A Romance in Transit

"I said always."

Conductor Graffo, coming out of the telegraph office with a scrap of tissue paper in his hand: "All abo-o-ard!"

"That parts us again," said Brockway, sorrowfully. "Good-night, dear; God keep you safe" – the air-brakes sighed sympathetically, and he kissed her hand and released it – "till to-morrow." His face was at the window, and two soft arms came out of the square of darkness and went about his neck, and two lips that he could not see brushed his cheek.

"Till to-morrow," she repeated; and then the train began to move and she let him go quickly that he might run no risk of stumbling.

The engine groaned and strained, filling the air with a jarring as of nearby thunder; the steam hissed from the cylinders, and the great driving-wheels began once more to measure the rails. Brockway swung lightly up to the step of the Tadmor, and when the last switch-lamp had shot backward into the night, went to his berth to wrestle with his happiness until tardy sleep came, bringing in its train a beatific vision in which the song of the drumming wheels became the overture to a wedding march, and the mellow blasts of the whistle rang a merry peal of joy-bells.