"Where is his mother now?" I asked, no longer able to restrain my curiosity.
"In the freight room." His eyes filled with tears.
"Was it her coffin I saw in the hearse awhile ago?"
"Yes."
"Oh I am so sorry;" and I too burst into tears. He busied himself getting a spirit lamp lighted, and soon the baby's milk was simmering, and almost before good humor had been restored throughout the car the baby had comfortably dined, and gone off into a refreshing slumber. I made him a snug little bed out of rugs and shawls, and laid him down in blissful unconsciousness of the cold, still form, even more unconscious than he, in the adjoining freight room.
The passengers as well as Mr. Winthrop had been watching me curiously, and my sudden burst of tears had mystified them.
Once the baby was nicely settled to its nap I returned to my seat. Mrs. Flaxman eagerly asked why there was no woman to look after the baby. I saw Mr. Winthrop listening, as if interested also in the strange phenomenon of a man in attendance alone on an infant.
"The mother is in the freight room."
"What?" Mrs. Flaxman asked, looking a trifle alarmed.
"She is in her coffin." My lip trembled, and with difficulty I restrained my tears once more.