My mind was made up in a minute. Here was a real chance to “Give Service.” If I hurried I could get down to the station and catch him before he got on the train. I made sure from the watchman that he had left the college grounds. I looked at my wrist watch. It was quarter to five. Without a moment’s hesitation I picked up the bag and ran out to the street. I caught a car right away and sank down in a seat breathless, but easy in my mind, because the station was only a ten minutes’ ride in the car.
Then, of course, something had to happen. A sand wagon was in the cartrack ahead of us and the motorman jingled his bell so furiously that the driver got excited and pulled the lever that dumped the whole load of sand on the car track.
I jumped out of the car and looked wildly up and down the road to see if there was a taxi in sight. There wasn’t; nothing but a motor truck from the glue factory. There was something covered with canvas in the back of it, and I knew instinctively that it was a dead horse. Did I hesitate a second? Not I. For the sake of my Captain and my country I would have endured anything. I hailed the driver. “I’ll give you a dollar if you’ll take me to the station,” I panted.
The driver laughed out loud. “This is some depoe hack,” he said, “but if you can stand it I guess I can.”
With that he gave me a sidewise glance that was meant to be admiring, I suppose, but I froze him with a look and climbed gravely up beside him.
“It is very important that I be there in time for the five o’clock train,” I remarked by way of explanation.
“You ain’t running away from school, are you?” inquired the driver genially.
“I am not,” I replied frigidly, and looked loftily past him for the remainder of the five minutes’ ride to the station.
I flung the man the dollar and was out of the truck before he had time to say a word, and raced into the long waiting room of the station. I could have shouted with relief when I saw on the blackboard the notice that the five o’clock train for Washington was forty minutes late. I was in time!
But where was Captain Bannister? Nowhere in sight. I walked up and down the length of the waiting room several times, growing more nervous every minute. Suppose that he had discovered that he had left the bag behind and gone back after it only to find it gone? The thought made my blood run cold. Would he come down to the train at all without the bag? Would he not go back and search for it, alarming the whole college? And all the while I had it safe with me! What should I do? Should I go back and run the risk of missing him, or stay and see if he came? One thing I could do. I could telephone back to the college and find out if he had returned for it.