I thought we was in Venice when we woke up next mornin’, but the porter says it was just Cairo, Illinois. The river’d went crazy and I bet they wasn’t a room without a bath in that old burg.
As we set down in the diner for breakfast the train was goin’ acrost the longest bridge I ever seen, and it looked like we was so near the water that you could reach right out and grab a handful. The Wife was a little wabbly.
“I wonder if it’s really safe,” she says.
“If the bridge stays up we’re all right,” says I.
“But the question is, Will it stay up?” she says.
“I wouldn’t bet a nickel either way on a bridge,” I says. “They’re treacherous little devils. They’d cross you as quick as they’d cross this river.”
“The trainmen must be nervous,” she says. “Just see how we’re draggin’ along.”
“They’re givin’ the fish a chance to get offen the track,” I says. “It’s against the law to spear fish with a cowcatcher this time o’ year.”
Well, the Wife was so nervous she couldn’t eat nothin’ but toast and coffee, so I figured I was justified in goin’ to the prunes and steak and eggs.
After breakfast we went out in what they call the sun parlor. It was a glassed-in room on the tail-end o’ the rear coach and it must of been a