The sun rose upon a squalid scene--a wide flat area where stakes and
floors and frames mingled with all the flotsam and jetsam left by a
hurried and profligate populace, moving on to another camp. Daylight
found no man there nor any living creature. And all day the wind
blew the dust and sheets of sand over the place where had reigned
such strife of toil and gold and lust and blood and death. A train
passed that day, out of which engineer and fireman gazed with
wondering eyes at what had been Benton. Like a mushroom it had
arisen, and like a dust-storm on the desert wind it had roared away,
bearing its freight of labor, of passion, and of evil. Benton had
become a name--a fabulous name.
But nature seemed more merciful than life. For it began to hide what
man had left--the scars of habitations where hell had held high
carnival. Sunset came, then night and the starlight. The lonely
hours were winged, as if in a hurry to resolve back into the
elements the flimsy remains of that great camp.
And that spot was haunted.
29
Casey left Benton on the work-train. It was composed of a long
string of box--and flat-cars loaded with stone, iron, gravel, ties--
all necessaries for the up-keep of the road. The engine was at the
rear end, pushing instead of pulling; and at the extreme front end
there was a flat-car loaded with gravel.
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