It is amazing the amount of work that can be done in ten minutes, when all the world is working. Tons of trunks had passed in and out, the long platform had been peopled and depopulated twice since the two men began their walk, and now another train gave up its human freight to the already crowded city.
Now, as they went up and down, the Philosopher, at each turn, went a little nearer to the engine. Only three minutes remained to him in which to render his decision, which was to help the unhappy man a half-thousand miles on the way to his dying wife, or leave him sadder still because of the failure—to pine and ponder upon man's inhumanity to man.
Patsy, glancing now and then at the big clock on the station wall, searched the sad face of his friend and tried to read there the answer to the man's prayer.
It would be that the man should ride, he had no doubt, for this story was so like the story of this same man, the Philosopher, with which he had come into Patsy's life, and Patsy had resolved never to turn his back upon a man who was down on his luck.
The Philosopher's face was indecipherable. Finally when they had come to the turning point in the shadow of the mail car, he stopped, leaned against the corner of the tank and said: "I can't make you out, and you haven't made out your case."
"I don't follow you," said the man.
"No? Well suppose I say, for answer, that I'll let you go—sneak away up through the yards and lose yourself; provided you promise not to do it again."
"You talk in riddles. What is it that I am not to do again? You say you have hit the road yourself, and you ought to have sympathy for a fellow out o' luck."
"I have, and that's why I'm going to let you go. Your story is a sad one, and it has softened my heart. It's the story of my own life."
"Then how can you refuse me this favor, that will cost you nothing?"