The station agent is a busy man, with three or four hard-worked assistants; for all the supplies for one of the big furnaces come in over this branch, and the furnace’s product goes out by the same route. The furnace itself towers above the very station, great ore piles spraddling over acres of ground waiting for the traveling crane that scoops them and carries the ore to the fires.
On the other side of the station, across the street, there are two buildings with ornate fronts—and locked doors. They proclaim themselves as buildings with a past—a bibulous past. County local option was their ruin, county local option locked their doors and stripped their shelves and spread dust upon their bars. They are ugly things, eyesores, specters of shame. Whatever may be said for the wares they dispense, there is nothing more hideous than a saloon.
Gergue and Hollow crossed the street at a diagonal, past these locked saloons, to the station platform. They found on the platform a familiar throng. Hardiston was the county seat, and served as market place for the southern half of the county. Many people came and went daily on the dirty, rattling, uncomfortable trains; and this, the afternoon train, always picked up a score or so of passengers southward bound.
In addition to these travelers, there were folk at the station to meet every incoming passenger; for Hardiston still meets people at the train. Guests, home-comers, even the commercial travelers find a welcome waiting. Every one in the neighborhood stops at the station at train time to pick up matters for gossip.
Gergue made it his custom to meet a train whenever no more important matter occupied his time; for by so doing he saw many men of the county whom he would not otherwise have seen, and renewed acquaintances that would otherwise have languished. He was, as it were, a professional meeter of trains, like the editors of the three weekly papers, and the bus men from the hotels. He left Hollow at one end of the platform, while he traversed its length, exchanging a word with every one, observing, inquiring, cultivating.
On this business, he was fifty yards away from Hollow when the Caretall touring car whirled down the street and stopped beside the platform. Hollow took off his hat in greeting, and the four young people in the car acknowledged the salutation carelessly.
Agnes Caretall was driving, with Jack Routt beside her in the front seat, and Wint Chase and Joan Arnold in the tonneau. They remained in the car, the two in front turning half around in their seats to talk with those behind. Agnes Caretall did most of the talking. She was a gay little thing, with fair hair and laughing eyes and flying tongue. Joan Arnold was darker, brown hair, eyes almost black. She was quiet, with a poise in sharp contrast to Agnes’ vivacity. Routt and Wint Chase were just average young men, pleasant enough in appearance. Routt was dark; Wint had a fair skin, his father’s strong jaw, eyes that inclined at times to sulky anger, and a head of crisp hair that was brown, with golden flashes when the sun touched it. There was a healthy color in his cheeks, but his eyes were reddened, and there were faint pouches beneath them. While they waited for the train, he rolled a cigarette, fizzling his first attempt because his hands were faintly tremulous. Routt laughed at him for this.
“You’re shaky, Wint,” he jested. “Better take a tailor-made one.”
And he offered the other his cigarette case; but Wint shook his head stubbornly, tried again, and this time succeeded in rolling a passable cigarette, which he lighted eagerly.
Peter Gergue, coming back along the platform, saw the four in the car and came toward them. He caught Joan Arnold’s eyes and took off his hat, and she smiled a greeting; and he came and stood beside the car, exchanging sallies awkwardly with Agnes Caretall and with Routt.