A heap of still smouldering cinders and ashes marked the site.  Bart stood silently ruminating for some minutes.  He tried to think things out clearly, to decide how far he was warranted in acting for his father.

“I don’t exactly know what action the express people usually take in a case of this kind,” he reflected, “nor how soon they get about it.  I can only wait for some official information.  In the meantime, though, somebody has got to keep the ball rolling here.  I seem to be the only one about, and I am going to put the system in some temporary order at least.  If I’m called down later for being too officious, they can’t say I didn’t try to do my duty.”

Bart set briskly at work to put into motion a plan his quick, sensible mind had suggested.

About one hundred feet away was a rough unpainted shed-like structure.  He remembered the time, several years back, when the express office had been located there.

It was, however, forty feet from any tracks, and for convenience sake, when the railroad gave up the burned building which they had occupied for unclaimed freight storage, it had been turned over to the express people.

Bart went down to the old quarters.  The door had lost its padlock and stood half open.  Inside was a heap of old boards, and empty boxes and barrels thrown there from time to time to keep them from littering the yards.

A truck and the little delivery cart, being outside of the burned shed, Bart found intact.  He ran them down to the building he had determined to utilize, temporarily at least, as express headquarters for Pleasantville.

The yards were fairly deserted except for a sleepy night watchman here and there.  It was not yet seven o’clock, but when Bart reached the in-freight house he found it open and one or two clerks hurrying through their work so as to get off for the day at ten.

There was a good deal of questioning, for they knew of the fire, and knew Bart as well, and liked him, and when he made his wants known willing hands ministered to his needs.

Bart carried back with him a hammer and some nails, a broom, a marking pot and brush, pens, ink and a couple of tabs of paper.

As he neared the switch shanty where Lem Wacker had been on duty the day previous, he noticed that it had been opened up since he had passed it last.  Some one was grumbling noisily inside.  Bart was curious for more reasons than one.

He placed his load on the bench outside and stuck his head in through the open doorway.

“Oh, it’s you, Mr. Evans,” he hailed, as he recognized the regular flagman on duty for whom Wacker had been substituting for three days past.  “Glad to see you back.  Are you all well?”

“Eh? oh, young Stirling.  Say, you’ve had a fire.  I hear your father was burned.”

“He is quite seriously hurt,” answered Bart gravely.

“Too bad.  I have troubles of my own, though.”