News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1906-05-16

| abSG,H74iy novel to Bullhead-Bullhead.
who had never got anything but kicks
and curses aud frowns. Before Nellie's
smiles, judlciously administered, Bull
| head melted like the sugar she began
to sprinkle in his coffee. That was
what she wanted; when he was fairly
| dissolved Nellie, like the coffee, went
! lradually cold. Bullhead became mis-
'rable, and to her life at Goose River
was once more endurable.
1t was then that Bullhead began to
sit up all day, after working all night,
10 get single smile from the direction
Of the pie rack. He hung, utterly mis-
cradle, around the lunch room all day,
while Nellie made impersonal remarks
| about the colorlesS life of a mere oper-
ator as compared with life in the cab
of a ten wheeler. She admired the en-
gineer, Nellie. Was there ever
doughnut girl who didn't? And when
| No. l or No. rose smoking out of the
| aIkali east or the alkali west and the
mogul engine checked its gray string
of sleepers at the junction platform,
round-as he always did-there were
the liveliest kind of heels behind the
counter.
| Such were the moments when Bull
head sat in the lunch room, unnoticed,
! somewhat back where the flies were
bad and helped himself aimlessly to the
| sizzling maple sirup, Nellie rustling
| back and forth for Engineer Mullen,
who ran in for a quick cup and consult
ed. after each swallow, a dazzling open
| faced gold watch thin as a double eagle,
| for Bat at twenty-one was pulling the
| fast trains and carried the best. And
with Bullhead feeding on flannel cakes
and despair and Nellie Cassidy looking
quite her smartest, Mullen would drink
his coffee in an impressive rush, never
even CHANGING Builhead's way-aDso-
lutely ignoring Bullhead. What was
he but a nightman, anyway? Then
Mullen would take as much as min
ute of his running time to walk for
ward to the engine with Miss Cassidy
and stand in the lee of the drivers chat
ting with her, while Bullhead went COM
pleIely ITdnllc.
1t was being ignored in that way, aft
er her smiles had once been his, that
crushed the night operator. 1t filled
his head with schemes for obtaining
recognition at all hazards. He began
by quarreling violently with Nellie, and
things were coming to a serious pass
around the depot when the Klondike
business struck the Mountain division.
1t came with a rush, and when they
began running through freight extras
by way of the Goose River short line,
day and night, the Junction station
caught the thick of it. 1t was some
thing new altogether for the short line
rails and the short line operators, and
Bullhead's night trick, with nothing to
do but poke the fire and pop at coyotes,
became straightway a busy and i'm
portant post.
On a certain night, windier than all
the November nights that had gone be-
fore, the night operator sat alone in the
office facing a resolve. Goose River
had become intolerable. Medicine Bend
was not to be thought of, for Bullhead
now had suspicion, due TO Callahan,
that he was a good deal of u chump,
and he wanted to get away from the
ridicule that had always and every
where made life burden. There APP
peared to Bullhead nothing for it but
the Klondike. On the table before the
moody operator lay his letter of resig-
nation, addressed in due form to j. S.
the lamp, lay a well thumbed copy of
the book of rules, open at the chapter
On designations, with subheads on