“It looks a little that way, I must admit, Cousin Ned,” said the culprit who had answered so readily to his Christian name.  “We tried pretty hard to get it cleaned up before you came along, but we couldn’t quite make it.”

“Oho! tried to cover it up, did you?  Afraid I’d fire you?  You needn’t be.  My job as president merely gets me passes over the road.  Ford’s your man; he’s the fellow you want to be scared of.”

“I am,” laughed Lidgerwood.  The big man’s heartiness was always infectious.  Then:  “Coming over to camp with us awhile?  If you are, I hope you carry your commissary along.  Angels will starve you, otherwise.”

“Don’t tell me about that tin-canned tepee village, Howard—­I know.  I’ve been there before.  How are we doing over in the Timanyoni foot-hills?  Getting much ore down from the Copperette?  Climb up here and tell me all about it.  Or, better still, come on across the desert with us.  They don’t need you here.”

The assertion was quite true.  With Dawson, the trainmaster, and an understudy Judson for bosses, there was no need of a fourth.  Yet intuition, or whatever masculine thing it is that stands for intuition, prompted Lidgerwood to say: 

“I don’t know as I ought to leave.  I’ve just come out from Angels, you know.”

But the president was not to be denied.

“Climb up here and quit trying to find excuses.  We’ll give you a better luncheon than you’ll get out of the dinner-pails; and if you carry yourself handsomely, you may get a dinner invitation after we get in.  That ought to tempt any man who has to live in Angels the year round.”

Lidgerwood marked the persistent plural of the personal pronoun, and a great fear laid hold upon him.  None the less, the president’s invitation was a little like the king’s—­it was, in some sense, a command.  Lidgerwood merely asked for a moment’s respite, and went down to announce his intention to McCloskey and Dawson.  Curiously enough, the draftsman seemed to be trying to ignore the private car.  His back was turned upon it, and he was glooming out across the bare hills, with his square jaw set as if the ignoring effort were painful.

“I’m going back to Angels with the president,” said the superintendent, speaking to both of them.  “You can clean up here without me.”

The trainmaster nodded, but Dawson seemed not to have heard.  At all events, he made no sign.  Lidgerwood turned and ascended the embankment, only to have the sudden reluctance assail him again as he put his foot on the truck of the Nadia to mount to the platform.  The hesitation was only momentary, this time.  Other guests Mr. Brewster might have, without including the one person whom he would circle the globe to avoid.

“Good boy!” said the president, when Lidgerwood swung over the high hand-rail and leaned out to give Williams the starting signal.  And when the scene of the wreck was withdrawing into the rearward distance, the president felt for the door-knob, saying:  “Let’s go inside, where we shan’t be obliged to see so much of this God-forsaken country at one time.”