Breakfast over, I again sought the seclusion of the Torture Chamber. The man with the piece of chalk had been kept busy. No. 31 was now one hour and forty-two minutes late.
When it finally reached Jackson and I boarded it with my grip and overcoat, it looked as if it had run into a glacier somewhere up the road and had half a snowslide still clinging to its length.
Day had broken now, and what light could sift its way through the falling flakes, shone cold and gray into the frost-dimmed windows of the car. I had lost more than two hours of my leeway of three, and the drifts were still level with the hubs of the driving-wheels.
We shunted and puffed and jerked along, waiting on side tracks for freight trains hours behind time and switching out of the way of delayed "Flyers," and finally reached Adrian. (Does anybody know of a Flyer that is on time when but a bare inch of snow covers the track?)
Out of the car again, still lugging my impedimenta.
"Train for Toledo and the East, did you say?" answered the ticket agent. "Yes, No. 32 is due in ten minutes—she's way behind time and so you've just caught her. Your ticket is good, but you can't carry no baggage."
The information came as a distinct shock. No baggage meant no proper habiliments in which to appear before my distinguished and critical audience—the most distinguished and critical which I ever had the good fortune to address—a young ladies' school.
"Why no baggage?"
"'Cause there's nothing but Pullmans, and only express freight carried—it's a news train. Ought to have been here a week ago."
"Can I give up my check and send my trunk by express?"