I thanked him for his information. That night I went an hour or so before the coaches were brought into the station way down into the railway yards where the coaches stood ready to be coupled to the train. I went to the section house. There was an old section hand there. He held up his lantern to see me.
“Oh, Mother Jones,” he said, “and is it you that’s walking the ties!”
“It’s myself,” said I, “but I’m not walking. I have a sleeper ticket for the south and I want to know if the trains are made up yet. I want to go aboard.”
“Sit here,” he said, “I’ll go see. I don’t know.” I knew he understood without any explaining why I was there.
“I wish you would tell the porter to come back with you,” said I.
He went off, his light bobbing at his side. Pretty soon he returned with the porter.
“What you want, Mother?” says he.
“I want to know if the berths are made up yet?”
“Do you want to get on now, Mother?”