“She’s a dear girl,” he said.
“Yes,” agreed Mamie, a little doubtfully.
“But not the dearest,” added Allan smiling. “Come here. Look what a beautiful sunset. Look at those crimson clouds along the horizon.”
“Who is the dearest?” asked Mamie, refusing to be led aside from the question under discussion. “Can’t you guess?”
“I’m not good at guessing.”
“It’s the same one I jerked from in front of an engine years and years ago; the same one I used to do sums for; the same one who saved my life just the other day. Now can you guess?”
“Yes,” said Mamie, dimpling and snuggling close to him; “yes, I think I can!”
And so we leave them.
What does the future hold? For one thing, be sure that it holds happiness. Be sure, too, that the young train master will not always be merely that. He can afford to wait—to grow and broaden, to learn his business thoroughly; but the time will come when he will step up and up. Yet, however high he climbs, those first years, whose history we know, will be a sweet and ever-present memory, as years of trial always are when one has emerged from them triumphant.