"Gawd--I--may--die!" ho broke out falteringly then. "There goes a
injine! A steam injine--wan't it?"
Long afterward, when he had realized that the boy's life was to bring
again and again a repetition of that sublime moment of realization--a
moment of fulfillment unspoiled by surfeit or sophistication or a
blunted capacity to marvel, which Caleb had seen grow old and stale
even in the children he knew, he wondered and wished that he might have
known it himself, once at least. Years of waiting, starved years of
anticipation, he felt after all must have been a very little price to
pay for that great, blinding, gasping moment. But at the time, amazed
at the boy's white face, amazed at the hushed fervor in the words he
forgot,--he spoke before he thought.
"But haven't you ever seen an engine before?" he exclaimed.
As soon as the question had left his lips he would have given much to
have had it back again; but at that it failed to have the effect which
he feared too late to check. Instead of coloring with hurt and shame,
instead of subterfuge or evasion, the boy simply lifted his eyes
levelly to Caleb's face.
"I ain't never seed nuthin'," he stated patiently. "I ain't never seed
more'n three houses together in a clearin' before. I--I ain't never
been outen the timber--till today. But I aim to see more, naow--before
I git done!"
The man experienced a peculiar sensation.
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