“I’m pleased to hear you say so,” commended “Captain” McDonald. “There’s plenty of good young men in America.” “I’m—I’m going to marry the best of them to-night,” confided Mary. “I’m running away this very minute! He’s going to meet me at Jaffa Junction!” The trainman’s face clouded dubiously. The girl’s heart began beating panic time. The dice of Fate were rolling. “Your folks don’t know about this?” he inquired. She shook her head. “They—they drove me to it!” “Who’s your young man?” asked the “Captain.” She informed him. “Captain” McDonald sat pondering inscrutably for a long while. The girl’s breast heaved convulsively in suspense. The small god stood by in Napoleonic posture, but whether it was the posture of Austerlitz or Waterloo he did not himself know. “I don’t see nothing the matter with Mr. Copewell, ma’am,” the man at last adjudicated, “but I promised to see you safe to Mercerville. It’s apt to look kind of careless-like to lose a young lady that’s put in your charge.” “But I’m of age!” The conductor’s face brightened. It was a new situation and he was willing to avail himself of technical defenses. “Then I guess you can do what you like, but I wish you hadn’t told me in advance.” “I was afraid,” naïvely explained Mary Asheton, “you wouldn’t let me get off at Jaffa Junction.” Again the train director thought deeply. Finally he announced himself. “I’m ordered to stop my train at Jaffa Junction. I don’t know who gets off there, see? But the brakeman will open up the vestibule door and—may you never regret it, ma’am!” CHAPTER IV A TRAGEDY OF ERRORS While these matters were transpiring, the sister express was rushing west. On the west-bound train “Captain” Fallow chanced to be in command, and “Captain” Fallow was peeved. Sundry irritating delays had marred his run from Pittsburg. His firemen had been hefting coal into the engine’s cavernous maw in a Titanic effort to mend the time-losses. The locomotive had been roaring along with a streaming wake of black smoke lying level from its stack. At Mercerville only twenty minutes were left standing in the way of a perfect score, and at Mercerville the conductor had received orders to stop at an ungodly and forlorn tank-town in the midst of emptiness, known by the opprobrious name of Jaffa Junction! “Captain” Fallow was fully prepared to be irascible with the Jaffa Junction party. Accordingly, when he discovered Mr. Lewis Copewell in the last seat of the last coach he eyed him without enthusiasm. “I believe, Captain,” commented Mr. Copewell pleasantly, “you have instructions to drop me at Jaffa Junction?” The “Captain’s” glance became flinty. “So you are that Jaffa Junction party?” The manner of saying it indicated that the designation carried black opprobrium. Mr. Copewell nodded complacently. “Captain” Fallow’s stern visage became more granite-like.