“The contract is let for the grading. In fact work has already begun. I expect to begin laying the track by next Spring, perhaps sooner. As soon as the track is laid we shall show them.”
David’s eyes shone and he reached out and grasped the hand of the man who had the will and apparently the means of accomplishing this great thing for the country.
“It will make a wonderful change in the whole land,” said David musingly. He had forgotten to eat. His face was aglow and a side of his nature which Marcia did not know was uppermost. Marcia saw the man, the thinker, the writer, the former of public opinion, the idealist. Heretofore David had been to her in the light of her sister’s lover, a young man of promise, but that was all. Now she saw something more earnest, and at once it was revealed to her what a man he was, a man like her father. David’s eyes were suddenly drawn to meet hers. He looked on Marcia and seemed to be sharing his thought with her, and smiled a smile of comradeship. He felt all at once that she could and would understand his feelings about this great new enterprise, and would be glad too. It pleased him to feel this. It took a little of his loneliness away. Kate would never have been interested in these things. He had never expected such sympathy from her. She had been something beautiful and apart from his world, and as such he had adored her. But it was pleasant to have some one who could understand and feel as he did. Just then he was not thinking of his lost Kate. So he smiled and Marcia felt the glow of warmth from his look and returned it, and the two visitors knew that they were among friends who understood and sympathized.
“Yes, it will make a change,” said the older man. “I hope I may live to see at least a part of it.”
“If you succeed there will be many others to follow. The land will soon be a network of railroads,” went on David, still musing.
“We shall succeed!” said Mr. Jervis, closing his lips firmly in a way that made one sure he knew whereof he spoke.
“And now tell me about it,” said David, with his most engaging smile, as a child will ask to have a story. David could be most fascinating when he felt he was in a sympathetic company. At other times he was wont to be grave, almost to severity. But those who knew him best and had seen him thus melted into [child-like] enthusiasm, felt his lovableness as the others never dreamed.
The table talk launched into a description of the proposed road, the road bed, the manner of laying the rails, their thickness and width, and the way of bolting them down to the heavy timbers that lay underneath. It was all intensely fascinating to Marcia. Mr. Jervis took knives and forks to illustrate and then showed by plates and spoons how they were fastened down.
David asked a question now and then, took out his note book and wrote down some things. The two guests were eager and plain in their answers. They wanted David to write it up. They wanted the information to be accurate and full.
“The other day I saw a question in a Baltimore paper, sent in by a subscriber, ‘What is a railroad?’” said the old gentleman, “and the editor’s reply was, ‘Can any of our readers answer this question and tell us what is a railroad?’”