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Later, after he had forced himself to go to work, a door slammed somewhere in the despatcher's end of the building, and automatically his hand shot out to the closed drawer. Then he made his decision and carried it out.
Now give me 22 as quick as the Lord will let you, and ring the neck off the bell." Lefever answered the call on number 22. The talk was quick and sharp. Messengers were instantly pressed into service from the despatcher's office. Telephone wires hummed, and every man available on the special agent's force was brought into action.
"If his death means this to you, think of what it means to me!" A flood of sympathy bore them together. The moment was hardly one for interruption, but the despatcher's door opened and Rooney Lee halted, thunderstruck, on the threshold. Dicksie's hand disappeared in her handkerchief. McCloud had been in wrecks before, and gathered himself together unmoved. "What is it, Rooney?"
He pulled a plug out of the switch board one evening, and Burke threatened to kill him. Another evening, he went into my office and monkeyed with an instrument that I kept there connected to the despatcher's wire, and left it open. There was no report from any of the offices on either side, and investigation soon revealed the culprit.
When Leckhard was gone, Lidgerwood climbed the stair in the station building to the despatcher's office and gave orders for the return of his car to Angels.
When all trains are running on time, and there are no extras or specials out, the despatcher's duty is easy, and consists largely in taking and recording "O. S. reports," and "Consists." The "O. S. report" is the report sent in by the various operators as the trains arrive and depart from the several stations.
Again Collins made a journey to his desk, returning with the telegraph-impression book open at the proper page. Blount glanced at the copy of the brief message: "Thomas Gryson wants to know when he can be sure of finding you here," and handed the book back. "How did you send that?" he asked. "I sent it down to the despatcher's office by Barney." Blount nodded.
About the middle of the room, or in the recess of the bay window, is the despatcher's table. On it in front of the man on duty, is the train sheet, containing information, exact and absolute in its nature, of each train on the division. On this sheet there is also a space set apart for the expected arrival of trains on his district from the other end, and one for delays.
If there ever were faithful hard working fighters in that country, it was these same dusky brunettes. I told the gang where I had been, and in a few minutes several of them went over to the station to help me rig up a wire. I knew the despatcher's wire, and taking a pole's length out of another line, I soon made a connection to the instrument I had saved. It was no go the wire was dead open.
When a train is delayed and the system spoiled, it is the despatcher's duty to make up another one on the spot, and arrange by telegrams, which are repeated for fear of mistakes, for the holding of this train and the movement of others until the tangle is straightened out.
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