“Donovan?” said the girl sweetly; “that is—er—a German name, isn’t it?” Miss Bess Holcombe never missed a chance to make an embarrassed boy still more embarrassed, if she could help it.
“No,” Larry blurted out; “it’s Irish.” And then he turned his back on her and began to talk to Bart Johnson, telling him where he was to run slowly, and what he was coming to around the curves ahead.
“Dear me!” said the girl, in an aside to Dick, “what a bear of a boy! He’s—he’s a workingman, isn’t he?”
Dick bridled at once.
“See here, Bess,” he frowned; “down in Brewster, or back in New York where you live, you can draw all the little, no-account social lines you want to. But up here in the mountains a man’s a man, according to how well he holds up his end in the day’s work. Larry’s father is a crossing watchman in Brewster, if you want to know—though he was one of the best locomotive engineers the company had before he lost an arm sticking to his engine to keep a train-load of passengers from going into the ditch—and Larry earned his way through High School by working nights in the company shops. If you think that’s anything against him, you’ve got to fight it out with me.”
The girl’s laugh showed a mouthful of pretty teeth.
“You needn’t be so spiteful about it,” she retorted. “I’m not going to quarrel with your—‘bunkie?’—was that what you called him?” Then: “What are we stopping here for?”
The answer set itself out in action. As the big engine slowed down, Larry dropped from the step and ran on to disappear around the next curve in the canyon. Presently he came in sight again to give the “come-ahead” signal.
“Another place where the O. C. has been doing a lot of shooting,” Dick explained, “and Larry went to see if it would be safe for us to try to pass.” Then he did a bit of the “gruff and workmanlike” on his own account. “You don’t know what a nuisance it is to have this junketing train of yours lugged up here in our way when every minute of our time is worth a million dollars!”
“Why, Dick! you almost make it sound as if we were unwelcome!” was the girl’s quick protest.