The coffee and the lunch seemed to stimulate them both, for they sat and chatted and laughed together till past eleven o’clock. Then he noticed that she was growing sleepy, so he took the vacant seat behind her.
“It ’ll give you more room,” he said.
By and by he saw her head fall forward. She was asleep. He rolled up his overcoat in the shape of a pillow and placed it on the end of the seat, and touching her gently, he told her to lie down and rest her head on the coat. She obeyed, with a drowsy smile of gratitude. He watched her all through the night. She slept soundly, like a tired child.
“I never seed a body look so much like Rachel in all my life,” he said several times to himself. “Pore woman! I’m that glad I come with ‘er! She’s had ’er grief, an’ I’ve had mine.”
The stopping of the train a little after the break of day roused her. She sat up and rubbed her eyes. He did not wait to speak to her, but taking the coffee-pot, he ran out at the door behind her, so that her first glimpse of him was when he appeared before her with more hot coffee.
“You must take a cup to start you out fer the day,” he smiled.
“You do beat the world, Joel!” she laughed. “I couldn’t ‘a’ done without you.”
She made room for him beside her, and they ate breakfast together. The rest of the journey they sat watching the changing landscape, remarking upon the different methods of tilling the soil, and talking of home and their neighbors.
“It’s strange how people can live as nigh to one another as me an’ you have an’ not git better acquainted,” he said. “I declare, you ain’t a bit like I thought you was.”
“I never railly knowed you, nuther, Joel,” she laughed. “You was always sech a busy, say-nothin’ sort of a man.”