The express shed was a one-story, substantial frame building having two rooms.  It stood in the center of a network of tracks close to the freight depot and switch tower, and a platform ran its length front and rear.

Framed by the window an active railroad panorama spread out, and beyond that view the quaint town of Pleasantville.

Bart had spent all his young life here.  He knew every nook and corner of the place, and nearly every man, woman and child in the village.

Pleasantville did not belie its name to Bart’s way of thinking.  He voted its people, its surroundings, and life in general there, as pleasant as could well be.

Here he was born, and he had found nothing to complain of, although he was what might be called a poor boy.

There were his mother, his two sisters and two small brothers at home, and sometimes it took a good deal to go around, but Bart’s father had a steady job, and Bart himself was an agreeable, willing boy, just at the threshold of doing something to earn a living and wide-awake for the earliest opportunity.

Mr. Stirling had been express agent for the B. & M. for eight years, and was counted a reliable, efficient employee of the company.

For some months, however, his health had not been of the best, and Bart had been glad when he was impressed into service to relieve his father when laid up with his occasional foe, the rheumatism, or to watch the office at mealtimes.

Bart was on duty in this regard at the present time.  It was about five in the afternoon, but it was also the third of July, and that date, like the twenty-fourth of December, was the busiest in the calendar for the little express office.

All the afternoon Bart had worked at the desk or helped in getting out packages and boxes for delivery.

A little handcart was among the office equipment, and very often Bart did light delivering.  On this especial day, however, in addition to the regular freight, Fourth of July and general picnic and celebration goods more than trebled the usual volume, and they had hired a local teamster to assist them.

With the 4:20 train came a new consignment.  The back room was now nearly full of cases of fruit, a grand boxed-up display of fireworks for Colonel Harrington, the village magnate, another for a local club, some minor boxes for private family use, and extra orders from the city for the village storekeepers.

It was an unusual and highly inflammable heap, and when tired Mr. Sterling went home to snatch a bite of something to eat, and lazy Lem Wacker came strolling into the place, pipe in full blast, Bart had not hesitated to exercise his brief authority.  A spark among that tinder pile would mean sure and swift destruction.  Besides, light-fingered Lem Wacker was not to be trusted where things lay around loose.

So Bart had squelched him promptly and properly.  The man for whom “Lem” was good enough, was in his opinion pretty nearly good for nothing.