CHAPTER VIII
LITTLE JACK’S PROMOTION
“Idon’tcare a tinker’s dime about Denis McGuire,“ said the agent, angrily, “but something must be done for little Jack. He’s having malaria. Winter will be coming on and he can’t stand a winter in that shanty.”
“I can take Jack in my office to carry dispatches,” said the roadmaster; “but who can I put on the bridge to watch it as that boy does?”
“There you are,” replied the agent, sarcastically. “Because the boy is faithful, you would keep him there until he dies and leaves his mother utterly helpless. But,” he added quickly—for he was a good stayer when he elected to stay—“since you ask my advice, I’ll tell you: Put Denis McGuire on the bridge—he’s a cripple for life; crippled in the service of this company.”
“I’ve told ye,” said the roadmaster, “thatDenis McGuire was barred from workin’ fur the Vandalia phile I’m here.”
The agent wore a look of disgust, as he turned to answer a call.
Presently he came near the roadmaster, drew a chair, and said, as though he were telling a new, strange story to a little child: “I knew a section boss once who let a flat car get away on the hill at Collinsville; the car ran out on the main line, collided with the President’s private car, wrecked it and killed a trainman. He was discharged, reinstated after a few months, and is now—”
“That was not my fault,” broke in the roadmaster, “I sint a man to set the brake.”
“Denis McGuire sent a man to flag, but—”
“And he should have seen the flagman beyent th’ curve before loadin’ th’ push kayre.”
“And the gentleman at Collinsville should have seen that the brake was in working order before kicking the block from under the wheel with his own brave foot,” said the agent, nodding his head to clinch the point.
The roadmaster was beaten out. Presently he got to his feet and began walking the floor.When the local freight came along the agent told the conductor what had passed between the official and himself. “Hazelton,” said the agent, “they won’t give you a passenger train because you’re a good man on freight. Jim Law is no good as a freight man so they reward him with a soft run; a thorn for virtue and a rose for vice. Hazelton, the poor should help the poor—speak a word for little Jack, the Hibernian czar goes down with you to-day.”
And it came to pass that Denis McGuire, with one leg shorter than the other, was made watchman at Silver Creek, and little Jack went to be messenger boy in the office of the roadmaster.
Although loath to part company with his little friend, Tommy rejoiced at Jack’s good luck. What distressed him most was the thought that little Mary would not come now to fetch his dinner and put fresh flowers in the old tomato can.
There was no need for him to stay in the shanty nights; in fact, his mother wanted his protection, so Tommy moved back to the McGuire cottage in the heart of Lick Skillet.
To his surprise, Mary continued to bring his dinner until the beginning of the winter term of school, after which Tommy ate a cold lunch or came home for his dinner. He invariably had the tank filled, his mule stabled, and was up the road to meet Mary on her way from school. In winter, when the snow was deep, he took the mule, and the sled that Mr. Collins had made for him, and brought Mary home. It was wonderful, the change that had come over this apparently worthless boy within a year. He could walk into the pay-car, sign his name for forty dollars, and it was his, and he was a man, all but the whiskers, and he felt sure that they would be along on time.
When Jack came home for the holidays, with a new suit of store clothes, presents for his mother, a new, warm cloak for Mary, and firecrackers for all the little boys in the place, he and Tommy had many a happy hour together. East St. Louis was a wonderful city, and they were building a great bridge across the river that ran between the two towns, as wide as Anderson’s orchard and as deep as a well. And some day the roadmaster was going togive Tommy a lay-off and he was to visit Jack, and they would cross the great river on a steamboat with a whistle as big as the water tank.
“An’ dive off d’ bridge,” broke in Tommy, enthusiastically.