naked hands.

But long before they reached the tracks the express roared round the
headland and plunged into the freight. The two locomotives met and rose
up and wrestled like two black bears, and fell over. The cars were
scattered and jumbled like a baby's train. They were all of wood--heated
by soft-coal stoves and lighted by coal-oil lamps.

The wreck was the usual horror, the usual chaos of wanton destruction
and mysterious escape. The engineers stuck to their engines and were
involved in their ruin somewhere. The passenger-train was crowded, and
destruction showed no favoritism: old men, women, children, sheep,
horses, cows, were maimed, or killed, or left scot-free.

Some of those who were uninjured ran away. Some stood weeping. Some of
the wounded began at once to rescue others. Crosson stood gaping at the
spectacle, but Irene went into the wreckage, pawing and peering like a
terrier.

She could not find what she was looking for. She would bend and stare
into a face glaring under the timbers and maundering for help, then pass
on. She would turn over a twisted frame and let it roll back. She was
not a sister of charity; she was Drury Boldin's helpmeet.

She kept calling his name, "Drury--Drury--Drury!" Crosson watched her as
she poised to listen for the answer that did not come. He gaped at her
in stupid fascination till a brakeman shook him and ordered him to lend
a hand. He rested his gun against a pile of ties and bowed his shoulder
to the hoisting of a beam overhanging a woman and a suckling babe.

The helpers dislodged other beams and finished the lives they had meant
to save.

There were no physicians on the train. But a doctor or two from the town
came out and the others were sent for. A telegram was sent to summon a
relief-train, but it could not arrive for hours.

The doctors began at the beginning, but they could do little. Their own
lives were in constant danger from tumbling wreckage, for the rescuers
were playing a game of tragic jackstraws. The least mistake brought down
disaster.

As he worked, Crosson could hear Irene calling, calling, "Drury, Drury,
Drury!"

He left his task to follow her, his jealousy turned into a wild sorrow
for her.

At last he heard in her cry of "Drury!" a note that meant she had found
him. But such a welcome as it was for a bride to give! And such a
trysting-place!

The car Drury was in had turned a somersault and cracked open across
another. Its inverted w