"Where are you going?" he asked.
"For food," said I. "I'm nearly dead for a cup of coffee."
"We're not going to stop any time," said he, with a glance at his watch. "We're seven hours late as it is."
"Oh, come now, Conductor!" said I. "Five minutes more isn't going to hurt anybody—"
"All right," said he, "go ahead. Only when you hear the whistle blow don't lose a minute, hungry or no hungry."
With that understanding I sped to the lunch counter, and in a few moments had a roll and a steaming cup of coffee before me; but, alas for all human expectations! the coffee was so fearfully hot nothing but a salamander could have hoped to drink it with safety, and I had hardly taken one scalding sip of it when the whistle blew sharply. There was but one thing to do, and I did it. I poured the coffee into my saucer and drained as much as I could of it from that, thrust the roll into my pocket, and darted after the train, which had already begun to move slowly, conscious all the while of the soft thud of pattering feet, like those of the white rabbit in "Alice in Wonderland," behind me. I caught the train, seizing the rear platform rail with one hand, and when swinging myself on board was projected almost flat on my face by another passenger who suddenly developed like an infant battering ram at the rear. He was a little man, and his breath came in appropriate pants. Both completely winded, we gazed into each other's eyes.
"Bub-beg pardon," he gasped. "I dud-didn't mean to bub-bump into you. Very grateful to you—yuh—you saved my life!"
"Saved your life?" said I. "How so?"
"Why," said he, "I was nearly gone for want of my coffee, and the stuff was so infernally hot I couldn't drink it, and then when I saw you pouring yours out into your saucer, I says to myself, 'Well, if a swell-lookin' guy like that kin do that, I kin,—an' b'gosh, I did!"
A not infrequent source of terror to the platform speaker, if not a real peril, is the small boy one encounters en route, singly and alone or in groups. I am glad to say that I have always delighted in him, and so far, despite the possibilities, none of my contacts with him has resulted disastrously; but, while nobody ever need mark him "FRAGILE," it is none the less true that he should be handled with care, and kept right side up if possible, for the sake of the general comfort.