The Recognition of Mrs. Nichols
NELL stepped off the little platform at the rear of the cars with a
dazed sensation of utter unreality all about her.
Only once before, since she could remember, had she ridden in a train,
and that was more than a year before her father died.
Now it seemed to her that she had been whirling along for days,
weeks—or was it years since Abe Lorimer had put her on the cars at Nine
Springs?
“This morning, of course, at nine o’clock, and now it is nearly four
o’clock; and oh, I wonder if the baby misses me very much, and what they
are all doing at home?” she sighed to herself, feeling strangely
desolate and forlorn, as she stood beside the small box containing her
belongings, and looked at the towering hills and gloomy pine-clothed
slopes about Bratley.
Then a stout woman, with a shawl over her head, came through a small
wicket gate by the side of the track, and, advancing straight towards
Nell, asked in a rather wheezy tone—
“Are you Miss Lorimer’s new deputy?”
“Yes,” replied Nell, with a sudden terror lest she should be found
wanting in some unexpected place, and the fear made her feel for the
moment like an interloper, or an impostor, until she remembered the
words of the merry, good-natured operator at Nine Springs; then her
courage came back, and she was able to smile at Mrs. Nichols, whom she
recognized by her appalling squint, according to the description given
by Gertrude.
“Well, I’m Mrs. Nichols. You’ve got to board with me, and I’ll make you
as comfortable as I can, though, between you and me, I’m getting more
than a little tired of deputies, and I’d give a good deal to have Miss
Lorimer back again, bless her kind little heart. How is she now, poor
lamb?”
“She is getting stronger every day now, and the doctor says she will be
able to come back directly the winter is over,” Nell replied cheerfully.
Now there was some one to greet her, she did not feel quite so desolate
and forlorn.
“Well, it ain’t over yet by a long way,” sighed the stout woman, “and I
can only hope you will not be so faddy in your food as the deputy who is
leaving. What I’ve had to bear with that young woman’s appetite these
weeks past no one but myself can ever understand. She can’t, or she
won’t, eat potatoes, nor turnips, nor carrots; she turns up her snubby
nose at leek pie and Irish stew, and as for a bit of pudding, she won’t
touch it. All her cry is for new-laid eggs, bread and butter, toasted
cheese, and such like. Just think what that means to a poor widow woman,
with butter at twenty-five cents a pound, and new-laid eggs at five
cents apiece.”
“As dear as that, are they? Well, it is good for the people that have
got them to sell, but we will live on potatoes, Irish stews, and that
sort of thing, until butter and eggs get cheaper,” replied Nell, with a
smile.
“Ah, you are one of Miss Lorimer’s sort, I can see, only you have got a
stronger will and more purpose. But you can’t have a kinder heart; I
will say that for her. But come along, my dear, and I will get you a
nice early cup of tea, for you must want it after a long day of knocking
about on the cars,” said Mrs. Nichols, who was a fairly shrewd reader of
human nature, and had taken the measure of Nell’s stronger character at
the first glance.
“Is this the office? Would you mind if I went in and had a look round
first? I’m not very hungry, but I do want to get used to things, and the
other deputy goes away to-night, I believe,” said Nell, who was in
secret terribly afraid of her new responsibilities, and anxious to
reassure herself on the subject of her own capability.
“Yes, that is the office, and Miss Simpson goes away by the
eight-o’clock cars, and the office shuts down then for the night,”
explained Mrs. Nichols.
“Would you mind, then, if I didn’t come in until after eight o’clock? I
want to have as much time to get used to things as I can,” Nell said
nervously.
“Do just as you like, my dear. I might as well step in and introduce you
to Miss Simpson, then she will treat you properly. Let me see, what is
your name—Miss Hammond?”
“No; Hamblyn, Eleanor Hamblyn,” explained Nell; whereat a puzzled look
came over the face of Mrs. Nichols, and she treated Nell to a look of
the keenest scrutiny, then marched into the dingy little telegraph
office, and promptly introduced her to the dyspeptic-looking girl who
had been acting as Gertrude’s deputy for so long.
Miss Simpson chose to be very affable, greeted Nell warmly, and declared
herself utterly thankful that she was going to leave a dead-alive hole
like Bratley.
“I never saw such a place; not a solitary individual to talk to, except
the miners that go backwards and forwards to Camp’s Gulch and Roseneath,
and they are a mixed lot, I can tell you,” Miss Simpson said, with a
toss of her head, and an air of knowing a great deal on all sorts of
subjects.
“But the work, is that very heavy?” asked Nell, who was not interested
in this aspect of the drawbacks of Bratley. “I mean, does it come with a
great rush at certain times of the day?”
“Oh no, there is never a rush of any sort; I wish there were, if only
for the sake of keeping one in practice. I’m a twenty-five-word operator
myself, and ought to have been promoted long ago, instead of which I
have just had to hang round, doing deputy work while waiting for my
chance. An eighteen-word operator would manage very well here; what do
you scale?”
“I can do twenty words comfortably,” replied Nell, modestly; then added,
with deprecating candour, “but I’m not on the list yet, so I can only do
deputy work.”
“Get yourself put on the list, then, the very first time the inspector
comes this way; he’ll be glad enough to get a twenty-word operator, I
can tell you, for some of the beginners are a fearfully slow lot.”
Nell began to feel reassured, and when, a few minutes later, the
clicking call of the sounder gave warning of a message coming, she took
her place at the table and wrote the words down as they came through.
“Stop Roseneath cars for twenty minutes; supplies on to Camp’s
Gulch got wrong.”
“What does it mean?” asked Nell, in a bewildered tone, as she stared at
the message she had written down.
“You’ve got to stop the cars, of course; run, or you will be too late,”
said Miss Simpson, pointing to the door with a hasty gesture.
Nell made haste to obey, returning five minutes later very much out of
breath, and rather curious concerning the message.
“Did it mean that the supplies for Camp’s Gulch had got on to the
Roseneath cars by mistake? or what did it mean?” she asked, panting
still from the haste she had made.
“I don’t know, and as it is not my business, I don’t care,” returned
Miss Simpson, languidly.
“But I care; I want to know what everything means, or else how can I do
my work properly?” Nell asked, with an inflection of dismay in her tone.
“Oh, a few months’ work as an operator will soon cure you of any
tendency to curiosity, and take away some of your superfluous energy as
well,” replied Miss Simpson, with a superior air. “But here comes
another message; look sharp!”
Nell turned to the sounder, writing down the words as the machine ticked
them out, and when the message was all through, she heaved a great sigh
of relief.
“There is my mystery explained, and I am so very glad,” she said, with a
laugh.
The conductor of the Roseneath train came into the office at this
moment, anxious to know why his train had been prevented from starting,
and she read the message to him.
“Three cases tinned meats, four boxes marked fragile, seven bags
rice, all marked W. H. P., put on Roseneath train here by
mistake.”
“I said it was a mistake when they were put on, only no one would
believe me,” said the conductor, wrathfully, as he turned to go and take
the misladen freight from his cars, shouting loudly for the baggage
clerk to come and help him, and so shorten the delay in starting.
But the baggage clerk, who was also pointsman and a good many other
things as well, had already gone off to some other duty, and was not
available.
“I will help you,” said Nell, impulsively, running after the harassed
conductor, who was fuming and irritable with the delay.
He stared at her for a moment in astonishment; then his face cleared as
if by magic.
“Thank you, miss; it will make five minutes’ difference, perhaps more,
and it all counts in the day’s work,” he said. But he lifted his hat to
her with a ready chivalry that showed he respected her none the less for
her offer of help.
Five minutes of really hustling work, then the packages were all off the
train, the whistle sounded, and the cars moved off towards Roseneath,
just as the baggage clerk came running back to see what was amiss.
Nell explained the situation to him, putting the freight in his care for
loading on to the next Camp’s Gulch cars, then returned to the office,
very warm and rather untidy from that spirited wrestling with rice bags
and boxes marked “fragile.”
“Oh, how could you do such a thing?” cried Miss Simpson, holding up her
hands in horror.
“There was no one else to help, and it didn’t hurt me, only I’m rather
dusty,” Nell said, with a rueful look at her brown coat.
“The cars might have waited until to-morrow morning before I would have
soiled my fingers by helping to take off freight. Such a fearfully
unladylike thing to do,” rejoined Miss Simpson, severely, pursing her
thin lips, and looking very prim and proper.
“Was it unladylike?” asked Nell, opening her eyes very widely. “I’m very
sorry; but, if the same thing happened again, I expect I should do just
the same.”
“I expect you would. Some people are made so,” rejoined Miss Simpson,
slightingly. Then, with a change of tone, she said briskly, “As you are
here and settled in so comfortably, there is no reason why I shouldn’t
go off duty at once. I shall have time to dress myself nicely before the
cars come in.”
Nell looked a little blank. She had expected to have Miss Simpson’s help
all the evening, especially as her own actual coming on duty was not
supposed to begin until the next morning. However, it was of no use to
protest, as the young lady had so plainly made up her mind to do no more
work at Bratley.
The evening was a busy one. So many calls from the instrument, some of
which had to be answered, others merely going through to other places.
Nell’s breakfast, and the luncheon she had taken on the cars, had become
dim memories, and she was feeling tired and faint when, about six
o’clock, Mrs. Nichols came puffing and wheezing into the office, laden
with a basket and a small tin can.
“Feelin’ half starved, ain’t you? If not, you ought to by this time. A
burning shame, I call it, to leave you here in charge, while she is
curling and frizzing her front hair, and you with no chance to feed
comfortably all day, while your duty properly doesn’t begin until
to-morrow morning. But I’ve brought you a drop of tea and a doughnut, so
that you shan’t starve outright before supper.”
“It is very kind of you,” said Nell, gratefully, as she sipped her tea
and nibbled the doughnut. Then, remembering a problem which had been
bothering her several times that evening, she said rather anxiously,
“Now that you are here, will you tell me how I am to find your house? It
will be quite dark at eight o’clock, for the moon does not rise until
nearly midnight.”
“I’ll come and fetch you myself. It is lucky that the weather is frosty
to-day, or a nice time I should have had of it tramping through the mud.
There is that telegraph again. What a nuisance the thing is!” Mrs.
Nichols said, as the warning machine ticked out its third summons while
Nell drank her tea.
“There is a clerk at Lytton who seems to find time hang heavy on her
hands to-night, for she keeps calling me up, and asking me if I won’t
talk; but I don’t know what to say to her,” replied Nell.
“Tell her so, then, and she will soon leave off. Well, I must go now and
see if Miss Simpson is through with her frizzing and curling. If she
goes on torturing her poor hair like this for another ten years she
won’t have any left;” and away went Mrs. Nichols, puffing and wheezing
like a laden locomotive on an up-grade track.
“I wonder why she stares at me so much?” Nell said to herself, when the
stout woman had gone, for the scrutiny of Mrs. Nichols had been very
close and keen, making her feel vaguely uncomfortable.
Just then there was a call from the sounder. Nell had to take down a
list of instructions from Camp’s Gulch, then send a message to
Roseneath. After that Lytton called her up again, and so the evening
went on.
Ten minutes before the cars for Lytton came in, Miss Simpson sailed into
the office in all the glory of her frizzed hair, her best hat, and smart
new winter coat.
“Thought I’d just look in and see how you are getting on, though it is
rather a shame to come and make you envious,” she said, with a laugh at
her own wit.
“Why envious?” asked Nell, simply, thinking the envy was to be called
forth by the splendours of Miss Simpson’s array.
“Because I’m going away, of course, and you have got to stay on here in
this dull hole. Wait until this time next week and see if you don’t find
yourself longing to be in my shoes.”
“Perhaps I shall if that tiresome Lytton girl keeps calling me up and
wanting to talk, only I’m afraid your shoes would pinch me rather badly,
they are so much smaller than mine,” Nell answered, with a merry laugh,
looking from her own stout footgear, bought from the store at Nine
Springs, and eminently suitable for country wear, to the high-heeled,
pointed-toed shoes with great steel buckles which Miss Simpson was
wearing.
“That isn’t a girl at Lytton; but Claude Hale, a friend of mine. I
didn’t tell him I was going away to-day, so, of course, he wonders why I
am so unresponsive. Pray don’t tell him I am gone, then he’ll be puzzled
to death at my coldness,” giggled Miss Simpson, in a high state of glee.
“I shall not tell him anything, but I hope he will soon leave off
worrying,” replied Nell; then, as the cars came rumbling down the
valley, she went to the door of her office to see Miss Simpson get on
board.
“If nothing is harder than to-night has been, I shall be able to manage
all right, and I will write to Gertrude to-morrow and tell her so,”
murmured Nell to herself, as she stood at the door watching the
retreating figure of Miss Simpson.
A wave of homesick longing came over her as, with a screech, a roar, and
a clatter, the train of cars moved on out of the station. Lorimer’s
Clearing was not her home, but it was the only place in the wide world
which had given her a home feeling, and she yearned to go back to the
toil and the drudgery, if only with these she could have the love which
had surrounded her there.
In her generous heart she had quite overlooked and forgotten Mrs.
Lorimer’s first hard treatment of her, and although it was quite
possible that she would never feel the same warm love for the mistress
of the house as she had felt for all the others, there was no danger of
her remembering, as a grudge, that Mrs. Lorimer had been unfair, nay,
positively unkind.
Punctually on the stroke of eight came puffing, wheezing Mrs. Nichols,
who subsided on the one chair which the office contained, to wait while
Nell shut everything up safely for the night.
Even in the pauses of her work she was conscious again of that same
close scrutiny which had bothered her so much before.
“Perhaps it is her way, or her squint,” she said to herself, with a
shrug, as she locked the office door and put the key in her pocket, then
plunged with her guide into the frosty dark.
The baggage clerk had taken her box earlier in the evening, and in a
very few minutes Nell found herself in a warm, cosy sitting-room, in
darkness at present save for a ruddy glow from the half-open door of the
stove.
“You stay right there while I light the lamp, then you won’t fall over
anything,” said Mrs. Nichols; and Nell did as she was told, feeling very
thankful that the long exciting day was over at last, and that she had
nothing more to do but to sit still and rest.
The lamp, when lighted, revealed a well-spread supper-table, and a most
inviting armchair, into which Nell was promptly hustled, and ordered to
take her boots off.
“What a nice room!” she exclaimed, her attention being immediately
attracted by a row of books on a long shelf in the farther recess.
“It is comfortable; but then, I’ve been used to being comfortable all my
life,” Mrs. Nichols said, with a laugh, as she poked up the fire, drew
the coffee-pot nearer to boil up again, and then, opening the oven door,
lifted out a dish of delicately-browned sausages, surrounded by a
rampart of mashed potato.
Nell enjoyed her supper, and the unaccustomed sensation of being waited
upon; but she was conscious all the time of being held in close scrutiny
by her hostess, who kept dropping into strange silence.
“You said your name was Eleanor Hamblyn, didn’t you? Was your father a
preacher on the American side years ago?” the good woman asked
presently.
“Yes,” replied Nell, but with a sudden shrinking, for with her
grandfather’s injunction to secrecy fresh in her mind, it was rather
embarrassing that this woman should recognize her.
“I was sure of it, for you are just your mother over again; poor Nell
Gwynne, with her great dark eyes and her sweet low voice,” said Mrs.
Nichols, then burst into a fit of hearty crying.