3
ngers in a futile effort to restore warmth, slipped his hands back into a pair of heavy--but, on this night, entirely inadequate--driving-gloves, and gave himself over to a mental rebellion against the career of a professional taxi-driver.
"Worst night I've ever known," he growled to himself; and he was not far wrong.
Midnight! No train due until 12.25, and that an accommodation from some small town up-State. No taxi fares on such a train as that. The north-bound fast train--headed for New York--that was late, too. Due at 11.55, Spike had seen a half-frozen station-master mark it up as being fifty minutes late. Perhaps a passenger to be picked up there--some sleepy, disgruntled, entirely unhappy person eager to attain the warmth and coziness of a big hotel.
Yet Spike knew that he must wait. The company for which he worked specialized on service. It boasted that every train was met by a yellow taxicab--and this was Spike's turn for all-night duty at the Union Station.
All the independent taxi-drivers had long since deserted their posts. The parking space on Cypress Street, opposite the main entrance of the station--a space usually crowded with commercial cars--was deserted. No private cars were there, either. Spike seemed alone in the drear December night, his car an exotic of the early winter.
Ten minutes passed--fifteen. The cold bit through Spike's overcoat, battled to the skin, and chewed to the bone. It was well nigh unbearable. The young taxi-driver's lips became blue. He tried to light a cigarette, but his fingers were unable to hold the match.
He looked around. A street-car, bound for a suburb, passed noisily. It paused briefly before the railroad-station, neither discharging nor taking on a passenger, then clanged protestingly on its way. Impressed in Spike's mind was a mental picture of the chilled motorman, and of the conductor huddled over the electric heater within the car. Spike felt a personal resentment against that conductor. Comfort seemed unfair on a nig