A slim young man, with a smooth face too rugged to be handsome, and gray eyes too keen to be always dreaming, Huber stood erect, the wide collar of his woolen overcoat turned up, for the spring lingered that year in the valleys of Virginia, and the brim of his Alpine hat pulled over his nose. He disregarded the group of boys waiting for the "up-train" that would bring the Philadelphia morning newspapers to his native Pennsylvania town, disregarded the grimy station-buildings, and looked toward the river, where the morning mists were lifting and the cold sunshine was creeping through to light the Susquehanna hills. He was one of those fortunate and few human beings who are born without the original sin of superstition, but what he saw seemed to him almost a favorable omen. He had come down early, because he disliked to prolong the good-bys of his mother and sister, and because he felt that even the walk to the station was an important advance in the quest which he was so eager to begin. When he arrived beside the railway tracks and allowed his father, the Congressman, to see to the checking of the baggage—a concession that Luke made to his parent’s desire for some part in the great adventure—the entire river was hidden from view by a thick dun curtain: one could see nothing beyond the point by the shore where the black arms of a derrick, at the Americus Sand Company’s works, were silhouetted against that curtain and stretched over a tremendous mound of sand, as if they were the arms of some gigantic skeleton pronouncing the benediction at a Black Mass. But now, though the fog really rose, it appeared to Luke to be torn from above, and as the sun mounted over distant Turkey Hill and gradually gilded the pines on the surrounding summits, it seemed to advance up the bed of the stream, slowly descending of its own force along the dark hillsides, until, all at once, the river was a rushing stream of gold. Luke found himself thinking of the veil of the Temple, and how it was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. His father, who was taller than Luke, but broad out of all proportion to his height, came puffing back from the baggage-room. He held the checks for Luke’s luggage and a slip of pink paper. "Here are your checks," he said, "and here’s your pass. I forgot to give it to you. It came last night." Luke took the proffered paper. "I thought," he began, "that the Interstate Commerce Commission didn’t——" The Congressman interrupted with a deep chuckle. "Oh, that’s all right," he said. "Don’t let your conscience worry you about that. This is for a continuous ride to a terminus of the road."