child's lips moved: she seemed to be making a more than human
effort, and a whisper escaped her lips:

"Yes----"

But she could say no more: her eyes rolled, her whole frame tottered,
and then, without sign or cry, she fell rigid and unconscious to the
floor.

V. "ARREST ME!"

Twelve or thirteen miles from Souillac the main line from Brives to
Cahors, which flanks the slope, describes a rather sharp curve. The
journey is a particularly picturesque one, and travellers who make it
during the daytime have much that is interesting and agreeable to see;
but while they are admiring the country, which marks the transition from
the severe region of the Limousin to the more laughing landscapes on the
confines of the Midi, the train suddenly plunges into a tunnel which
runs for half a mile and more through the heart of the mountain slope.
Leaving the tunnel, the line continues along the slope, then gradually
descends towards Souillac. Two or three miles from that little station,
which is a junction, the line runs alongside the highroad to Salignac,
skirts for a brief distance the Correze, one of the largest tributaries
on the right bank of the Dordogne, and then plunges into the heart of
Lot.

Torrential winter rains had seriously affected the railway embankment,
particularly near the mouth of the tunnel; a succession of heavy storms
in the early part of December had so greatly weakened the ballast that
the chief engineers of the Company had been hastily summoned to the
scene of the mischief. The experts decided that very important repairs
were required close to the Souillac end of the tunnel. It was necessary
to put in a complete system of drainage, with underground pipes through
which the water that came down from the mountain could escape between
the ballast and the side of the rock and so pass underneath the
permanent way. The sleepers, too, had been loosened by the bad weather,
and some of them had perished so much that the chairs were no longer
fast, a matter which was all the more serious because the line described
a very sharp curve at that precise spot.

Gangs of first-class navvies had been hurriedly requisitioned, but in
spite of the fact that an exceptional rate of wages was paid, a local
strike had broken out and for some days all work was stopped. Gradually,
however, moderate counsels prevailed and for over a week now, nearly all
the men had taken up their tools again. Nevertheless, for a month past,