The Uphill Climb | Page 8

the
girl had been compelled to run down the platform to reach the train
before it started, and that the wheels began to turn before she was up
the steps of the day coach.
"And don't you remember turning around and saying to me: 'I'm a poor
married man, but you can't notice the scar,' or something like that?"
The agent was plainly interested and desirous of rendering any
assistance possible, and also rather diffident about discussing so
delicate a matter with a man like Ford.
Ford drummed his fingers impatiently upon the shelf outside the ticket
window. "I don't remember a darned thing about it," he confessed
glumly. "I can't say I enjoy running all around town trying to find out
who it was I married, and why I married her, and where she went
afterwards, but that's just the kinda fix I'm in, Lew. I don't suppose she
came here and did it just for fun--and I can't figure out any other reason,
unless she was plumb loco. From all I can gather, she was a nice girl,
and it seems she thought I was Frank Ford Cameron--which I am not!"
He laughed, as a man will laugh sometimes when he is neither pleased
nor amused.
"I might ask McCreery--he's conductor on Fourteen. He might
remember where she wanted to go," the agent suggested hesitatingly.
"And say! What's the matter with going up to Garbin and looking up
the record? She had to get the license there, and they'd have her name,
age, place of residence, and--and whether she's white or black." The
agent smiled uncertainly over his feeble attempt at a joke. "I got a
license for a friend once," he explained hastily, when he saw that Ford's
face did not relax a muscle. "There's a train up in forty minutes--"

"Sure, I'll do that." Ford brightened. "That must be what I've been
trying to think of and couldn't. I knew there was some way of finding
out. Throw me a round-trip ticket, Lew. Lordy me! I can't afford to let a
real, live wife slip the halter like this and leave me stranded and not
knowing a thing about her. How much is it?"
The agent slid a dark red card into the mouth of his office stamp, jerked
down the lever, and swung his head quickly toward the sounder
chattering hysterically behind him. His jaw slackened as he listened,
and he turned his eyes vacantly upon Ford for a moment before he
looked back at the instrument.
"Well, what do you know about that?" he queried, under his breath,
released the ticket from the grip of the stamp, and flipped it into the
drawer beneath the shelf as if it were so much waste paper.
"That's my ticket," Ford reminded him levelly.
"You don't want it now, do you?" The agent grinned at him. "Oh, I
forgot you couldn't read that." He tilted his head back toward the
instrument. "A wire just went through--the court-house at Garbin
caught fire in the basement--something about the furnace, they
think--and she's going up in smoke. Hydrants are froze up so they can't
get water on it. That fixes your looking up the record, Ford."
Ford stared hard at him. "Well, I might hunt up the preacher and ask
him," he said, his tone dropping again to dull discouragement.
The agent chuckled. "From all I hear," he observed rashly, "you've
made that same preacher mighty hard to catch!"
Ford drummed upon the shelf and scowled at the smoke-blackened
window, beyond which the snow was sweeping aslant. Upon his own
side of the ticket window, the agent pared his nails with his
pocket-knife and watched him furtively.
"Oh, hell! What do I care, anyway?" Revulsion seized Ford harshly. "I
guess I can stand it if she can. She came here and married me--it isn't

my funeral any more than it is hers. If she wants to be so darned
mysterious about it, she can go plumb--to--New York!" There were a
few decent traits in Ford Campbell; one was his respect for women, a
respect which would not permit him to swear about this wife of his,
however exasperating her behavior.
"That's the sensible way to look at it, of course," assented the agent,
who made it a point to agree always with a man of Ford's size and
caliber, on the theory that amiability means popularity, and that
placation is better than plasters. "You sure ought to let her do the
hunting--and the worrying, too. You aren't to blame if she married you
unawares. She did it all on her own hook--and she must have known
what she was up against."
"No, she didn't," flared Ford unexpectedly. "She made a mistake, and I
wanted to point it out to her and help