Page:The Blind Man's Eyes (July 1916).pdf/65

Rh glistening white snow as high as the top of the car at this point and rising even higher ahead. He listened, therefore, while the Englishman—for the voice calling to the porter was his—extracted all available information from the negro.

"Porter!" Standish called again.

"Yessuh!"

"Close my window and be quick about it!"

"It's closed, suh."

"Closed?"

"Yessuh; I shut it en-durin' the night."

"Closed!" the voice behind the curtains iterated skeptically; there was a pause during which, probably, there was limited exploration. "I say, then, how cold is it outside?"

"Ten below this morning, suh."

"What, what? Where are we?"

"Between Fracroft and Simons, suh."

"Yet?"

"Yessuh, yit!"

"Hasn't your silly train moved since four o'clock?"

"Moved? No, suh. Not mo'n a yahd or two nohow, suh, and I reckon we backed them up again."

"That foolish snow still?"

"Yessuh; and snow some more, suh."

"But haven't we the plow still ahead?"

"Oh, yessuh; the plow's ahaid. We still got it; but that's all, suh. It ain't doin' much; it's busted."

"Eh—what?"

"Yessuh—busted! There was right smart of a slide across the track, and the crew, I understands, diagnosed it jus' fo' a snowbank and done bucked right into it. But they was rock in this, suh; we's layin'