Thereupon one may conceive that all the good in him would rise up and plead strenuously for a little respite, for a few hours of sober second thought in which the soul-destroying possibilities of such a relapse might be weighed and measured; but to such a plea such a man must needs harden his heart and drive out the better prompting with muttered curses, as thus: “No, by God! I have listened to that song for the last time! From now on there is nothing to do but to forget, if I can. And I shall forget, I will forget, if I have to smother myself in the reek of the bottomless pit to do it!”
As he passed the colonel’s desk on his way to the door his hand sought the train mail box mechanically and from force of habit. There were two letters in the box, letters written by the chief engineer before going out with the party in the private car, and Brant slipped them into his pocket, excusing himself to himself for letting the bit of routine obtrude itself into the presence chamber of desperate resolves. “I’ll take them down and put them on the train. It is my last day of honest work, and I’ll round it out fairly.”
The masthead electric lamps over the platform at the Union Depot lighted the customary train-time pandemonium when he passed through the archway and made one in the jostling crowd under the arc lamps. It was before the day of gates and gate keepers, and the unquiet throng filled the open space opposite the archway. From the open space as a fountain head little rivulets of humanity filtered away to trickle up and down between the trains headed in either direction.
A symphony of sound, pitched in the key of preparation, rose upon the still air of the outer night. The hum of human voices; the rumblings of the baggage trucks piled mountain-high with outgoing luggage; the monotonous “Look out!” of the baggagemen as they steered the rumbling mountains slowly through the throng; the measured beat of the air-brake pumps on the waiting engines, drowned at irregular intervals by a cacophonous blast from some overloaded safety valve—these contributed to a din which was rather harmonious than discordant.
But if the savage scowl of him told the truth, Brant was in no mood to find harmony in anything—to find it or to contribute to it. Having mailed the two letters in the baggage car, he pushed his way aggressively through the narrow space between the trains, intent only upon getting free of the crowd. At the steps of the Pullman he jostled one man so rudely that the victim turned in pardonable heat. It was Hobart; and when he recognised the offender resentment gave place to gladness.
“Why, George! By all that’s good, this is lucky! I had given up all hope of seeing you on this trip.”
Brant shook hands as if it were a thing which could not be avoided, and his greeting was anything but cordial. “How are you?” he said; and then, reverting to the hope, “I guess it wasn’t very hard to give up; I haven’t been hard to find.”
“Perhaps not, but I managed to miss you all around; drove first to your boarding house, and have just come down from your office. I have been in town only an hour and a half, all told, and a good bit of that was used up in taking Kate over to Judge Langford’s. But never mind about that; luck is with us for a minute or two. How are you getting along? and why don’t you write once in a while?”
Brant ignored the friendly questions, and went back of them to the statement of fact.
“Do you know the Langfords?” he asked.