The directors' party had been inspecting the Camp Pilot mines. The

train was riding the crest of the pass when the sun set, and in the

east long stretches of snow-sheds were vanishing In the shadows of the

valley.

Glover, engaged with Mr. Brock, Judge Saltzer, and Bucks, had been

forward all day, among the directors. The compartments of the Brock

car were closed when he walked back through the train and the rear

platform was deserted. He seated himself in his favorite corner of the

umbrella porch, where he could cross his legs, lean far back, and with

an engineer's eye study the swiftly receding grace of the curves and

elevations of the track. They were covering a stretch of his own

construction, a pet, built when he still felt young; when he had come

from the East fiery with the spirit of twenty-five.

But since then he had seen seven years of blizzards, blockades, and

washouts; of hard work, hardships, and disappointments. This maiden

track that they were speeding over he was not ashamed of; the work was

good engineering yet. But now with new and great responsibilities on

his horizon, possibilities that once would have fired his imagination,

he felt that seven years in and out of the mountains had left him

battle-scarred and moody.

"My sister was saying last night as she saw you sitting where you are

now--that we should always associate this corner with you. Don't get

up." Gertrude Brock, dressed for dinner, stood in the doorway. "You

never tire of watching the track," she said, sinking into the chair he

offered as he rose. Her frank manner was unlooked for, but he knew

they were soon to part and felt that something of that was behind her

concession. He answered in his mood.

"The track, the mountains," he replied; "I have little else."

"Would not many consider the mountains enough?"

"No doubt."

"I should think them a continual inspiration."

"So they are; though sometimes they inspire too much."

"It is so still and beautiful through here." She leaned back in her

chair, supported her elbows on its arms and clasped her hands; the

stealing charm of her cordiality had already roused him.

"This bit of track we are covering," said he after a pause, "is the

first I built on this division; and just now I have been recalling my

very first sight of the mountains." She leaned slightly forward, and

again he was coaxed on. "Every tradition of my childhood was

associated with this country--the plains and rivers and mountains. It

wasn't alone the reading--though I read without end--but the stories of

the old French traders I used to hear in the shops, and sometimes of

trappers I used to find along the river front of the old town; I fed on

their yarns. And it was always the wild horse and the buffalo and the

Sioux and the mountains--I dreamed of nothing else. Now, so many

times, I meet strangers that come into the mountains--foreigners

often--and I can never listen to their rhapsodies, or even read their

books about the Rockies, without a jealousy that they are talking

without leave of something that's mine. What can the Rockies mean to

them? Surely, if an American boy has a heritage it is the Rockies.

What can they feel of what I felt the first time I stood at sunset on

the plains and my very dreams loomed into the western sky? I toppled

on my pins just at seeing them."




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