The rear end of the last car was opposite the automobile when the train stopped; and Agnes and Gergue pushed that way; for Amos Caretall always got off at the rear end of a train. “If you do that you can’t get run over—unless she backs,” he was accustomed to explain. The two reached the steps just as the Congressman emerged from the car, and Agnes flew up to meet him so that her arms were around his neck when he stepped down to the platform. He was a stocky man of middle height with sandy hair, shrewd, squinting eyes, and a habit of holding his head on one side as though he suffered from that malady called stiff neck.
He hugged Agnes close, affectionately, for an instant, then held her away from him with both hands and surveyed her. “You sure look good, Agnes,” he told her, and hugged her again.
She slipped her hand through his arm. “We came down to get you,” she explained. “Come along—quick. These cinders are awful.”
He laughed. “In a minute. Hello, Peter. Hello, Jim.” He shook hands with Gergue and with Hollow. “Looking for somebody, Peter?”
“Just come down to see you come in.”
“Well—” The Congressman grinned amiably. “I’m in.”
“We wish to welcome you home, Congressman,” said James T. Hollow.
“Thanks, Jim.”
The three men were silent for a moment. The situation had its interesting side. When Gergue and Hollow had been alone together, Gergue was the dominant figure of the two. Gergue seemed then like a superman, calm, assured, at ease; and Hollow, beside Gergue, had been almost pathetically docile.
Now, however, in the presence of the Congressman, Gergue seemed to shrink to Hollow’s stature. He and Hollow were both mere creatures, Hollow if anything the stronger of the two. And Amos Caretall towered head and shoulders above them both.