Ormsby did not know, for at this
conjuncture the telegraph instruments on the table set up a furious
chattering, and the railway man dropped the receiver and sprang to his
key.

This left the listener out of it completely, and Ormsby strolled out to
the platform, wondering what had happened and where it had happened. He
glanced up at the telephone wires: two of them ran up the graveled
driveway toward Breezeland Inn; the poles of the other two sentineled the
road to the west down which the tally-ho had driven in the early morning.

In the reflective instant the telegraph operator dashed out of his
bay-windowed retreat and ran up the track to the private car. In a few
minutes he was back again, holding an excited conference with the
chauffeur of the Inn automobile, who was waiting to see if the Flyer
should bring him any fares for the hotel.

Curiosity is said to be peculiarly a foible feminine. It is not, as every
one knows. But of the major masculine allotment, Ormsby the masterful had
rather less than his due share. He saw the chauffeur turn his car in the
length of it and send it spinning down the road and across the line into
the adjoining State; heard the mellow whistle of the incoming train, and
saw the station man nervously setting his stop signal; all with no more
than a mild desire to know the reason for so much excitement and haste--a
desire which was content to wait on the explanation of events.

The explanation, such as it was, did not linger. The heavy train thundered
in from the west; stopped barely long enough to allow the single passenger
to swing up the steps of the Pullman; and went on again to stop a second
time with a jerk when it had passed the side-track switch.

Ormsby put his head out of the window and saw that the private car was to
be taken on; remarked also that the thing was done with the utmost
celerity. Once out on the main line with car Naught-seven coupled in, the
train was backed swiftly down to the station and the small mystery of
hurryings was sufficiently solved. The governor and his party were
returning, and they did not wish to miss connections.

Ormsby had settled back into the corner of his section when he heard the
spitting explosions of the automobile and the crash of hoofs and
iron-tired wheels on the sharp gravel. He looked out again and was in time
to see the finish of the race. Up the road from the westward came the
six-horse tally-ho, the horses galloping in the traces