Its upper parts seemed to be mostly white, and I can only surmise that
it may have been a sandhill crane, a bird which is said to have such a
habit.
As I left the boat I had a little experience of the seamy side of
Southern travel; nothing to be angry about, perhaps, but annoying,
nevertheless, on a hot day. I surrendered my check to the purser of the
boat, and the deck hands put my trunk upon the landing at Blue Spring.
But there was no one there to receive it, and the station was locked. We
had missed the noon train, with which we were advertised to connect, by
so many hours that I had ceased to think about it. Finally, a negro, one
of several who were fishing thereabouts, advised me to go "up to the
house," which he pointed out behind some woods, and see the agent. This
I did, and the agent, in turn, advised me to walk up the track to the
"Junction," and be sure to tell the conductor, when the evening train
arrived, as it probably would do some hours later, that I had a trunk at
the landing. Otherwise the train would not run down to the river, and my
baggage would lie there till Monday. He would go down presently and put
it under cover. Happily, he fulfilled his promise, for it was already
beginning to thunder, and soon it rained in torrents, with a cold wind
that made the hot weather all at once a thing of the past.
It was a long wait in the dreary little station; or rather it would have
been, had not the tedium of it been relieved by the presence of a newly
married couple, whose honeymoon was just then at the full.
Pages:
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123