He waited, lighting a cigarette. On his left a heavy electric engine rolled into the station, drawing a Western express train. The lighted windows of the cars threw a running yellow illumination over his motionless figure for a few moments, then the train passed into the depths of the station.
And now her train began to move very slowly out through the wilderness of yard tracks. Car after car passed him, gaining momentum all the while.
When the last car sped by and the tail-lights dwindled into perspective, Grismer had finished his cigarette.
Behind him lay the dusky, lamp-lit tunnel of the station. Before him, through ruddy darkness, countless jewelled lamps twinkled, countless receding rails glimmered, leading away into the night.
It was in him to travel that way—the way of the glimmering, jewelled lamps, the road of the shining rails.
But first he shoved his suitcase, with his foot, over the platform's edge, as though it had fallen there by accident.... And, as though he had followed to recover it, he climbed down among the tracks.
There was a third rail running parallel to the twin rails. It was roofed with wood. Lying flat, there in the shimmering dusk, he could look up under the wooden guard rail and see it.
Then, resting both legs across the steel car-tracks, he reached out and took the guarded third rail in both hands.
CHAPTER XXXV
The train that Cleland took, after calling Runner's Rest on the telephone, landed him at the home station at an impossible hour. Stars filled the heavens with a magnificent lustre; the July darkness was superb and still untouched by the coming dawn.