Not only an adventure story packed with thrills, this is also a book about railroads that will appeal to all railroad fans. "Every boy and every man breathes quicker at the sight and sound of a big locomotive storming down the rails," says Mr. Meader. The quick breath of this excitement stirs on every page.

Through Calico Gap, one of the passes to the West through the Appalachian wall, runs a four-track rail artery, an important military objective for enemy sabotage. Randy MacDougal, youngest son in a family of railroaders, stumbled on the clues leading to such an attempt, followed them through with the aid of the railroad detective and the FBI, and averted a catastrophe endangering war transportation.

This vivid picture of train and track crews at work, talking railroad slang, carrying on in all weathers, shows them doing a war job just as surely as the men building the bombers and the guns.

From the dust jacket