“Why, I know ’im like a book,” Muldoon was saying. “Name’s Landon, Ole Joe Landon of Gloucester, made his money on codfish: ante up there, Patsy.”
“It’s his do,” said Patsy.
“Come to the centre there, ole brandin’ iron,” said the editor to the cattleman, and the latter dropped a cartridge among the coin and other equivalent upon the impoverished poker table.
Time had been when McGuire could linger and laugh for hours where these rollicking voyagers played and told stories, but now their talk seemed absolutely silly, not to say vulgar, and he turned away.
“After all,” mused McGuire, “there’s not such a gulf between us. She’s a rich merchant’s daughter, I’m a poor conductor. She must ever remain a merchant’s daughter with no show for promotion. I’m due to be a superintendent, a general manager, and, possibly, the president of a railroad. And then—if she is still a merchant’s daughter! well, it’s a long, long road, but by the god o’ the wind, I’ll make the effort. If I fail, very well, I shall be better for having tried.”
Seating himself in a quiet corner, McGuire began to count upon the fingers of his left hand the men who had begun far below where he now stood and worked up to positions of trust. First he counted presidents only. There were Manvill, Moffett, Newell, Blackstone, Clark of the U. P., Clark of the M. & O., Towne, Hughitt, and Van Horne. When he began on the general managers he had to go to the other hand, and when he came to count the self-made superintendents, beginning loyally with “the old man” of the mountain division, he ran out of fingers and took heart. And what a prize to work for, and she was rich. Incidentally she was an angel.
He could not tell why he did so, but he now went back through the car, and as he was passing the old merchant’s section the head engine, which was wearing a pilot plough, screamed for brakes, and the train came to a dead stop.
“Anything wrong?” asked the traveller.
“Oh! no,” said McGuire cheerfully, “just a little skiff o’ snow.”
Now, he had made up his mind not to look into the eyes of the girl again, but when she leaned over and asked, with just the sweetest, distressing little scare in her voice, if there were any wolves about, he had to look.