ting-suit, natty leather leggings and a broad-brimmed
hat, he bore himself generally as though second in importance only to the
construction superintendent himself. And naturally he had promptly been
made the butt of the party.

"But you know," gravely observed one of the inspectors, as they took
their places about the plain board table in the dining-car, "some of
these tramps are dangerous fellows. They'd just as soon pull a gun on you
as borrow a dime. So there's nothing like being prepared. Particularly
when one carries about such evidence of wealth and rank as friend Elder,
here."

At the chuckles which followed the clerk bridled angrily.

"Well, anyway, Ryan," he retorted, "I am ready to fight if one of them
interferes with me. I'll not stick up my hands and let him go through me,
as you did once."

"Oh, you wouldn't, eh?"

"No, I wouldn't. In fact, I'd like to see anyone make me throw up my
hands, even if I didn't have a revolver," Elder went on emphatically.
"I'd rather be shot--yes, sir, I'd rather be shot than have to think
afterward that I'd been such a weak-kneed coward. And that's what I think
of any man who would permit a low-down tramp to go through his pockets."

Loud applause greeted these remarks, clapping, banging of plates, and
cries of "Hear, hear!"

"Go it, Elder!"

"Show him up!"

"It's on me. He has me labelled, OK," admitted Ryan with marked humility.
"But then, gentlemen, I protest it is hardly fair to compare an ordinary
mortal to so remarkably courageous a man as Elder. I claim it is not
given many men to be that fearless. Why, 'with half an eye,' as the old
grammars say, you can see courage sticking out all over him."

"All right, laugh. But I never showed the white feather to a hobo," Elder
repeated scathingly.

"No; but--what is it Kipling, or Shakespeare, says?--'While there's life
there's soap?'" observed Ryan, a sudden twinkle appearing in his eye.

The inspector explained the meaning of his facetiously garbled quotation
when Elder left the table. The proposal he made was greeted with
enthusiasm.

Work had been started on the branch road itself that morning, and on
returning to the telegraph-car at noon the superintendent's clerk found
most of the party there before him, preparing for dinner. An animated
debate which was in progress ceased as he entered, and someone exclaimed,
"Here he is now. He'd soon straighten them up."

"What is the trouble, men?" inquired Elder, w