The Forbidden Trail | Page 4

sandy hair.
"Charley! Where have you been? We thought you were asleep upstairs.
Mamma was just getting scared. And whose clothes have you got on?"
Charley rushed headlong past her brother, shrieking for her mother,
while Roger struggled with his explanation of certain of the afternoon's
complications.
"Gee!" was Dick's comment, "I'll bet Charley gets the paddle whacks
for running away."
"You weren't thinking of driving into town, were you?" asked Roger.
"Naw, lazy bones! You can just foot it, after half drowning my sister."
"You better keep your old sister home then," replied Roger, starting for
the gate.
It was a long walk for seven-year legs. Roger was considerably less
active on the return trip than he had been plowing through the sea fog
on his way out. But his mind was hard at work.
"It would be nice to have a railroad all the way out to Prebles'. One that
just us children could use--under the road. And I'd have little doors that
would open up in the road and we'd peek out. And if we saw any grown
ups coming we'd close the door quick. I'd be the engineer and Ernie the
fireman. And we wouldn't have that old Dick at all. He's too big and
cross. The girls could ride if they'd behave and run errands for us. Let's

see. We'd have to dig it out first. Then we'd want ties and rails and a
little engine. I wonder how much it would cost. But it would be very
useful. 'Specially if we let Mr. Preble send his corn to town on it. He
wouldn't have so much trouble with his hired men if they could ride on
my engine, I bet."
This delectable dream, with infinite variations, carried Roger home.
Supper was on the table and Mr. Moore was already in his place. A thin
man, Roger's father, with a deeply lined face and good gray eyes, under
a thatch of iron gray hair. He was a master mechanic, now owner of a
little factory which turned out plowshares. Moore had devised
machinery which enabled him to turn out plowshares of a superior
quality, in greater quantity and at a cheaper rate than any of his larger
competitors in neighboring states. His was only a small concern,
employing twenty-five or thirty men, but even this made Moore the
chief manufacturer of the town of Eagle's Wing, whose only other glory
was that it housed the state university. The members of the college
faculty did not recognize many of the town people socially. But Dean
Erskine, the young new dean of the School of Engineering, had visited
the plow factory and had been so enthusiastic over Moore and his work
that he had come a number of times to the house, bringing Mrs. Erskine
with him. Factory management was a new theme in these days and
Dean Erskine found Roger's father open minded to his theories.
"Well, old son, have you been a good boy to-day?" asked Mr. Moore as
Roger slid into his place at the table.
"No, sir. I've been pretty bad. Say, Papa, how much would it cost to
build a railroad, under the ground, from our house to Prebles'?"
"A good deal of money. What way were you bad, Rog?"
"Oh, about every way, temper and all. Papa, I guess I'll build that
railroad. I got a big piece of pipe and a gauge that might work. Guess I
might begin to make a engine. Aren't I a pretty good inventor, Papa?"
"I don't know, Son. Nothing you've ever said or done makes me think
you're one yet. In the first place an inventor is the most patient animal

in the world. An inventor just can't lose his temper. Why don't you
begin by inventing a way to control your temper, Son?"
Roger subsided into his bowl of bread and milk.
Mr. Moore was smoking on the front porch when Mrs. Moore joined
him after putting Roger to bed. She sat down on the steps beside him
while she told him of Roger's day.
"He's so contrite and so sweet, after one of his passions!" she said.
"And yet, well, maybe it's his age, but he's so sort of casual about his
temper. To-night, for instance, after he'd said the Lord's Prayer, he
added, 'And please God, help me to find some pipe to make that engine
and some rails too. And bless Charley, she's so little. And bless
Mamma and Papa. And Lord, you might do something about my
temper if you have time. Amen.'"
The father and mother laughed together, then Mr. Moore said, "I do
hope the boy will keep up his interest in mechanics. It's the coming
game for real he-men. The world's going to turn into a big machine.