“There you are,” announced his companion, pausing and pointing over at a train on a siding. “Isn’t that last car the very picture of the one that Dallas was on?” 246
“Remarkably so,” assented Ralph.
“I’ve got to get to the roundhouse,” explained the little fellow, turning back in his tracks. “Thought you’d want to know about that car, though.”
“I do, most emphatically,” declared Ralph, “and greatly obliged to you for thinking of it.”
Ralph approached the train on the siding. It was one of the queerest he had ever seen. There was a motley gathering of every class of freight cars on the line. As he passed along he noted the destination of some of the cars. No two were marked for the same point of delivery. It was easy to surmise that they were victims of the recent blockade.
Ralph came up to the rear car of the incongruous train with a good deal of curiosity. It was not the car that had made that mysterious run to Fordham Spur with Zeph Dallas, although it looked exactly like it. The present car was newer and more staunch. A fresh discovery made Ralph think hard. The car was classified as “fast freight,” and across one end was chalked its presumable destination.
“Fordham Spur,” read the young engineer. “Queer—the same as the other car. I wonder what’s aboard?”
Just like the other car, the curtains were closely 247 drawn in this one. There was no sign of life about the present car, however. Smoke curled from a pipe coming up through its roof. No one was visible in the immediate vicinity except a flagman and some loiterers about a near switch shanty. Ralph stepped to the rear platform of the car. He placed his hand on the door knob, turned it, and to his surprise and satisfaction the door opened unresistingly.
He stepped inside, to find himself in a queer situation. Ralph stood in the rear partitioned-off end of the car. It resembled a homelike kitchen. An oil stove stood on a stand, and around two sides of the car were shelves full of canisters, boxes and cans, a goodly array of convenient eatables. Lying asleep across a bench was a young colored man, who wore the cap and apron of a dining-car cook.
Ralph felt that he was intruding, but his curiosity overcame him. He stepped to the door of the partition. Near its top was a small pane of glass, and through this Ralph peered.