“Oh!” said Beetrus. “Yes, we’re going up the river. Our things are packed on the White Dove. We’d have to go so far around and pay so much freight the other way. But I don’t like to go on a freight boat, and neither does ma, though the men are just as kind and clever as they can be. We have to sit upon deck all night, too, among the machinery and grease.” “Yes, you will. It’s a twelve hours’ run betwixt this and New Harmony against the current. The White Dove starts about three o’clock. Will you be down any during the winter?” “I guess not. Our man and his wife can tend to everything on the farm. We never do run back and forth any after cold weather sets in.” “And I suppose you’ll put the time in dancin’ and takin’ music lessons?” “It isn’t so very lively in Harmony; but I’m going on with my music--That isn’t the train?” “Yes, it is,” responded the station-master, swinging the mail-bag as he walked forth to keep appointment with the black and hissing locomotive sliding to its brief pause. Beetrus flew through the store, ran down the back steps, and sheltered herself in woods which stretched away toward the Wabash. Swift as her exit was, she scarcely escaped the eye of a young man who swung himself off the train, sample case in hand. His face twinkled humorously, which it could very well do, being a pleasant mustached face in spite of the marks of dissipation it bore. His trim dress and brisk air bespoke the prosperous commercial traveler. He went indoors and swept a business-like glance around before the train steamed away; therefore by the time the station-master had put up the mail and served one or two customers, he had a satisfactory order written out, and professed himself ready to mount the next train, for which he would have to wait quite two hours. “Oh, you know how to put the time in,” said the station-master, “as long as we have any pretty girls left in the neighborhood.” The drummer smiled out of the back door at a huddle of two or three cabins and board huts, as if the capacity of such a place for producing pretty girls was too contemptible a joke for him to meddle with. He said he guessed he would go down to the landing and see if he couldn’t get a skiff a while. “Bee Jenkins will be down that way,” suggested the station-master. “She was in here a minute ago.” “Ran from me,” noted the drummer. “I’d kind of advise her to, if she hadn’t,” said the station-keeper. “What’s the objection to me?” laughed the drummer; “I’m only a good gray sinner. They’ll have to dip me several times more before I’m as black as you South Illinois Egyptians.” “Old lady Jenkins will have a crow to pick with you, though, if she happens to drop onto all these letters and walks.” “You undertake too much,” said the drummer, shaking his head with gentle persuasiveness. “The store and post-office and station and the neighborhood will accumulate, and be too many for you.”