Leaning against one of the big white stone pillars of the porch of his home, Cyrus wearily tore open No. 18—and the words fairly swam before his eyes. He had to rub them hard to make sure that he was not mistaken.
Go again to Kingston Heights, corner West and Dwight streets, reaching there by 6:50. Read No. 19. C. W., Jr.
The boy looked up at the windows, desperately angry at last. If his pride and his sense of the meaning of that phrase, "My word of honour," as the men of the Woodbridge family were in the habit of teaching it to their sons, had not been both of the strongest sort, he would have rebelled and gone defiantly and stormily in. As it was, he stood for one long minute with his hands clenched and his teeth set; then he turned and walked down the steps, away from the longed-for dinner, and out toward L Street and the car for Kingston Heights.
As he did so, inside the house, on the other side of the curtain, from behind which he had been anxiously peering, Cornelius Woodbridge, Senior, turned about and struck his hands together, rubbing them in a satisfied way.
"He's come—and gone," he cried softly, "and he's on time to the minute!"
Cornelius, Junior, did not so much as lift his eyes from the evening paper, as he quietly answered, "Is he?" But the corners of his mouth slightly relaxed. One who knew him well might have guessed that he thought it a simple matter to risk any number of chances on a sure thing.
The car seemed to crawl out to Kingston Heights. As it at last neared its terminus, a strong temptation seized the boy Cyrus. He had been on a purposeless errand to this place once that day. The corner of West and Dwight streets lay more than half a mile from the end of the car route, and it was an almost untenanted district. His legs were very tired; his stomach ached with emptiness. Why not wait out the interval which it would take to walk to the corner and back in the little suburban station, read "Env. No. 19," and spare himself? He had certainly done enough to prove that he was a faithful messenger.
Had he? Certain old and well-worn words came into his mind: they had been in his "writing-book" in his early school-days: "A chain is no stronger than its weakest link." Cyrus jumped off the car before it fairly stopped and started at a hot pace for the corner of West and Dwight streets. There must be no weak places in his word of honour.
Doggedly he went to the extreme limit of the indicated route, even taking the longest way round to make the turn. As he started back, beneath the arc light at the corner there suddenly appeared a city messenger boy. He approached Cyrus grinning, and held out an envelope.
"Ordered to give you this," he said, "if you made connections. If you'd been later than five minutes past seven, I was to keep dark. You've got seven minutes and a half to spare. Queer orders, but the big railroad boss, Woodbridge, give 'em to me."