The Road Builders

The engineer got up to stretch his legs, and incidentally took occasion to read the placard. It ran as follows: —

Purple Finn: I heard you was looking for me. Well, I’ll be around to Murphy’s to-morrow because I want to tell you you’re talking too much.

    JACK FLAGG.

He returned to his table, and amused himself listening to Charlie’s talk. Then he looked at his watch and found that it was nearly two hours after midnight. Within six or seven hours the train would be starting. He wondered what his friends would say if they could see him. He was afraid that if he should drop off again, he might sleep too late, and so he determined to keep awake. He communicated this plan to Charlie, who nodded approval. But he was not equal to it. Within a very short time his chin was reposing on his breast, and Charlie was looking at him and chuckling. “Awful good joke,” murmured Charlie.

Young Van fell to dreaming. He thought that the doors suddenly swung in, and that Purple Finn himself entered the room. The noise seemed, at the instant, to die down; the barkeeper paused and gazed; the card-players turned and sat motionless in their chairs. Finn, thought Young Van, nodded in a general way, and laughed, and his laugh had no humor in it. He walked toward the bar, but halfway his roving eye rested on the placard, and he stood motionless. The blue tobacco haze curled around him and dimmed the outlines of his figure. In the dream he seemed to grow a little smaller while he stood there. Then he walked across and read the placard, taking a long time about it, as if he found it difficult to grasp the meaning. When he finally turned and faced the crowd, his expression was weak and uncertain. He seemed about to say something but whatever it was he wished to say, the words did not come. Instead, he walked to the bar, ordered a drink, put it down with a shaking hand, and left the room as he had entered it, silently. The door swung shut, and somebody laughed; then all returned to their cards.

When Young Van awoke, the room was flooded with sunlight from the side windows. He straightened up in his chair and looked around. Charlie was still at the table. Here and there along the side bench men were sleeping. The card-players, with seamed faces and cold eyes, were still at their business. A new set of players had come in, one of them a giant of a man, dressed like a cowboy, with a hard eye, a heavy mustache, and a tuft of hair below his under lip.

The engineer was almost afraid to look at his watch. It was half-past eight. He turned to the still smiling Charlie. “See here,” he said, “did Finn come in here last night?”

Charlie nodded. “You didn’t wake up.”

Young Van almost groaned aloud. “Where is he? Where did he go?”

“Listen to ’im!” Charlie was indicating a lank stranger who was leaning on the bar, and talking to a dozen men who had gathered about him.

“… And when I got off the train,” the lank man was saying, “there was Purple Finn a-standin’ on the platform. I thought he looked sort o’ caved in. ‘Hello, Purple,’ says I, ‘what you doin’ up so early in the mornin’?’ But he never answers a word; just climbs on the train and sits down in the smoker and looks out the window as if he thought somebody was after ’im.”

A laugh went up at this, and all the group turned and looked at the big man with the mustache. But this individual went on fingering his cards without the twitch of an eyelid.

“So Finn has left town,” said Young Van, addressing his vis-a-vis.

“Yes,” Charlie replied humorously. “He had to see a man down to Paradise.”

“Who is that big man over there?”

“Him?” Charlie’s voice dropped. “Why, that’s him – Jack Flagg.”

“Did you tell me last night that he was a cook?”

Charlie nodded. “He’s won’erful – won’erful! I know ’im. I’ve been workin’ – ”

Young Van pushed back his chair and got up. For a moment he stood looking at the forbidding face and mighty frame of the man who was now the central figure in the room; then he crossed over and touched him on the shoulder. “How are you?” said he, painfully conscious, as every waking eye in the room was turned on him, that he did not know how to talk to these men.

Flagg looked up.

“They tell me you can cook,” said the engineer.

“What’s that to you?” said Flagg.

“Do you want a job?”

“This is Mr. Van’ervelt,” put in Charlie, who had followed; “Mr. Van’ervelt, of the railroad.”

“What’ll you pay?” asked Flagg.

Young Van named the amount.

“When do you want to start?”

“Now.”

“Charlie,” – Flagg was sweeping in a heap of chips, – “go down to Jim’s and get my things and fetch ’em here.” And with this he turned back to the game.

Young Van looked uncertainly at Charlie, whose condition was hardly such that he could be trusted to make the trip without a series of stops in the numerous havens of refuge along the way. The thing to do was perhaps to go with him; at any rate, that is what Young Van did.

“Won’erful man!” murmured Charlie, when they reached the sidewalk. Then, “Say, Mr. Van’ervelt, come over here a minute – jus’ over to Bill White’s. Wanna see a man, – jus’ minute.”

But Young Van was not in a tolerant mood. “Stiffen up, Charlie,” he said sharply. “No more of this sort of thing – not if you’re going with us.”

Charlie was meekly obedient, and even tried to hurry; but at the best it took considerable time to get together the clothing of the cook and his assistant, pay their bill, and return to Murphy’s. This much accomplished, it became necessary to use some tact with Flagg, who was bent on winning a little more before stopping. And as Flagg could easily have tossed the engineer out of the window, and had, besides, the strategical advantage, Young Van was unable to see much choice for himself in the matter. And standing there, waiting on the pleasure of his cook, he passed the time in wondering where he had made his mistake. Paul Carhart, or John Flint, he thought, would never have found it necessary to take the undignified measures to which he had been reduced. But what was the difference? What would they have done? In trying to answer these questions he hit on every reason but the right one. He forgot that he was a young man.

Carhart and Flint, after waiting a long time at the “Eagle, House,” went down to the station, arriving there some time after the outburst of Peet, which was noted at the beginning of the chapter. Tiffany saw them coming, and communicated the news to the superintendent. The engine reappeared, and again coupled up to the forward car.

“Everything all right?” called Tiffany.

“No,” replied Carhart; “don’t start yet.”

The three walked on and joined Old Van by the steps of the rear car.

“Well,” growled the veteran, “how much longer are we going to wait, Paul?”

“Until Gus comes.”

“Gus? I thought he was aboard here.”

“No,” said John Flint, with a wink; “he went out last night to see the wheels go round. Here he comes now. But what in – ”

They all gazed without a word. Three men were walking abreast down the platform, Gus Vandervelt, with a white face and ringed eyes, in the middle. The youngest engineer of the outfit was not a small man, but between the two cooks he looked like a child.

“Would you look at that!” said Flint, at length. “Neither of those two Jesse Jameses will ever see six-foot-three again. Makes Gus look like a nick in a wall.”

Young Van met Carhart’s questioning gaze almost defiantly. “The cook,” he said, indicating Flagg.

“All right. Get aboard.”

“Rear car,” cried Old Van, who had charge of the arrangements on the train.

This time the bell did not ring in vain. The train moved slowly out toward the unpeopled West, and the engineers threw off coats and collars, and made themselves as nearly comfortable as they could under the circumstances.

A few minutes after the start Paul Carhart, who was writing a letter in pencil, looked up and saw Young Van beside him, and tried not to smile at his sorry appearance.

“I think I owe you an explanation, Mr. Carhart,” began the young man, in embarrassment which took the form of stiffness.

But the chief shook his head. “I’m not asking any questions, Gus,” he replied. Then the smile escaped him, and he turned it off by adding, “I’m writing to Mrs. Carhart.” He held up the letter and glanced over the first few lines with a twinkle in his eyes. “I was just telling her,” he went on, “that the cook problem in Chicago is in its infancy.”