" The older hoboes had warned me against it,
saying it was a cruel trip ... the train crews knew no compunction
against ditching a fellow anywhere out in the desert, where there would
be nothing but a tank of brackish water....

My new chum, on the other hand, swore, that, to one who knew the ropes,
it was not so hard to make the jump on the Southern Pacific ... through
Arizona and New Mexico, to El Paso. He said he would show me how to
wiggle into the refrigerator box of an orange car ... on either end of
the orange car is a refrigerator box, if I remember correctly ... access
to which is gained through the criss-cross bars that hold up a sort of
trap-door at the top. It was in the cold season, so there was now no ice
inside. These trap-doors are always officially sealed, when the car is
loaded. To break a seal is a penitentiary offense.

I stood off and inspected the place I was supposed to go in at. The
triangular opening seemed too small for a baby to slide through. I
looked my chunky pal up and down and laughed.

"--think I can't make it, eh?... well, you watch ... there's an art in
this kind of thing just like there is in anything."

Inch by inch he squeezed himself in. Then he stood up inside and called
to me to try ... and he would pull me the rest of the way, if I stuck.
He was plump and I was skinny. It ought to be easy for me. Nevertheless,
it was the hardest task I ever set myself ... I stuck half-way. My pal
pulled my shirt into rags, helping me through,--I had handed my coat in,
previously, or he would have ripped that to pieces, too. It seemed that
all the skin went off my hips, as I shot inside with a bang. And none
too soon. A "shack" (brakeman) passed over the tops of the cars at
almost that very moment. We lay still. He would have handed me a
merciless drubbing if he had caught me, with my nether end hanging
helplessly on the outside.

* * * * *

We squatted on the floor of the refrigerator box. When we reached Yuma
my pal rose to his feet.

"Ain't yer goin' ta throw yer feet fer a hand-out?" he asked me.

"No, I'm going to stick in here till I reach El Paso, if I can."

"What's the fun bein' a bum, if you're goin' ter punish yerself like
that!"

"I want to find a country where there's growing green things, as soon as
I can."

"So long, then."

"So long.. don't you think you'd better stick till we reach Tuscon? Some
of the boys told me the 'bulls' (officer