Brecky knew every inch of that line. As they approached the desired destination, he got up and went out upon the platform. The pinochle players saw him standing there, in the wind and the rain. Then, suddenly, he vanished. He had climbed down the steps and jumped.
The fall stunned him, and he lay still for an instant. When he could breathe freely again, he rose, and mechanically tried to brush himself off. He was always a neat fellow.
The train had disappeared, and he was alone in the universe. He could still hear the sea, dull and menacing, and the demoniac wind still blew. He didn’t quite know where he was. His plan was to follow the tracks.
Wet to the skin, a sinister enough figure with his face nearly hidden by pulled down cap and turned up collar, he went doggedly[Pg 48] forward toward the next station. He presented the appearance of a highwayman.
Before long he saw the feeble light of the New Chelsea station ahead of him, blurred through the rain. With a sigh of relief he mounted the wooden platform, where he was for the moment sheltered from the weather.
He tried to open the door, but it was locked. He looked in through the window, and saw the dimly lit room, quite empty, and the stove, without fire. Evidently the station master had gone for the night. This was a blow to Brecky, for he had counted upon making inquiries here.
He prowled around the platform, scowling, trying to plan his course. To his right he saw a few scattered lights, which must be, he thought, the village of New Chelsea; and he went toward them, along a muddy road. In due time he reached the main street. There was a drug store, closed and locked, with a ghostly green light in the window. There was also a protective light in the window of a well stocked grocery; but not a human being to be seen, not a sound to be heard, except the yelping of a dog somewhere in the hills that rose behind the town and partly sheltered it from the wind. Only a sudden cruel gust, from time to time, met him full in the face.
He turned a corner, and at the end of the street he saw a distant form, walking with a slow and deliberate step very familiar to him. It was a policeman, and Brecky hastened after him.
“I’ve lost my bearings,” he said. “Is Charley Sands’s place anywhere near here?”
The policeman hesitated for a moment, with rural caution.