By the time I had arrived at this stage in my observations, there was rustle and stir behind me, and a man who had been lounging, silent, moveless, and, as I had supposed, asleep, stretched forward a brown fist, exclaiming:
"Hallo, old boy! Stop right here. Harding, how are ye?"
Of course the "old boy" stopped. There was the usual hand shaking, and mutual exclamations of surprise and pleasure, not unmixed with profanity. Evidently they had been sometime friends and neighbors, and had not met before for years.
They talked very fast and, it seemed to me, unnecessarily loud; the one asking, the other answering, questions concerning a certain village, which, because it would not be wise to give its real name we will call Trafton.
Evidently Trafton was the station we had just left, and where we took on this voluble passenger. They talked of its inhabitants, its improvements, its business; of births, and deaths, and marriages. It was very uninteresting; I was beginning to feel bored, and was meditating a change of seat, when the tone of the conversation changed somewhat, and, before I could sufficiently overcome my laziness to move, I found myself getting interested.
"No, Trafton ain't a prosperous town. For the few rich ones it's well enough, but the poor--well, the only ones that prosper are those who live without work."
"Oh! I see; some of the old lot there yet; wood piles suffer?"
"_Hen roosts!_" in a still deeper tone of disgust.
"_Clothes lines!_" Evidently this was the last straw. "Thunder and lightning, man, that's baby talk; there's more deviltry going on about Trafton than you could scoop up in forty ordinary towns."
"No! you don't tell me. What's the mischief?"
"Well, it's easy enough to tell _what_ the mischief is, but _where_ it is, is the poser; but there's a good many in Trafton that wouldn't believe you if you told them there was no such thing as an organized gang of marauders near the place."
"But, good Lord, that's pretty strong for Trafton. Do you believe it?"
"Well, I'm blessed! Come, old man, tell us some of the particulars. What makes you suspect blacklegs about that little town?"
"I've figured the thing down pretty close, and I've had reason to. The thing has been going on for a number of years, and I've been a loser, and ever since the beginning it has moved like clock-work. Five years ago a horse thief had not been heard of in Trafton for Lord knows how long, until one night Judge Barnes lost a valuable span, taken from his stable, slick and clean, and never heard of afterwards. Since then, from the town and country, say for twenty-five miles around, they have averaged over twenty horses every year, and they are always the very best; picked every time, no guess work."