Grampa was not very much interested, so 'Tilda Jane tried something more startling.
"There's great talk of railroad accidents there. Men get killed awful. I heard a table-girl ask a brakeman how he could go on a train for fear he'd be hurt, an' he said he dassent stop to think, he had to take chances. I used to see 'em runnin' like cats on top o' them cars, slippery with snow an' ice. If you're inside one o' them cars, grampa, an' there's goin' to be a turnover, jus' grip hard on somethin' steady, 'cause then you're not so apt to get killed. I heard a conductor say that."
Grampa's travelling days were over, yet it pleased him to be talked to as if he were still a strong and active man, and he said, shortly, "I'm not likely to be going far from home."
"You don't know, grampa," she said, soothingly. "Some day when you get nice and well, I'd like to travel with you, but first you must be very quiet like one of Job's mice, an' not have anythin' gnawin' at you—I guess you've had lots of plague times in your life."
Grampa looked unheedingly beyond her to the apple-trees.
Her face was shrewd and puckered, and she was surveying him like a cunning little cat.
"Sometimes, grampa, I hear you fussin' in your sleep—moanin' an' cryin' like a poor dog what's lost her pups."
The old man turned and looked at her sharply.
She went on boldly, "Can I lie in my soft, warm bed up-stairs an' you a-sufferin'? No, I creepy, creepy down, to see if I can do anythin'."