The Depot Master Part 37

'Have the up-state delegates got to buckin' the ponies, too? Why ain't you back home killin' pertater bugs? You ought to be ashamed.'

"'But we wa'n't gamblin'--me and my friend wa'n't. We was led in here by mistake. We was told that a feller named Kelly lived here and we're huntin' for a man of that name. I've got a message to him from his poor dead father back in Orham. We come all the way from Orham, Ma.s.s.--to find him and--'

"The police cap'n turned around then and stared at him hard. 'Humph!'

says he, after a spell. 'Go over there and set down till I want you. No, you'll go now and we'll waste no breath on it. Go on, do you hear!'

"So we went, and there we set for ha'f an hour, while the rest of the gang and the blackboards and the paper slips and the telephones and Big Mike and his chair was bein' carted off to the wagon. Once, when one of the constables was beatin' acrost to get us, the police cap'n spoke to him.

"'You can leave these two,' he says. 'I'll take care of them.'

"So, finally, when there was nothin' left but the four walls and us and some of the police, he takes me and Jonadab by the elbows and heads for the door.

"'Now,' says he, 'walk along quiet and peaceable and tell me all about it. Get out of this!' he shouts to the crowd of small boys and loafers on the sidewalk, 'or I'll take you, too.'

"The outsiders fell astern, lookin' heartbroke and disapp'inted that we wa'n't hung on the spot, and the fat boss policeman and us two paraded along slow but grand. I felt like the feller that was caught robbin'

the poorhouse, and I cal'late Jonadab felt the same, only he was so busy beggin' and pleadin' and explainin' that he couldn't stop to feel anything.

"He told it all, the whole fool yarn from one end to t'other. How old Pat give him the message and how he went to the laundry, and about his ridiculous dream, every word. And the fat policeman shook all over, like a barrel of cod livers.

"By and by we got to a corner of a street and hove to. I could see the station house loomin' up large ahead. Fatty took a card from his pocketbook, wrote on it with a pencil, and then hailed a hack, one of them stern-first kind where the driver sits up aloft 'way aft. He pushed back the cap with the gilt wreath on it, and I could see his red hair s.h.i.+nin' like a sunset.

"'Here,' says he to the hack driver, 'take these--this pair of salads to the--what d'ye call it?--the Golconda House, wherever on top of the pavement that is. And mind you, deliver 'em safe and don't let the truck horses get a bite at 'em. And at half-past eight to-night you call for 'em and bring 'em here,' handin' up the card he'd written on.

"''Tis the address of my house, I'm givin',' he says, turnin' to Jonadab. 'I'll be off duty then and we'll have dinner and talk about old times. To think of you landin' in Silver Pete's pool room! Dear! dear!

Why, Cap'n Wixon, barrin' that your whiskers are a bit longer and a taste grayer, I'd 'a' known you anywheres. Many's the time I've stole apples over your back fence. I'm Jimmie Kelly,' says he."

"Well, by mighty!" exclaimed the depot master, slapping his knee. "So HE was the Kelly man! Humph!"

"Funny how it turned out, wa'n't it?" said Barzilla. "Course, Cap'n Jonadab was perfectly sat on spiritu'lism and signs and omens and such after that. He's had his fortune told no less'n eight times sence, and, nigh's I can find out, each time it's different. The amount of blondes and brunettes and widows and old maids that he's slated to marry, accordin' to them fortune tellers, is perfectly scandalous. If he lives up to the prophecies, Brigham Young wouldn't be a twospot 'longside of him."

"It's funny about dreams," mused Captain Hiram. "Folks are always tellin' about their comin' true, but none of mine ever did. I used to dream I was goin' to be drowned, but I ain't been yet."

The depot master laughed. "Well," he observed, "once, when I was a youngster, I dreamed two nights runnin' that I was bein' hung. I asked my Sunday school teacher if he believed dreams come true, and he said yes, sometimes. Then I told him my dream, and he said he believed in that one. I judged that any other finish for me would have surprised him. But, somehow or other, they haven't hung me yet."

"There was a hired girl over at the Old Home House who was sat on fortune tellin'," said Wingate. "Her name was Effie, and--"

"Look here!" broke in Captain Bailey St.i.tt, righteous indignation in his tone, "I've started no less than nineteen different times to tell you about how I went sailin' in an automobile. Now do you want to hear it, or don't you?"

"How you went SAILIN' in an auto?" repeated Barzilla. "Went ridin', you mean."

"I mean sailin'. I went ridin', too, but--"

"You'll have to excuse me, Bailey," interrupted Captain Hiram, rising and looking at his watch. "I've stayed here a good deal longer'n I ought to, already. I must be gettin' on home to see how poor little Dusenberry, my boy, is feelin'. I do hope he's better by now. I wish Dr.

Parker hadn't gone out of town."

The depot master rose also. "And I'll have to be excused, too," he declared. "It's most time for the up train. Good-by, Hiram. Give my regards to Sophrony, and if there's anything I can do to help, in case your baby should be sick, just sing out, won't you?"

"But I want to tell about this automobilin' sc.r.a.pe," protested Captain Bailey. "It was one of them things that don't happen every day."

"So was that fortune business of Effie's," declared Wingate. "Honest, the way it worked out was queer enough."

But the train whistled just then and the group broke up. Captain Sol went out to the platform, where Cornelius Rowe, Ed Crocker, Beriah Higgins, Obed Gott, and other interested citizens had already a.s.sembled.

Wingate and St.i.tt followed. As for Captain Hiram Baker, he hurried home, his conscience reproving him for remaining so long away from his wife and poor little Hiram Joash, more familiarly known as "Dusenberry."

CHAPTER XIII

DUSENBERRY'S BIRTHDAY

Mrs. Baker met her husband at the door.

"How is he?" was the Captain's first question. "Better, hey?"

"No," was the nervous answer. "No, I don't think he is. His throat's terrible sore and the fever's just as bad."

Again Captain Hiram's conscience smote him.

"Dear! dear!" he exclaimed. "And I've been loafin' around the depot with Sol Berry and the rest of 'em instead of stayin' home with you, Sophrony. I KNEW I was doin' wrong, but I didn't realize--"

"Course you didn't, Hiram. I'm glad you got a few minutes' rest, after bein' up with him half the night. I do wish the doctor was home, though.

When will he be back?"

"Not until late to-morrer, if then. Did you keep on givin' the medicine?"

"Yes, but it don't seem to do much good. You go and set with him now, Hiram. I must be seein' about supper."

So into the sick room went Captain Hiram to sit beside the crib and sing "Sailor boy, sailor boy, 'neath the wild billow," as a lugubrious lullaby.

Little Hiram Joash tossed and tumbled. He was in a fitful slumber when Mrs. Baker called her husband to supper. The meal was anything but a cheerful one. They talked but little. Over the home, ordinarily so cheerful, had settled a gloom that weighed upon them.

"My! my!" sighed Captain Hiram, "how lonesome it seems without him chatterin' and racketin' sound. Seems darker'n usual, as if there was a shadow on the place."

"Hush, Hiram! don't talk that way. A shadow! Oh, WHAT made you say that?

Sounds like a warnin', almost."

"Warnin'?"

"Yes, a forewarnin', you know. 'The valley of the shadow--'"

"HUs.h.!.+" Captain Baker's face paled under its sunburn. "Don't say such things, Sophrony. If that happened, the Lord help you and me. But it won't--it won't. We're nervous, that's all. We're always so careful of Dusenberry, as if he was made out of thin china, that we get fidgety when there's no need of it. We mustn't be foolish."

After supper Mrs. Baker tiptoed into the bedroom. She emerged with a very white face.

"Hiram," she whispered, "he acts dreadful queer. Come in and see him."

The "first mate" was tossing back and forth in the crib, making odd little choky noises in his swollen throat. When his father entered he opened his eyes, stared unmeaningly, and said: "'Tand by to det der s.h.i.+p under way."