Next morning Donald and Gum started from San Francisco by an early train
on their way to Silver Creek. The appearance of the monkey in the
railway carriage created much amusement among the passengers, and Donald
had to stand a running-fire of questions as to whether it belonged to
his great-grandfather or to a barrel-organ. The fun was stopped in a
little while by the entrance of the conductor, who demanded Gum's
ticket. Gum not having a ticket, an angry discussion arose on the
subject of fare; but Donald said he would only pay when the conductor
showed him the correct price for a monkey printed in black and white in
the official books. There being no special mention in these volumes of
monkeys on tour, Donald declined to pay a cent, and the conductor
departed, vowing he would put Gum out of the train at the next station.
When the next station came, however, Donald and the monkey were
entrenched in a corner, the latter tightly grasped in the miner's great
arms, and the conductor, after a glance at the situation, decided to
wait for a more convenient season. In America the conductor, instead of
entering the carriages only when the train stops, moves about all the
time from one carriage to another, so that as the station for Silver
Creek was still eleven hours' distant, he had little doubt his chance
would come.
[Illustration: BURIED HIS TEETH IN THE CONDUCTOR'S WRIST]
And come it did. It was a piping hot day, even for California, and late
in the afternoon Donald fell asleep. His arms were still clasped round
the monkey, and the conductor would never have succeeded in his object
but for an accident. It happened that about that time the train was
approaching an important junction, and part of every ticket had to be
given up at that point. In America a railway ticket is sometimes half a
yard in length, and pieces have to be torn off from point to point. To
avoid the disturbance caused by this operation, miners, cowboys, and
others are in the habit of wearing their tickets slipped into the band
of their great wide-awake hats, and Donald was in this inviting position
when the conductor came round. He snatched it out of the hat to tear off
the necessary piece, when the monkey, thinking a theft was meant, sprang
at the man and buried his teeth in his wrist. Roaring with pain, the
conductor seized his assailant by the throat, and, before Donald could
come to the rescue, tossed him out of the window. The train was dashing
round a curve at thirty miles an hour, and when Donald stretched out his
neck to find out whether Gum was killed, it was with small hope of ever
seeing him more. For two minutes the miner gazed at the receding
distance, then, without uttering a word, turned round and felled the
conductor to the floor.