Under The Train.

liquor . For this he had been discharged from our road , after making several narrow escapes from smashing his train to pieces , and had since found employment on a road several hundred miles farther west . "Just wait here a few minutes , Mrs .

Shafer , " said I , hastily , as an ominous rumour which had that morning reached my ears , returned to my mind . I ran to the little telegraph office connected with the station , aud sent the following message : " John Daily , Master Trans R . R . ; Is Shafer on the road yet ?" To which I soon received the following

reply : " Dear John : Accident , Tuesday ; Shafer killed : terribly mangled ; residence unknown , and was buried yesterday . " I never in all my life saw such a white look come over any poor mortars face as faded into her ' swhen at last I managed to

, stammer out the awful fact . She never said one Avord , but sat there looking so AVhite and miserable that at last , in sheer desperation , I broke the silence by saying "Here is some money poor Charlie intended to send youand AVMCII Brooks

, inclosed in the telegram , " and I put forty dollars in her hand , Avhich I had saved to buy a new suit of clothes . The Lord forgive me for the lie , but I

had no compunctions of conscience then , as the poor woman , never thinking of the impossibility of the money coming to her on the telegraph wires , squeezed it hi her hands , ivhile the tears rolled sloivly , one by one , doAvn her cheeks , as she

murmured : . "Poor Charlie , my poor boy Charlie , that I Avas thinking such bad thoughts about , you did think of me and love me too , for all I said you did not . 0 , if I only had you back with me once more , "

and she fell to kissing the money as if it was the dead face of her husband , while I stood by a little conscience-smitten , thinking strange thoughts of the way Charlie ' s ghost would feel to see his wife kissing another man ' s money , under the supposition that it was Ms .

Just at this moment John Martin , who had been making the woods hideous b y blowing the whistle for me , rushed into the room with an oath , to know what in thunder kept me so long , so that I only had time to tell Mrs . Green to put her under the care of the conductor of the down train ,

take the poor little woman's hands , with the words , " Good-bye ! may God help and protect you , " before I had to run for it . Mrs . Green told me , the next time I saw her , that Mrs . Shafer had been so prostrated by the news that she thought it best to leave the room in care of the switchman , and accompany her to her home , where she had left her in care of her relatives , which ivas the last I heard of her for a loner

time . Several years passed ; and my only interest was centered in my engine , and my only ambition was to have her make the best time of any on the road . All the love ivhich should have been expended upon wife and childenwas rubbed out

, upon that engine , until every piece of brasswork about her glistened in- the sunshire like gold . M } fireman had been married the night before to a pretty girl , and I was standing tho next day in the engine-house , wondering if it would not be a great deal

more agreeable to buy perfumes and pretty ribbons for some nice g irl , than it was to buy tripoli and other stuffs to make our engine the shiniest on the road . You might think that a mighty easy question to answerbut it was not so with me : I had

, run her a great many years , and she had never played me a trick yet , and I am sure I loved her a great deal better than many men did their wives . Before I had time to make up my mind on the subject , Jim Armstrong came up to ask me if I

would not run his camel engine to Cedar Point that afternoon , as his child was very sick , and he was afraid to go , lest it might die in his absence .

I was idle for a feiv days , as my engine ivas laid up for repairs , so I promised him I Avould , and he Avent home Avith a lightened heart . You know I most always had a passenger train , but this was a freight train , and a

very heavy one it was too , of about seventy coal hoppers . I tell you this , that you may understand what followed . We started about two o ' clock , and went along at a right good speed . This part of the road ivas new to me , and Tom ivas

pointing out different places aud telling me about them . " That ' s ivhere Charlie Shafer lived , " he said , pointing to a pretty house surrounded by a garden , and opening out on the railroad by a little bridge . " You remember him , don ' t you _ . He was killed about two