FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162  
163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   >>   >|  
would also sail away southward, and the whole Hudson be left clear as in midsummer. At Yonkers a down train ranged by the side of Wade's train, and, looking out, he saw Mr. and Mrs. Skerrett alighting. He jumped down, rather surprised, to speak to them. "We have just been telegraphed here," said Peter, gravely. "The son of a widow, a friend of ours, was drowned this morning in the soft ice of the river. He was a pet of mine, poor fellow! and the mother depends upon me for advice. We have come down to say a kind word. Why won't you report us to the ladies at my house, and say we shall not be at home until the evening train? They do not know the cause of our journey, except that it is a sad one." "Perhaps Mr. Wade will carve their turkey for them at dinner, Peter," Fanny suggested. "Do, Wade! and keep their spirits up. Dinner's at six." Here the engine whistled. Wade promised to "shine substitute" at his friend's board, and took his place again. The train galloped away. Peter and his wife exchanged a bright look over the fortunate incident of this meeting, and went on their kind way to carry sympathy and such consolation as might be to the widow. The train galloped northward. Until now, the beat of its wheels, like the click of an enormous metronome, had kept time to jubilant measures singing in Wade's brain. He was hurrying back, exhilarated with success, to the presence of a woman whose smile was finer exhilaration than any number of votes of confidence, passed unanimously by any number of conclaves of overjoyed Directors, and signed by Brummage after Brummage, with the signature of a capitalist in a flurry of delight at a ten per cent dividend. But into this joyous mood of Wade's the thought of death suddenly intruded. He could not keep a picture of death and drowning out of his mind. As the train sprang along and opened gloomy breadth after breadth of the leaden river, clogged with slow-drifting files of ice-blocks, he found himself staring across the dreary waste and forever fancying some one sinking there, helpless and alone. He seemed to see a brave, bright-eyed, ruddy boy, venturing out carelessly along the edges of the weakened ice. Suddenly the ice gives way, the little figure sinks, rises, clutches desperately at a fragment, struggles a moment, is borne along in the relentless flow of the chilly water, stares in vain shoreward, and so sinks again with a look of agony, and is gone. But
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162  
163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
number
 

friend

 

Brummage

 

breadth

 

bright

 
galloped
 
thought
 

singing

 
enormous
 

suddenly


flurry

 

delight

 
dividend
 

measures

 
joyous
 

jubilant

 
metronome
 
exhilarated
 

presence

 

exhilaration


intruded

 

confidence

 

passed

 

signed

 

signature

 

hurrying

 

Directors

 

overjoyed

 

success

 

unanimously


conclaves

 
capitalist
 

Suddenly

 

figure

 

clutches

 
weakened
 

venturing

 
carelessly
 

desperately

 
fragment

stares
 

shoreward

 
chilly
 
moment
 

struggles

 

relentless

 
clogged
 

leaden

 
drifting
 

blocks