We would like to have a few pictures of those writers who have contributed considerably to our various magazines. It is obvious that this refers to you. Therefore, if you will send us a portrait it will be greatly appreciated. Very truly yours, "R. H. Davis." Mr. Davis got the picture; also a serial or two and some short stories for new publications issued by the Munsey Company of which he was editor. Late in 1905 he called for a railroad serial, and he wanted a particularly good one. Edwards had never tried his hand at such a story. He knew, in a general way, that the "pilot" was on the front end of a locomotive, and that the "tender" was somewhere in the rear, but his technical knowledge was hazy and unreliable. The story, if accepted, was to appear in _The Railroad Man's Magazine_, would be read by "railroaders" the country over, and would be damned and laughed at if it contained any technical "breaks." Here was just the sort of a nut Edwards liked to crack. The perils of the undertaking lent it a zest, and were a distinct aid to industry and inspiration. He resolved that he would give Mr. Davis a story that would bear the closest scrutiny of railroad men and win their interest and applause. To this end he studied railroads, up and down and across. He absorbed what he could from books, and the rest he secured through personal investigation. When the story was done, he submitted the manuscript to a veteran of the rails--one who had been both a telegraph operator and engineer--and this gentleman had not a change to suggest! Mr. Davis took the story aboard. While it was running in the magazine a reader wrote in to declare that it must have been written by an old hand at the railroad game: the author of the letter had been railroading for thirty-five years himself, and felt positive that he ought to know! "The Red Light at Rawlines" scored a triumph, proving the value of study, and the ability to adjust one's self to an untried situation. Edwards had imbibed too much technical knowledge to exhaust it all on one story, so he wrote another and sent it to Mr. White. The latter informed him: "I turned 'Special One-Five-Three' over to _The Railroad Man's Magazine_ at once, without reading it, and they are sending you a check for it this week, I understand. This does not mean that I did not care to consider it for _The Argosy_. I certainly have an opening for more of your stories, but when you took the railroad for your theme and treated it so intelligently, I think it better that you give _The Argosy_ some other subject matter."