Through the murk came the winking eye of the conductor’s lantern.
“That your dog that broke loose?” he asked.
“Yes.” David handed him his ticket.
“Too bad. I saw him go. He just raised up and gave one jump. Shot out of the baggage before they could grab him.”
“I’m glad they didn’t try to grab him,” said David.
“From what I seen of him I guess that’s right. North Station? Eight-thirty.” He leaned across the aisle and shook the sleeping man’s arm. “Belvidere next stop. Your station.”
Ahead in the night sprang the parallel silver ribbons, the glistening rails that shot beneath the rocking Titan of steam and steel and wound smoothly away to nothing as the train thundered on. David could hear the humming wheels beneath him clack quickly over the switch-points of infrequent freight sidings and then the reëchoed roar as the train whirled between the forest walls, driving the long shaft of its head-light through the eerie gloom of the dripping woodlands.
He rapped the ashes from his pipe and closed the window. The scar above his temple throbbed and pained him. He passed his hand through his hair. His head felt hot, despite the chill that ran through his limbs. His hand trembled as he felt for his pipe again. “This won’t do,” he muttered. “Wonder what the dickens is the matter with me? I never felt this way before.”
Then he drew a memorandum book from his pocket and sat gazing into space, frequently jotting down figures. Soon he was completely absorbed in the intricacies of approximating roughly the cost of establishing a plant to mine the asbestos on Lost Farm. “Now if the N. M. & Q. crosses five miles below us, it’s going to make quite a difference. I doubt that a spur from Timberland would be practicable. Perhaps it’s a bluff—this new survey. Maybe the old survey was a bluff. Bascomb had it in his power to do as he pleased about that. Anyway, the stuff’s there and he wants it. If they were going to cross at Lost Farm, we should have received notice from their attorneys before this, that’s certain. Right of eminent domain would settle that. Well, we’ll stick to our guns and fight it out. It’s bully!” he exclaimed aloud. “It’s worth while; and if we win out, well, Swickey will have to change her first name, that’s certain. She will go to school, of course.” He tried to picture Swickey as a gracefully gowned young woman like—no, not like Elizabeth Bascomb. She could never be like Bessie; and yet—why should she be like any one but herself. The memory of Swickey’s last appeal came to him keenly; the pleading eyes, the parted lips—
He arose, opened the car door, lurched across the platform to the next car, where he dropped into a more comfortable seat, and pulling his hat-brim over his eyes, fell asleep.