The train slowed down. We walked back through the vestibule. The porter stood at the door, his hand on the catch. When the train came to a stop, he slammed up the platform, jerked open the door, jumped down the stairs, and stood staring. I could see the whites of his eyes.
The sharp tang of pure desert air knifed my nostrils. Even in the air-conditioned car I’d been conscious of sticky emanations oozing into the atmosphere from persons who were sleeping. Out in the desert, the cold, dry air, pure and sharp, dissolved those impurities from my lungs so rapidly it was like a stab.
I held a quarter out to the porter. He started to reach for it, then suddenly jerked his hand back and said, “No, suh. That’s all right, suh. Ah ain’ courtin’ no bad luck— Ah means— Good mornin’, suh.”
I put the quarter back in my pocket.
Kleinsmidt chuckled.
I looked forward along the train. There was a wind blowing. Smoke and steam from the locomotive were whipped back, and tossed about to dissolve into fragments. Kleinsmidt walked ahead with my bag, seemed to know very definitely where he was going. Out beyond the station, I looked up at the sky. The stars were staring steadily down, close to me, unwinking and brilliant. It seemed there wasn’t an inch of the heavens that wasn’t blazing with pin points of light.
Typical of the vagaries of desert climate, the heat had given way to an intense, dry cold.
“Got an overcoat?” Kleinsmidt asked.
“No.”
“Okay, the car’s warm.”