There were men that he knew in the sleepers, but he shunned acquaintance and walked on till he found an empty section into which he could throw himself and feast undisturbed on his telegram. He studied it anew, tried to consider coolly whether her message meant anything or nothing, and gloated over the magic of the letters that made her initials: and when he slept, the word last in his heart was Gertrude.
In the morning he breakfasted late in the sunshine of the diner, pa.s.sed his friends again and secluded himself in his section. Never before had she said "I"; always it had been "we." With eyes half-closed upon the window he repeated the words and spoke her name after them, because every time the speaking drugged him like lotus, until, yielding again to the exhaustion of the week"s work and strain, he fell asleep.
When he woke the car was dark; the train conductor, Sid Francis, was sitting beside him, laughing.
"You"re sleepy to-day, Mr. Glover."
"Sid, where are we?" asked Glover, looking at his watch; it was four o"clock.
"Grouse Creek."
"Are we that late? What"s the matter?"
The conductor nodded toward the window. "Look there."
The sky was gray with a driving haze; a thin sweep of snow flying in the sand of the storm was whitening the sagebrush.
Glover, waking wide, turned to the window. "Where"s the wind, Sid?"
"Northwest."
"What"s the thermometer?"
"Thirty at Creston; sixty when we left MacDill at noon."
"Everything running?"
"They"ve been getting the freights into division since noon. There"ll be something doing to-night on the range. They sent stock warnings everywhere this morning, but they can"t begin to protect the stock between here and Medicine in one day. Pulling hard, isn"t she? We"re not making up anything."
The porter was lighting the lamps. While they talked it had grown quite dark. Losing time every mile of the way, the train, frost-crusted to the eyelids, got into Sleepy Cat at half-past six o"clock; four hours late.
The crowded yard, as they pulled through it, showed the tie-up of the day"s traffic. Long lines of freight cars filled the trackage, and overloaded switch engines struggled with ever-growing burdens to avert the inevitable blockade of the night. Glover"s anxiety, as he left the train at the station, was as to whether he could catch anything on the Glen Tarn branch to take him up to the Springs that night, for there he was resolved to get before morning if he had to take an engine for the run.
As he started up the narrow hall leading to the telegraph office he heard the rustle of skirts above. Someone was descending the stairway, and with his face in the light he halted.
"Oh, Mr. Glover."
"Why--Miss Brock!" It was Gertrude.
"What in the world--" he began. His broken voice was very natural, she thought, but there was amazement in his utterance. He noticed there was little color in her face; the deep boa of fur nestling about her throat might account for that.
"What a chance that I should meet you!" she exclaimed, her back hard against the side wall, for the hall was narrow and brought them face to face. She spoke on. "Did you get my----?"
"Did I?" he echoed slowly; "I have travelled every minute since yesterday afternoon to get here----"
Her uneasy laugh interrupted him. "It was hardly worth while, all that."
"--and I was just going up to find out about getting to Glen Tarn."
"Glen Tarn! I left Glen Tarn this afternoon all alone to go to Medicine Bend--papa is there, did you know? He came yesterday with all the directors. Our car was attached for me to the afternoon train coming down." She was certainly wrought up, he thought. "But when we reached here the train I should have taken for Medicine Bend had not come----"
"It is here now."
"Thank heaven, is it?"
"I came in on it."
"Then I can start at last! I have been so nervous. Is this our train?
They said our car couldn"t be attached to this train, and that I should have to go down in one of the sleepers. I don"t understand it at all.
Will you have the car sent back to Glen Tarn in the morning, Mr.
Glover? And would you get my handbag? I was nearly run over a while ago by some engine or other. I mustn"t miss this train----"
"Never fear, never fear," said Glover.
"But I _cannot_ miss it. Be very, very sure, won"t you?"
"Indeed, I shall. The train won"t start for some time yet. First let me take you to your car and then make some inquiries. Is no one down with you?"
"No one; I am alone."
"Alone?"
"I expected to have been with papa by this time. It takes so little time to run down, you know, and I telegraphed papa I should come on to meet him. Isn"t it most disagreeable weather?"
Glover laughed as he shielded her from the wind. "I suppose that"s a woman"s name for it."
The car, coupled to a steampipe, stood just east of the station, and Glover, helping her into it, went back after a moment to the telegraph office. It seemed a long time that he was gone, and he returned covered with snow. She advanced quickly to him in her wraps. "Are they ready?"
He shook his head. "I"m afraid you can"t get to Medicine to-night."
"Oh, but I must."
"They have abandoned Number Six."
"What does that mean?"
"The train will be held here to-night on account of the storm. There will be no train of any kind down before morning; not then if this keeps up."
"Is there danger of a blockade?"
"There is a blockade."
"Then I must get to papa to-night." She spoke with disconcerting firmness.
"May I suggest?" he asked.
"Certainly."
"Would it not be infinitely better to go back to the Springs?"