“What is your business?” asked Huggins, growing suspicious of the stranger.
“I haven’t any just now. I am a minister’s son, traveling for my health. I’ll tell you what we might do, pard: if you are a good talker you might coax the agent to let us spend the night in the waiting-room. There’s a good fire there——”
Huggins waited to hear no more. The man was a professional tramp, there was no doubt about that, and the idea of passing the night in the same room with him was not to be entertained for a moment. He started for the office to have a talk with the agent, the tramp keeping close at his heels.
“I made a mistake in getting off here,” said Huggins to the agent, “and I would be greatly obliged if you will direct me to some house where I can put up until morning.”
“I should be glad to do it,” was the answer, “but there is no one right around the depot who can accommodate you. There is a boarding-house for the mill-hands about a mile from here, but I couldn’t direct you to it so that you could find it. The road runs through the woods, and you might miss it and get lost.”
“Why, what in the world am I to do?” asked Huggins, who, having never been thrown upon his own resources before, was as helpless as a child would have been in the same situation. “Must I stay out doors all night?”
“Not necessarily. Where did you come from?”
“I came from Bridgeport and paid a dollar and twenty-five cents to go from there to the next station.”
“Well, the next station is Carbondale, which is three miles from here. There is where you ought to have stopped.”
“Could I hire a horse and cutter to take me there?”