Free Of Time and the River by Thomas Wolfe Page B

unceasing change. The trains would hurtle onward bearing other lives like these, all brought together for an instant between two points of time—and then all lost, all vanished, broken and forgotten. The trains would bear them onward to their million destinations—each to the fortune, fame, or happiness he wished, whatever it was that he was looking for—but whether any to a sure success, a certain purpose, or the thing he sought—what man could say? All that he knew was that these men, these words, this moment would vanish, be forgotten—and that great wheels would hurtle on for ever. And the earth be still.
    Mr. Flood shifted his gouty weight carefully with a movement of his fat arm, grunting painfully as he did so. This delicate operation completed, he stared sharply and intently at the boy again and at length said bluntly:
    “You’re one of those Gant boys, ain’t you? Ain’t you Ben’s brother?”
    “Yes, sir,” the boy answered. “That’s right.”
    “Which one are you?” Mr. Flood said with this same brutal directness. “You ain’t the one that stutters, are you?”
    “No,” one of the other men interrupted with a laugh, but in a decided tone. “He’s not the one. You’re thinking of Luke.”
    “Oh,” said Mr. Flood stupidly. “Is Luke the one that stutters?”
    “Yes,” the boy said, “that’s Luke. I’m Eugene.”
    “Oh,” Mr. Flood said heavily. “I reckon you’re the youngest one.”
    “Yes, sir,” the boy answered.
    “Well,” said Mr. Flood with an air of finality, “I didn’t know which one you were, but I knew you were one of them. I knew I’d seen you somewhere.”
    “Yes, sir,” the boy answered. He was about to go on, hesitated for a moment, and suddenly blurted out: “I used to carry a route on The Courier when you owned it. I guess that’s how you remembered me.”
    “Oh,” said Mr. Flood stupidly, “you did? Yes, that’s it, all right. I remember now.” And he continued to look at the boy with his bulging stare of comic stupefaction and for a moment there was silence save for the pounding of the wheels upon the rail.
    “How many of you boys are there?” The swarthy and important- looking man who had previously been addressed as Emmet now spoke curiously: “There must be five or six in all.”
    “No,” the boy said, “there’s only three now. There’s Luke and Steve and me.”
    “Oh, Steve, Steve,” the little man said with an air of crisp finality, as if this was the name that had been at the tip of his tongue all the time. “Steve was the oldest, wasn’t he?”
    “Yes, sir,” said the boy.
    “Whatever became of Steve, anyway?” the man said. “I don’t believe I’ve seen him in ten or fifteen years. He doesn’t live at home any more, does he?”
    “No, sir,” the boy said. “He lives in Indiana.”
    “Does he for a fact?” said the little man, as if this was a rare and curious bit of information. “What’s Steve doing out there? Is he in business?”
    For a moment the boy was going to say, “No, he runs a pool room and lives up over it with his wife and children,” but feeling ashamed to say this, he said:
    “I think he runs some kind of cigar store out there.”
    “Is that so?” the man answered with an air of great interest. “Well,” he went on in a moment in a conciliatory tone, “Steve was always smart enough. He had brains enough to do almost anything if he tried.”
    Emmet Wade, the man who had asked the boy all these questions, was a quick, pompous little figure, corpulently built, but so short in stature as to be almost dwarfish-looking. His skin was curiously and unpleasantly swarthy, and save for a fringe of thin black hair at either side, his head was completely bald. In that squat figure, the suggestion of pompous authority and mountainous conceit was so pronounced that even in repose, as now, the whole man seemed to strut. He was, by virtue of that fortuitous chance and opportunity which has put so many