d out of the boy as well as accounts of
various escapades among the men he worked with--especially the younger
engineers and one of the foremen who had rooms next his own--all told
with a gusto and ring that kept the table in shouts of merriment--Morris
laughing loudest and longest, Peter whispering behind his hand to Miss
Felicia:

"Charming, isn't he?--and please note, my dear, that none of the dirt
from his shovel seems to have clogged his wit--" at which there was
another merry laugh--Peter's, this time, his being the only voice in
evidence.

"And she is such fun, Miss Felicia" (Mrs. Hicks was under
discussion), called out Jack, realizing that he had, perhaps--although
unconsciously--failed to include his hostess in his coterie of
listeners. "You should see her caps, and the magnificent airs she puts
on when we come down late to breakfast on Sunday mornings."

"And tell them about the potatoes," interrupted Ruth.

"Oh, that was disgraceful, but it really could not be helped--we had
greasy fried potatoes until we could not stand them another day, and
Bolton found them in the kitchen late one night ready for the skillet
the next morning, and filled them with tooth powder, and that ended it."

"I'd have set you fellows out on the sidewalk if I'd been Mrs. Hicks,"
laughed Morris. "I know that old lady--I used to stop with her myself
when I was building the town hall--and she's good as gold. And now tell
me how MacFarlane is getting on--building a railroad, isn't he? He told
me about it, but I forget."

"No," replied Jack, his face growing suddenly serious as he turned
toward the speaker; "the company is building the road. We have only got
a fill of half a mile and then a tunnel of a mile more."

Miss Felicia beamed sententiously when Jack said "we," but she did not
interrupt the speaker.

"And what sort of cutting?" continued the architect in a tone that
showed his entire familiarity with work of the kind.

"Gneiss rock for eleven hundred feet and then some mica schist that
we have had to shore up every time we move our drills," answered Jack
quietly.

"Any cave-ins?" Morris was leaning forward now, his eyes riveted on the
boy's. What information he wanted he felt sure he now could get.

"Not yet, but plenty of water. We struck a spring last week" (this time
the "we" didn't seem so preposterous) "that came near drowning us out,
but we managed to keep it under with a six-inch centrifugal; but it
meant pumpi