Both of these things the great man studiously refrained from doing, but turning his back alike to the windows and to the indicator, he devoted5 his time to going through his correspondence, dictating6 to his secretary, and meditating7 ways and means for holding New York in the column of the “safe and sane8.”
He sat up late into the night, as the train whirled across the Illinois prairies, smoking meditatively10, a wrinkle of perplexed11 anxiety between his brows, for the path to the White House was proving more thorny12 than he had thought possible. Not the least of his unexpected tribulations13 was this record-breaking trip half across the continent. He was naturally a nervous man, and this hurtling through space distressed14 him acutely. He felt that he was being offered as a sacrifice upon the altar of his country, and the sensation was anything but pleasant. His only consolation15 was that his meteoric16 trip was being featured by the papers, both friendly and unfriendly, and would prove an excellent advertisement—more especially since the friendly papers were taking care to point out how lightly the great man considered his own comfort—nay, even his life—when his country called him! He smiled grimly to himself as he thought of those headlines, for he was thoroughly17 conscious that he was not in the least heroic, but merely an ordinary man with a faculty18 of making friends, a power of keeping his mouth shut when it was wise to do so, and a gift for rounded periods when rounded periods were demanded.
He went to bed, at last, long after midnight, and it was not until Cincinnati had been left far behind that he arose. He took his bath, dressed himself leisurely19, and finally sat down to breakfast. Sitting thus, with his side to the window, he could not escape the vision of the landscape, which was rushing madly past. Involuntarily his eyes rested for an instant on the speed-indicator, and he started as he saw that the needle showed an hourly speed of seventy-two miles. He closed his lips firmly together and with a hand not altogether steady started to attack his grapefruit.
Then suddenly the car lurched heavily and the next instant it seemed to stand on end and buckle20 in the middle. The great man was thrown forward across the table, which overturned with a crash; a negro waiter, who was just entering with a tray of dishes, was hurled21 through a glass partition and disappeared with a yell of terror. Every movable thing in the car leaped toward the front end; what was breakable broke and the orderly interior was transformed in an instant to an appalling22 chaos23.
Of what happened in the next minute or two, the great man never had any very definite recollection. He staggered to his feet at last and looked dazedly24 around. Had there been a wreck25? Was he badly injured?
Then he realized that the car was moving, that the landscape was slipping past as rapidly as ever. His eyes fell again upon the needle of the indicator. It stood at sixty-eight. He glared at it for a moment, unable to believe his senses, then collapsed26 into a chair and buried his head in his hands.
And it was in that position that his secretary found him.
Bill Higgins, the engineer, always claimed it was because the agent at Roxabel had held him up for an hour waiting for a box-car to be loaded. The car was for a friend of the agent’s, Bill explained, or he never would have held the train. It wasn’t perishable27 goods, either—just some household stuff, which the friend was having moved in from Roxabel to Loveland.
Jim Burns, the conductor, said it was the heat—a really remarkable28 and enervating29 heat for October, presaging30 a great storm brewing31 somewhere. What the fireman said and the brakemen is immaterial, because when their superiors went to sleep, it was to be expected that they would do likewise. All of which came out when Train Master Plumfield had them “on the carpet” for the investigation32 which followed. What happened was really this:
Local freight west had started out from Wadsworth early in the morning, to make the trip in to Cincinnati, picking up such cars as were waiting for it along the way, and delivering others to the several stations. The day was hot—there was no question of that—and the work was heavy, for there was an unusual number of cars to deliver and pick up. Besides which, came the delay at Roxabel, where the agent did hold the train for a while, until the work of loading a car could be finished. The agent swore, however, that the delay on this account did not amount to more than fifteen minutes. At Lyndon, came an order for the freight to proceed to the gravel-pit siding east of Greenfield, and run in there and await the passage of a special.
“Don’t say how long we’ll have to wait,” said Burns, as he and the engineer compared notes. “Jest wait—time ain’t no object to nobody. We’ll be mighty33 lucky if we get into Cincinnati before midnight.”
“Them dispatchers don’t know their business, an’ never did!” protested Higgins, wiping the perspiration35 from his red face. “It’s an outrage36 to keep a train on the road the way they’re keepin’ us. The government ort t’ hear about it.”
“It sure ort,” agreed the conductor. “Well, I guess we’re ready,” and as the train rattled37 slowly out of the siding, he swung himself aboard the caboose, looked back to see that a yard-man closed the switch, and then, having made up his report as far as he could, calmly laid himself down in a berth39 and went to sleep.
The train rumbled40 on under the hot sun. The engineer, looking ahead, could see the waves of heat rising from the rails and the pitch oozing41 from the ties. Beside him, the fire beneath the boiler42 spat34 and roared; the sun beat down upon the great locomotive, until Higgins almost fancied it was turning red-hot before his eyes. The fireman, stripped to the waist, swung the fire-box door open and shut as he ladled in the coal, stopping now and then to dash the sweat from before his eyes or to spray himself with water from the tank. For they were travelling with the wind, not against it, and so lost the effect of any cooling breeze.
“Blamed if you’d think she’d need so much coal,” remarked the front brakeman, who was riding in the cab. “You’d think this heat would purty nigh git up steam without any help.”
“You don’t know this blamed old hog,” said the fireman, referring to the engine. “She eats up coal like a trans-Atlantic liner. I’ve thought sometimes they wasn’t no front end to her fire-box, an’ that I was jest shovellin’ coal out into creation. She’s a caution, she is!”
“Oh, she ain’t so bad,” put in Higgins, who like all engineers, loved his engine in spite of her faults. “You’re jest a-talkin’, Pinkey.”
But to this absurd proposal the engineer returned no answer. Instead, he tooted the whistle for a crossing, and, his hand on the throttle44, watched a nervous farmer whip a team of horses across the track.
“Blamed fool!” he muttered. “Couldn’t wait till we got past! Well, there’s the sidin’,” he added, and stopped until the brakeman had run ahead and thrown the switch. Then he ran slowly in.
The brakeman closed the switch, and swung himself up into the caboose. He found the conductor and rear brakemen peacefully sleeping, and without disturbing them, clambered up into the cupola, intending to keep a lookout45 for the special, and open the switch after it had passed, so that the freight could pass out again upon the main track and proceed upon its way. For a few minutes, his eyes remained fixed46 upon the track ahead; then his lids gradually drooped47, his head nodded, and finally fell forward upon his arms.
Forward in the engine, the engineer and fireman settled themselves upon their respective boxes.
“How long do we have t’ wait?” inquired the latter, after a few moments.
“Blamed if I know,” answered the engineer. “That fool dispatcher didn’t say. But it can’t be more’n ten minutes. If it had been, he’d have let us go on to Greenfield.”
The minutes passed; and, finally, lulled48 by the quiet breathing of the engine, the purr of insects, and the distant rattle38 of a mowing49 machine, both engineer and fireman nodded off.
Twenty minutes later, the engineer awoke with a start, just in time, as he thought, to hear the roar of a train fade away in the distance. He glanced at his watch, then got down from his seat, and shook the fireman with no gentle hand.
“Goin’ t’ stay here all day, Pinkey?” he asked. “An’ what’s the matter with them blame fools back there?” he added, savagely50, and seizing the whistle cord, blew three shrill51 blasts. A moment later, the front brakeman, who had started awake at the first blast, came running forward over the train and clambered down into the cab.
“Why don’t some o’ you ijits open that there switch back there,” demanded Higgins, “so’s I kin9 back out? Or do you want t’ stay here the rest o’ your natural lives?”
“Why don’t you pull straight out?” asked the brakeman. “What’s th’ use o’ backin’ up?”
“Why, that there switch has been out o’ fix fer three months,” answered Higgins, savagely. “I’ve reported it a dozen times, but much good it does. Burns knows it. He knows we’ve got t’ back out. Why don’t he wake up? Is he deef?” and he jerked the whistle fiercely again.
Conductor and brakeman in the caboose were having a discussion of much the same tenor52. Then Burns remembered about the broken switch.
“We’ve got t’ back out,” he said. “Higgins ’s right. Git her open,” and as the brakeman threw the switch, he signalled the engineer to back up.
The front brakeman, meanwhile, being of an inquiring disposition53, had dropped off the engine and walked forward to the other switch, to see just what the matter was with it. To his surprise, he found it in perfect working order, for the section gang had repaired it the afternoon before. Chuckling54 to himself, he opened and closed it two or three times, thinking what a good joke he had on Burns and Higgins. Then, looking back, he saw that his train had passed out upon the main track and was steaming toward him.
“THE NEXT INSTANT IT FLASHED INTO VIEW AROUND THE CURVE.”
He closed the switch and was just about to lock it, when he heard another sound that made his heart stand still—the roar of a train approaching from the west. The next instant it flashed into view around the curve, running, as the brakeman afterwards expressed it, about three hundred miles a minute.
Without conscious thought, but seizing the one chance in a thousand to avoid a terrible accident, he threw the switch open again and then sprang aside as the special swept in upon the siding. He heard the screaming of the brakes and saw the train fairly buckling55 upon itself in an almost human effort to stop. But stop it could not, and out upon the main track again it swept, through the switch at the farther end of the siding, which the brakeman there had sense enough to open, and on toward Wadsworth.
Staring after it, they saw it pick up speed again, and disappear.
And it was a mighty solemn train crew that took that local freight in to Greenfield.
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1
luxurious
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| adj.精美而昂贵的；豪华的 | |
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2
blurred
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| v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离 | |
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3
flickered
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| （通常指灯光）闪烁，摇曳( flicker的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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4
indicator
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| n.指标；指示物，指示者；指示器 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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6
dictating
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| v.大声讲或读( dictate的现在分词 )；口授；支配；摆布 | |
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7
meditating
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| a.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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8
sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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9
kin
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| n.家族，亲属，血缘关系；adj.亲属关系的，同类的 | |
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10
meditatively
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| adv.冥想地 | |
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11
perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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12
thorny
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| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
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13
tribulations
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| n.苦难( tribulation的名词复数 )；艰难；苦难的缘由；痛苦 | |
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14
distressed
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| 痛苦的 | |
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15
consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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16
meteoric
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| adj.流星的，转瞬即逝的，突然的 | |
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17
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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18
faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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19
leisurely
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| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
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20
buckle
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| n.扣子，带扣；v.把...扣住，由于压力而弯曲 | |
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21
hurled
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| v.猛投，用力掷( hurl的过去式和过去分词 )；大声叫骂 | |
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22
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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23
chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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24
dazedly
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| 头昏眼花地，眼花缭乱地，茫然地 | |
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25
wreck
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| n.失事，遇难；沉船；vt.(船等)失事，遇难 | |
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26
collapsed
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| adj.倒塌的 | |
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27
perishable
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| adj.（尤指食物）易腐的，易坏的 | |
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28
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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29
enervating
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| v.使衰弱，使失去活力( enervate的现在分词 ) | |
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30
presaging
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| v.预示，预兆( presage的现在分词 ) | |
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31
brewing
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| n. 酿造, 一次酿造的量 动词brew的现在分词形式 | |
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32
investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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33
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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34
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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35
perspiration
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| n.汗水；出汗 | |
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36
outrage
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| n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒 | |
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37
rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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38
rattle
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| v.飞奔，碰响；激怒；n.碰撞声；拨浪鼓 | |
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39
berth
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| n.卧铺，停泊地，锚位；v.使停泊 | |
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40
rumbled
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| 发出隆隆声，发出辘辘声( rumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 轰鸣着缓慢行进； 发现…的真相； 看穿（阴谋） | |
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41
oozing
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| v.（浓液等）慢慢地冒出，渗出( ooze的现在分词 )；使（液体）缓缓流出；（浓液）渗出，慢慢流出 | |
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42
boiler
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| n.锅炉；煮器(壶，锅等) | |
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43
grunted
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| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说 | |
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44
throttle
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| n.节流阀，节气阀，喉咙；v.扼喉咙，使窒息，压 | |
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45
lookout
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| n.注意，前途，瞭望台 | |
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46
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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47
drooped
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| 弯曲或下垂，发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
lulled
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| vt.使镇静，使安静（lull的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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49
mowing
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| n.割草，一次收割量，牧草地v.刈，割( mow的现在分词 ) | |
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50
savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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51
shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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52
tenor
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| n.男高音（歌手），次中音（乐器），要旨，大意 | |
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53
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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54
chuckling
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 ) | |
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55
buckling
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| 扣住 | |
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