A BABY LEFT IN THE TRAIN
A ROAR of machinery, a succession of dizzying flashes past the window,
then sudden relief from the deafening noise, and the express train had
gone on its way.
Christie looked at Wells Burton. His face was very grave, and she
thought it a trifle paler than before.
"Did you know that?" he asked, nodding his head in the direction of the
departed train.
"Did I know what?"
"That the express train was almost due, and would come thundering over
me so soon?"
Christie shivered. "I did not know anything about the express train,"
she said.
"Well, you could not have done any quicker work if you had known. It is
queer I didn't think of it. I thought of almost everything else while I
lay there; it was the queerest thing that ever happened to me. I can't
think how it happened. I've stood on that very step fifty times this
winter, and never thought of such a thing as slipping. I suppose there
was ice on my boots. Nice-looking boot, isn't it?" he said, glancing
down at it. "The conductor made short work of getting it off, with that
sharp knife of his. Look here, I don't know why I keep talking about
boots and things, instead of trying to thank you, and show my gratitude
in some way. Boys don't know how to do that sort of thing, anyhow. You
ought to see my mamma; or she ought to see you. Mothers know how to say
what they feel."
"I don't want to be thanked," said Christie, her cheeks flushing, "I
didn't do anything."
"No, only saved my life, and showed more pluck and common sense, and
quick wit than any fourteen girls put together ever had before. You
see, if you had wasted twenty-five seconds, this train couldn't have
run back to pick me up, without running into the express; and I should
just have had to lie there and be crushed. I couldn't move, any more
than if I had been dead; in fact, I was dead, when they picked me up,
fainted, you know. But before I fainted, I knew just what had happened,
and where I was, and what was likely to happen next. I didn't think of
this express that had just rushed by, but I thought of the up train,
due in half an hour, and I knew there wasn't a house nor a shed within
a mile. Did you ever come to a place where you thought you could see
pretty plainly that you were not going to live but a few minutes more?"
"Once I was very sick indeed," Christie said, "and the doctor gave me
up, and mother thought I was dying; and they told me that I couldn't
live but a few minutes."
"And what did you do?"
The blood rolled in waves over Christie's face and neck. It was rather
hard to talk to a strange boy who might laugh at her, about one of the
most solemn experiences of her life. She was not used to talking with
boys, only Karl, and he never asked such straight-out questions about
things, and waited for answers. Something must be said; and what should
be said but the truth? Was she ashamed of it? Christie wondered.
She dropped her grey eyes, and her voice was low but clear as she said:
"I prayed."
There was no sound of a laugh or a sneer in answer.
"Yes," he said, nodding his head as though he understood, "so did I.
I wonder if they all do when they get into downright trouble? I have
heard that people did, bad men, you know, and all sorts of people. It
seems sort of mean, and—well, I don't suppose girls use such words, but
what we boys would call sneaking. Don't you think so?"
But Christie, in her confusion, did not understand him. Did he mean
that boys would call it "sneaking" to pray? "What is?"
"Why, living along all your life without thinking of such a thing as
praying until just when you get into trouble, and then praying with all
your might, and getting helped out, and going on just the same as you
did before."
"Oh," said Christie, relieved, "why, yes, I think that would be mean,
but then, real honest people don't do it."
"They don't? What 'do' they do then? Weren't you honest?"
"Yes," said Christie gravely, "I was, but I didn't go on just as I did
before; everything was just as different as could be."
"What do you mean? What was different?"
"Why, I myself. I didn't feel the same, nor do the same. I don't think
I can explain what I mean."
"Didn't you pray to get well?"
"A little; and I prayed to be made ready to die if I 'was' to die, and
to—not to be afraid, you know."
"Well?"
"And pretty soon the feeling afraid all went away, and I didn't think
it made much difference whether I got well or not; and for days and
days nobody thought I would."
"But you did get well?"
"Oh, yes, I did, of course, or else I should not be here now."
And at this point Christie could not help giving a little laugh.
Wells did not laugh at all. He looked grave and perplexed.
"That is just what I said," he repeated. "You prayed to be gotten out
of trouble, and you got out, and then things went on as before."
"But things didn't go on as before," persisted Christie. "I asked not
to be afraid to die, to have a heart given to me that could trust Jesus
anyhow, whether He wanted me to live or die. And I got it; so of course
things were different."
"You got it!"
"Why, yes. All in a minute everything seemed changed. I can't tell you
how, but then I know it was so."
"When was that?"
"That I was sick? It was a year ago last December, just a little bit
before Christmas."
"And the difference lasts?"
"Oh, yes, it lasts," said Christie, with a curious little smile. "Every
day when I'm working, it all comes back, you know, in a quick little
think."
She began to think that this was the strangest boy to talk she had ever
heard of. He was even stranger than some of the boys in story books.
"Well," he said, after a few moments of silence, "I prayed to be made
ready to die too; for when this train rattled off, I didn't see any
other way. It didn't seem probable that anybody would come along that
lonesome road on Christmas Day in time to save me, and I meant to be
honest, but I didn't think of such a thing as its lasting if I got out
of the scrape."
Christie looked puzzled.
"How could it last to take you to Heaven, if it wouldn't last any when
you were not to go to Heaven yet?" she asked.
And then Wells Burton laughed, though the pain in his ankle immediately
made heavy wrinkles come back into his face.
"It looks like playing a very poor game, I'll own," he said, "but I
thought I meant it."
"But if you really did mean it, you gave yourself away to Him, and if
you are honest, how can you take yourself back?"
To this he made no answer for several seconds, and, indeed, what he
said next can hardly be called an answer:
"Then you are a Christian!"
The red came back in swift waves to Christie's cheeks. She had been
so interested as to hardly remember that the talk was partly about
herself, but this plain question which was also an exclamation, brought
back her embarrassment.
"I think I am," she said hesitatingly, and then ashamed of such
witnessing, added boldly: "Yes, I 'know' I am."
"And I know that I am not," he said, with a little laugh.
After a few minutes of silence, during which Christie was wondering
whether the proper thing to do now would be to go back to her seat, he
spoke again:
"Isn't it time we were introduced? I know you very well indeed. You are
Christie Tucker, aren't you? And the boy whom I meet at the station
almost every morning, who will not look at me nor give me a chance to
speak to him, is your brother Karl. I asked the stage-driver all about
him. What is the use in his not speaking to me?"
"He is only ten," said Christie in apology.
"And I am only fourteen, or half-way between that and fifteen. What
difference does four or five years make? When I get to be forty, it
won't hinder our being good friends because he is only thirty-five or
so. There are not so many people to be friendly with up there where we
live that we can afford to waste any of them. I looked over at your
class that day I stayed to Sunday-school, and thought you were having a
nice time."
"We were," said Christie with animation. "Mr. Keith is splendid."
Wells made a gesture of disagreement.
"I don't like ministers as a rule," he said; "they always pitch into a
fellow so."
"I don't know what that is," said Christie simply, "but every one likes
Mr. Keith—that is, every one but bad men; of course they don't like
him because he makes them remember that they are bad, and they want to
forget it."
"Do you suppose that is the reason why I don't like him?" Wells asked
with a comical little look.
And then, his face growing grave, "I'll tell you a queer thing, though.
Back there, while I lay across those rails and thought I was done with
things, I didn't even think of mamma in the sense that I wanted her
there that minute—the only one that I thought of was this Mr. Keith. I
wished for him, not to pull me off of the track, you know, which would
have been the reasonable thing to do if he had been there, but to pray
for me; and I never saw him but twice in my life.
"I'll tell you what made me think of that though. Do you remember a
Sunday when they thought that Olin boy was going to die? Well, I was in
church that Sunday, and Mr. Keith prayed for him; and I thought then if
I were going to die, I should like to have Mr. Keith pray for me.
"Aren't we going most uncommonly slow? By the way my foot twinges, I
should say we had been about seventeen hours so far reaching the city,
and we must be twelve or fourteen miles away yet. I declare, if we are
not stopping again! What for, I'd like to know? There is no station
here."
What for, indeed? That question seemed to be on the faces of all the
passengers. Christie looked out of the window; so did everybody else
except Wells Burton, who could not lift himself up to do so.
"Where is it?" he asked.
"It is nowhere," answered Christie with a little laugh. "We seem to
be just in the road. There isn't a house to be seen, and there is
snow everywhere where there isn't mud. No, I don't think there is any
station; at least, I don't see any depot."
"I know there isn't a station nor a depot," said Wells, confidently,
"unless it has been built since last night."
"What's the matter sir?" This last to a man who had been out to hear
the news.
"Track washed away," said the man, using as few words as possible, and
looking gloomy.
"Washed away! Why, how much of it?"
"More than I know; some say half a mile, and some say five miles;
enough of it to keep us standing here longer than we want to, I guess."
"Where is 'here?' Are we near the station?"
"No, two miles out."
"And is it right here that the track has washed?"
"No, half a mile or so up the track; they sent signals down to us."
"Thank you, sir," said Wells, and the man moved on.
"Here's a go!" the boy said gravely. "Or no, it isn't, it's a
standstill; and that's slang I suppose. My mother hates slang, and so
does yours I presume, mothers all do; I beg your pardon for using it,
but I do wonder how long we are to be stopped here! If it is going to
be long, I'm afraid I shall wish for a surgeon to cut off my foot."
"Does it pain you very much?" asked Christie sympathetically.
"Well, I've had things that felt pleasanter. These heavy rains and
then the thaw have played the mischief with the railroad track; father
said he was afraid there would be trouble. But I just wish they had
waited until after Christmas. I'm afraid you and I will be late to our
Christmas dinner."
"I'm sorry for that poor man," said Christie, twisting herself to get
a glimpse of the sad-faced young man who had his watch in his hand at
this moment. "There is a sick friend whom he thinks he could help if he
could only get there in time; see how troubled he looks."
"Poor fellow!" said Wells sympathetically.
But the next moment Christie's attention was turned elsewhere. She
turned herself completely around, and gazed up and down the car.
Finally, she stood up on tiptoe for a moment.
"What's the trouble?" asked Wells. "Lost something?"
But by way of answer, she turned toward him, her face full of anxiety,
and asked: "Where is that baby's mother?"
"What baby? The lady with a baby got off at the last station."
"Why, no, she didn't; I see the baby as plain as can be, lying on the
little bed she made for him; he is fast asleep, but I don't see her
anywhere?"
"I tell you she got off," said Wells, growing earnest. "I happened to
be looking right at her; I noticed her particularly because she had
a shawl like mamma's, and I wondered if she looked like mamma, and I
stared at her a good deal to find out. Oh, yes, she stepped off the
cars and stepped into a mud puddle and got her feet wet, and looked
cross. I raised myself up to see her do it and hurt my foot by the
means, and then I looked cross."
"Then," said Christie, her face full of anxiety, not to say terror,
"then she has left her baby!"
Unlikely as it sounds, this appeared to be the case. In the course of a
few minutes, somebody else began to be interested in the same thought;
that was no other person than the baby himself. He began to rub his
eyes, and yawn and twist about on his narrow bed in a very dangerous
way. At last, he was only held on by the cane of a gentleman who built
a fence before baby by holding up the cane. Then he looked about him in
a savage manner, and asked,—
"Where is this child's mother?"
Where indeed! That was just what baby wanted to know, and he began to
give warning little whimpers which said: "I'll cry in a way to astonish
you, if somebody doesn't come and attend to me very soon."
What was to be done? Christie looked about her very much startled, and
discovered that there was but one lady on the car; she was young and
pretty, dressed in velvet, and looked as though she thought babies were
a mistake and a nuisance.
"Madam," said the man with the cane, glowering at her, "do you know
anything about the child's mother?"
"How should I?" answered the velvet-dressed lady, and she immediately
went back to her "Seaside Library" book.
Then the baby gave a warning yell.
Christie started up. "That baby is afraid," she said to Wells. "The
next thing he will cry so hard that nobody can stop him; I'm going over
there."
"Do you know him?" asked Wells, looking at the baby as though he would
much rather undertake to pacify a cross dog.
"Oh, no; I don't know who he is at all. But he begins to cry as though
he was afraid, and if it was our baby at home, I don't know what I
should do."
With this rather mixed up sentence, she hurried away, and in another
moment was bending over the baby who had not fully decided whether to
be angry or grieved over the strange treatment he was receiving. He had
his lips in a dreadful pucker, and the squeal he was prepared to give
would, I think, have astonished all the people. But he changed his mind
when he saw Christie, and gave her an astonished stare, and made no
objection when she raised him with cooing words, and cuddled his face
to hers.
"Is he your brother?" inquired the gentleman with the cane. "You
shouldn't leave him alone in that way; it is very careless. He might
have rolled off and knocked his brains out."
"Oh, no, sir," said Christie, who by this time could not help smiling
to think how many people she was expected to claim as relatives. "I
don't know who he is, poor baby! And I can't think what has become of
his mother." Then she kissed him.