“Two days ago I would no more have thought I’d be in this position than I would of trying to fly. Yet here I am, I’ve run away from the professor, there’s a reward for my arrest, I have just escaped in time, and now I’m bound for I don’t know where. Things are certainly happening to me. Let’s see; that tramp said this train was going east. I don’t suppose it makes much difference to me, but I almost wish it was going west. I’d like to find out what’s become of my folks, and the nearer I get to California, the better chance I have of hearing news from China. I think, after I get far enough away so there’s no danger of me being arrested, I’ll strike out for San Francisco. When I get there I may have a chance to work my passage to China.”
This thought comforted Jack somewhat. As he sat in the dark car, going over in his mind what had happened in the last twenty-four hours, he was suddenly nearly thrown to the floor as the vehicle gave a lurch, following a loud crash. Another car had bumped into the one in which Jack was.
“They’re making up the train,” he said, as he heard the engine whistle. “We’ll be moving pretty soon.”
He went to the door and peered out of the small opening the tramp had left. He could see brakemen running to and fro in the freight yard, while men in greasy blue suits, carrying flaming torches, for it was now getting dark, made hasty examinations of the running gear and trucks of the cars, so that any breaks might be detected before the train started, while journal boxes, in which rest the wheel axles, that had not a sufficient amount of waste and oil, were filled, so that the axles would not get hot, producing what is known in railroad terms as a “hot box.”
Then came more signals from the locomotive. Jack heard men shouting out orders. Next came two short, sharp blasts from the whistle.
“That means we’re going to start,” thought the boy, and, a moment later, with many a squeak and shrill protest from the wheels, the freight train was under way.
Jack soon discovered that riding in a “side-door Pullman” was not very comfortable. The freight car was not as well provided with springs as even an ordinary day coach, and as it went bumping along over the rails, he was jostled about considerably.
“Guess if I got in a corner and braced myself, I could ride easier,” he thought, and, carrying his suit case there, he made himself as comfortable as possible.
“This is better,” he remarked to himself. “Guess I’ll eat now, though I must save some food for breakfast. But what am I going to drink? I never thought of that.”
There was no solution of that problem, and Jack was forced to make a very dry meal on about half of what remained of the food he had brought from the professor’s pantry. In a little while he was more thirsty than before.