Page:Chetyates00yateiala.pdf/317

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on a smaller grip than that; and he couldn't afford it. He seemed to have a morbid suspicion that there was an inspector peering in at one of the ventilators, or somewhere.

"I told him if he'd put it up on the seat, I'd sit on it, if that would help any; but it didn't seem to, and he went away mourning, and returned to mourn, and sat down behind me and mourned, and in front of me and mourned. He couldn't sit down beside me or opposite me, because there wasn't any room for his feet. I didn't dare to try to tip him; for I was afraid that conductors were above that sort of thing, and I didn't want to make him feel any worse; so I sat and stared at the 'Fragile, WITH CARE,' and felt as if his wife and sixteen children were going to starve to death on my account; and every time the train stopped, I held my breath for fear that an inspector would come in and say, 'Off with his fifteen days!'—and I could fairly hear those hungry children weep.

"Well, neither the inspector nor any one else came into the car, and at last we got to Hyde Park, at ten o'clock at night. The train stopped with my car away down in Indiana somewhere;