d you about. . . ."

Sir John's voice paused abruptly. The train was drawing near the M----
viaduct, and Mr. Molesworth from force of habit had turned his eyes to the
window, to gaze down the green valley. He withdrew them suddenly, and
looked around at his companion.

"Ah, to be sure," he said vaguely; "I had forgotten the hissing sound."

It was curious, but as he spoke he himself became aware of a loud hissing
sound filling his ears. The train lurched and jolted heavily.

"Hullo!" exclaimed Sir John, half rising in his seat, "something's wrong."
He was staring past Mr. Molesworth and out of the window. "Nasty place
for an accident, too," he added in a slow, strained voice.

The two men looked at each other for a moment. Sir John's face wore a
tense expression--a kind of galvanised smile. Mr. Molesworth closed his
eyes, instinctively concealing his sudden sickening terror of what an
accident just there must mean: and for a second or so he actually had a
sensation of dropping into space. He remembered having felt something
like it in dreams three or four times in his life: and at the same instant
he remembered a country superstition gravely imparted to him in childhood
by his old nurse, that if you dreamt of falling and didn't wake up before
reaching the bottom, you would surely die. The absurdity of it chased
away his terror, and he opened his eyes and looked about him with a short
laugh. . . .

The train still jolted heavily, but had begun to slow down, and Mr.
Molesworth drew a long breath as a glance told him that they were past the
viaduct. Sir John had risen, and was leaning out of the farther window.
Something had gone amiss, then. But what?

He put the question aloud. Sir John, his head and shoulders well outside
the carriage-window, did not answer. Probably he did not hear.

As the train ran into M---- Station and came to a standstill, Mr.
Molesworth caught a glimpse of the station-master, in his gold-braided
cap, by the door of the booking-office. He wore a grave, almost a scared
look. The three or four country-people on the sunny platform seemed to
have their gaze drawn by the engine, and somebody ahead there was
shouting. Sir John Crang, without a backward look, flung the door open
and stepped out. Mr. Molesworth was preparing to follow--and by the
cramped feeling in his fingers was aware at the same instant that he had
been gripping the arm-rest almost desperately--when the guard of t