A Young Man in a Hurry, and Other Short StoriesChambers, Robert W. (Robert William)
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A Young Man in a Hurry, and Other Short Stories
Chambers, Robert W. (Robert William)
Short stories; United States -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
"If I were a coward," he said, "I'd stop this cab and get out. I never
faced anything that frightened me half as much as you do!"
She looked him straight in the eyes, one hand twisting at the knob.
"Don't you suppose that this mistake of mine is as humiliating and
unwelcome to me as it is to you?" he said. "If you stop this cab it will
ruin somebody's life. Not mine--if it were my own life, I wouldn't
hesitate."
Her hand, still clasping the silver knob, suddenly fell limp.
"You say that you are in a hurry?" she asked, with dry lips.
"A desperate hurry," he replied.
"So am I," she said, bitterly; "and, thanks to your stupidity, I must
make the journey without my brother!"
There was a silence, then she turned towards him again:
"Where do you imagine this cab is going?"
"It's going to Cortlandt Street--isn't it?" Suddenly the recollection
came to him that it was her cab, and that he had only told the driver to
drive fast.
The color left his face as he pressed it to the sleet-shot window.
Fitful flickers of light, snow, darkness--that was all he could see.
He turned a haggard countenance on her; he was at her mercy. But there
was nothing vindictive in her.
"I also am going to Cortlandt Street; you need not be alarmed," she
said.
The color came back to his cheeks. "I suppose," he ventured, "that you
are trying to catch the Eden Limited, as I am."
"Yes," she said, coldly; "my brother--" An expression of utter horror
came into her face. "What on earth shall I do?" she cried; "my brother
has my ticket and my purse!"
A lunge and a bounce sent them into momentary collision; a flare of
light from a ferry lantern flashed in their faces; the cab stopped and a
porter jerked open the door, crying:
"Eden Limited? You'd better hurry, lady. They're closin' the gates now."
They sprang out into the storm, she refusing his guiding arm.
"What am I to do?" she said, desperately. "I _must_ go on that train,
and I haven't a penny."
"It's all right; you'll take my sister's ticket," he said, hurriedly
paying the cabman.
A porter seized their two valises from the box and dashed towards the
ferry-house; they followed to the turnstile, where the tickets were
clipped.
"Now we've got to run!" he said. And off they sped, slipped through the
closing gates, and ran for the gang-plank, where their porter stood
making frantic signs for them to hasten. It was a close connection, but
they made it, to the unfeigned amusement of the passengers on deck.
"Sa-ay!" drawled a ferry-hand, giving an extra twist to the wheel as the
chains came clanking in, "she puts the bunch on the blink f'r a looker.
Hey?"
"Plenty," said his comrade; adding, after a moment's weary deliberation,
"She's his tootsy-wootsy sure. B. and G."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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