“I wonder if I am going to faint or die. I wish some one would bring me some water,” she thought, looking in the faces of those nearest to her to see if she dared speak to them.
They were strange and new, with something different in their expression from the home faces familiar to her. She could not appeal to them, and, removing her hat and leaning her head back against a post, she shut her eyes and sat as still and nearly as white as if she were dead. How long she sat thus she did not know. There was a partial blank in her consciousness. The hum of voices, the splash of the water and the thuds of the engine all mingled together in one great roar, which made her head ache harder. Then she must have slept for a few minutes, and when she woke it was to find a young man standing beside her and scanning her curiously.
“Oh-h!” she said, with a start, and reached for her hat, which had fallen from her lap.
The young man picked it up and handed it to her, saying: “Aren’t you Miss Elithe Hansford, from Samona?”
“Yes, sir,” Elithe answered, timidly.
“I thought so,” he continued, taking a seat beside her. “I’m Paul Ralston. I guess you have never heard of me.”
Elithe did not reply, and he went on: “I know your aunt, Miss Phebe Hansford,—have known her for years. We are great friends. She told me you were coming about this time. We must have been on the same train part of the way. I didn’t see you. Funny, too, as I went through all the sleepers looking for some one I thought might be there.”
“I wasn’t in a sleeper. I came in a common car, and it was so hot!” Elithe said.
“You don’t mean you came all the way from Montana in a common car!” Paul exclaimed, and Elithe replied: “Yes, I do,” in a weary kind of way, which struck Paul with an intense pity for her.
“Great Scott! What made you do that? I wonder you are alive. Why did they let you?” he said, impulsively, his voice indicating that somebody was to blame.