Was one of the nuns a relative? Was the younger, perhaps, its sister? Or was either neither? These and similar questions could be easily read on the countenances of the wondering passengers.
Some minutes elapsed before the conductor again made his appearance, when he was at once besieged with questions concerning the mysterious stranger. And, as if determined that not a word should escape their ears, each of the twelve or fifteen occupants of the car crowded about him as he seated himself beside the lonely child.
The story they heard was brief and pathetic. The little boy was as much of a stranger to the conductor as he was to the passengers. His mother was dead. His home was in one of the smaller manufacturing towns of New England, where his father, who was to meet him on the arrival of our train at Omaha, lived in humble circumstances. The conductor had promised the sisters to protect and care for the child during the five days' journey. It was, however, not the little fellow's first trip across the plains, as nearly a year and a half ago, when but a few weeks old he had come to California with his invalid mother. The latter had survived the long journey but a very short time, and died among strangers in one of the foot-hill towns near San Francisco. The Sisters of Mercy of that city had by correspondence arranged with the father to adopt, or, rather, to provide a temporary home for the little waif, until he should be old enough to make the long return journey. And now, although the boy had reached but the tender age of eighteen months, the distant parent, craving for his presence, had begged the sister to enlist in his behalf the sympathies and care of some kind-hearted East-bound passenger or railway employee. Their repeated efforts in the former direction having failed, they had at last applied to the conductor.
In relating the child's sad history, the sisters had, the conductor continued, so feelingly solicited his kindly offices and paid such glowing tribute to the almost angelic disposition and exceptional bravery of the infant that, however disinclined he had been to assume the responsibility, a persistent refusal of their unusual request seemed almost inhuman. He had therefore undertaken the strange charge, and trusted, he said, that the passengers would
