Ralph of the Roundhouse: or, Bound to Become a Railroad Man

"I guess not!" snapped the stowaway. "I don't know who John Fairbanks is, but I know enough to be sure you ain't him."

"No, he was my father. Climb over the fence. I don't quite understand this, and I want you to explain."

The stowaway sized up the fence, wincing as he lifted one foot, and then, with a disgusted exclamation, turned abruptly and broke into a run.

Ralph saw that the cause of this action was the watchman, who had come into view through a doorway in the brick wall, and had started a new pursuit of the boy.

He was a husky, clumsy individual, and had counted on heading off or creeping unawares on the fugitive, but the latter, with a start, soon outdistanced him, and was lost to Ralph's view where the lane broadened out into the railroad scrap yards.

Ralph stood undecided for a minute or two, and then somewhat reluctantly resumed his way.

"He'll find us, if he's got that letter to deliver," he concluded. "I wonder what it can be? From somebody who doesn't know father is dead, it seems."

Ralph neared home in the course of ten minutes, to save time crossing lots to reach by its side door the plain, but comfortable looking, neatly kept cottage that had been his shelter since childhood.

It was going to be a busy day with him, he had planned, and he flung off his coat with a business air of hurried preparation for a change of toilet.

Ten feet from the door through which he intended to bolt as usual with all the impetuosity of a real flesh and blood boy, on the jump every waking minute of his existence, Ralph came to an abrupt halt.

He expected to find his mother alone, and was ready to tell her about the stowaway episode and the letter.

But voices echoed from the little sitting room, and the first intelligible words his ear caught, spoken in a gruff snarl, made Ralph's eyes flash fire, his fists clenched, and his breath came quick.

"Very well, Widow Fairbanks," fell distinctly on Ralph's hearing, "what's the matter with that good-for-nothing son of yours going to work and paying the honest debts of the family?"

CHAPTER II-WAKING UP

Ralph recognized that strident voice at once. It belonged to Gasper Farrington, one of the wealthiest men of Stanley Junction, and one of the meanest.

Whenever Ralph had met the man, and he met him often, one fact had been vividly impressed upon his mind. Gasper Farrington had a natural antipathy for all boys in general, and for Ralph Fairbanks in particular.

The Criterion Baseball Club was a feature with juvenile Stanley Junction, yet they had many a privilege abrogated through the influence of Farrington. He had made complaints on the most trivial pretexts, winning universal disrespect and hatred from the younger population.

More than once he had put himself out to annoy Ralph. In one instance the latter had stood for the rights of the club in a lawyer-like manner. He had beaten Farrington and the town board combined on technical legal grounds as to the occupancy of a central ball field, and Ralph's feelings towards the crabbed old capitalist had then settled down to dislike, mingled with a certain silent independence that nettled Farrington considerably.

He had publicly dubbed Ralph "the ringleader of those baseball hoodlums," a stricture passed up by the club with indifference.

Ralph never set his eyes on Farrington but he was reminded of his father. John Fairbanks had come to Stanley Junction before the Great Northern was even thought of. He had thought of it first. A practical railroad man, he had gone through all the grades of promotion of an Eastern railway system, and had become a division superintendent.

He had some money when he came to Stanley Junction. He foresaw that the town would one day become a tactical center in railroad construction, submitted a plan to some capitalists, and was given supervisory work along the line.

His minor capital investment in the enterprise was obscured by mightier interests later on, but before he died it was generally supposed that he held quite an amount of the bonds of the railroad, mutually with Gasper Farrington.

It was a surprise to his widow, and to friends generally of the Fairbanks family, when, after Mr. Fairbanks' death, a few hundred dollars in the bank and the homestead, with a twelve-hundred dollar mortgage on it in favor of Gasper Farrington, were found to comprise the total estate.

Mrs. Fairbanks discovered letters, memoranda and receipts showing that her deceased husband and Farrington had been mutually engaged in several business enterprises, but they were vague and fragmentary, and, after ascertaining from her the extent of her documentary evidence, Farrington bluntly declared he had been a loser by her husband.

He professed a friendship for the dead railroader, however, and in a patronizing way offered to help the widow out of her difficulties by taking the homestead off her hands for the amount of the mortgage, "and making no trouble."

Mrs. Fairbanks had promptly informed him that she had no intention of selling out, and for two years, until the present time, had been able to meet the quarterly interest on the mortgage when due.

Gasper Farrington was now on one of his periodical visits on business to the cottage, but as, right at the home threshold, and in the presence of the gentle, loving-hearted widow, he gave utterance to the scathing remark still burning in the listener's ears, a boy of true spirit, Ralph's soul seemed suddenly to expand as though it would burst with indignation and excitement.

Many times Ralph had asked his mother concerning their actual business relations with Gasper Farrington, but she had put him off with the evasive remark that he was "too young to understand."

But now he seemed to understand. The spiteful tone of the crabbed old capitalist implied that he indulged in the present malicious outburst because in some way he had the widow in his power.

Ralph took an instantaneous step forward, but paused. He could trust his mother to retain her dignity on all occasions, and he recalled her frequent directions to him to never act on an angry impulse.

Now he could see into the room. His mother stood by her sewing basket, a slight flush of indignation on her face.

Farrington squirmed against the doorway, fumbling his cane, and puffing and purple with violent internal commotion.

"Then what's the matter with that idle, good-for-nothing, son of yours going to work and paying the honest debts of the family!" he stormily repeated.

The widow looked up. Her lips fluttered, but she said calmly: "Mr. Farrington, Ralph is neither idle nor good-for-nothing."

"Huh! aint! What's he good for?"

The widow's face became momentarily glorified, the true mother love shone in the depths of her pure, clear eyes.

"He is the best son a mother ever had." She spoke with a tremor that made Ralph thrill, and must have made Farrington squirm.

"He is affectionate, obedient, considerate. And that is why I have never burdened his young shoulders with my troubles."

"It's high time, then!" snarled Farrington-"a big, overgrown bumpkin! Guess he'll shoulder some responsibility soon, or some one else will, or you'll all be without a shelter."

Ralph felt a sinking at the heart at the vague threat. He was relieved, however, as anxiously glancing at his mother's face he observed that she was not a whit disturbed or frightened.

"Mr. Farrington," she said, "Ralph has nothing to do with our business affairs, but I wish to say this: I am satisfied that my dead husband left means we have never been able to trace. It lies between your conscience and yourself to say how much more you know about this than I do. I have accepted the situation, however, and with the few dollars in ready money he left me, and my sewing, I have managed to so far give Ralph a fair education. He has well deserved the sacrifice. He has been foremost in every athletic sport, a leader and of good influence with his mates, and was the best scholar at the school, last term."

"Oho! prize pupil in the three R's!" sneered Farrington-"Counts high, that honor does!"

"It is a step upwards, humble though it be," retorted Mrs. Fairbanks proudly. "If he does as well in his academic career-"

"In his what?" fairly bellowed Farrington. "Is the woman crazy? You don't mean to tell me, madam, that you have any such wild idea in your head as sending him to college?"

"I certainly have."

"Then you'll never make it-you'll waste your dollars, and bring him up a pampered ingrate, and he's a sneak if he allows his old mother to dig and slave her fingers off for his worthless pleasure!"

A faint flush crossed the widow's face. Ralph burst the bounds. He sprang forward, and confronted the astonished magnate so abruptly that in the confusion of the moment, Farrington dropped his cane.

"Mr. Farrington," said Ralph, striving hard to keep control of himself, "my mother is not old, but I am-older than I was an hour ago, I can tell you! old enough to understand what I never knew before, and-"

"Hello!" sniffed Farrington, "what's this your business?"

"I just overheard you say it was essentially my business," answered Ralph. "I begin to think so myself. At all events, I'm going to take a hand in my mother's affairs hereafter. If I have hitherto been blind to the real facts, it was because I had the best mother in the world, and never realized the big sacrifice she was making for me."