Engineer Maclure was leaning out of the cab window, watching for the conductor's signal, when Brockway and Gertrude came up.
"Didn't know but you'd backed out," he said, jocosely, when they had climbed aboard.
"Oh, no, indeed; we had to get word to my father," said Gertrude.
The engineer waved them across the cab. "Make yourselves at home; the 926 belongs to you as long as you want to own her. Just you pre-empt Johnnie's box over there, Fred, and make the young lady comfortable."
Brockway stuck a propitiatory cigar into the pocket of the fireman's jumper, and proceeded to carry out his instructions. Before the tardy signal came, Gertrude was perched upon the high seat, with her skirts gathered up out of harm's way, and Brockway had fashioned a pad out of a bunch of waste and tied it upon the boiler-head brace at her feet.
"It's hot," he explained. "When she begins to roll you can put your foot against that and steady yourself. Are you quite comfortable?"
"Quite; and you?" She looked over her shoulder to ask the question, and the strong red glow from the open door of the fire-box glorified the sweet face.
"Comfortable? No, that is hardly the word for it"—he tried the window-fastening, that he might have an excuse for bending over her—"I'm happy; happy to my finger-tips. Do you know why?"
He sought to look up into her face, but at that moment the red glow of the fire-light went out suddenly with the crash of the closing door, and the clangor of the bell made her reply inaudible. None the less, by the dim, half light of the gauge-lamp he saw her eyelashes droop and her lips say No.
For a passing instant the social barriers went down and became as though they never were. Standing beside her and blessing the clamor that isolated them, he said:
"Because I am here with you; because, no matter what happens to either of us in the future, no one can ever rob me of this."
He half expected a rebuke, and waited a moment with becoming humility. When it did not come, he swung himself into the seat behind her and held his peace until she spoke again. That was five full minutes afterward. For that length of time Gertrude was crushed under an avalanche of new sensations. The last switch-light in the Carvalho yards had flashed to the rear, and the 926 was quickening her speed with sharp little forward lunges under Maclure's skilful goading. The dizzying procession of grayish-white telegraph-poles hurling itself past the cab windows; the thousand clangorous voices of the great machine; the intermittent glare from the fire-box door, alternating with the fiery shower of sparks pouring from the smoke-stack—it was a bit of pandemonium detached and dashing through space, and she sat cowed and stunned by the rush and the uproar. But presently the warm wine of excitement began to quicken her heart-beats.
"Isn't it glorious!" she exclaimed, trying to look back at him.
It is quite possible for two persons to converse in the cab of a flying locomotive, but the factor of distance must be eliminated. Wherefore he bent over her till his mustache brushed the pink ear.
"I am glad you like it. Are you still quite comfortable?"
"Yes, indeed; thank you. How fast are we going now?"
"About twenty-five miles an hour; but we'll double that when Maclure gets her warmed up."
"Double it! Why, we seem to be fairly flying now!"
"Wait," said Brockway.
Maclure was sitting sphynx-like on his box, coming to life now and then to reduce the angle of the reversing-lever, or to increase that of the throttle. The fireman labored steadily, swaying back and forth between the coal-chute and the fire-box door, his close-fitting cap on the back of his head, and Brockway's cigar,—unlighted, in deference to Gertrude,—between his teeth.
"What dreadfully hard work it must be to shovel coal that way all night," Gertrude said, following the rhythmic swing of the fireman's sinewy figure with her eyes.
"He's getting his fire into shape, now," Brockway explained. "He'll have it easier after a bit."
"Why doesn't he smoke his cigar?"
Brockway smiled. "Because, down under the grime and coal-dust and other disguises, there is a drop or two of gentle blood, I fancy."
"You mean it's because I'm here? Please tell him to light his cigar, if he wants to."
Brockway obeyed, and the fireman unbent and bobbed his head in Gertrude's direction. "Thank ye, ma'am," he shouted, with a good-natured grin on his boyish face; "but I'm thinkin' a dhry smoke's good enough for the lady's car"—and he bent to his work again, while the endless procession of telegraph-poles hurtled past with ever-increasing swiftness, and the sharp blasts of the exhaust lost their intermittence, and became blent in a continuous roar.
Presently, the laboring engine began to heave and roll like a storm-tossed vessel, and Gertrude was fain to make use of the foot-rest. Being but a novice, she made unskilful work of it; and when her foot slipped for the third time, Brockway took his courage in both hands.
"Just lean back and brace yourself against my shoulder," he said; "I'm afraid you'll get a fall."
She did it, and he held himself in watchful readiness to catch her if she should lose her balance.
"Is that better?"
She nodded. "Much better, thank you. Have we doubled it yet?"
Brockway took out his watch and timed the revolutions of the flying drive-wheels. "Not quite, but we're bettering the schedule by several miles. Do you still enjoy it?"
"Yes, much; but it's very dreadful, isn't it? I don't see how he dares!"
"Who? Maclure?"
"Yes; or anyone else. To me it seems braver than anything I ever read of—to drive a great thing like this with so many precious lives behind it. The responsibility must be terrible."
"It would be if a fellow thought of it all the time; but one doesn't, you know. Now I'll venture a guess that Mac is just speculating as to how much of the 'Kestrel's' lost time he can get back between this and the end of his run."
But the shrewd old pioneer with the Scottish name was thinking of no such prosaic thing. On the contrary, he was wondering who Miss Vennor was; if she would be a worthy helpmate for the passenger agent; and if so, how he could help matters along.
The switch-lights of Arriba were twinkling in the distance, and his hand was on the whistle-lever, when the engineer reached a conclusion. The next instant Gertrude shrieked and would have tumbled ignominiously into the fireman's scoop if Brockway had not caught her.
"How silly of me!" she said, shame-facedly. "One would think I had never heard a locomotive whistle before. But it was so totally unexpected."
"I should have warned you, but I didn't think. This is Arriba; do you want to go back?"
Gertrude was enjoying herself keenly, after a certain barbaric and unfettered fashion hitherto undreamed of, and she was tempted to drink a little deeper from the cup of freedom before going back to the proprieties. Moreover, there was doubtless a goodly measure of reproof awaiting her, and when she remembered this, she determined to get the full value of the castigation.
"I'll go on, if you'll let me," she said.
"Let you!" Brockway had been trembling for fear his little bubble of joy was about to burst, and would have multiplied words. But before he could say more, the 926 thundered past the station and came to a stand.
Maclure released the air-brake, and clambering down from his box, dragged the passenger agent from his seat and so out to the gangway.
"Say, Fred, is she goin' back?" he whispered.
"No, not just yet."
"Bully for her; she's got sand, she has. Reckon you could run a spell and talk to her at the same time?"
Brockway's nerves tingled at the bare suggestion. "Try me and see," he said.
"It's a go," said Maclure. "Get her over there on my side, and I'll smoke me a pipe out o' Johnnie's window. Swear to bob I won't look around once!"
"Let me promote you, Miss Vennor," Brockway said, helping Gertrude to the foot-board; "Mr. Maclure says you may have his seat for awhile."
Gertrude acquiesced unquestioningly. For some cause as yet unclassified, acquiescence seemed to be quite the proper thing when she was with Brockway, though docility with others was not her most remarkable characteristic. When she was safely bestowed, Maclure rang the bell and gave Brockway his instructions.
"Next stop's Red Butte—twenty-seven miles—thirty-eight minutes o' card-time—no allowance for slowin' down at Corral Siding. And if you can twist 'em any quicker, do it. Turn her loose."
The engineer betook himself to the fireman's box, and Brockway's resolution was taken on the spur of the moment.
"Do just as I tell you, Miss Vennor, and I'll give you a brand-new experience," he said, quickly. "Take hold of this lever and pull—both hands—pull hard!"
Gertrude did it simply because she was told to, and it was not until the engine lunged forward that she understood what it was she was doing. "Oh, Mr. Brockway—I can't!" she cried; "it won't mind me!"
"Yes, it will; I'll show you how. Push it back a little; you mustn't tear your fire. There; let her make a few turns at that."
Gertrude clung to the throttle as if she were afraid it was alive and would escape, but her eyes sparkled and the flush of excitement mounted swiftly to cheek and brow.
"Now give her a little more—just a notch or two—that's enough. You needn't hold it; it won't run away," Brockway said, laughing at her.
"I shall go daft if I don't hold something! Oh,please, Mr. Brockway! I know I shall smash everything into little bits!"
"No, you won't; I sha'n't let you. A little more steam, if you please; that's right. Now take hold of this lever with both hands, brace yourself and pull steadily."
The reversing-lever of a big ten-wheeler is no child's plaything, and he stood ready to help her if she could not manage it. But Miss Vennor did manage it, though the first notch or two had to be fought for; and Maclure, who had quite forgotten his promise not to look on, applauded enthusiastically.
"Good!" said Brockway, approvingly; "you are doing famously. Now a little more throttle; that's enough."
The 926 forged ahead obediently, and Gertrude began to enter into the spirit of the thing.
"This is simply Titanic!" she exclaimed. "What shall I do next?"
"Cut her back a little more," Brockway commanded; "two notches. Now a little more steam—more yet; that will do."
The great engine lunged forward like a goaded animal, and Gertrude sat up very straight and clung to the reversing-lever when the cab began to lurch and sway. But she obeyed Brockway's directions promptly and implicitly.
"Don't be afraid of her," he said. "You have a clear track and a heavy rail."
"I'm not afraid," she asserted; "I'm miles beyond that, now. If anything should happen, we'd all be dead before we found it out, so I can be perfectly reckless."
Mile after mile of the level plain swept backward under the drumming wheels, and Brockway's heart made music within him because it had some little fragment of its desire. In order to see the track through the front window of the cab, he had to lean his elbow on the cushion beside her, and it brought them very near—nearer, he thought, than they would ever be again.
Gertrude was much too full of the magnitude of things to care to talk, but she was finally moved to ask another question.
"Are we really running along on the rails just like any well-behaved train? It seems to me we must have left the track quite a while ago."
Brockway laughed. "You would know it, if we had. Do you see those two little yellow lights away out ahead?"
"Yes; what are they?"
"They are the switch-lights at Corral Siding. Take hold of this lever and blow the whistle yourself; then it won't startle you so much."
Gertrude did that, also, although it was more trying to her nerves than all that had gone before. Then Brockway showed her how to reduce speed.
"Push the throttle in as far as it will go; that's right. Now the reversing-lever—both hands, and brace yourself—that's it. Now take hold of this handle and twist it that way—slowly—more yet—" the air whistled shrilly through the vent, and the song of the brake-shoes on the wheels of the train rose above the discordant clangor—"that will do—turn it back," he added, when the speed had slackened sufficiently; and he leaned forward with his hand on the brake-lever and scanned the approaching side-track with practised eyes.
"All clear!" he announced, springing back quickly. "Pull up this lever again, and give her steam."
Gertrude obeyed like an automaton, though she blenched a little when the small station building at the Siding roared past, and in a few seconds the 926 was again bettering the schedule.
"How fast are we going now?" she asked, when the engine was once more pitching and rolling like a laboring ship.
Brockway consulted his watch. "A little over fifty miles an hour, I should say. You will be quite safe in calling it that, anyway, when you tell your friends that you have run a fast express train."
"They'll never believe it," she said; "but I wouldn't have missed it for the world. What must I do now?—watch the track?"
Brockway said "Yes," though, with all his interest in other things, he had not omitted that very important part of an engineer's duty from the moment of leaving Arriba. After a roaring silence of some minutes, during which Brockway gave himself once more to the divided business of scanning the rails and burning sweet incense on the altar of his love, she spoke again.
"What is that we are coming to, away out there?" she asked, trying vainly to steady herself for a clearer view.
"The lights of Red Butte," he answered, relaxing his vigilance for the moment at the thought that his little side-trip into the land of joy would so shortly come to an end.
"No, I don't mean those!" she exclaimed, excitedly; "but this side of the lights. Don't you see?—on the track!"
Brockway allowed himself but a single swift glance. Half-way between the flying train and the station the line crossed a shallow sand creek on a low trestle. On both sides of the swale, crowding upon the track and filling the bed of the creek, was a mass of moving forms, against which the lines of glistening rails ended abruptly.
At such a crisis, the engineer in a man, if any there be, asserts itself without reference to the volitional nerve-centres. In the turning of a leaf, Brockway had thrown himself upon the throttle, dropped the reversing-lever, set the air-brake, and opened the sand-box; while Maclure, seeing that his substitute was equal to the emergency, woke the echoes with the whistle. A hundred yards from the struggling mass of frightened cattle, Brockway saw that the air-brake was not holding.
"Don't move!" he cried; and Gertrude cowered in her corner as the heavy reversing-lever came over with a crash, and the great engine heaved and buckled in the effort to check its own momentum.
It was all over before she could cry out or otherwise advertise her very natural terror. The moving mass had melted away before the measured approach of the train; the trestle had rumbled under the wheels; and the 926 was steaming swiftly up to the station under Brockway's guidance.
"Have you had more than enough?" he asked, when he had brought the train to a stand opposite the platform at Red Butte.
"Yes—no, not that, either," she added, quickly. "I'm glad to have had a taste of the real danger as well. But I think I'd better go back; it's getting late, isn't it?"
"Yes. Mac, we resign. Sorry I had to put your old tea-kettle in the back-gear; but the air wasn't holding, and we didn't want any chipped beef for supper. Good-night, and many thanks. Don't pull out till I give you the signal."
They hurried down the platform arm-in-arm, and Gertrude was the first to speak.
"Didn't you think we were all going to be killed?"
"No; but I did think I should never forgive myself if anything happened to you."
"It wouldn't have been your fault. And I've had a glorious bit of distraction; I shall remember it as long as I live."
"Yes; you have actually driven a train fifty miles an hour," laughed Brockway, handing her up the steps of car Naught-fifty.
"I have; and now I shall go in and be scolded eighty miles an hour to pay for it. But I sha'n't mind that. Good-night, and thank you ever so much. We shall see you in the morning?"
"Yes." Brockway said it confidently, and gave a tug at the bell-cord, to let Maclure know they were safely aboard; but when the door of the private car had yawned and swallowed Miss Vennor, he remembered the President's probable frame of mind, and thought it doubtful.
When Brockway pulled the bell-cord, he meant to drop off and wait till the Tadmor came along—a manœuvre which would enable him to rejoin his party without intruding on the President's privacy. Then that reflection about Mr. Vennor's probable frame of mind, and the thought that the late excursion into the fair country of joy would doubtless never be repeated, came to delay him, and he let the train get under way before he remembered what it was that he had intended doing. Whereupon, he scoffed at his own infatuation, and went into the Ariadne to chat with the Burtons until another halt should give him a chance to get back to the Tadmor.
The route to the body of the car led past the smoking-room, and the passenger agent, having missed his after-dinner cigar, was minded to turn aside. But the place was crowded, and he hung hesitant upon the threshold.
"Come in," said Burton, who was one of the smokers.
"No, I believe not; there are too many of you. I'll go and talk to Mrs. Burton."
"Do; she's spoiling to quiz you."
"To quiz me? What about?"
"You wouldn't expect me to tell, if I knew. Go on and find out."
Brockway went forward with languid curiosity.
"I thought you had quite deserted us," said the little lady. "Sit down and give an account of yourself. Where have you been all afternoon?"
"With my ancients and invalids," Brockway replied.
Mrs. Burton shook a warning finger at him. "Don't begin by telling me fibs. Miss Vennor is neither old nor infirm."
Brockway reddened and made a shameless attempt to change the subject.
"How did you like the supper at Carvalho?" he asked.
The general agent's wife laughed as one who refuses to be diverted. "Neither better nor worse than you did. We had a buffet luncheon—baked beans and that exquisite tomato-catchup, you know—served in our section, and we saw one act of a charming little comedy playing itself on the platform at the supper station. Be nice and tell me all about it. Did the cold-blooded gentleman with the overseeing eyes succeed in overtaking you?"
Brockway saw it was no use, and laughed good-naturedly. "You are a born detective, Mrs. Burton; I wouldn't be in Burton's shoes for a farm in the Golden Belt," he retorted. "How much did you really see, and how much did you take for granted?"
"I saw a young man, who didn't take the trouble to keep his emotions out of his face, marching up and down the platform with Miss Vennor on his arm. Then I saw an elderly gentleman pacing back and forth between two feminine chatterboxes, and trying to outgeneral the two happy people. Naturally, I want to know more. Did you really go without your supper to take a constitutional with Miss Gertrude? And did the unhappy father contrive to spoil yourtête-à-tête?"
There was triumph in Brockway's grin.
"No, he didn't—not that time; I out-witted him. And I didn't go without my supper, either. I had the honor of dining with the President's party in the Naught-fifty."
"You did! Then I'm sure she must have invited you;he'dnever do it. How did it happen?"
Brockway told the story of the disabled cooking-stove, and Mrs. Burton laughed till the tears came. "How perfectly ridiculous!" she exclaimed, between gasps. "And she took your part and invited you to dinner, did she? Then what happened?"
"I was properly humiliated and sat upon," said Brockway, in wrathful recollection. "They talked about everything under the sun that I'd never heard of, and I had to sit through it all like a confounded oyster!"
"Oh, nonsense!" said Mrs. Burton, sweetly; "you know a good many things that they never dreamed of. But how did you manage to get Gertrude away from them all?"
"I didn't; she managed it for me. When we got up from the table the train was just slowing into Carvalho. I was going to run away, as befitted me, but she proposed a breath of fresh air on the platform."
"Then you had a chance to show her that you weren't born dumb, and I hope you improved it. But how did you dodge Mr. Vennor?"
"We missed a turn and went forward to look at the engine. Then Ger—Miss Vennor thought she would like to take a ride in the cab, and——"
"And, of course, you arranged it. You knew that was just the thing of all others that would reinstate you. It was perfectly Machiavellian!"
Brockway opened his eyes very wide. "Knew what?" he said, bluntly. "I only knew it was the thing she wanted to do, and that was enough. Well, we skipped back and notified Mrs. Dunham—she's the chaperon, you know—and then we chased ahead again and got on the engine."
"Where I'll promise you she enjoyed more new sensations in a minute than you had all through their chilly dinner," put in Mrs. Burton, who had ridden on many locomotives.
"She did, indeed," Brockway rejoined, exultantly, living over again the pleasure of the brief hour in the retelling. "At Arriba, the engineer turned the 926 over to me, and I put Miss Vennor up on the box and let her run between Arriba and Red Butte."
"Well—of all things! Do you know, Fred, I've had a silly idea all afternoon that I'd like to help you, but dear me! you don't need my help. Of course, after that, it was all plain sailing for you."
Brockway shook his head. "You're taking entirely too much for granted," he protested. "It was only a pleasant bit of 'distraction,' as she called it, for her, and there was no word—that is I—oh, confound it all! I couldn't presume on a bit of good comradeship like that!"
"You—couldn't—presume! Why, you silly,sillyboy, it was the chance of a lifetime! So daringly original—so utterly unhackneyed! And you couldn't presume—I haven't a bit of patience with you."
"I'm sorry for that; I need a little sympathy."
"You don't deserve it; but perhaps you'd get it if you could show cause."
"Can't you see? Don't you understand that nothing can ever come of it?" Brockway demanded, relapsing fathoms deep into the abyss of hopelessness.
"Nothing ever will come of it if you go on squandering your chances as you have to-day. What is the matter with you? Are you afraid of the elderly gentleman with the calculating eye?"
"Not exactly afraid of him; but he's a millionnaire, and Miss Vennor has a fortune in her own right. And I——"
"Don't finish it. I understand your objection; you are poor and proud—and that's as it should be; but tell me—you are in love with Miss Vennor, aren't you? When did it begin?"
"A year ago."
"You didn't permit yourself to fall in love with her until you knew all about her circumstances and prospects, of course?"
"You know better than that. It was—it was what you'd call love at first sight," he confessed, rather shame-facedly; and then he told her how it began.
"Very good," said Mrs. Burton, approvingly. "Then you did actually manage to fall in love with Gertrude herself, and not with her money. But now, because you've found out she has money, you are going to spoil your chance of happiness, and possibly hers. Is that it?"
Brockway tried to explain. "It's awfully good of you to try to put it in that light, but no one would ever believe that I wasn't mercenary—that I wasn't a shameless cad of a fortune-hunter. I couldn't stand that, you know."
"No, of course not; not even for her sake. Besides, she doubtless looks upon you as a fortune-hunter, and——"
"What? Indeed she doesn't anything of the kind."
"Well, then, if you are sure she doesn't misjudge you, what do you care for the opinion of the world at large?"
"Much; when you show me a man who doesn't care for public opinion, I'll show you one who ought to be in jail."
"Fudge! Please don't try to hide behind platitudes. But about Gertrude, and your little affair, which is no affair; what are you going to do about it?"
"Nothing; there is nothing at all to be done," Brockway replied with gloomy emphasis.
"I suppose nothing would ever induce you to forgive her for being rich?"
"I can never quite forgive myself for being poor, since it's going to cost me so much."
"You are too equivocal for any use. Answer my question," snapped the small inquisitor.
"How can I?" Brockway inquired, with masculine density. "Forgiveness implies an injury, and——"
"Oh,oh—how stupid you can be when you try! You know perfectly well what I mean."
"I'm not sure that I do," said Brockway, whose wit was easily confounded by a sharp tongue.
"Then I'll put it in words of one syllable. Do you mean to ask Miss Vennor to be your wife?"
"I couldn't, and keep my self-respect."
"Not if you knew she wanted you to?" persisted the small tormentor.
"Oh, I say—that couldn't be, you know," he protested. "I'm nothing more than a pleasant acquaintance to her, at the very most."
"But if you knew she did?"
"How could I know it?"
"We are not discussing ways and means; answer the question."
Thereat the man, tempted beyond what he could bear, abdicated in favor of the lover. "If I could be certain of that, Mrs. Burton—if I could be sure she loves me, nothing on earth should stand in the way of our happiness. Is that what you wanted me to say?"
The little lady clapped her hands enthusiastically. "I thought I could find the joint in your armor, after awhile. Now you may go; I want to be by myself and think. Good-night."
Brockway took the summary dismissal good-naturedly, and, as the train was just then slowing into a station, he ran out to drop off and catch the upcoming hand-rail of the Tadmor.
When Gertrude bade Brockway good-night, she changed places for the moment with a naughty child on its way to face the consequences of a misbehavior, entering the private car with a childish consciousness of wrong-doing fighting for place with a rather militant determination to meet reproof with womanly indifference. Much to her relief, she found her father alone, and there was no distinguishable note of displeasure in his greeting.
"Well, Gertrude, did you enjoy your little diversion? Sit down and tell me about it. How does the cab compare with the sitting-room of a private car?"
The greeting was misleading, but she saw fit to regard it as merely the handshaking which precedes a battle royal.
"I enjoyed it much," she answered, quietly. "It was very exciting; and very interesting, too."
"Ah; I presume so. And your escort took good care of you—made you quite comfortable, I suppose."
"Yes."
Mr. Vennor leaned back in his chair and regarded her gravely through the swirls of blue smoke curling upward from his cigar. "Didn't it strike you as being rather—ah—a girlish thing for you to do? in the night, you know, and with a comparative stranger?"
Gertrude thought the battle was about to open, and began to throw up hasty fortifications. "Mr. Brockway is not a stranger; you may remember that we became quite well acquainted——"
"Pardon me," the President interrupted; "that is precisely the point at which I wished to arrive—your present estimate of this young man. I have nothing to say about your little diversion on the engine. You are old enough to settle these small questions of the proprieties for yourself. But touching this young mechanic, it might be as well for us to understand each other. Have you fully considered the probable consequences of your most singular infatuation?"
It was a ruthless question, and the hot blood of resentment set its signals flying in Gertrude's cheeks. Up to that evening, she had thought of the passenger agent only as an agreeable young man of a somewhat unfamiliar type, of whom she would like to know more; but Brockway's moment of abandonment in the cab of the 926 had planted a seed which threatened to germinate quickly in the warmth of the present discussion.
"I'm not quite sure that I understand you," she said, picking and choosing among the phrases for the least incendiary. "Would you mind telling me in so many words, just what you mean?"
"Not in the least. A year ago you met this young man in a most casual way, and—to put it rather brutally—fell in love with him. I haven't the slightest idea that he cares anything for you in your proper person, or that he would have thrust himself upon us to-day if he had known that your private fortune hangs upon the event of your marriage under certain conditions which you evidently purpose to ignore. If, after the object-lesson you had at the dinner-table this evening, you still prefer this young fortune-hunter to your cousin Chester, I presume we shall all have to submit; but you ought at least to tell us what we are to expect."
If he had spared the epithets, she could have laughed at the baseless fabric of supposition, but the contemptuous sentence passed upon Brockway put her quickly upon his defence, and, incidentally, did more to further that young man's cause than any other happening of that eventful day.
"I suppose you have a right to say and think what you please about me," she said, trying vainly to be dispassionate; "but you might spare Mr. Brockway. He didn't invite himself to dinner; and it was I who proposed the walk on the platform and the ride on the engine."
"Humph! you are nothing if not loyal. Nevertheless, I wish you might look the facts squarely in the face."
Gertrude knew there were no facts, of the kind he meant, but his persistence brought forth fruit after its kind, and she stubbornly resolved to neither affirm nor deny. Wherefore she said, a little stiffly:
"I'm quite willing to listen to anything you wish to say."
"Then I should like to ask if you have counted the cost. Assuming that this young man's intentions are unmercenary—and I doubt that very much—it isn't possible that there can be anything in common between you. The social world in which you move, and that to which he belongs, are as widely separated as the poles. I do not say yours is the higher plane, or his the lower—though I may have my own opinion as to that—but I do say they are vastly different; and the woman who knowingly marries out of her class has much to answer for. Admitting that you will do no worse than this, how can you hope to find anything congenial in a man who has absolutely nothing to say for himself at an ordinary family dinner-table?"
"I'm not at all sure that Mr. Brockway hadn't anything to say for himself, though he couldn't be expected to know or care much about the things we talked of. And it occurred to me at the time that it wasn't quite kind in us to talk intellectual shop from the soup to the dessert, as we did."
The President smiled, but the cold eyes belied the outward manifestation of kindliness. "You may thank me for that, if you choose," he went on, in the same calm argumentative tone. "I wanted to point a moral, and if I didn't succeed, it wasn't the fault of the subject. But that is only the social side; a question of taste. Unfortunately, there is a more serious matter to be considered. You know the terms of your granduncle's will; that your Cousin Fleetwell's half of the estate became his unconditionally on his coming of age, and that your portion is only a trust until your marriage with your cousin?"
"I ought to know; it's been talked of enough."
"And you know that if the marriage fail by your act, you will lose this legacy?"
"Yes."
"And that it will go to certain charitable institutions, and so be lost, not only to you, but to the family?"
"I know all about it."
"You know it, and yet you would deliberately throw yourself away on a fortune-hunting mechanic—a man whom you have known only since yesterday? It's incredible!"
"It is you who have said it—not I," she retorted; "but I'm not willing to admit that it would be all loss and no gain. There would at least be a brand-new set of sensations, and I'm very sure they wouldn't all be painful."
It was rebellion, pure and simple, and for once in his life Francis Vennor gave place to wrath—plebeian wrath, vociferous and undignified.
"Shame on you!" he cried; "you are a disgrace to the name—it's the blood of that cursed socialist on your mother's side. Sit still and listen to me—" Gertrude, knowing her own temper, was about to run away—"If you marry that infernal upstart, you'll do it at your own expense, do you hear? You sha'n't finger a penny of my money as long as I can keep you out of it. Do you understand?"
"I should be very dull if I didn't understand," she replied, preparing to make good her retreat. "If you are quite through, perhaps you will let me say that you are tilting at a windmill of your own building. So far as I know, Mr. Brockway hasn't the slightest intention of asking me to marry him; and until you took the trouble to demonstrate the possibility, I don't think it ever occurred to me. But after what you've said, I don't think I can ever consent to be married to Cousin Chester—it would be too mercenary, you know;" and with this parting shot she vanished.
In the privacy of her own stateroom she sat at the window to think it all out. It was all very undutiful, doubtless, and she was sorry for her part in the quarrel almost before the words were cold. She could scarcely forgive herself for having allowed her father to carry his assumption to such lengths, but the temptation had proved irresistible. It was such a delicious little farce, and if it might only have stopped short of the angry conclusion—but it had not, and therein lay the sting of it. Whereupon, feeling the sting afresh, she set her face flintwise against the prearranged marriage.
"I sha'n't do it," she said aloud, pressing her hot cheek against the cool glass of the window. "I don't love Chester, and I never shall—not in the way I should. And if I marry him, I shall be just what papa called Mr. Brockway—only he isn't that, or anything of the kind. Poor Mr. Brockway! If he knew what we have been talking about——"
From that point reflection went adrift in pleasanter channels. How good-natured and forgiving Mr. Brockway had been! He must have known that he was purposely ignored at the dinner-table, where he was an invited guest, and yet he had not resented it; and what better proof of gentle breeding than this could he have given? Then, in that crucial moment of danger, how surely his presence of mind and trained energies had forestalled the catastrophe. That was grand—heroic. It was well worth its cost in terror to look on and see him strive with and conquer the great straining monster of iron and steel. After that, one couldn't well listen calmly to such things as her father had said of him.
And, admitting the truth of what had been said about his intellectual shortcomings, was a certain glib familiarity with the modern catch-words of book-talk and art criticism a fair test of intellectuality? Gertrude, with her cheek still touching the cool window-pane, thought not. One might read the reviews and talk superficially of more books than the most painstaking student could ever know, even by sight. In like manner, one might walk through the picture galleries and come away freighted with great names wherewith to awe the untravelled lover of art. It was quite evident that Mr. Brockway had done neither of these things, and yet he was thoughtful and keenly observant; and if he were ignorant of art, he knew and understood nature, which is the mother of all art.
From reinstating the passenger agent in his rights and privileges as a man, she came presently upon the little incident in the cab of the 926. How much or how little did he mean when he said he was happy to his finger-tips? On the lips of the men of her world, such sayings went for naught; they were but the tennis-balls of persiflage, served deftly, and with the intent that they should rebound harmless. But she felt sure that such a definition went wide of Mr. Brockway's meaning; of compliments as such, he seemed to know less than nothing. And then he had said that whatever came between them—no, that was not it—whatever happened to either of them.... Ah, well, many things might happen—would doubtless happen; but she would not forget, either.
The familiar sighing of the air-brake began again, and the low thunder of the patient wheels became the diapason beneath the shrill song of the brake-shoes. Then the red eye of a switch-lamp glanced in at Gertrude's window, and the train swung slowly up to the platform at another prairie hamlet. Just before it stopped, she caught a swift glimpse of a man standing with outstretched arms, as if in mute appeal. It was Brockway. He was merely standing in readiness to grasp the hand-rail of the Tadmor when it should reach him; but Gertrude knew it not, and if she had, it would have made no difference. It was the one fortuitous touch needed to open that inner chamber of her heart, closed, hitherto, even to her own consciousness. And when the door was opened she looked within and saw what no woman sees but once in her life, and having once seen, will die unwed in very truth if any man but one call her wife.
Once more the drumming wheels began the overture; the lighted bay-window of the station slipped backward into the night, and the bloodshot eye of another switch-lamp peered in at the window and was gone; but Gertrude neither saw nor heard. The things of time and place were around and about her, but not within. A new song was in her heart, its words inarticulate as yet, but its harmonies singing with the music of the spheres. A little later, when the "Flying Kestrel" was again in mid-flitting, and the separate noises of the train had sunk into the soothing under-roar, she crept into her berth wet-eyed and thankful, and presently went to sleep too happy to harbor anxious thought for the morrow of uncertainties.
Brockway was up betimes the following morning, though not of his own free will. Two hours before the "Flying Kestrel" was due in Denver, the porter of the Tadmor awakened him at the command of the irascible gentleman with the hock-bottle shoulders and diaphanous nose. While the passenger agent was sluicing his face in the wash-room some one prodded him from behind, and a thin, high-pitched voice wedged itself into the thunderous silence.
"Mr. ah—Brockway; I understand that you are purposing to take the party to ah—Feather Plume or ah—Silver Feather, or some such place to-day, and I ah—protest! I have no desire to leave Denver until my ticket is made to conform to my stipulations, sir."
Brockway had soap in his eyes, and the porter had carefully hidden the towels; for which cause his reply was brief and to the point.
"Please wait till I get washed and dressed before you begin on me, won't you?"
"Wait? Do you say ah—wait? I have been doing nothing but wait, sir, ever since my ah—stipulations were ignored. It's an outrage, sir, I——"
Brockway had found a towel and was using it vigorously as a counter-irritant.
"For Heaven's sake, go away and let me alone until I can get my clothes on!" he exclaimed. "I promised you yesterday you should have the thirty days that you don't need."
The aggrieved one had his ticket out, but he put it away again in tremulous indignation. "Go away? Did I ah—understand you to tell me to go away, sir? I ah-h-h——" but words failed him, and he shuffled out of the wash-room, cannoning against the little gentleman in the grass-cloth duster and velvet skull-cap in the angle of the vestibule.
"Good-morning, Mr. Brockway," said the comforter, cheerily. "Been having a tilt with Mr. Ticket-limits to begin the day with?"
"Oh, as a matter of course," Brockway replied, flinging the damp towel into a corner, and brushing his hair as one who transmutes wrath into vigorous action.
"Find him a bit trying, don't you? What particular form does his mania take this morning?"
"It's the same old thing. I promised him, yesterday, I'd get the extension on his ticket, and now he says he won't leave Denver till it's done. He 'ah-protests' that I sha'n't go to Silver Plume with the party; wants me to stay in Denver and put in the day telegraphing."
"Of course, you'll do it; you do anything anybody asks you to."
"Oh, I suppose I'll have to—to keep the peace. And if I don't go and 'personally conduct' the others, there'll be the biggest kind of a row. Isn't it enough to wear the patience of a good-natured angel to frazzles?"
"It is, just that. Have a cigar?"
"No, thank you. I don't smoke before breakfast."
"Neither do I, normally; but like most other people, I leave all my good habits at home when I travel. But about Jordan and the thirty-odd; how are you going to dodge the row?"
"The best way I can. There is a good friend of mine on the train—Mr. John Burton, the general agent of the C. & U., in Salt Lake—and perhaps I can get him to go up the canyon for me."
"Think he will do it?"
"I guess so; to oblige me. He'd lose only a day; and he'd make thirty-odd friends for the C. & U., don't you see."
"I must confess that I don't see, from a purely business point of view," was the rejoinder. "We are all ticketed out and back, and we can't change our route if we want to."
Brockway laughed. "The business of passenger soliciting is far-reaching. Some of you—perhaps most of you—will go again next year; and if the general agent of the C. & U. is particularly kind and obliging, you may remember his line."
"Dear me—why, of course! You say your friend is on the train?"
"Yes."
"Very well; you go and see him, and I'll help you out by breaking the news to the thirty-odd."
Brockway struggled into his coat and shook hands with the friendly one. "Mr. Somers, you're my good angel. You've undertaken a thankless task, though."
The womanish face under the band of the skull-cap broke into a smile which was not altogether angelic. "I shall get my pay as I go along; our friend with the bad case of ticket dementia will be carrying the entire responsibility for your absence before I get through."
"Good! pile it on thick," said Brockway, chuckling. "Make 'em understand that I'd give all my old shoes to go—that I'm so angry with Jordan for spoiling my day's pleasure that I can't see straight."
"I'll do it," the little man agreed. "Take a cigar to smoke after breakfast"—and the gray duster and velvet skull-cap disappeared forthwith around the angle in the vestibule.
Not until he was ready to seek Burton did the passenger agent recollect that the Naught-fifty was between the Tadmor and the Ariadne, and that it would be the part of prudence to go around rather than through the President's car. When he did remember it he stepped out into the vestibule of the Tadmor to get a breath of fresh air while he waited for the train to come to a station. Mrs. Dunham was on the Naught-fifty's rear platform, and she nodded, smiled, and beckoned him to come across.
"I'm glad to know that somebody else besides a curious old woman cares enough for this grand scenery to get up early in the morning," she said, pleasantly.
"You mustn't make me ashamed," Brockway rejoined. "I'm afraid I should have been sound asleep this minute if I hadn't been routed out by one of my people."
Mrs. Dunham smiled. "Gertrude was telling me about some of your troubles. Do they get you up early in the morning to ask you foolish questions?"
"They do, indeed"—and Brockway, glad enough to find a sympathetic listener, told the story of the pertinacious human gadfly masquerading under the name of Jordan.
"Dear, dear! How unreasonable! Will you have to give up the Silver Plume trip and stay in Denver with him?"
"I suppose so. I'm going forward presently to try to get Mr. Burton and his wife to take my place with the party for the day."
"Not Mr. John Burton, of the Colorado & Utah?"
"Yes; do you know him?"
"Only through Gertrude; she met them when she was out here last year, and she likes Mrs. Burton very much indeed."
"I'm glad of that," said Brockway, with greatnaïveté; "they are very good friends of mine."
In the pause that succeeded he was reminded that his way and Gertrude's would shortly diverge again, and in the face of that thought he could not well help asking questions.
"I suppose you are going straight on to Utah," he said, not daring to hope for a negative reply.
"Not to-day. I believe it is Mr. Vennor's plan to go on to-morrow morning."
When he realized what this meant for him, Brockway forgave his evil genius in the Tadmor. Then he gasped to think how near he had come to missing his last chance of seeing Gertrude. But he must know more of the movements of the President's party.
"Will you go to a hotel?" he inquired.
"I think not. I heard Mr. Vennor order dinner in the car, so I presume we shall make it our headquarters during the day."
Brockway reflected that the private car would doubtless be side-tracked on the spur near the telegraph office in the Union Depot, and wrote it down that prearrangement itself could do no more. When the train drew up at Bovalley a little later, he excused himself and ran quickly forward to board the Ariadne. Come what might, Burton must be over-persuaded; the thirty-odd must be given no chance to defeat the Heaven-born opportunity made possible by the pertinacity of the gadfly.
So marched the intention, but the fates willed delay. Bovalley is but a flag-station, and the passenger agent had barely time to swing up to the rear platform of the regular sleeper when the train moved on. Then he found that he had circumvented one obstacle only to be hampered by another. The rear door of the Ariadne was locked, and the electric bell was out of repair. Wherefore it was forty minutes later, and Denver was in sight, when the rear brakeman opened the door and admitted him.
When Mrs. Dunham returned to the central compartment of the Naught-fifty, the waiter was laying the table for breakfast, and the President was looking on with the steadfast gaze which disconcerts.
"Good-morning, Cousin Jeannette. Up early to see the scenery, are you?" The genial greeting had no hint in it of inward disquietude, past or present.
"Yes, and I wish I had been earlier. I have been out on the platform watching the mountains grow."
"Grand, isn't it? You might have had a better view if our car had been left in its proper place in the rear; but our friend the passenger agent took good care to secure that for his own party."
Mrs. Dunham was inclined to be charitable. "I fancy he couldn't help it. From what he tells me, his people must be very exacting."
"Have you seen him this morning?" the President inquired, with some small show of curiosity.
"Yes; out on the platform. He has been telling me some of his exasperating experiences."
The President smiled indulgently. "I suspect our young friend has fallen into a habit of magnifying his difficulties," he said. "It's very easy to do, you know, when one's business makes a fine art of exaggeration."
"Why, he doesn't impress me that way, at all," said the good lady, who knew nothing of her cousin's very excellent reasons for disliking Brockway. "He seems to be a very pleasant young man, and quite intelligent."
Mr. Vennor shrugged his shoulders. "I don't question his intelligence—though it wasn't very remarkable at the dinner-table last night. Did you happen to find out whether he is going all the way across with his party?"
"He didn't say. His people are going up to Silver Plume to-day, but he can't go with them. He has to stay in Denver with one of the exacting ones whose ticket is out of repair."
"Ha! that's a very sharp little trick," said the President; but inasmuch as he did not elucidate, the chaperon misunderstood.
"To get him into trouble with the others? I fancy that is only incidental. Mr. Brockway is going to try to get Mr. Burton—our Mr. Burton, of Salt Lake City, you know—who is on the train, to take charge of the party on the Silver Plume trip."
Mr. Vennor said, "Oh," and then the young people began to appear, and the waiter announced breakfast. During the meal the President was too deeply engrossed in the working out of a small counterplot to hear or heed much of the desultory table-talk. It was quite evident that the passenger agent had learned of the proposed stop-over in Denver, and was preparing to take advantage of it. His confidence with Mrs. Dunham was only a roundabout way of notifying Gertrude.
Mr. Vennor considered many little schemes of the frustrating sort, and finally choosing one which seemed to meet all the requirements, put it in train immediately after breakfast.
"What are you going to do with yourself to-day?" he asked of Fleetwell, when they had drawn apart and lighted their cigars.
"Don't know," replied the collegian, between whiffs; "whatever the others want to do."
"I was just thinking," the President continued, carelessly. "The Beaswicke girls want to call on some friends of theirs, and that eliminates them. I expect to be busy all day; and Cousin Jeannette says she doesn't care to go about. Suppose you and Gertrude take a run up into the mountains on one of the narrow-gauges. It'll fill in the day, and you can be back in time for dinner this evening."
"I don't mind, if Gertrude wants to go; but I don't believe she does," said Fleetwell, with so little enthusiasm that the President looked at him sharply.
"Think not?"
"I'm almost sure she doesn't," the collegian replied, placidly.
Mr. Francis Vennor was a conservative man, slow to admit even the contradiction of facts. While waiting for Gertrude the previous evening, he had convinced himself that his daughter was about to sacrifice herself. To an impartial onlooker—and he prided himself on being no less—the evidence was logically conclusive; and, notwithstanding Gertrude's tardy denial, he still believed that his major premise was correct, or, at most, only errant in time.
Having thus set his judgment a bad example, it easily broke bounds again in the same direction. How should Fleetwell know that Gertrude would not care to spend the day in his company? Probably because they had found time before breakfast for another of their foolish disagreements. In that case, it would be the part of wisdom to separate them for the day; and a plan by which this might be accomplished, and the passenger agent checkmated at the same time, suggested itself at the instant.
"We'll let it go at that, then," he said, answering Fleetwell's assumption. "You can manage to wear out the day in town. Perhaps the Beaswicke girls will let you go calling with them."
"Think so? I'll go and ask them," Fleetwell said, with more animation than he had yet exhibited; and he threw away his cigar and went about it.
The President rose and crossed over to Mrs. Dunham's chair.
"Where is Gertrude?" he inquired.
"She complained of a headache and went to her room. Shall I call her?"
"Oh, no; but if you haven't already done so, I wish you wouldn't mention what Brockway told you, this morning—about his spending the day in Denver, I mean."
"Certainly not, if you wish it," the chaperon agreed; but the expression of her face was so plainly interrogative that the President was constrained to go on.
"There is nothing to be anxious about yet," he hastened to say; "but you know the old adage about the ounce of prevention. Gertrude is very self-willed, and they were together rather more than I could wish, last summer."
"I think you are altogether mistaken, Cousin Francis," said the good lady, in whom there was no drop of match-making blood. "She has talked very freely with me about him, and a young girl doesn't do that if there is any sentiment in the air."
"I hope you are right. But it will do no harm to give ourselves the benefit of the doubt. I fancy Chester didn't quite approve of the little diversion last evening—on the engine, you know."
"Pooh! I don't believe he gave it a second thought."
"Possibly not; but he had a very good right to object. It was a reckless bit of impropriety."
"You sat up for Gertrude last night; did you say as much to her?" the chaperon asked, shrewdly.
"Not quite that," said the President, who was unwilling to go into particulars.
"Because, if you did, it was injudicious, that's all. Gertrude is your own daughter, and she is enough like you to resent anything of that kind in a way to make you regretful. That accounts for the headache this morning."
Gertrude's father smiled rather grimly. "I shall presently find a remedy for the headache, and you'll see that it will work like a charm. But its efficacy will depend upon your discretion. Not a word about the passenger agent, if you please."
Mrs. Dunham promised, rather reluctantly, and Mr. Vennor put on his hat and left the compartment. He had business in the Ariadne; and a little later, Mrs. Burton, who was buttoning her shoe, looked up to find the calculating eyes of the President making a calm and leisurely valuation of her.
There was the usual early morning confusion in the aisle of the Ariadne when Brockway picked his way forward to section three over a litter of opened hand-bags, lately polished shoes, and unshod feet. He found the Burton section empty, with the porter putting the finishing touches to his morning's work of scene-shifting.
"Yes, sah; de gemman's in de washroom, an' de lady——"
"Is right here," said a voice at Brockway's elbow. "Good-morning, Mr. Frederick; how do you find yourself—or aren't you lost?"
The forty-minute lock-out had left scant time for preliminaries, and Brockway left off the preamble.
"I'm not lost, but I'm going to be if you and John don't help me out. Will you do it?"
"Sight unseen." The little lady was eying her shoes wistfully and hoping that Brockway would be brief.
"I thought I could count on you. What is your programme for to-day?"
"For John, business, I suppose; for myself, a carriage, a handy card-case, and any number of 'how do you dos' and 'good-byes.' Why?"
"I want you both to give me the day, out and out. Listen, and don't say no till you've heard me through."
"Go on, but don't let it lap over into Denver; we're 'most there."
Brockway stated his case briefly. "It's probably the last chance I'll ever have to see her," he concluded.
"Why should you want to see her when there is nothing to be done, as you say?"
"I don't know that—but I do, and you must help me. Will you?"
"Help you carry on a brazen flirtation with that poor, innocent girl? Never! But if John says he'll go, I suppose I can't help myself"—resignedly.
"Thank you; I knew you wouldn't be cruel. And if John should happen to balk a little——"
"Why, I'll talk him over, of course; is that what you want?"
"That's it exactly. Thank you some more."
"Don't mention it. Is that all?"
"Y—yes, all but one little trifle of detail. Have you told John about my—my lunacy?"
"No."
"Then don't; it's bad enough to be an idiot and know it myself."
"I sha'n't—perhaps. Isthatall?"
"Yes, I believe so."
"Then for mercy's sake do go and talk to John, and let me put on my shoes," said Mrs. Burton, impatiently. "I can't go to breakfast in my slippers."
Brockway vanished obediently, and presently found Burton struggling into his outer garments in the smoking-room.
"Hello, Fred; how are the invalids this morning? Get you out bright and early?"
"One of them did—that old fellow with the bad case of ticket-limits. I'm in trouble up to my neck, and you've got to help me out."
"Say the word and I'll do it if it costs me something," said Burton, who was nothing if not helpful to his friends.
"It's going to cost you something—a whole day, in fact. I promised to 'personally conduct' the crowd up to Silver Plume to-day, and the arrangements are all made. Now this old fellow says he isn't going; says I've got to stay in Denver with him and telegraph another thirty days to his ticket, or the heavens will fall. I'm going to do it, and I want you to take my place with the party."
"Same old maker of hard-and-fast promises, aren't you, Fred," said the general agent, smiling. "I suppose I can do it, if you can square it with Emily."
"I've done that already; she's awfully good about it—says she'll go along and help you out. What's this place? Overton? By Jove! I'll have to be getting back to my car; we're only fifteen miles out. Thank you much, old man—see you later"—and the passenger agent pushed through the group in the wash-room and dropped off to once more make the circuit of car Naught-fifty.