Part 41 (1/2)

And Regan listened--and the story lost nothing in the telling because the faded eyes were wet, and the wrinkled lips quivered sometimes, and would not form the words.

At the end, big-hearted Regan reached into his back pocket for his plug, met his teeth in it, wrenched a piece away without looking at her, and cleared his throat--but he still shook his head.

”It's no use you talking, Mrs. MacQuigan,” he said gruffly, to hide his emotion. ”I'd fire any man on earth, 'tis no matter the who or why, for drinking in the cab on a run.”

”But, Regan,” she begged, catching at his arm, ”he'll be leaving Big Cloud with his job gone.”

”And what then?” said Regan. ”Mabbe 'twould be the best thing--h'm?”

”Ah, Regan,” she said, and her voice caught a little, ”sure, 'twould be the end of Martin, don't you see? 'Tis me that knows him, and 'twill not last long, the spell, only till the worst of it is over--Martin is too fine for that, Regan. If I can keep him by me, Regan, d'ye mind?

If he goes away where there's n.o.body to give him a thought he'll--he'll--ah, Regan, faith, Regan, 'tis a lot you've thought of Martin Bradley the same as me.”

Regan examined a crack in the planking of the station platform minutely, while Mrs. MacQuigan held tenaciously to his coat sleeve.

”I dunno,” said Regan heavily. ”I dunno. Mabbe I'll----”

”Ah, Regan!” she cried happily. ”I knew 'twas----”

”Not in a cab!” interposed Regan hastily. ”Not if he was the president of the road. But I'll see, Mrs. MacQuigan, I'll see.”

And Regan saw--Thornley, the trainmaster. And after Thornley, he saw Reddy MacQuigan in the roundhouse.

”Reddy,” said he, with a growl that wasn't real, ”there's a vacancy in the engine crews--h'm?”

”Martin's?” said Reddy quickly.

”Yes,” said Regan. ”Do you want it?”

”No,” said Reddy MacQuigan shortly.

”Good boy,” said the fat little master mechanic. ”Then I'll give it to you just the same. Martin's through in here; but he'll get a chance braking for Thornley. You'll run spare to begin with, and”--as Reddy stared a little numbly--”don't break your neck thanking me. Thank yourself for turning into a man. Your mother's a fine woman, Reddy. I guess you're beginning to find that out too--h'm?”

So Reddy MacQuigan went to firing where Martin Bradley had fired before, and his pay went up; and Bradley--no, don't get that idea--whatever else he may have done, Martin Bradley didn't make a beast of himself. Bradley took the job they offered him, neither gratefully nor ungratefully, took it with that spirit of utter indifference for anything and everything that seemed to have laid hold of him and got him in its grip--and off duty he spent most of his time in the emporiums along Main Street. He drank some, but never enough to snow him under; it was excitement that he seemed to crave, forgetfulness in anything that would absorb him for the moment. It was not drink so much; it was the faro tables and the roulette and the stud poker that, crooked from the drop of the hat, claimed him and cleaned him out night after night--all except Mrs. MacQuigan's board money, that they never got away from, him. Mrs. MacQuigan got that as regularly now that she didn't need it with Reddy to look after her as she had when she was practically dependent upon Bradley for it all.

Silent, grim, taciturn always, more so now than ever, Bradley went his way; indifferent to Regan when Regan b.u.t.tonholed him; indifferent to Thornley and his threats of dismissal, meant to jerk Bradley into the straight; indifferent to every mortal thing on earth. And the Hill Division, with Regan leading, shook its head. There wasn't a man but knew the story, and, big under the greasy jumpers and the oil-soaked s.h.i.+rts, they never judged him; but Bradley's eyes held no invitation for companions.h.i.+p, so they left him pretty much alone.

”I dunno,” said Regan, tugging at his mustache, twiddling with his thumbs over his paunch, ”I dunno--looks like the sc.r.a.p heap at the end of the run--h'm? I dunno.”

But Mrs. MacQuigan said no.

”Wait,” said she, with her patient smile. ”It's me that knows Martin.

It's a sore, hurt heart the boy has now; but you wait and see--I'll win him through. It's proud yet you'll be to take your hats off to Martin Bradley!”

Martin Bradley--a game man--that's what they call him now. Mrs.

MacQuigan was right--wasn't she? Not perhaps just in the way she thought she was--but right for all that. Call it luck or chance if you like, something more than that if it strikes you that way--but an accident in the yards one night, a month after Bradley had lost his engine, put one of the train crew of the Rat River Special out of commission with a torn hand, and sent a call boy streaking uptown for a subst.i.tute. Call it luck if you like, that the work train with a hybrid gang of a hundred-odd Polacks, Armenians, and Swedes, cooped up in a string of box cars converted into bunk houses, mess houses and commissariat, a window or two in them to take the curse off, and end doors connecting them for the sake of sociability, pulled out for the new Rat River trestle work with Reddy MacQuigan handling the shovel end of it for Bull Coussirat, who had been promoted in the cab--and Bradley as the subst.i.tute brakeman on the front end. Well, maybe it was luck--but that's not what they call it on the Hill Division.

Perhaps no one quite understood Bradley, even at the end, except Mrs.

MacQuigan; and possibly even she didn't get it all. Inconsistent, to put it mildly, that a man like Bradley would have let go at all? Well, it's an easy matter and a very human one, to judge another from the safe vantage ground of distance--isn't it? Some men take a thing one way, and some another; and in some the feelings take deeper root than in others--and find their expression in a different way. Ditched from the start, Bradley hadn't much to cling to, had he--only the baby girl he had dreamed about on the runs at night; only the little tot he had slaved for, who some day was to make a home for him? But about the Rat River Special----

It was midnight when they pulled out of Big Cloud; and Bradley, in the caboose, glanced at Heney's tissue, which, as a matter of form, the conductor gave him to read. The Special was to run twenty minutes behind No. 17, the westbound mail train, and make a meeting point with the through freight, No. 84, eastbound, at The Forks. The despatchers had seized the propitious moment to send the rolling camp through in the quiet hours of traffic, with an eye out to getting the foreigners promptly on the job in the morning for fear they might draw an extra hour or two of time--without working for it! The Special was due to make Rat River at four o'clock.