Snow on the headlight

by Cy Warman

"Excuse me," said the Philosopher, reaching for the match-box, "I've lost my fire."

The melancholy man made a move towards his vest, paused, changed his mind, and passed over his lighted cigar.

"Go on," said the examining judge, when he had got his cigar going again.

Now at each turn the Philosopher quickened his pace, and the man, eager to finish his sad story, walked beside him with a graceful, springy walk. The man's story was so like his own—so like the tale he had told to Patsy when the strikers had chased him into a box car—that his heart must have melted, had it not been for the fact that he was becoming more and more convinced, as the story grew upon him, that the man was lying. Now and then he said to himself in spite of himself, "This must be true," for there were tears in the man's voice, and yet there were things about him that must be explained before he could ride.

"Patsy," said the Philosopher, pausing before the conductor, "if you'll stand half the strain, I'll go buy a ticket for this man to Cheyenne."

"N' no," said the man, visibly affected by this unexpected generosity, "n' no, I can't let you do that. I should be glad of a ride that would cost you nothing and the company nothing; but I can't—I can't take your money," and he turned away, touching the cuff of his coat, first to his right and then to his left eye.

Patsy sighed, and the two men walked again. Five minutes more and the big engine would begin to crawl from the great shed, and the voyager began wondering whether he would be on board. The engineer was going round the engine for the last time. The fireman had spread his fire and was leaning leisurely on the arm-rest. The Pullman conductors, with clean cuffs and collars, were putting away their people. The black-faced porters were taking the measures of men as they entered the car. Here comes a gray-haired clergyman, carrying a heavy hand-satchel, and by his side an athletic looking commercial tourist.

One of the black porters glides forward, takes the light hand-grip, containing the travelling man's tooth-brush, nightshirt, and razor, and runs up the step with it.

Now a train arrives from the West, and the people who are going away look into the faces of the people who are coming home, who look neither to the right nor left, but straight ahead at the open gates, and in three minutes the empty cars are being backed away, to be washed and dusted, and made ready for another voyage. How sad and interesting would be the story of the life of a day coach. Beaten, bumped, battered, and banged about in the yards, trampled and spat upon by vulgar voyagers, who get on and off at flag stations, and finally, in a head-end collision, crushed between the heavy vestibuled sleepers and the mighty engine.

But sadder still is the story of a man who has been buffeted about and walked upon by the arrogant of this earth, and to such a story the Philosopher was now listening. The man was talking so rapidly that he almost balled up at times, and had to go back and begin again. At times it seemed to him that the Philosopher, to whom he was talking, was giving little or no attention to his tale; but he was. He was making up his mind.