Even tramps were unusual at Chazy Junction.  The foothills were sparsely settled and the inhabitants too humble to be attractive to gentlemen of the road, while the rocky highways, tortuous and uneven, offered no invitation to the professional pedestrian.

“You’ll hev to move on!” repeated the agent, more sternly.

“I can’t,” replied the other with a smile.  “The car I was—­er—­attached to has come to a halt.  The engine has left us, and—­here we are, I and the nabobs.”

“Be’n ridin’ the trucks, eh?”

“No; rear platform.  Very comfortable it was, and no interruptions.  The crazy old train stopped so many times during the night that I scarcely woke up when they sidetracked us here, and the first thing I knew I was abandoned in this wilderness.  As it grew light I began to examine my surroundings, and discovered you.  Glad to meet you, sir.”

“You needn’t be.”

“Don’t begrudge me the pleasure, I implore you.  I can’t blame you for being gruff and unsociable; were you otherwise you wouldn’t reside at—­at—­” he turned his head to read the half legible sign on the station house, “at Chazy Junction.  I’m familiar with most parts of the United States, but Chazy Junction gets my flutters.  Why, oh, why in the world did it happen?”

Mr. Judkins scowled but made no answer.  He was wise enough to understand he was no match in conversation for this irresponsible outcast who knew the great world as perfectly as the agent knew his junction.  He turned away and stared hard at the silent sleeper, the appearance of which was not wholly unexpected.

“You haven’t informed me who the nabobs are, nor why they choose to be sidetracked in this forsaken stone-quarry,” remarked the stranger, eyeing the bleak hills around him in the growing light of dawn.

The agent hesitated.  His first gruff resentment had been in a manner disarmed and he dearly loved to talk, especially on so interesting a subject as “the nabobs.”  He knew he could astonish the tramp, and the temptation to do so was too strong to resist.

“It’s the great John Merrick, who’s got millions to burn but don’t light many bonfires,” he began, not very graciously at first.  “Two years ago he bought the Cap’n Wegg farm, over by Millville, an’—­”

“Where’s Millville?” inquired the man.

“Seven mile back in the hills.  The farm ain’t nuthin’ but cobblestone an’ pine woods, but—­”

“How big is Millville?”

“Quite a town.  Eleven stores an’ houses, ‘sides the mill an’ a big settlement buildin’ up at Royal, where the new paper mill is jest started.  Royal’s four mile up the Little Bill Hill.”

“But about the nabob—­Mr. Merrick, I think you called him?”

“Yes; John Merrick.  He bought the Cap’n Wegg place an’ spent summer ‘fore last on it—­him an’ his three gals as is his nieces.”

“Oh; three girls.”