A SERIOUS PROBLEM
The chums from Tillbury looked at each other in awed amazement. Nothing
just like this had ever come to their knowledge before. The healthy
desire of a vigorous appetite for food was one thing; but this child's
whimpering need and its mother's patient endurance of her own lack of
food for nearly twenty-four hours, shook the two girls greatly.
"Why, the poor little fellow!" gasped Nan, and sank to her knees to place
her cheek against the pale one of the little French boy.
"They--they're starving!" choked Bess Harley.
The woman seemed astonished by the emotion displayed by these two
schoolgirls. She looked from Nan to Bess in rather a frightened way.
"Monsieur, the conductor, say it cannot ver' well be help'," she
murmured. "It is the snow; it haf overtaken us."
"It just _can_ be helped!" cried Bess, suddenly, and she whirled and
fairly ran forward into the chair car. Nan did not notice her chum's
departure at the moment. The baby had seized her finger and was smiling
at her. Such a pretty little fellow, but so weak and ill in appearance.
"Oh, madame!" Nan cried in her best French, "is it not terrible? We may
be here for hours."
"As the good God wills," said the woman, patiently. "We cannot devise or
shape Fate, mademoiselle."
Nan stood up and shook her head, saying vigorously, and in her own
tongue, for she was too much moved to remember Mademoiselle Loro's
teaching:
"But we need not accept Fate's determination as final, I am sure! There
is a good God, as you say, madam. This child must have food, and--"
At the moment Bess rushed in carrying the paste-board box containing the
remains of their lunch. "Here!" she cried, dramatically. "Give the poor
little fellow this."
"Oh, little ladies!" responded the woman, "have a care. You will have
need of this food yourselves."
"No, no!" cried Bess, the impetuous. "We are stuffed to repletion.
Aren't we, Nan?"
"We have certainly eaten much more recently than madam and the little
one," agreed Nan, heartily.
The woman opened the box. The child sat up with a crow of delight. The
mother gave him one of the stale crullers, and he began gnawing on it
with all the gusto of a hungry dog on a bone.
"Take something yourself, madam," commanded Nan. "And more for the
little fellow."
"Let 'em have it all, Nan," whispered the impulsive Bess. "Goodness! we
can get on somehow."
But Nan was more observant than her chum. There were other children in
the car besides this little fellow. In fact, in the seat but one behind
the French woman and her baby, a girl of six or seven years was
clinging to the seat-back and staring with hungry eyes at the broken
food in the box.
"Gracious!" gasped Bess, seeing this little one when Nan had nudged her
and pointed. "Gracious! that's the picture of Famine, herself."
She seized one of the greasy little pies and thrust it into the child's
hands. The latter began devouring it eagerly. Bess saw other hungry
mouths open and eager hands outstretched.
"Oh, Nan!" she almost sobbed. "We've got to give them all some. All the
poor little children!"
Her chum did not try to curb Bess Harley's generosity. There was not much
of the food left, so there was no danger of over-feeding any of the small
children who shared in the generosity of the chums. But when the last
crumb was gone they found the conductor at their elbows.
"Well, girls!" he exclaimed grimly. "Now you've done it, haven't you?"
"Done what, sir?" asked Bess, rather startled.
"You've given away all your own lunch. What did I tell you? I warned you
to take care of it."
"Oh, sir!" cried Nan. "We couldn't have eaten it, knowing that these
little folks were so hungry."
"No, indeed!" agreed Bess.
"If you had remained in your own car," the conductor said, "you would
have known nothing about these poor kiddies."
"Well, I'm glad we did find out about 'em before we ate our lunch all
up," declared Nan.
"Why, I'd like to know, Miss?" asked the man.
"It would have lain heavily on our consciences--"
"And surely injured our digestions," giggled Bess. "That pie was
something awful."
"Well, it's all gone now, and you have nothing."
"Oh, that's not the worst," cried Bess, suddenly. "Oh, Nan!" and she
clasped her gloved hands tragically.
"What is it now?" asked her chum.
"The poor little dog! He won't have even railroad pie to eat."
"What dog is this?" demanded the conductor.
"Oh!" cried Nan. "Are you Mr. Carter?"
"Yes, I am, Miss. But this dog?"
"Is in the baggage car," Nan said eagerly. "And he's so cold and hungry
and lonesome. He's just crying his heart out."
"He is?"
"Won't you let us take him into our car where it is warmer and take
care of him?"
"That nuisance of a pup?" demanded the conductor, yet with twinkling eyes
that belied his gruffness. "I know he's yapping his little head off."
"Then let us have him, sir, do!" begged Nan earnestly.
"Take him into the Pullman, you mean?"
"Yes, sir, we'll take the best care of him," promised Nan.
"Against the rules!" declared the conductor, briskly.
"But rules ought to be broken at times," urged Nan. "For instance, can't
they be relaxed when folks are cast away on desert islands?"
"Oh, ho!" chuckled the conductor. "I see the point, Miss. But the captain
of the ship must maintain discipline, just the same, on the desert island
as aboard ship."
"I s'pose you've got to enforce the rule against passengers riding on the
platform, too, even if we are stuck in a snowdrift?" Bess said a little
crossly. They had come out into the vestibule, and she was cold.
The conductor broke into open laughter at this; but Nan was serious.
"Suppose anything happens to the poor little fellow?" she fumed. "He may
get cold. And he certainly will starve."
"Have you anything more in the line of food to give away?" demanded the
conductor.
"Not a crumb," sighed Bess. "By the time the cannibals arrive at this
desert island we'll all be too thin to tempt them to a banquet."
"But there may be something on the train with which to feed that poor
doggie," insisted Nan.
"If you mean in the crew's kettles," said the conductor, "I can assure
you, young lady, there is nothing. This crew usually eats at the end of
the division. It's not like a freight train crew. We'd be a whole lot
better off right now," added the conductor, reflectively, "if we had a
caboose attached to the end of this train. We'd stand a chance of
rustling up some grub for all these hungry people."
"Oh, dear!" gasped Bess. "Do you s'pose we're going to be hungry long?"
"They say one doesn't notice it much after about eight days," her chum
said, chuckling.
"Ugh!" shivered Bess, "I don't much care for your kind of humor, Nan
Sherwood."
The conductor suddenly glanced at Nan more keenly and asked, "Are you
Nancy Sherwood, Miss?"
"Why, yes, sir."
"And you go to school somewhere upon the shore of Lake Huron?" he
pursued.
"Why, yes, sir."
"We go to Lakeview Hall. And we know Linda Riggs," blurted out Bess,
remembering what the baggage-man had advised them to say to the
conductor.
"Oh, indeed?" said Mr. Carter; but his interest remained fixed on
Nan. "You didn't go to school last September over this division, did
you?" he asked.
"No, sir. We went from Chicago," replied the wondering Nan.
"Your train was broke in two at the Junction to put in a car?"
"Yes, sir."
"And what did you do at the Junction?" asked the conductor, quickly.
"Oh, I know!" cried Bess, as her chum hesitated. "She got off the train
and killed a big rattlesnake that was just going to bite a little
girl--yes, you did, Nan Sherwood!"
"You're the girl, Miss!" declared Mr. Carter, drawing out his notebook
and pencil. "There have been some inquiries made for you."
"Mercy!" ejaculated Nan. "I don't want to hear anything more about that
old snake."
The conductor laughed. "I fancy you won't hear anything unpleasant about
the snake," he said. "Where do you live, Nancy Sherwood?"
"I live at Tillbury," Nan said. "But I sha'n't be home much this
vacation."
"Where will you be, then, about the first of the year?"
"I'll tell you," Bess cried briskly, and she gave Mr. Carter Mr. Mason's
address in Chicago.
The conductor wrote it down carefully in his notebook. Nan was
impatient.
"Can't you find something among the express packages to help us out,
sir?" she asked. "Canned goods. For instance, a case of canned milk?"
"We'll see, Miss," said the conductor, starting forward again. "At any
rate, I'll let you two girls have the dog."