“If she grows up like this, she will give many a man the heartache.”
A sigh chased away the smile, and a cold, cynical look came into the dark eyes, as if some unpleasant memory stirred within him.
The train rushed on through the rainy afternoon, past the swamps and forests, past the unfrequent little towns where they seemed to make the most unconscionably long stops, considering the small additions received to the stock of passengers, and presently it seemed to Norman de Vere that every one was asleep but himself.
The drummers had each taken a double seat to himself, and with silk handkerchiefs over their faces, snored sedately. Even the “little widow,” as Norman called her in his thoughts, had let her arm and head slip down to the back of her seat, and seemed to be quietly sleeping. Sweetheart still lay close in the fold of his strong arm, and though presently the plump little thing began to feel warm and heavy, he would not rouse her, lest he should call her back from her wandering in the beautiful Land of Nod.
“But what a careless little mother!” he thought. “She takes small concern over her baby, leaving her to be nursed and cuddled by utter strangers. Still,” with an excusing thought, “she must be fond of the little one, she has trained her to sing with such wondrous sweetness and accuracy. It is only that she is tired or ill—broken down with grief most likely—and she knows that even rough men are only too proud to play the nurse to her little pet.”
He wondered vaguely if the face hidden under the little poke bonnet and veil were one half as lovely as the one slumbering so peacefully on his breast, and gazing down at little Sweetheart, tried to fancy the cherub face grown older, and the innocent soul grown wise with woman’s lore; but again a heavy sigh heaved his breast and a frown of deep cynicism drew ungracious lines on his high, white brow.
“Heaven forbid! Heaven forbid!” he muttered, with something like impatient wrath. “It seems a pity for this dear little one to grow up so. Yet,” bitterly, “how else could it be, and a woman?”
The early autumn twilight, hastened by the steady rain, began to darken in the car, and the brakeman came in and lighted the lamps.
“A bad spell o’ weather, sir,” he said, loquaciously, to the occupant of the car who had his eyes open. “Uncommon rainy for Florida; been fallin’ stiddy for two days and nights. ’Counts for the few passengers, I ’spose. Well, ’tis er ill wind blows nobody good. Better sleepin’ ’commodations for the passengers,” glancing around humorously; for this was twenty years ago, reader, and before the luxurious era of Pullman sleepers and parlor cars and fast-flying vestibule trains.
Norman de Vere was about to make some brief, courteous answer to the man’s remarks, but he was prevented by a sudden terrible rumble and rocking of the car—the swift precursor of one of those dreadful railway accidents due to heavy rains and weakened bridge foundations that desolate so many hearts and homes. With a swift instinct he clasped his sleeping burden tightly to his breast just as the doomed car reared upward a moment, like a maddened, living creature, only to collapse the next instant with its freight of human souls and go crashing down through a broken bridge into a mad hell of seething, foaming water.