Compared to the villages of Wilton or Belleport, this railroad terminus was quite a metropolis. It boasted two dry-goods stores, an A & P, a drug store, a coal office, a hardware shop, and a grain shed. Around its shabby station clustered a group of motor cars, a truck or two, and the usual knot of loitering men and boys.
In spite of his depression, Elisha's spirits took another upward turn.
It was interesting to see something different, something more bustling and novel than his home town.
"S'pose we drop in an' get a moxie," he suggested.
"'Twould go kinder good. I want to buy a roll of lozengers, too, an' some cough drops now I'm here."
"Come ahead."
"Don't you s'pose we'd oughter go to the smithy first an' leave the badge? It may take some little time to get it mended," Eleazer said.
The badge!
Would the man never cease dangling before his vision the wretched memories Elisha was struggling so valiantly to forget?
With an ungracious, wordless grunt, he grudgingly turned the nose of the car toward the railroad.