Dr. Payson sprang out of bed, and running to the table took up the Railway Guide, turned to the pages devoted to the O. C. and C. C. Railroad and ran his finger down the printed tables.  The morning train for Cape Cod left at 7:10.  It was 6:45 at that moment.  As has been said, the assistant had considerable common sense.  He proved this by wasting no time in telling the forgetful Jackson what he thought of him.  He sent the latter after a cab and proceeded to dress in double-quick time.  Ten minutes later he was on his way to the station with the little wooden case containing the precious antitoxin, wrapped and addressed, in his pocket.

It was seven by the Arlington Street Church clock as the cab rattled down Boylston Street.  A tangle of a trolley car and a market wagon delayed it momentarily at Harrison Avenue and Essex Street.  Dr. Payson, leaning out as the carriage swung into Dewey Square, saw by the big clock on the Union Station that it was 7:13.  He had lost the train.

Now, the assistant had been assistant long enough to know that excuses—­in the ordinary sense of the word—­did not pass current with Dr. Morgan.  That gentleman had telegraphed for antitoxin, and said it was important that he should have it; therefore, antitoxin must be sent in spite of time-tables and forgetful butlers.  Dr. Payson went into the waiting room and sat down to think.  After a moment’s deliberation he went over to the ticket office and asked: 

“What is the first stop of the Cape Cod express?”

“Brockboro,” answered the ticket seller.

“Is the train usually on time?”

“Well, I should smile.  That’s Charlie Mills’s train, and the old man ain’t been conductor on this road twenty-two years for nothin’.”

“Mills?  Does he live on Shawmut Avenue?”

“Dunno.  Billy, where does Charlie Mills live?”

“Somewhere at the South End.  Shawmut Avenue, I think.”

“Thank you,” said the assistant, and, helping himself to a time-table, he went back rejoicing to his seat in the waiting room.  He had stumbled upon an unexpected bit of luck.

There might be another story written in connection with this one; the story of a veteran railroad man whose daughter had been very, very ill with a dreaded disease of the lungs, and who, when other physicians had given up hope, had been brought back to health by a celebrated specialist of our acquaintance.  But this story cannot be told just now; suffice it to say that Conductor Charlie Mills had vowed that he would put his neck beneath the wheels of his own express train, if by so doing he could confer a favor on Dr. John Spencer Morgan.

The assistant saw by his time-table that the Cape Cod express reached Brockboro at 8:05.  He went over to the telegraph office and wrote two telegrams.  The first read like this: 

Calvin S. Wise, The People’s Drug Store, 28 Broad Street, Brockboro, Mass.: