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About The Oregon daily journal. (Portland, Or.) 1902-1972 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 21, 1909)
1 ' ' S ' - THE "o&EGOtf SUNDAY' JOURNAlT PORTLAJNI'TuNPAV"ilOING FEBRUARY 21? 1969. " 4" - 7 frr T7 -rn rr c-sr xTr ; J r v y , y i v ... y f - i'i- r E was oiling around on the "519 when Althea first saw him, and he was not very pretty to look at. There is, or there may be, a sort of artistic fittness, in blue denim overclothes and a mechanic'! cap, but the big-boned, thin-faced young man who was jabbing the snout ot the oil-can into the vitals of the ten-wheeler had missed it. His overalls, which were as, much to large ctrcumferentially as they were lacking in length, were innocent of soap and water ; his jumper was : little more than a greasy rag ; and to complete the motley , he was wearing a, cap which was the latest ' wrinkle in golf headgear. - . j:. Vice-President Lockhart s private car, Nadia, was coupled in the rear of Number Five, and at the breakfast-station stop three members of the party, I m;- lrlthirt. the vice-president and Mr. Bain- bridge Brockton, had descended to take the fresh morning air on the platform. After i few turns op and down beside the "Nadia" Miss Althea had said: "l want to see the engine; don't you know I a'wiyt i ... , .fiffin?" And so the three of them f had walked up the long platform, clear now ot the rwnrrvinff thrones of breakfast seekers, to where" the ' big "Baldwin" stood throbbing and shuddering: i preparatory to its plunge into the tunnel-like" gate i way of Gringo Canyon This.wat the way Miss Lockhart came to see Or 1 man. In the ordinary course of things he would ' scarcely have had a second glance of hers; but with no such intention in mind the peppery vice-president : stood his friend. Major Lockhart had been known 'to have flagman called down for the lack of a ! button on his uniform; and Oman's ill-fitting over 1 clothes, the oil, the coal smut, and the parti-colored olf cap aroused his ire. , i "Har he snorted, "I wonder how long Hoskms Jlas been putting roustabouts in charge ot his first iclassvtrains?" - , . There was a moment of fuse-fizzing silence m '-wh Rmrlftnn. decently reluctant to witness the shaming of fellow man, turned away. Mis Althea ( meaning the engineer, ctrwt hrr amnnA honinr that the engineer had not Brockton adjusted heard. But it was said of the vice-president mat nis xapiers were all broad-swords. v "Yes, . I mean youl" he rasped, when Orman 'straightened op and faced him. "You are a disgrace -to the ervice-i-a harlequin, sir! There is no excuse for the engineer of a passenger train masquerading as a round-house wipen Report to Mr. Hosktns when you get in, and say to him, with my compli ments, that th audttiifg department will approve a voucher for a box of soap and a supply of wash- i tuckets for the use of the company's enginemen. "Oh, uncle !" said Althea, under her breath; an! ther visible distress changed the engineer's scowl of I resentment into a shame-faced grin. ;' "I'm afraid I do look rather tough," he admitted, good-naturedly, "And there is no excuse, as you say. , I'll report to Mr. Hoskins and mention the box of aoap." j Althea was watching him narrowly as he spoke, withhcr woman's heart full of sympathy. She wa not, of those who believe that all the finer feelings are monopolized by the .leisure classes, and she was ccnerouslv indignant . Now, if there be women whom emotion mars and their name is a multiple of all the others there are a few whose charms are heightened thereby. Miss Althea was one of the few; and Brockton, who ' had reattached himself to the group, thought he had never seen her more entirely beautiful Also, it dis turbed him a little to reflect that the exciting cause j was an upflash of womanly sympathy for an un washed workingman. As he knew to his own dis- i comfiture, Miss Lockhart had an exaggerated re- ' spect for men who had work to do and did it It -was clearly the moment for a diversion, and he made i one. "We are due to leave, Major," he said, consult ing his watch. "Don't you think we'd best be get ting back to the car?" ' For the first few miles of the canyon-stormin Miss Althea sat with Brockton's cousin, Alicia, be hind the "broad windows in the observation end of the "Nadia," watching the cliffs and peaks swing right and left with the curves and thinking point edly of a small dilemma. The outing trip, which was now three days old, and which was to pause indefinitely at Undercliff Inn a Summer resort in the heart of the main range, had not been, nor did it promise to be, an unalloyed joy. While her invitation to join the party had come from her uncle in his own proper person, Althea was beginning to suspect that it had been prompted by certain match-making proclivities on the part of the vice-president's wife. Mrs. Lockhart IL was a young woman, and Bainbridge Brockton was her. cousin, once removed. Althea had known Brockton since his college days, and had liked him as much as she could like any man who was content to do nothing. Left to her self, she might have come, in time, to look with favor upon his wooing, wmch was as energetic as amthing he ever did. But, with all its yieldings, the woman-heart has a latent quality of stubbornness; and when Miss Althea began to suspect that Mrs. Lockhart had planned things, she set her fine white teeth firmly upon a steady resolve not to be "mar keted,"' at least, not while she was cn the small match-maker's own ground. That her fortune had anything to do with the match-making, or .with Brockton's devotion, she was unwilling to believe, since Brockton had enough of his own to make him the most uncon scionable of idlers. Yet she remembered, with a curious little thrill of scorn, that the fortune-hunting initinct was in the Brockton blood. Alicia, the fair haired, serene-eyed cousin who sat within arms reach, looking out Upon this same backward-racing procession of peaks and cliffs, had once so gossip said broken an engagement almost between the church steos and the altar because the man had told her he had been cut out -of his father's will. Such thoughts were not altogether pleasant, and she was rather glad when Brockton flung his cigar away and came in from the platform to draw up a chair beside her. ."Enjoying the scenery by height and depth?" he aid, making idle talk, as was his wont. s"Ve and no; not as much as I should if we were going toward it instead of running away from it' she rejoined. . "It i disappointing to catch fleeting glimpses of It just as it is vanishing." The vice-president had been closeted in his atate roora with Hoskins, the general manager, and the two men Joined the group at the observ.'ion win dows in time to hear Althea's reply. Lockhlr?-yJ!n thc en?ine if 3rGU'd c Mi" v 7 r V, Jhe en:4' manag'r. "Mr. Brock-v a-rA.: arrange it at the next sharp edge of it. , ' "By the way, Mr. Hoskins, who is our engineer this morning?" demanded the vice-president, "A general utility man named Orman," was tfie reply, but its facetiousness did not seem to lay hold of Major Lockhart. "The regular man bad a death in his family, and " ; The vice-president's smile was portentous. "Or man will have something to say to yoa' when he reports his run," he remarked. Altbea happened to be looking at Alicia, and she surprised a little start at the mention, of the sub. stjtute's name. While two rail joints could click under the wheels the slate-blue eyes were clouded and a faint flush came and went in the fair neck and cheek. Althea wondered why, but at that mo ment the chime of the 519 sounded for a station and she rose to go forward with Brockton and the general manager. i With the highest executive authority "of the com pany to sanction it, the invasion of the 519's cab facilitated itself, though Orman was no more than gruffly polite to the invaders. Room was made for them on the fireman's box, Althea was told briefly how to brace herself against the side-slam of the cab in rounding the curves, and thereafter the engi neer left them to their own devices. , -The experience proved something less than excit ing, even to a novice. The grade was very heavy, and the big engine labored up the hills and around the dodging curves rather faithfully than spectacularly. When she had grown somewhat accustomed to the novelty, and had found the approaching scenic procession much like an inversion of the view from the "Nadia's" observation windbws, Althea began to take note of her more immediate surroundings; to make mental notes, and to wonder how she might pour a little of the oil of kindliness into the broad sword slashes of the vice-president Despairing of finding an opening unless she could make it, she turned to Brockton to say, "I wish I could know how he does it without going crazy," "I'll put it any way yon like," he answered :.JFt a week after the side-tracking t of the , "Nadia' his eye-glasses and stared across at the crouching figure on the opposite box as if the subject bored him. But it was the better part of him that made him get upon his feet and offer to help her down from ber perch. promptly. "Suppose we say that Major Lockhart nas me respcci, if jnoi, cxacuy me wui-mvih affection, of all the men In the service, your humble servant included. - And his guess hit the mark- This rig of mine is a wiper's outfit." The 519 was picking her way judiciously around a set of complicated elbows and reversed curves at a point in the eanyon where Gringo Creek runs every way sare uphfll.and for a minute or two the man was lost in the engineer; When he spoke again it was in gentle deprecation of the vice-president's mar tinetism . : . "Of course, .Major Lockhart was within his rights in landing on me. But some things which are-tjuite justifiable are nof always expediept- This is a rough country, with rough work to be done in It; and the men who do the work are not always mindful of dress-parade regulations. ; It was at . this conjuncture that Althea's precon ceived ideas of a workingman's point of view went, to pieces. She was modern enough to be able to set aside the conventions when the occasion demanded; and she had a tfue woman's disregard of social dis tinctions based on the lines of a man's occupation. But he could not disguise the fact that she had meant to placate Orman as she would have tried to placate John the gardener, or Thomas the coach man, if her nncle had browbeaten the one or the other. And slje was finding it blankly impossible. "You make me wish I hadn't said anything," she protested, fluite humbly; and then she blushed a little in deference to a certain maidenly shame fpr having opened a door of familiarity whica she did not know how to shut again. But afterward she remembered that the solemn faced young i man had not taken advantage of the opened door. On the contrary, he had stopped talk ing when she did; and some few minutes later, when he had brought the engine to a shuddering stand at the little station of Undercliffe, he had signed to Brockton to come and take her down from the box. "Who is Mr. Orman, Cousin Bainbridge?" was the question1 she asked of Brockton that evening, while they were watching the moon come up over the hunched shoulder of. Gringo Mountain from the piazza of the inn. Brockton got up and flicked the ash of his cigar at Undercliffe there was no lack of diversions for the outing party, and little Mrs. Lockhart outdid herself In devising pastimes new and different There gifted, and a helpless idler from choice, '; . y By some workings of the mysterious, sixth sense, Brockton felt the comparison, and it angered him. 41:,.: itn, rlA ,,r tU n ' of Gringo Mountain; burro climbs to the ytop, of gine cab'?' he replied" shortly,-"It's" Jack Orman, rhincrarn and to the Bridal Veil fails: na pedeStrain Inn1rinr r1nrn iinnn li.r tn nnt th .flrVr WW hn marches ud the nrulcbes in which Alicia the languid - leaned heavily upoia the arm of the Reverend Percy Montgomery, a fellow guest at the inn, whom Mrs. Lockhart had attached .to eke out the. ill-balanced masculine side of her party. s .'- : On the eighth day the vice-president went On an' inspection trip to .the; end of the Extension; and while Mrt. Lockhart was planning another excur sion which should make - Althea dependent for the day upon Mr. Bainbridge Brockton, the little station saw gave him a weapon which he1 fully meant to U3t if the need should arise. . -l . Orman slept that night at the inn, and, as a matter vof course, fate flung them together. cThejwork of track-clearing was completed by, nightfall, but there "was ,yfcking-up enough to keep the wrecking crew on the ground for two or three days, and Orman wired in to the division station for his travelling which was the railway stopping-place for.the inn h ag whi ch canie down 0B Number Seven. : Because had its sensation made to order. - ; ,.- . , . .... . u.. . . A heavy freight tram haa double-headed no the w mountain from the west, and at the summit, fifteen AHhea 'hardly knew' him when he walked into the hundred feet straightaway above the' station of Un- dining-room, but she gave him a friendly little nod iLl when the waiter, at a sign from Mrs.: Lockhart, shoulder of the mountain, the leading engine had seated him in the chair which would have been been cut off to run down ahead of the train. Three minutes later, the guests at the inn fumed out in a body at the bidding of demoniac, whistle shrieks on the high grade. Glasses were levelled and the coming disaster foreshowed itself. The train was out of control, was" running away , down thV mountain, and the driver of the detached engine had a lead of no more than a few hundred yards in the race for life. The catastrophe climaxed in full view from the ; inn piazzas at a point where the down-mountain track curves sharply to enter the canyon prcuper. The engineer of the leading engine knew he could not take the curve at full speed, and at the critical moment lost his head. There was a shrill squeal of brake-shoes grinding on the tires, the flying en gine buckled to a dead stop, and the two men of its crew leaped from the gangways and ran for dear life. Three seconds farther along-there was a crash like the shock of an earthquake and the long train rammed the standing engine, piling up the wreckage mountain high. Happily, there were no lives lost. The crew of "I know him,' he said shortly. "I'll introduce him, if von like." Jifir held back. "Did you know him when Uncle when we were at the breakfast station?'' "I didn't recognize him; nobody would in that farricial rip. But Mr. Hoskins' mention of his name gave it away." The clamor of matter in motion isolated them, and Orman was attending strictly to business. Brockton waited for a bit of straight track, and when it came he gave Althea his hand and steadied her across the foot-plate. ' "I take it yo,t don't remember me, Orman." he said. "I'm Brockton, of the class of '98; and this is Mis Lockhart, the niece of the vice-president." The engineer took the introduction a little sheep ishly, as befitted his station, Althea thought; and she was sorry she had let Brockton make it. But since thrre were now two reasons for kindliness where there had been only one, she would not retreat Now a man who runs an engine in Gringo Canyon is happy if. bj gluing his eyes to the track, he can see a scant half dozen rail-lengths ahead; to do this and to answer the curious questions of. a sweet voiced young woman who must needs stand almost directly behind him, is manifestly impossible. Or man gave it up after one or two futile attempts, and, surrendering his box to the inquisitive one, he took his place beside her on the running step. "Now you may ask all the questions yott want to," he said, after Brockton, finding himself shut out of this most convenient arrangement for two, had gone back to his place on the fireman's side. For a dodging curve or two she clung to the windew-seat arm-rest and was ' silent Then she said: "I want to ask you not to care too much about what my uncle said to you a little while ago. I- don't think- he really meant to to " . The young engineer's laugh Vas wholly without bitterness. , ; ' ' N ' "Is that what voo had in mind?" he asked.' 1 And then: "You needn't have taken so much trouble. It was nothing; and, besides, I'm not quarreling with" my bread andfbutter."- ' - - ' "I wish you wouldn't put it that way," sheTald, after another pause. . Quite conscientiously he was trying to get down to his level; to. the level of a man in his walk in life; and it perplexed her a little tot findhirq 5Q.unrespjysijtp the effort"; . . , 'V '. ' ; . " ' j' : ; ' ' ' ost the piazza railing' to gain time. He was not sure how much it would be advisable to tell her. "He used to be a sort of fourteen-fifteen puzzle when I knew him in the university, and he seems to be keeping it up yet," he replied guardedly. "He was two years ahead of me, and in the Scientific, so I didn't see very much of him." v - "Is he a a gentleman?.' she asked; and the word was no sooner spoken than she could have bitten her tongue for the base-born use of it. "That depends somewhat on your definition. He was always messing in the manual training shops, and he made a social outcast of himself for the sake of 'poling.' It was my impression at the time that he was a poor man's son, working his way through college. So much Brockton said with a nicely calculated air of disinterest. But he had de termined not to say anything of .the later develop ments, or of his Cousin Alicia's part in them. That was Alicia's -affair, to be buried or kept alive, as she saw fit. . . Althea was silent for a little time,' and then she said another . thing for which -. she was instantly sorry. , "He stems somehow to be above his present sta tion m life. the train engine had jumped before the crash; and the head brakeman who stuck to his post until the box-car on which he was, riding reared high in air. made a flying leap and landed in the inn trotit pool. But. as we have said, the guests of the hotel bad their sensation ready-made, and for that day there was no talk of 4ime-killing excursions in- the hil! Two hours after the dust of the crash had settled, the division wrecking train was on the ground and .hard at work; and af:er luncheon Brockton took Althea and his cousin down to join the crowd of 011 .lodkers frorrt the hotel. .-. ! It was Althea's first sight of a trained army of track-clearers in action, and the fierce toil and wonderful method pi it all thrilled her like the clash of arms. Here was a battle royal with dead Weights inanimate td tall out all that was fittest and most heroic in a master of men and things. Huge freight cars rose to the creaking of windlasses apd were toppled with the nicest precision to right and left down the embankment Gangs of workmen, as or derly and purposeful as well-drilled soldiers, placed the jackscrews, adjusted the lifting tackles, or stood clear at the word of command when the great haw- k ! . sers were singing ukc yioitn-strings under tne neart breaking strain. Althea thought it was- the finest Brockton laughed easily. The danger, if any there thing-"She had ever-seen, and said so, looking mean ere, was passing. r " " "while for the master mindr-'" " "Who is directing !t alir she kedWhen Brock ton had folded his 'top-coat to make a cushion for Alicia. x - , ... . His smile was half cynical.jand at the moment she could have hated him for it "It's our friend of the engine cab, I think. Don't you see him down under that car showing the men how to make the next hitch?" . . She looked again and - recognized Orman. As oncebefore, he was a sight to grate upon the neryes of martinet majors and the wearers of purple raiment and fine linen. The grimy overclothes were want ing, but the rough tweed suit was soiled and stained and muddied, artd the big, skilful-hands were -the hands of a blackamoor. . 1 -. It did not occur to her to question how a driver' of locomotives came to be the commander of this armv of workmen: there was mom n-t. i She had a dis- r and admiration, and for an instant comparison 'be- iiwccn iwu meui one uown mere in the thick of it toiling, shouting, commanding accomplishing; the' other standing beside her, well groomed, handsome, 'Oh. you can't tell anything about that, you know, A man iinds his level; not because he is forced to it but because he likes it Orman has an education which would fit him for anything in sight in the technical line; and, apparently, he chooses to wear outlandish clothes and to be a driver of locomo tives."; " it was not the wisest possible thing to say, since the lightest word may sometimes suffice to turn a clean-hearted woman into a militant defender of the absent.' ' ' : "How can you tell?", she retorted. "Perhaps it was the best he could do; and, at all events, it is honest" work. You couldn't dof it. Cousin Bain- bridtfe,", - V' ."-' ""' :- '.'" v:.M -, "Now, what have yon two found to - quarrel ''about ?" said a voice out of the shadows behind them; and Althea left her chair and wnt to stand beside one of the piazza pillars, .comforting conviction that .Mrs., Lockhart II. was . always just in the background in her capacity 'of , matcn-makerv' . COTYKIGHTA'V oc cupied by Alicia if she had not pleaded a headache and gone to her room. It was a moment of surprises for Althea on more counts than one. That the vice-president, who had returned on Number Seven, should remember the young man whom he had reprimanded was not be yond " belief; but that he should welcorne him cordially to a seat at his own table was by way of being inexplicable. And when-MrsfXockhart made much of him, calling him "Jack," and putting him at', once upon the footing oi a family friend, Althea's' wonder was complete. , After dinner it was Orman, and not Brockton, who went with Althea to her accustomed corner on tne eiectric-ugntea piazza; and their talk in that first tete-a-tete was all of industry battles. But three evenings la.er. when the wrecking crew was finally piecing the string of "cripples" together for. the run to the shops, the mile-posts of commonplace ; were well to the rear, and she ventured to repeat the question she had once asked of Mr. Bainbridge Brockton. "Mr. Orman, who are you? By all' the family tra- i ditions I ought to have known you long ago, but Ii didn't." Hrs smile was a slow wrinkling of the plain-song face. ' ' ' , " "You haven't missed much. I've known your J . cousins and Mrs. Lockhart for a number of years; ' but the Major knows me only as a wheel in the rail-! way naehine.' . She marked the plural, "cousins," and remembered that AUcia had been all but invisible since the day , of .the wreck; had., avoided Orman at every turn, j But she was npt to be turned aside by the intrusion ! of. the small mystery. J ---tiri,- you are not accounted for," slie persisted, half jestingly. "Were you 'in character' that day when Uncle , Jabez scolded you?' "Yes a!nd no. No, because he didn't recognize me' in the wiper's regimentals; and yes, because I am truly a workingman, as truly as I seemed to be that day; a 'lean, unwashed artificer,' as your Cousin Bainbridge once dubbed me. But twice in my life I have played the part of Bottom, the weaver,, I think." ' "Is it permitted one to ask how?" "It is permitted to you. The first time was when I was'Jool enough to believe that a woman loved me for myself; and the other " He broke off abruptly at this point, and she led' him on,, whether from idle curiosity or real interest, he could not tell. "The other?" she said "Was a time when I was tempted to forget the lesson so hardly learned' She. was silent for a full minute, and he rose, but toning his cOat. "I must go now. MacCarthy is about ready to pull out. Shall I hunt up Mrs. Lockhart or Brock ton for you?'' She shook her head and went .with him to the steps, where they stood for n momerft looking down upon the string of "cripples'" pricked out by the- moving lanterns of the . trainmen. Then she gavel riim her hand, and her parting word was no les than friendly. - ! "I am sorry to have you go. You have done much' for me in these three days." He smiled down upoh her quizzically. "Is it permitted one to ask the nature of the serv- ice?" 1 "Yes; it is in the way of striking off shackles, anI in the widening of horizons. I can t particularize; at least, not while Mr. MacCarthy waits." Th. n I chall rnmc harlr- m a v i ?" "Whenever you please. But you mustn't neglecfi your work." He laughed like a pleased boy. "How good thaft sounds!" he. said. "My ideal woman is one who would say to a man, to the man she cared for, 'Your work is the thing; go and do it, and do it better than you have ever done it before for' my sake.' " She smiled back at him. "That sounds very un selfish on the part of your ideal. But really, don't you know, it is the most sublimated type of feminine, selfishness It would be a true woman's triumph to know that a man's work in the world owed some thing to her. Good-bye." -He ran dwn the steps and crossed quickly to the waiting train, throwu'ng up his hand to her, railroad wise, as he passed out of the hotel grounds. Fifteen minutes later they were bringing him back on an x improvised stretcher, and the house physician was ,'2 ine cpmpanys surgeon to Come to Under cliffe By special train. When the string of "cripples was started, a broken drawhead had pulled out. drop ping a oraKeman xwij beneath the wheels. Orman had saved the roan's life at the eost of h; nn all least, so ran the report which passed from lip to ear on the hotel piazzas. ; - It was a fortnisrht befor th wnuM 1f her rrrt t0 him.'?d Mrs- Lockhart had talked herself to standstill in expostulation. f "It is simply dreadful!" she declared, firing hee next ; to the last shot.. "Evervhod you are Bainbridge's fiancee I have as good as told then, so and it will make ridiculous scandaL Why, you have known Jack Oman only a day os twq at the mostf" -" " - v.
