eight o'clock
As a pebble striking an anthill stirs into angry life a thousand startled workers , so a mountain washout startles a division and concentrates upon a single point the very last reserve of its activities and energies . For thirty minutes the wires sung with Callahan 's messages . When his special for a run to the Rat Cañon was ready all the extra yardmen and both roadmasters were in the caboose ; behind them fumed a second section with orders to pick up along the way every section man as they followed . It was hard on eight o'clock when Callahan stepped aboard . They double-headed for the pass , and not till they pulled up with their pony truck facing the water at the mouth of the big cañon did they ease their pace . In the darkness they could only grope . Smith Young , roadmaster of the Pilot branch , an old mountain boy , had gone down from Sleepy Cat before dark , and crawling over the rocks in the dusk had worked his way along the cañon walls to the scene of the disaster .