Ralph of the Roundhouse; Or, Bound to Become a Railroad Man

by Frank V. Webster

  CHAPTER XXVII--RECALLED TO LIFE

  Van landed half-way down the incline. His feet sank deep into the sandysoil, the shock threw him forward with dangerous velocity, and he wenthead over heels, slid ten feet like a rocket, and reached the bottom ofthe embankment.

  His head landed squarely against the lower board of the fence. Rip!crack! splinter! The contact burst the board into kindling wood. Vandrove through and about five feet beyond, and lay still and inert in thebed of the dusty country road.

  Ralph believed he was killed. With a groan he leaped to the side ofGriscom and grabbed his arm. The engineer's lightning eye followed hisspeechless indication of Van, and he pulled the machinery to a speedyhalt that jarred every bolt and pinion.

  Ralph was trembling with dread and emotion. He ran back along the trackfifty feet, and breathlessly rushed down the incline at the point whereVan had descended.

  As he gained the bottom of the embankment his heart gave a great jump ofjoy. He saw Van move, struggle to a sitting posture, rub his headbewilderedly with one hand, and stare about him as if collecting hisscattered senses.

  "Are you hurt?" involuntarily exclaimed Ralph.

  "Not much---- Hello! Who are you?"

  Ralph experienced the queerest feeling of his life. He could notanalyze it just then. There was an indescribable change in Van thatsomehow thrilled him. For the first time since Ralph had found him inthe old factory he spoke words connectedly and coherently.

  A great wave of gladness surged over Ralph's soul. He was a quickthinker. The presentation of the moment was clear. The young doctor atStanley Junction had said that just as a shock had deprived Van ofreason, so a second shock might restore it. Well, the second shock hadcome, it seemed, and there was Van, a new look in his eyes, a newexpression on his face. Ralph remembered to have read of just suchextraordinary happenings as the present. He had but one glad, gloriousthought--Van had been recalled to life and reason, and that meanteverything!

  Toot! toot! Ralph glanced at the locomotive where Griscom wasimpatiently waving his hand. The Great Northern could not check itsschedule to suit the convenience of two dead-head passengers.

  "Quick, Van," said Ralph, seizing the arm of his companion--"hurry, weshall be left."

  "Left--how? where?" inquired Van, resisting, and with a vague stare.

  "To the locomotive. We must get back, you know. They won't wait."

  "What have I got to do with the locomotive?"

  "You just jumped from it."

  "Who did?"

  "You."

  "You're dreaming!" pronounced Van.

  "What you giving me--or I've been dreaming," he muttered, passing hishand over his forehead again.

  Ralph suddenly realized that Van regarded him as an entire stranger,that time and explanation alone could restore a friendly, comprehensivebasis.

  He gave Griscom the go ahead signal. The engineer looked puzzled, butthere was no time to waste, for the tracks were now signaled clearahead. He put on steam and the train moved on its way, leaving Ralphand Van behind.

  The boy paid no further attention to locomotive or Ralph. He struggledto his feet, and looked up the country road, then down it. The gig haddisappeared, but a cloud of dust lingered in the air over where it hadjust turned a bend.

  Van started forward in this direction. There was a pained, confusedexpression on his face, as if he could not quite get the right ofthings. Ralph came up to him and detained his steps by placing a handon his arm.

  The way Van shook off his grasp showed that he had lost none of hisnatural strength.

  "What you want?" he asked suspiciously.

  "Don't you know me?"

  "Me? you? No."

  "Hold on," persisted Ralph, "don't go yet. You are Van."

  "That's my name, yes."

  "And I am Ralph--don't you remember?"

  "I don't."

  "Ralph Fairbanks."

  Van gave a start. He squarely faced his companion now. His blinkingeyes told that the machinery of his brain was actively at work.

  "Fairbanks--Fairbanks?" he repeated. "Aha! yes--letter!"

  His hand shot into an inside coat pocket. He withdrew itdisappointedly. Then his glance chancing to observe for the first time,it seemed, the suit he wore, apparel that belonged to Ralph, he stood ina painful maze, unable to figure out how he had come by it and what itmeant.

  "You are looking for a letter," guessed Ralph.

  "Yes, I was--'John Fairbanks, Stanley Junction.' How do you know?" witha stare.

  "Because I am Ralph Fairbanks, his son. When you first showed it tome----"

  "Showed it to you?"

  "Yes."

  "Where?

  "At Stanley Junction."

  "I never was there."

  "I think you were."

  "When?"

  "About three weeks ago. And you just left there this morning. You waswith me on that locomotive that just went ahead, jumped off, and--youhad better sit down and let me explain things."

  Van looked distressed. He was in repossession of all his faculties,there was no doubt of that, but there was a blank in his life he couldnever fill out of his own volition. He studied Ralph keenly for aminute or two, sighed desperately, sat down on a bowlder by the side ofthe road, and said:

  "Something's wrong, I can guess that. I had a letter to deliver, and itseems as if it was only a minute ago that I had it with me. Now it'sgone, I find myself here without knowing how I came here, with you whoare a stranger telling me strange things, and--I give it up. It's ariddle. What's the answer?"

  Ralph had a task before him. In his judgment it was best not to crowdthings too speedily, all of a jumble.

  "You came to Stanley Junction with a letter about three weeks ago," hesaid. "It seemed you had dead-headed it there on the trucks from somepoint down the line."

  Van nodded as if he dimly recalled all this.

  "You hid in an old factory, or went there to take a nap. A baseballstruck your head accidentally. We took you to our home, you have beenthere since."

  "That's queer, I can't remember. Yes--yes, I do, in a way," Vancorrected himself sharply. "Was there a chicken house there--oh, such afine chicken house!" he exclaimed expansively, "with fancy towers madeout of laths, and a dandy wind vane on it?"

  "You built that chicken house yourself," explained Ralph.

  "Oh, go on!" said Van incredulously.

  "Well, you did."

  "And there was a lady there, dressed in black," muttered Van, his glancestrained dreamily. "She was good to me. She used to sing sweetsongs--just like a mother would. I never had a mother, to remember."

  Van's eyes began to fill with tears. Ralph was touched at therecognition of his mother's gentleness. Emotion had lightened theshadows in Van's mind more powerfully than suggestion or memory.

  Ralph felt that he had better rouse his companion from a retrospectivemood.

  "You're all right now," he said briskly.

  "And I was knocked silly?" observed Van "I see how it was. I've beenlike a man in a long sleep. How did I come out of it, though?"

  "Just as you went into it--with a shock. I took you for a trip on alocomotive. Just as we got near here you made a sudden jump, rolleddown the embankment, your head burst through that fence board yonder,and I thought you were killed."

  Van felt over his head. He winced at a sensitive touch at one spot, butsaid, with a light laugh:

  "I've got a cast-iron skull, I guess! But what made me jump from thelocomotive? Did I have daffy fits?"

  "Oh, not at all."

  "Well, then?"

  "Why," said Ralph, "I think the sight of a man in a long linen duster,driving a one-horse gig down this road startled you or attracted yourattention, or something of that sort."

  "Ginger!" interrupted Van, jumping to his feet, "I remember now! Itwas--him! And I've got to see him. He went that way. I'm off."

  "Hold on! hold on!" called the dis
mayed Ralph.

  But Van heard not, or heeded not. He sprinted for the bend in the road,Ralph hotly at his heels.