Within a week new schedules were established, and Central freight and passengers went on without delay.
“It's all settled,” said McCarthy. “My dream is coming true. Soon there'll be one system from New York and Boston to Chicago.”
But things not so cheerful were pressing on us. My mother and sister and I had taken a small furnished house in Albany, and fitted up a room for the gentleman, agreeably with his own plan, for he had been urgent in his wish to live with us. Months had passed, but the room was still unoccupied. My sister had made it cosey and homelike, with the pretty arts of a school-girl.
“Don't you think it's lovely?” she said to me one day.
“Oh, it's a charming room!” I exclaimed.
“I wonder why he doesn't like it?”
“I think that he does like it.”
“But he's only been here once since it was ready,” she answered. “Just one look at that room was enough for him.”
She turned away, and when I went and put my arm around her waist and kissed her I saw that there were tears in her eyes.
“You silly child,” I said, “you are fond of him!” I had not dreamed of such a thing, and yet I ought to have known it.