Jackson Gregory

“ He wore a heavy overcoat, very long, touching the heels of his shoes, the collar drawn up about his throat. There was more darkness than light in the freight yards, and it seemed to his quivering nerves that everywhere about him the darkness was a thin, insufficient veil through which a million brilliant lights were flashing, seeking him out.
A slight noise, the sound of a man walking across the tracks, drove him deeper into the shadow until he had pressed his body between two cars. A brakeman with swinging lantern went across the yards, moving swiftly to supper and bed. ”

“ The cry, whipped from the lips of the man in the overcoat, was one of profound amazement. He stood suddenly upright, as suddenly as though he had been jerked upward by some force outside himself, greater than his own. And as he moved he drew his coat collar higher about his throat, pulled his hat brim lower over his face. The match flared a little in the gust of a draft drawn through the cars and went out. In the glow of the cigarette the face of the smoker was seen faintly and only fitfully. ”

“ The man in the overcoat watched anxiously as the other hesitated and then began to stride off across the yards. He continued to watch until the swiftly moving form stood clearly outlined in the street fifty yards away. And then he drew back between the box cars, slipped quickly under the coupling-chain, darted out upon the further side, and ran as a man runs for his life. ”