Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall. Jean Katherine Baird
attention to her even in a crowd.
Her companion was as tall, but more slender. It was evident that she looked up to Landis and depended upon her in every emergency. A reader of human nature could have seen at a glance that she was the weaker.
From their conversation, it appeared they knew all places and people of importance along the route. As the train stopped at Westport, Landis viewed the town with critical eye.
“Tacky little hole, isn’t it? I should simply die if I were compelled to live here.”
“You would never stand it. You’d run away, Landis, or do something desperate. Isn’t this where the Gleasons live?”
“It used to be. But they live at Gleasonton now. They have a perfectly elegant place there. Of course, it is just their summer home. I’d like to take you down there sometime. I feel like taking the liberty for they are such old friends. They are in Washington during the winter. He’s United States Senator, you know.”
“Have you ever been there to visit them, Landis?”
“How could I, Min? I’ll have to leave all such times until I’ve finished school and have come out. I don’t doubt that Mrs. Gleason will ask me there for my first season. She’s not a society woman. She hasn’t much ability that way, and has sense enough to know it; so she goes in for charity, and temperance work, and all that.”
A suppressed exclamation from the seat behind her caused Elizabeth to look around. She was just in time to see the plainly-dressed woman suppress a laugh. As Elizabeth glanced at her, she was pretending absorption in a magazine, but her lips were yet twitching with amusement.
The baby across the aisle began a low, fretful cry. The mother soothed it as best she could, holding it in her arms, patting it on the back, and trying all manner of devices to keep it quiet. A little boy several years old was on the seat beside her, and the instant the baby began to fret, he set up a distinct and independent howl of his own.
Landis made no attempt to conceal her discomfort.
“How annoying!” she exclaimed in tones that could be heard half the length of the car. “Anything but a crying baby! Why don’t women with babies stay at home? It wouldn’t matter so much if there was a decent train on this road, but one can’t get a Pullman for love or money. If there is anything I despise, it’s traveling with a mixed set. You never know whom you are getting next to.”
Her companion agreed, offering her subtle flattery in sympathizing that one of her station should be compelled to mingle with such people.
Again Elizabeth, in her hurried glance, caught a twinkle of amusement in the eyes of the woman back of her. Elizabeth could form no opinion about the girls in the seat ahead. She had no precedent to guide her. All she knew was learned from her parents and Miss Hale.
The train had been advancing at a steady if not rapid rate. They had descended the mountain, and were moving close to its base through a country barren of vegetation and population. There came a sudden jolt, – then a creaking sound as the train gradually slowed and then stopped.
The passengers looked from the window. No station or village was in sight. There was a moment of uneasiness. A few men got up and went to see what the trouble was. An half-hour passed. The restlessness expressed itself in words. Some complained loudly; some grumbled, others walked up and down the aisle, every few moments looking at their watches, while their faces grew more expressive of displeasure and annoyance.
The baby across the way fretted. The little boy cried aloud. The tired mother worried over them until she herself was almost sobbing.
The half-hour lengthened into an hour. Then a trainman entered the car with the unpleasant news that they would be delayed yet longer. The air-brake had failed them, and they must wait until the wreck-train came down from Westport with another car, so it might be an hour before they would be able to proceed.
The girls, Landis and Min, left their places to walk up and down the aisle. Landis looked infinitely bored. She turned to her companion with deprecatory remarks about second-class traveling, where one could not have either a lunch or dinner.
The dinner hour had passed. Some of the travellers who had a day’s journey before them had fortified themselves against hunger with a lunch.
The baby continued crying. The older child clamored loudly for something to eat. Elizabeth crossed the aisle.
“You look tired,” she said to the mother. “Will you trust your baby with me?” She held out her arms, but the child clung closer to its mother while its fretful cry grew louder.
“Perhaps I can persuade her to come,” said Elizabeth, going to her lunch box and returning with an orange. The bright color attracted the child at once. Elizabeth took her in her arms and began walking up and down. The other passengers, absorbed in their lunches or growling at their own discomfort, paid little attention to her.
The little boy continued his pleadings for something to eat. The mother endeavored to call his attention to other matters.
“Have you nothing for him?” asked Elizabeth.
The woman’s face flushed at the question. She was a subdued, worn-out little soul whose experience with the world had made her feel that every one was but awaiting an excuse to find fault with her. Her manner as she replied was more apologetic than explanatory.
“No; I hain’t. I counted on being home before noon. My man has a job in the brickyard at Italee, and we’d been there now if the train hadn’t stopped. I was up to Leidy a-buryin’ my mother,” she added, as though she expected that Elizabeth might blame her for being on the train at all.
Landis and Min had gone back to their seats. Hearing this bit of conversation, Landis turned her head to look at Elizabeth and her friend. Judging from her expression, she had no sympathy with a girl like Elizabeth who could hob-nob on a train with a common-looking person like this woman.
Landis turned back to her companion, who had opened a small leather lunch-case and was spreading out napkins on the seat before her. The napkins were of heavy linen with drawnwork borders. The drinking-cup was silver. The lunch was in harmony with its service. There were quantities of dainty sandwiches, olives and pickles, fruits, the choicest bits of roast chicken, slices of meat-loaf, and several varieties of cake and confections. The sight of it was quite enough to make one’s mouth water.
The lady back of them had also opened her lunch. She, too, had heard the conversation between Elizabeth and the woman with the babies. Arising with her lunch in her hand, and a traveling cape over her arm, she came over to where Elizabeth stood with the baby.
“The trainmen tell me we shall have an hour to wait,” she said, addressing them. “I see a pretty little bit of grass out here, not far from the car. There is shade, too. Don’t you think it would be pleasant to sit out there and eat our lunch together? It would be rest from the close car.”
Undoubtedly she was one whose suggestions were followed, as she expected them to be now. Before she had ceased speaking she had the boy in her arms, and was on the way to the door. The mother and Elizabeth with the baby followed.
A narrow green bank lay between the railroad and the creek. A large forest oak stood there, making the one bit of shade within sight. The woman, with the boy in her arms, hurried to this. Spreading out her traveling cape, she put him down upon it, and immediately taking a sandwich from her lunch, placed it in his hands. His cries ceased. He fell to munching the sandwich, at intervals giving expression to his enjoyment.
Elizabeth trudged after with the baby. She had never carried such a burden before, and was surprised to find how heavy the frail little child was. It was all she could do to keep it from slipping from her arms, or jumping out over them. The uncertainty of what its next move would be caused her to clutch it so tightly that her muscles and nerves were at a tension, and she was glad to put it down on the cape also. The mother, with her eyes open wide at this unexpected goodness of strangers, was close at her heels.
“It’s her sleeping time,” she explained. “That’s what makes her fret so.”
“Will she eat a piece of orange?”