E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, Janet Blenkinship, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 16630-h.htm or 16630-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/6/3/16630/16630-h/16630-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/6/3/16630/16630-h.zip) EMPIRE BUILDERS by FRANCIS LYNDE Author of The Quickening, The Grafters A Fool for Love, etc. With Illustrations by Jay Hambidge Indianapolis The Bobbs-Merrill Company Publishers Press of Braunworth & Co. Bookbinders and Printers Brooklyn, N.Y. 1907 [Illustration: "I won't attempt to apologize--it's beyond all that"] CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I A MASTER OF MEN 1 II A SPIKED SWITCH 13 III LOSS AND DAMAGE 30 IV COLD STORAGE 38 V WANTED: THIRTY-FIVE MILLIONS 47 VI THE AWAKENING OF CHARLES EDWARD 59 VII HAMMER AND TONGS 66 VIII THE AUTOMATIC AIR 75 IX THE RACE TO THE SLOW 90 X THE SINEWS OF WAR 100 XI HURRY ORDERS 120 XII THE ENTERING WEDGE 141 XIII THE BARBARIANS 155 XIV THE DRAW-BAR PULL 166 XV AN UNWILLING HOST 177 XVI THE TRUTHFUL ALTITUDES 186 XVII A NIGHT OF ALARMS 198 XVIII THE MORNING AFTER 217 XIX THE RELUCTANT WHEELS 238 XX THE CONSPIRATORS 254 XXI THE MILLS OF THE GODS 271 XXII THE MAN ON HORSEBACK 285 XXIII THE DEADLOCK 311 XXIV RUIZ GREGORIO 325 XXV THE SIEGE OF THE NADIA 336 XXVI THE STAR OF EMPIRE 362 EMPIRE BUILDERS I A MASTER OF MEN Engine Number 206, narrow gauge, was pushing, or rather failing to push, the old-fashioned box-plow through the crusted drifts on the uptilted shoulder of Plug Mountain, at altitude ten thousand feet, with the mercury at twelve below zero. There was a wind--the winter day above timber-line without its wind is as rare as a thawing Christmas--and it cut like knives through any garmenting lighter than fur or leather. The cab of the 206 was old and weather-shaken, and Ford pulled the collar of his buffalo coat about his ears when the grunting of the exhaust and the shrilling of the wheels on the snow-shod rails stopped abruptly. "Gar-r-r!" snarled Gallagher, the red-headed Irish engineer, shutting off the steam in impotent rage. "The power is not in this dommed ould camp-kittle sewin' machine! 'Tis heaven's pity they wouldn't be givin' us wan man-sized, fightin' lokimotive on this ind of the line, Misther Foord."