The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1921-03-18
81 sss

l
It would be the neighbor!y thing for
me TO do to help them off with their
handbags and see that they got a CAD
If they wanted one.
"Sure l WILL" says I. "That is, il
the lady's husband isn't there to meet
them. Her suit case has her name,
Mrs. Sheila Macrae,' on it,"
The boss has a way Of making two
! up-and-down wrinkles and a little
curved horseshoe line come between
his eyes when he is going to reach
/ for you.
"There are times, Jimmie, when you
see altogether too much" he said,
sort of gruff.
"Macrae, you say: that is Scotch.
And so is 'SheiIa' Most likely the
names, both of them, are only hand
downs. She looks straight American
to me-"
"She is pretty enough to look any
| thing" l threw in, just to see how he
would take it.
Fright you are, Jimmie" he agreed.
'Tve been looking at the back of her
neck all day. There are so many
| women who don't measure up to the
| promises they make when you see em
| from behind You catch a glimpse of
| O pretty neck, and when you get
around to the face you find out that
| the neck was only a bit of bluff"
If had been eating anything in the
world but ice cream believe it would
| have chOked me- What he said led
up to the admission that he had been
| making these face-and-neck c0mpari-
sons for goodness knows how long,
and I couldn't surround that, all at
once. You see, he was such picture
of mans man in every sense of the
word; a fighter and a hard-hitter,
right from the jump. And to a man
of that sort women are usually no
more than fluffy little side-issues, as
Eve said when they told her she was
made out of Adams rib.
That ended the dining-car part Of
it. The sure-enough, Knockout round
was fought at the rear end of our
Pullman, which happened to be the
last car in the train. AS we walked
back after dinner Mr. NOrcross gave
me a cigar and said we'd go out to
the observation platform to smoke.
When we reached the door we found
the young lady and the girl standing
at the rear railing to watch the track
unroll itself under the trucks. The
young lady was wearing a coat with
storm collar but the girl had a fur
thing around her neck, and her stocky
chunky little arms were elbow deep in
big pillow muff to match though the
April night wasn't even halfway
chilly.
The boss stepped out on the plat
form to close the side trap door which,
with the railing gate on that side, had
been left open by a careless rear flag
man. Just then the big Pacific type"
that was pulling US let out whistle
screech that would have walked the
dead, and the air-brakes went on
with jerk that showed how beauti-
fully reckless the railroading was on
the Pioneer Short Line.
Mr.. Norcross was reaching for the
| catch on the floor trap and the jerk
didn't throw him. But it snapped the
young woman and the girl away from
the railing so suddenly that the little
one had to grab for hand-holds; and
when she did that, of course the big
muff went overheard.
At this, bunch of things happened,
all in an eye-Wink. The train ground
and jiggled to a stop; the girl squeaed,
"Oh, my muff !" and skipped down
the steps to disappear in the general
direction Of the Pacific coast; the
young woman shrieked after her,
"MaiSie Ann !-come back here-you'n
be left !" and then took her turn at
disappearing by the same route; and.
on top of it all, the boss jumped off
and Sprinted after both of them, leav-
ing string of large, man-sized COM
ments on the foolishness of women
as a sex trailing along behind him as
he flew.
Right then it was my golden moment
to play safe and sane. With three Of
them off and lost in the gathering
night, somebody with at least a grain
Of sense ought to have stood by to
pull the emergency cord if the train
should start But, Of course, had to
take chance and spill the gravy all
over the tablecloth. The stop was at
blind siding in the edge of a noun
tain desert and when I squinted up
ahead and saw that the engine was
taking water, it looked as if there
were going to be plenty of time for a
bit Of promenade under the stars. SO
swung off and went to join the muff
hunt.
Amongst them, they had found the
pillow thing before had a chance to
horn in. They were coming up the
/ track, and the boss had each of the
! two by an arm and was telling them
that they'd be left to a dead moral
certainty if they didn't run. They
, couldn't run because their skirts were
: too fashionably narrow, and there were