Patsy went forward to the
engine. "If you hit Zero Junction on time, Guerin, I wish you'd slow
down and let the agent off," said the conductor.

"And if I'm late?"

"Don't stop."

"Well," said the young driver, "we'll not be apt to stop, for it's a
wild night, Patsy; a slippery rail and almost a head wind."

"Nothing short of a blizzard can check Blackwings," said Patsy, going to
the rear.

The day coaches were already well filled, and the sleeping-car
conductors were busy putting their people away when the Philosopher came
down the platform accompanied by the veteran engineer, his pretty wife,
and her bright little girl. Mrs. Moran and her daughter entered the
sleeper, while her husband and the station master remained outside to
finish their cigars.

"What a magnificent train," observed the old engineer, as the two men
stood looking at the Limited.

"Finest in all the West," the Philosopher replied. "Open from the tank
to the tail-lamps: all ablaze with electric lights; just like the
Atlantic liners we read about in the magazines. Ever been on one of
those big steamers, Dan?"

"No, and I never want to be. Never get me out o' sight o' land. Then
they're too blamed slow; draggin' along in the darkness, eighteen and
twenty miles an hour, and nowhere to jump."

"And yet they say we kill more people than they do."

"I know they say so," said the engineer, "but they kill 'em so
everlastingly dead. A man smashed up in a wreck on the road _may_
recover, but a man drowned a thousand miles from anywhere has no show."

Patsy, coming from the station, joined the two dead-heads, and Moran,
glancing at his watch, asked the cause of delay.

"Waiting for a party of English tourists," said Patsy; "they're coming
over the Grand Trunk, and the storm has delayed them."

"And that same storm will delay you to-night, my boy, if I'm any
guesser," observed the old engineer. "I'd go over and ride with Guerin,
but I'm afraid he wouldn't take it well. That engine is as quick as
chain-lightning, and with a greasy rail like this she'll slip going down
hill, and the more throttle he gives her the slower she'll go. And
what's more, she'll do it so smoothly, that, blinded by the storm, he'll
never know she's slipping till she tears her fire all out and comes to a
dead stall."

The old engineer knew just how to prevent all that, but he was afraid
that to offer any suggestion might wound the pride of the young man,
whom he did not kn