"but----"

"Then why not something where there's no handicap hanging over you?"
suggested the dispatcher--and his hand reached out and touched the
sender. "The key, for instance?"

"But I don't know anything about it," said Toddles, still helplessly.

"That's just it," returned Donkin smoothly. "You never tried to learn."

Toddles' eyes widened, and into Toddles' heart leaped a sudden joy. A
new world seemed to open out before him in which aspirations, ambitions,
longings all were a reality. A key! That _was_ real railroading, the
top-notch of railroading, too. First an operator, and then a dispatcher,
and--and--and then his face fell, and the vision faded.

"How'd I get a chance to learn?" he said miserably. "Who'd teach me?"

The smile was back on Donkin's face as he pushed his chair from the
table, stood up, and held out his hand--man-to-man fashion.

"I will," he said. "I liked your grit last night, Hoogan. And if you
want to be a railroad man, I'll make you one--before I'm through. I've
some old instruments you can have to practice with, and I've nothing to
do in my spare time. What do you say?"

Toddles didn't say anything. For the first time since Toddles' advent to
the Hill Division, there were tears in Toddles' eyes for some one else
to see.

Donkin laughed.

"All right, old man, you're on. See that you don't throw me down. And
keep your mouth shut; you'll need all your wind. It's work that counts,
and nothing else. Now chase yourself! I'll dig up the things you'll
need, and you can drop in here and get them when you come off your run
to-night."

Spare time! Bob Donkin didn't have any spare time those days! But that
was Donkin's way. Spence sick, and two men handling the dispatching
where three had handled it before, didn't leave Bob Donkin much spare
time--not much. But a boost for the kid was worth a sacrifice. Donkin
went at it as earnestly as Toddles did--and Toddles was in deadly
earnest.

When Toddles left the dispatcher's office that morning with Donkin's
promise to teach him the key, Toddles had a hazy idea that Donkin had
wings concealed somewhere under his coat and was an angel in disguise;
and at the end of two weeks he was sure of it. But at the end of a month
Bob Donkin was a god! Throw Bob Donkin down! Toddles would have sold
his soul for the dispatcher.

It wasn't easy, though; and Bob Donkin wasn't an easy-going taskmaster,
not by long odds. Donkin had a tongue, and on occasions