“I’m glad he’s gone,” concluded Conductor Tobin, “for if he hadn’t left, we would have fired him for what he did to Smiler. We won’t have that dog hurt on this road, not if we know it. It won’t hurt him to have to walk to New York, and I don’t care if he never gets there. What worries me, though, is who’ll look after those cattle, and go down to the stock-yard with them, now that he’s gone.”
“Why couldn’t I do it?” asked Rod eagerly. “I’d be glad to.”
“You!” said Conductor Tobin incredulously. “Why, you look like too much of a gentleman to be handling cattle.”
“I hope I am a gentleman,” answered the boy with a smile; “but I am a very poverty-stricken one just at present, and if I can earn a ride to the city, just by looking after some cattle, I don’t know why I shouldn’t do that as well as anything else. What I would like to do though, most of all things, is to live up to my nickname, and become a railroad man.”
“You would, would you?” said Conductor Tobin. Then, as though he were propounding a conundrum, he asked: “Do you know the difference between a railroad man and a chap who wants to be one?”
“I don’t know that I do,” answered the boy.
“Well, the difference is, that the latter gets what he deserves, and the former deserves what he gets. What I mean is, that almost anybody who is willing to take whatever job is offered him can get a position on a railroad; but before he gets promoted he will have to deserve it several times over. In other words, it takes more honesty, steadiness, faithfulness, hard work, and brains to work your way up in railroad life than in any other business that I know of. However, at present, you are only going along with me as stockman, in which position I am glad to have you, so we won’t stop now to discuss railroading. Let’s see what Joe has got for supper, for I’m hungry and I shouldn’t be surprised if you were.”
Indeed Rod was hungry, and just at that moment the word supper was the most welcome of the whole English language. First, though, he went to the wash-basin that he noticed at the forward end of the car. There he bathed his face and hands, brushed his hair, restored his clothing to something like order, and altogether made himself so presentable, that Conductor Tobin laughed when he saw him, and declared that he looked less like a stockman than ever.
How good that supper, taken from the mammoth lunch pails of the train crew, tasted, and what delicious coffee came steaming out of the smoke-blackened pot that Brakeman Joe lifted so carefully from the stove! To be sure it had to be taken without milk, but there was plenty of sugar, and when Rod passed his tin cup for a second helping, the coffee maker’s face fairly beamed with gratified pride.
After these three and Smiler had finished their supper, Conductor Tobin lighted his pipe, and, climbing up into the cupola of the caboose, stretched himself comfortably on the cushioned seat arranged there for his especial accommodation. From here, through the windows ahead, behind, and on both sides of the cupola, he had an unobstructed view out into the night. Brakeman Joe went out over the tops of the cars to call in the other two brakeman of the train, and keep watch for them, while they went into the caboose and ate their supper. They looked curiously at Rod as they entered the car; but were too well used to seeing strangers riding there to ask any questions. They both spoke to Smiler though, and he wagged his tail as though recognizing old friends.