2, Alma Villas, in a flutter, some ten minutes before the train
was due.
By noon the crowd was growing impatient. But hardly had the church
clock chimed the hour when the shriek of a whistle was heard from up
the valley. Amid wild excitement a puff of white smoke appeared,
then another, and finally the mid-day train steamed serenely into the
station.
As it drew up, a mild spectacled face appeared at the window of a
first-class carriage, and asked--
"Is this Troy?"
"Yessir--terminus. Any luggage, sir?"
The mild face got out. It belonged to the only stranger in the
train.
"There is only a black portmanteau," said he. "Ah, that is it.
I shall want it put in the cloakroom for an hour or two while I go
into the town."
The stranger gave up his ticket--a single ticket--and stepped outside
the station. He was a mild, thin man, slightly above middle height,
with vacant eyes and a hesitating manner. He wore a black suit, a
rather rusty top-hat, and carried a silk umbrella.
"Here he comes!"
"Look, that's him!"
"Give 'un a cheer, boys."
"Hip, hip, hoor-roar!"
The sound burst upon the clear sky in a deafening peal. The stranger
paused and looked confused.
"Dear me!" he murmured to himself, "the population here seems to be
excited about something--and, bless my soul, what a lot of it there
is!"
He might well say so.
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