Horatio Alger - Out For Business or Robert Frost's Strange Career

The tall, thin man looked at his confederate. He saw that their little plan of frightening Robert into giving them ten dollars had failed.

"Did you send him in to me?" went on Robert.

"There is some mistake. I sent him in for it, but he misunderstood me."

He looked askance at the miner, who he saw was disposed to be a friend of Robert.

"Look here," said the miner sternly, "you are a precious pair of rascals. Your little game hasn't worked. I have seen such men as you before. I was on the vigilance committee in San Francisco some years ago, and such fellows as you we strung up to the nearest lamp-post. Can you make it convenient to get off at the next station?"

"That's where we intend to stop," said the tall man meekly.

"That is fortunate. It will save you a good deal of trouble. Now, boy, come back into the other car. We have no further business with these gentlemen."

Going back, they sat down in the same seat.

"I am very much obliged to you for getting me out of the scrape," said Robert gratefully.

"Don't mention it."

"Do you really think they were–?"

"Crooks? Yes. They had all the signs. I've rubbed against such fellows before now. These fellows are not smart. They don't understand the rudiments of the business."

"You spoke of San Francisco. Have you been there?" asked Robert with interest.

"I lived there and at the mines for five years."

"Were you lucky?"

"You mean, did I strike it rich? Well, I had middling luck. I didn't go there for nothing. How much do you think I had when I landed at Frisco?"

"A hundred dollars?"

"I had just three dollars and a half. I had one extra shirt, and that was about all."

"That wasn't a very large supply. Where did you go from?"

"I was raised in Vermont. Worked on a farm for dad till I was twenty-two. Then with fifty dollars, which I had in the savings bank, I started for California. Well, I got there at last, but my funds were almost gone. I got a chance to do some rough work till I had enough to go to the mines. There I made something of a pile, enough to pay off the mortgage on the old farm, and have ten thousand dollars left. I've just come from there."

"Do you ever expect to go back to the mines?"

"Yes. I should not be satisfied now to remain at the East. Where are you going?"

"To the city."

"To get a place?"

"Yes, if I can."

"Have you parents living?"

"I have a mother," said Robert slowly.

"And you want to get work to help support her?"

"No, she has plenty of money."

"Then why do you leave home?"

Robert looked at his companion. His plain, honest face impressed him favorably. He felt that he was a man in whom he could confide.

"I have a step-father," he said briefly.

"I understand. You and he don't hitch horses. Is that so?"

"You are right."

"Tell me all about it."

"I will. I should like to ask somebody's advice. I want to know whether I have done right."

"Go ahead, my lad."

Robert told the story, and the miner listened attentively.

"Do you know what I think of that step-father of yours?"

"Tell me."

"I think he is about as mean a skunk as I ever heard mentioned. What made your mother marry him?"

"I don't know. She must have been infatuated."

"I suppose you had an easy time at home."

"Yes, I did."

"And now you will have to work for a living?"

"Yes, but I don't mind that."

"I see you're the right sort," said the miner approvingly.

They had reached the next station. In the next car there was a tumult and a noise as of men scuffling. The miner rose and opened the door of the car.

He and Robert saw the two men who had tried to swindle our hero in the hands of two angry men, who hustled them out of the car with such violence that they fell prostrate beside the track.

"What's the matter?" asked the miner.

"These men tried to relieve me of my watch. They won't try it again in a hurry."

Bruised by the fall, the two men picked themselves up and slunk away.

"They're a precious pair of rascals," said the miner. "If we had them at the mines, they would soon dangle from the branch of a tree."

Jones and Barlow, the two men who had been so ignominiously expelled from the train, picked themselves up, and with faces flaming with anger shook their fists at the train in impotent wrath.

"This is an outrage, Jones," said Barlow, the taller of the two.

"So it is," said Jones, rubbing his knee, which had received an abrasion from falling on a flinty stone.

"They don't know how to treat a gentleman."

"No, they don't. You're right, Barlow."

"I suppose the boy and that long-legged miner are laughing in their sleeves."

As he spoke, both turned their glances upon the car in which Robert and the miner were located, and saw both looking out of a car window. The miner's face wore a look of amusement and satisfaction, which was enough to anger the two adventurers.

"Good-by, boys!" he said. "You're leaving us in a hurry, but we won't forget you."

In reply, Jones, who was the more choleric of the two, shook his fist at the miner, but did not indulge himself in any remarks. His feelings were probably too deep for words.

"What shall we do, Barlow?" he asked.

"Foot it to the next station, I reckon. I'm used to walkin', aint you?"

"I've done a little of it in my time," said Jones, with a grin.

"Then we can take the next train that comes along. That cursed miner won't be on board, and we can be received as gentlemen."

"Say, have you got a clothes-brush, Barlow? My knees—that is the knees of my pants—are all over mud."

"So are mine. Yes, I believe I have, but don't let us repair damages here. They will be looking out of the car-windows and laughing at us."

"Go ahead, then. I'll follow."

They started in the direction in which the train was going. Two minutes later they fell in with a young Irish boy, who surveyed their dilapidated appearance with amusement.

"Say," he remarked, "have youse been racin' wid de train?"

"Why do you ask, boy?" inquired Barlow with lofty dignity.

"I take it all back. I guess you've been on your knees prayin'."

"Boy, don't you know how to address a gentleman?"

"Where's the gentleman?" inquired the youth, with a vacant look.

"Jones, chase that boy and give him a lesson."

Jones undertook to do so, but he was short and fat, and the boy easily eluded him. He climbed over a fence on one side of the railway, and began to make faces at the pair.

"What would you have done to me if you had caught me?" he asked in a mocking and derisive tone.

"Given you a first-class thrashing," growled Jones.

"Then I'm glad you didn't catch me. Say, I saw you get out of the train."

"Suppose you did?"

"You were kicked out. What had you been doin'?"

Angry as the two adventurers were at their humiliating treatment, their feeling of indignation was intensified by the boy's taunts. Jones was about to make an angry retort, when Barlow stopped him.

"Don't mind the boy," he said. "We'd better be getting on."

They walked briskly till they had probably got a quarter of a mile on their way to the next station. Then they paused and looked back, for on the way they had passed the train.

"What's the matter with the train?" asked Barlow.

"Don't know. It's making quite a stop."

"I wish it would get wrecked."

This gave an idea to Jones.

"So I say. We'd get even with that miner, and the men that hustled us off the train. What do you say to wrecking it?"

"We can do it. See that switch?"

"Yes. What of it?"

"I'm an old switchman. Tended switch for three years on a Western road. All we'll have to do is to reverse that switch," pointing to one a hundred feet farther on, "and there'll be a smash."