The Professors House
As soon as Tom was old enough to work, he got a
job as call boy and did his share toward supporting
the family.
“What’s a call boy, a messenger boy?”
“No, sir. It’s a more responsible position. Our town was an important freight division on the Santa Fe, and a lot of train men live there. The freight schedule is always changing, because it’s a single track road and the dispatcher has to get the freights through when he can. Suppose you’re a brakeman, and your train is due out at two A. M.; well, like as not, it will be changed to midnight, or to four in the morning. You go to bed as if you were going to sleep all night, with nothing on your mind. The call boy watches the schedule board, and half an hour before your train goes out, he comes and taps on your window and gets you up in time to make it. The call boy has to be on to things in the town. He must know when there’s a poker game on, and how to slip in easy. You can’t tell when there’s a spotter about, and if a man’s reported for gambling, he’s fired. Sometimes you have to get a man when he isn’t where he ought to be. I found there was usually a reason at home for that.” The boy spoke with gravity, as if he had reflected deeply upon irregular behaviour.
Just then Mrs. St. Peter came out into the garden and asked her husband if he wouldn’t bring his young friend in to lunch. Outland started and
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