got clothes enough to flag a handcar, and me waitin' table for a gang of tarriers as long as I can remember."
"You might be worse off," Mrs. Charles chided her, but kindly, feeling perhaps that her bitterness was not altogether unjustified.
"You might be on the bum, kid," said Annie, soberly. "It ain't so worse feedin' jerries. I'd rather do it than slave in somebody's kitchen in the city."
"Wise girl, Annie!" Dr. Hall commended her, patting her shoulder with patriarchal caress.
"I know what I'd say to Charley Burnett if he wanted me to put money in his cattle company," Annie continued. "I'd tell him to go straight up."
"I ain't put any money in it yet, Annie," Mrs. Charles reminded her.
"Don't, then," said the genial Annie, shortly.
"Old rags and old shucks, over in the corner!" Mary derided her. "Workin' your arms off on this darned old train, marryin' some snoot of a jerry and livin' in a shack by the side of the track. I'd rather marry one of these grays on a farm."
"Everything looks better than the business you're in," Mrs. Charles sighed, knowing from long experience the uselessness of argument against Mary when she had a spell on like that. Mary was the discord of the kitchen, the rebel of the train. Everybody else was either satisfied with things as they were, or accepted them cheerfully in the hope of doing better in time. Only Mary chafed her heart sore; only Mary, of the three, was ashamed of her lot. To-day she was sharper than usual, careless of who heard her or of whom she hurt.
Dr. Hall was called from the table before he had finished
