Story XVIII: Jack London

In a Depression-era boxcar, literary romance collides with harsh wisdom.

“Panhandle,” Steel Rail said.

The tramp sat on the edge of a boxcar door watching empty farms rush past. Oklahoma was nothing now but porch chairs and blinds with no one to draw them.

Tramps called it the Sandbox, with its old plows and Model Ts up to their steering wheels in dust, owners headed West for the orchards or East for the factories.

In the hobo jungle, they said Steel Rail “keeps his cards.” It was hard for the other three to know if he was about to share something or just talking to the cigarette he stared at from time to time.

Even sitting down, you could tell the man was tall and lean, hard muscle under his rolled-up sleeves and suntanned arms as wiry as California grapevine. Foremen hired him first because he kept his mouth shut, he picked fast, and all the rest picked faster around him.

An August morning was coming up over the horizon, red and hot. Outside Denver, the boxcar they’d picked had been a find, planks were up a bit, but still dry after a thunderstorm. In the n…