ight run
with the Flyer on the Western Division, heard above the din and clamor of
Union Station noises the sullen thump betokening the addition of another
car to his train.

"Now fwhat the divvle will that be?" he rasped, pausing, torch in hand, to
apostrophize his fireman.

The answer came up out of the shadows to the rear on the lips of M'Tosh,
the train-master.

"You have the Naught-seven to-night, Callahan, and a pretty severe head
wind. Can you make your time?"

"Haven't thim bloody fools in the up-town office anything betther to do
than to tie that sivinty-ton ball-an'-chain to my leg such a night as
this?" This is not what Callahan said: it is merely a printable paraphrase
of his rejoinder.

M'Tosh shook his head. He was a hold-over from the Loring administration,
not because his place was not worth taking, but because as yet no
political heeler had turned up with the requisite technical ability to
hold it.

"I don't blame you for cussing it out," he said; and the saying of it was
a mark of the relaxed discipline which was creeping into all branches of
the service. "Mr. Loring's car is anybody's private wagon these days. Can
you make your time with her?"

"Not on yer life," Callahan growled. "Is it the owld potgutted thafe iv a
rayceiver that's in her?"

"Yes; with Governor Bucks and a party of his friends. I take it you ought
to feel honored."

"Do I?" snapped Callahan. "If I don't make thim junketers think they're in
the scuff iv a cyclone whin I get thim on the crooks beyant Dolores ye can
gimme time, Misther M'Tosh. Where do I get shut iv thim?"

"At Agua Caliente. They are going to the hotel at Breezeland, I suppose.
There is your signal to pull out."

"I'll go whin I'm dommed good an' ready," said Callahan, jabbing the snout
of his oiler into the link machinery. And again M'Tosh let the breach of
discipline go without reproof.

Breezeland Inn, the hotel at Agua Caliente, is a year-round resort for
asthmatics and other health seekers, with a sanatorium annex which
utilizes the waters of the warm springs for therapeutic purposes. But
during the hot months the capital and the plains cities to the eastward
send their quota of summer idlers and the house fills to its capacity.

It was for this reason that Mr. Brookes Ormsby, looking for a comfortable
resort to which he might take Mrs. Brentwood and her daughters for an
outing, hit upon the expedient of going first in person to Breezeland,
part