climbed to the
foot-board, and the engineer, who knew him, grinned knavishly.

"Better get you some overclothes if you're goin' to ride up here," he
suggested.

"I'm not going to stay. Lend me a pair of overalls, and a jumper, and a
pair of pipe-tongs, and a hammer, and a few other things, will you?"

"Sure thing," said the man at the throttle. "What's up? One o' your
tourists broke a side-rod?"

Brockway laughed and dropped easily into the technical figure of speech.

"No; crown-sheet's down in the Naught-fifty's cook-stove, and I'm going
to jack it up."

"Good man," commented the engineer, who rejoiced in Brockway's happy
lack of departmental pride. "Help yourself to anything you can find."

Brockway found a grimy suit of overclothes and took off his coat.

"Goin' to put 'em on here and go through the train in uniform?" laughed
the engineer.

"Why not?" Brockway demanded. "I'm not ashamed of the blue denim yet.
Wore it too long."

He donned the craftsman's uniform. The garments were a trifle short at
the extremities, but they more than made up for the lack equatorially.

"How's that for a lightning change?" he shouted, trying to make himself
heard above the din and clangor of the engine. "Just hang on to my coat
and hat till I get back, and I'll swap with you again." And gathering up
the handful of tools, he climbed back over the coal and disappeared
through the door of the mail car.

V

AT THE MEETING-POINT

Brockway made his way unrecognized through the train, and found the
Falstaffian cook awaiting him in the kitchen of the Naught-fifty. Five
minutes later, he was hard at work on the disabled stove, quite reckless
of soot and grime, and intent only upon making a workmanlike job of the
repairs. The narrow compartment was none too well ventilated, and he was
soon working in an atmosphere rivalling that of the hot-room in a
Turkish bath. Wherefore he wrought arduously, and in due time the leaky
joint was made whole.

After turning the water on and satisfying himself of the fact, Brockway
crawled out from behind the range and got upon his feet with a sigh of
relief. Just then the portway into the waiter's pantry filled with faces
like the arch of a proscenium-box in a theatre. Brockway wheeled quickly
at the sound of voices and saw the President, one young woman with
eye-glasses and another without, a clean-faced young man with uncut
hair, and--Miss Vennor.

"Ha!" said the President, with