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Updated: May 19, 2025
Festing nodded, and they lounged in silence by the snapping fire. Next morning they got to work upon the track, and on the following afternoon, when the thaw had gone far enough into the ground, Charnock went for the gravel gang. The men came willingly, although Wilkinson and the foreman did not appear, and with the connivance of one Charnock obtained several of the company's blast-lamps.
The bridge would presently be rebuilt with steel, but in the meantime the frame was open and the gaps between the ties were wide. It was getting dark and noisy blast-lamps threw up pillars of white fire. The line had sunk in the afternoon and it was necessary to lift the rails and fill up the subsidence before the next gravel train arrived.
He was favorably impressed by the young missionary and kept the promise he had made, though it now and then involved him in difficulties with his comrades. The carload of lumber duly arrived, and with the help of men who gave their labor after their hard day's work was done, the church was raised by the light of flaring blast-lamps which the contractor allowed.
The post was not remarkably well paid, but since he was passed over now, he would, no doubt, be disappointed when he applied for the next, and it was significant that as he stood at the top of the ravine he first looked back and then ahead. In the distance, a dull red glow marked the bridge, where the glare of the throbbing blast-lamps flickered across a muddy river, swollen by melting snow.
We're working nights with the blast-lamps, and I've got to be about when the new shift makes a start." He went away and Festing studied the drawings. He had undertaken to cut and dress to size the heavy logs required for the lower posts of trestles and foundation piles. So far, he did not apprehend much difficulty, but he would run some risk over the underpinning of part of the track.
One hot night he stood, soaked with perspiration and dressed in soiled duck clothes, some distance beneath the top of the dam, which broke down to a lower level at the spot. There was no moon, but a row of blast-lamps that grew dimmer as they receded picked out the tall embankment with jets of pulsating flame.
From daybreak until dusk fell, hoarse shouts, the clank of rails, the beat of heavy hammers filled his ears, and often the uproar did not stop at dark. When a soft muskeg swallowed the new track, he must watch, by the flaring blast-lamps, noisy ploughs throw showers of gravel from the ballast cars. Labor and concentration had left their mark.
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