of a clock.

"Well, we've sure stopped," observed one of the drummers.

"What is it?" asked Hilma again. "Are you sure there's nothing wrong?"

"Sure," said Annixter. Outside, underneath their window, they heard the
sound of hurried footsteps crushing into the clinkers by the side of the
ties. They passed on, and Annixter heard some one in the distance shout:

"Yes, on the other side."

Then the door at the end of their car opened and a brakeman with a red
beard ran down the aisle and out upon the platform in front. The forward
door closed. Everything was quiet again. In the stillness the fat
gentleman's snores made themselves heard once more.

The minutes passed; nothing stirred. There was no sound but the dripping
rain. The line of cars lay immobilised and inert under the night. One of
the drummers, having stepped outside on the platform for a look around,
returned, saying:

"There sure isn't any station anywheres about and no siding. Bet you
they have had an accident of some kind."

"Ask the porter."

"I did. He don't know."

"Maybe they stopped to take on wood or water, or something."

"Well, they wouldn't use the emergency brakes for that, would they? Why,
this train stopped almost in her own length. Pretty near slung me out
the berth. Those were the emergency brakes. I heard some one say so."

From far out towards the front of the train, near the locomotive,
came the sharp, incisive report of a revolver; then two more almost
simultaneously; then, after a long interval, a fourth.

"Say, that's SHOOTING. By God, boys, they're shooting. Say, this is a
hold-up."

Instantly a white-hot excitement flared from end to end of the
car. Incredibly sinister, heard thus in the night, and in the rain,
mysterious, fearful, those four pistol shots started confusion from out
the sense of security like a frightened rabbit hunted from her burrow.
Wide-eyed, the passengers of the car looked into each other's faces. It
had come to them at last, this, they had so often read about. Now they
were to see the real thing, now they were to face actuality, face this
danger of the night, leaping in from out the blackness of the roadside,
masked, armed, ready to kill. They were facing it now. They were held
up.

Hilma said nothing, only catching Annixter's hand, looking squarely into
his eyes.

"Steady, little girl," he said. "They can't hurt you. I won't leave you.
By the Lord," he suddenly exclaimed, his excitement getting