“It is very kind of you,” said Nell, gratefully, as she sipped her tea and nibbled the doughnut. Then, remembering a problem which had been bothering her several times that evening, she said rather anxiously, “Now that you are here, will you tell me how I am to find your house? It will be quite dark at eight o’clock, for the moon does not rise until nearly midnight.”
“I’ll come and fetch you myself. It is lucky that the weather is frosty to-day, or a nice time I should have had of it tramping through the mud. There is that telegraph again. What a nuisance the thing is!” Mrs. Nichols said, as the warning machine ticked out its third summons while Nell drank her tea.
“There is a clerk at Lytton who seems to find time hang heavy on her hands to-night, for she keeps calling me up, and asking me if I won’t talk; but I don’t know what to say to her,” replied Nell.
“Tell her so, then, and she will soon leave off. Well, I must go now and see if Miss Simpson is through with her frizzing and curling. If she goes on torturing her poor hair like this for another ten years she won’t have any left;” and away went Mrs. Nichols, puffing and wheezing like a laden locomotive on an up-grade track.
“I wonder why she stares at me so much?” Nell said to herself, when the stout woman had gone, for the scrutiny of Mrs. Nichols had been very close and keen, making her feel vaguely uncomfortable.
Just then there was a call from the sounder. Nell had to take down a list of instructions from Camp’s Gulch, then send a message to Roseneath. After that Lytton called her up again, and so the evening went on.
Ten minutes before the cars for Lytton came in, Miss Simpson sailed into the office in all the glory of her frizzed hair, her best hat, and smart new winter coat.
“Thought I’d just look in and see how you are getting on, though it is rather a shame to come and make you envious,” she said, with a laugh at her own wit.
“Why envious?” asked Nell, simply, thinking the envy was to be called forth by the splendours of Miss Simpson’s array.
“Because I’m going away, of course, and you have got to stay on here in this dull hole. Wait until this time next week and see if you don’t find yourself longing to be in my shoes.”