Of a morning in May the faded, dust-covered day-coach drew in at the tiny prairie village. A little man alighted. He stood a moment on the 151 platform, his hands deep in his pockets, a big black cigar between his teeth, and looked out over the town. The coloring of the short straggling street was more weather-stained than a year ago, yet still very new, and the newcomer smiled as he looked; a big broad smile that played about his lips, turning up the corners of his brown moustache, showing a flash of white teeth, and lighting a pair of big blue eyes which lay, like a woman’s, beneath heavy lashes. In youth, that smile would have been a grin; but it was no grin now. The man was far from youth, and about the mouth and eyes were deep lines, which told of one who knew of the world.
Slowly the smile disappeared, and as it faded the little man puffed harder at the cigar. Evidently something he particularly wished to explain would not become clear to his mind.
“Of all places,” he soliloquized, “to have chosen––this!”
He started up the street, over the irregular warping sidewalk.
“Hotel, sir-r?” The formula was American, the trilling r’s distinctly German.
The traveller turned at the sound, to make 152 acquaintance with Hans Becher; for it was Hans Becher, very much metamorphosed from the retiring German of a year ago. He made the train regularly now.
The small man nodded and held out his grip; together they walked up the street. In front of the hotel they stopped, and the stranger pulled out his watch.
“Is there a livery here?” he asked.
“Yes; at the street end––the side to the left hand.”
“Thanks. I’ll be back with you this evening.”