forgot the special. It is one of those things that happen; that's all.

The rule of seniority was followed in the office, and in the natural sequence of events the night man got my job, I was promoted to the third trick—from twelve midnight until eight A. M.—and a new copy operator was brought in from Vining.

If any trick is easier than another it is the third, but none of them are by any means sinecures. When I was a copy operator I used to imagine it was an easy thing to sit over on the other side of the table and give orders, "jack up" operators, conductors and engineers, and incidentally haul some men over the coals every time I had to call them a few minutes; but when I reached the summit of an operator's ambition, and was assigned to a trick I found things very different. Copying with no responsibility was dead easy; but despatching trains I found about the stiffest job I had ever undertaken. I had to be on the alert with every faculty and every minute during the eight hours I was on duty. While the first and second trick men, have perhaps more train order work attached to them, the third is about on a par with them as far as actual labor is concerned, because, in addition to the regular train order work, a new train sheet has to be opened every night at twelve o'clock, which necessitates keeping two sheets until all the trains on the old one have completed their runs. There is also a consolidated train report to be made at this time, which is a re-capitulation of the movements of all trains for the preceding twenty-four hours, giving delays, causes thereof, accidents, cars hauled, etc. This is submitted to the division superintendent in the morning, and after he has perused and digested its contents he sends a condensed copy to the general superintendent. Many a man loses his job by a report against him on that train sheet.

To show the strain on a man's mind when he is despatching trains, let me tell a little incident that happened to me just in the beginning of my career as a despatcher. Every morning about five o'clock, the third trick man begins to figure on his work train orders for the day and when he has completed them he sends them out to the different crews. Work train orders, it may not be amiss to explain, are orders given to the different construction crews, such as the bridge gang, the grading gang, the track gang, etc., to work between certain points at certain times. They must be very full and explicit in detail as to all trains that are to run during the continuance of the order. For regular trains running on time, no notification need be given, because the time card rules would apply; but for all extras, specials, and delayed trains, warnings must be given, so that the work trains can get out of the way for them, otherwise the results might be very serious, and business be greatly delayed. Work orders are the bane of a new despatcher's existence, and the manner in which he handles them is a sure indication as to whether he will be successful or not. Many a man gets to a trick only to fall down on these work orders.

I stumbled along fairly well the first night as a despatcher, and had no mishaps to speak of, although I delayed a through passenger some ten minutes, by hanging it up on a siding for a fast freight train, and I put a through freight on a siding for a train of an inferior class. For these little errors of judgment I was "cussed out" by all the conductors and engineers on the division when they came in; and the division superintendent, on looking over the train sheet the next morning, remarked, that delaying a passenger train would never do—in such a tone of voice that I could plainly see my finish should I ever so offend again.

The second night passed all right enough, and by 5:30 A. M., I had completed my work orders and sent them out. From that time on until eight o'clock when the first trick man relieved me I was kept busy. He read over my outstanding orders, verified the sheet, and signed the transfer on the order book, and after a few moments' chat I went home. I went to bed about nine o'clock, and was on the point of dropping off to sleep, when all at once I remembered that an extra fast freight was due to leave at 9:45 A. M., and that there was a train working in a cut four miles out. I wondered if I had notified her to get out of the way of the extra. That extra would go down through that cut like a streak of greased lightning, because Horace Daniels, on engine 341, was going to pull her, and Horace was known as a runner from away back. I reviewed in my mind, as carefully as I could all the orders I had given to the work train, and was rather sure I had notified them, but still I was not absolutely certain, and began to feel very uncomfortable. Poor Borroughs had just had his smash up, and I didn't want "poor Bates," to have his right away. Maybe it was the spirit of this same old man Borroughs, who was sleeping so peacefully under the ground that made me feel and act carefully. I looked at my watch and found it was 9:20. The extra would leave in twenty-five minutes and I lived nearly a mile from the office. The strain was beginning to be too much, so I slipped on my clothes and without putting on a collar or a cravat, I caught up my hat and ran with all my might for the depot. As I approached I saw Daniels giving 341 the last touch of oil before he pulled out. Thank God, they hadn't gone. I shouted to him, "Don't pull out for a minute, Daniels; I think there is a mistake in your orders."

Daniels was a gruff sort of a fellow, and he snapped back at me, "What's the matter with you? I hain't got no orders yet. Come here until I oil those wheels in your head."

I went up in the office and Daniels followed me. Bennett, the chief, was standing by the counter as I went in, and after a glance at me he said, "What's up, kid? Seen a ghost? You look almost pale enough to be one yourself."

I said, "No, I haven't seen any ghosts, but I am afraid I forgot to notify that gang working just east of here about this extra."

The conductor and engineer were both there and they smiled very audibly at my discomfiture; in fact, it was so audible you could hear it for a block. Bennett went over to the table, glanced at the order book and train sheet for a minute and then said, "Oh, bosh! of course you notified them. Here it is as big as life, 'Look out for extra east, engine 341, leaving El Monte at 9:45 A. M.' What do you want to get such a case of the rattles and scare us all that way for?"

I was about to depart for home to resume my sleep, and was congratulating myself on my escape, when Bennett called me over to one side of the room, and in a low, but very firm voice, metaphorically ran up and down my spinal column with a rake. He asked me if I didn't know there were other despatchers in that office besides myself; men who knew more in a minute about the business than I did in a month; and didn't I suppose that the order book would be verified, and the train sheet consulted before sending out the extra? He hoped I would never show such a case of the rattles again. That was all. Good morning. All the same I was glad I went back to the office that morning, because I had satisfied myself that I had not committed an unpardonable error at the outset of my career.

In case of doubt always take the safe side.