"I'm a hopeless fool," he thought, "a fool in anger, a fool in love. A fool even in the eyes of that idiot of a railroad president in yonder smirking around Fannie.
"They'll laugh at me together, I suppose. O, Fannie, why can't I give you up? I know you're a flirt. Jeff-Jack knows it. I solemnly believe that's why he doesn't ask you to marry him!
"Yes, they're probably all laughing at me by now. O, was ever mortal man so utterly alone! And these people think what makes me so is this silly temper. They say it! Mother assures me they say it! I believe I could colonize our lands if it wa'n't for that. O, I will colonize them! I'll do it all alone. If that jackanapes could open this road I can open our lands. Whatever he used I can use; whatever he did I can do!"
"Sir?" said the neighbor at his elbow, "O excu—I thought you spoke."
"Hem! No, I was merely clearing my throat.
"I can do it. I'll do it alone. She shall see me do it—they shall all see. I'll do it alone—all alone——"
He caught the steel-shod rhythm of the train and said over and over with ever bigger and more bitter resolution, "I'll do it alone—I'll do it alone!"
Then he remembered Garnet.