It was a fit time for Roger Oakley to leave the gray walls, and the gray garb he had worn so long, and to re-enter the world of living things and the life of the one person in all that world who had reason to remember him. CHAPTER II OAKLEY drew down the top of his desk and left the office. Before locking the door, on which some predecessor had caused the words, “Department of Transportation and Maintenance. No admittance, except on business,” to be stencilled in black letters, he called to McClintock, who, with Dutch Pete, was still fussing over the wheezy switch-engine. “Will you want in the office for anything, Milt?” The master-mechanic, who had been swearing at a rusted nut, got up from his knees and, dangling a big wrench in one hand, bawled back: “No, I guess not.” “How's the job coming on?” “About finished. Damn that fool Bennett, anyhow! Next time he runs this old bird-cage into a freight, he'll catch hell from me!” After turning the key on the Department of Transportation and Maintenance, Oakley crossed the tracks to the station and made briskly off up-town, with the wind and rain blowing in his face. He lived at the American House, the best hotel the place could boast. It overlooked the public square, a barren waste an acre or more in extent, built about with stores and offices; where, on hot summer Saturdays, farmers who had come to town to trade, hitched their teams in the deep shade of the great maples that grew close to the curb. Here, on Decoration Day and the Fourth of July, the eloquence of the county assembled and commuted its proverbial peck of dirt in favor of very fine dust. Here, too, the noisiest of brass-bands made hideous hash of patriotic airs, and the forty odd youths constituting the local militia trampled the shine from each other's shoes, while their captain, who had been a sutler's clerk in the Civil War, cursed them for a lot of lunkheads. And at least once in the course of each summer's droning flight the spot was abandoned to the purely carnal delights of some wandering road circus. In short, Antioch had its own life and interests, after the manner of every other human ant-hill; and the Honorable Jeb Barrow's latest public utterance, Dippy Ellsworth's skill on the snare-drum, or “Cap” Roberts's military genius, and whether or not the Civil War would really have ended at Don-elson if Grant had only been smart enough to take his advice, were all matters of prime importance and occupied just as much time to weigh properly and consider as men's interests do anywhere.