We gathered closer around the red-hot stove in the bar-room of the Anderson House, for it was a biting cold night, and the snow was too much for our train, destitute as we were of a snowplow, and we had given up the attempt to push through to C—— that night, and retaken ourselves to the hospitalities of the Arlington.
It had often been whispered among the railway employees that Alf Whitney had once had something strange happen to him. He was a young man yet, though the oldest and most skillful engineer on the road—noted for his skill and judgment, no less than for his sturdy endurance and his bravery, which nothing ever overcame.
I suppose you people who ride in Pullman cars, rocked in velvet cushions, and look at the scenery rushing past, through plate glass windows, heavy with gilt and rosewood mouldings, never think much of the man upon whom your safety depends—the man who, with his hand upon the lever which controls the monster that is bearing you along, stands tireless at his post, through cold and heat, through storm and sunshine, smutty, grimy with smoke, greasy and weather-hardened, but oftentimes the bravest and noblest man among you all. But this is a digression.
We all hastened to assure Alf that we were ready to believe whatever he might say; and he, smiling a little, as if he doubted the sincerity of our assurances, began his story. I give it in his own words, which are much better than mine would be.
"Six years ago, one dark stormy night, Jack Horton lost his life in a smash-up at Rowley's Bend. Jack was an engineer, and as fine a fellow as ever trod the ground. He was handsome, too, and notwithstanding his dirty occupation, a great favorite with the ladies; for when he was off the machine long enough to get the oil and cinders washed off, and his other clothes on, he was the best-looking, as well as the best-mannered, young man anywhere in this vicinity.
"He was engaged to marry Esther Clay; and Esther was a beauty without anything by way of art to help her—a sound-looking, wholesome, healthy young girl—none of your die-away kind, fainting at the sight of a spider, and going into tantrums over a cow a mile off. She was just the kind of woman I could worship, and not put myself out any to do it, either!"
"Why didn't you go for her after Jack was dead?" asked Tom Barnard carelessly.
"Hush! she is dead!" said Alf, in a subdued voice; and the unwonted pallor that settled round his mouth gave me a slight clue to the reason he had never married. And afterward I knew that Esther Clay, dead, and pledged through all eternity to another, was more to him than any living woman!
After a little he went on.
"When Jack was killed, it was the breaking of an axle that caused the mischief; and, of course, this axle broke on just the worst part of the road. They always do. You all know Rowley's Bend? You all know just how high the grade is there, and just how rough and jagged the rocks lie all along the embankment, clear down to the river. No need to dwell on this. The train pitched down into the dark, head first, and Jack, true to his duty, never stirred from his post. It was a good while before we could get to him, the broken timbers of the piled-up cars so completely caged him in. She came there before we had taken his body out, and I shall never forget how she went down into the ruins where even the bravest of us hardly dared to venture, so insecure was the footing, and worked with her white, slender hands, until the blood ran from their wounds. She never minded it a particle, but worked on, with a face as pale and rigid as marble. But I am making a long story, and dwelling too much on details. Jack was dead when they found him, and she lived just a month afterward. And, though everybody lamented at her funeral, and said it was 'so sad,' I do not think it was sad, for when two people love each other, truly and loyally, and one of them dies, it seems to me Heaven's special mercy if the other is suffered to go along.