The first curve of the journey was made without much difficulty, although trucks and chains creaked ominously as one big stick after another switched around to the straight stretch beyond. Then came a sharp down-grade, and the engineer whistled for brakes, and every man jumped to do his bidding. An upgrade followed, and the brakes were kicked off and on they went as before, over a low trestle and a switch that bumped them so both Dale and Owen nearly lost their footing. Then another down grade, and again the whistle for brakes. Dale was hard at work when he heard a yell from Owen, and looking along the big stick behind him, saw his chum standing up, waving his hand frantically. "The chain!" he heard, above the grinding of the wheels. "The chain has broken! Look out!" For a moment he did not comprehend, but then he realized the truth of what had occurred. The chain on the truck behind had broken away from the steel hook that held it, and now the heavy log was lurching forward on the down grade, with all the weight on the front chain. It was already close to the brake, and just as Dale leaped to the top of the log in front it struck the rod and bent it over as if made of lead. "If it only holds until we get around the curve!" thought Dale, and wondered what he had best do. The train was going faster and faster, and he could not notify the engineer of the trouble, for they would be at the curve in thirty seconds more. Cling! The front chain snapped, the loose end whipping over the log and ringing sharply against the twisted brake. Then the big log lurched forward and struck the log on which Dale rested with the impact of a battering ram. There was a dull thud, and both logs swerved to the right and the left as if about to leave the trucks entirely. Dale clutched at his footing, tried to scramble up, and then pitched forward into space. Owen, on the trucks in the rear, saw the logs swerve, and saw the end of one hit some rocks beside the tracks. Then, to avoid a crushing blow, he leaped from the swiftly moving train, struck some thick brushwood on the down side of a hill, and disappeared like a flash from view. CHAPTER XXVIII JEFFERSON WILBUR SEEKS INFORMATION When Dale came to his senses he was lying flat on his back on some brushwood, with several lumbermen standing around him. One had been bathing his face, and another held a liquor flask in his hands. "He's coming around," he heard, in Andy Westmore's voice. "I guess he wasn't hurt so much as we supposed." "He had a close call, right enough," put in another lumberman. "I reckon you'd best give him a dose of the liquor, Andy." "No, he doesn't use the stuff, Hank." "Are any bones broken?" asked a third person of the group. "Wouldn't be surprised if his left arm was broken," answered Andy Westmore. "It was doubled under him when we picked him up."