tly where it needs must lie to give
the warning through the crushing wheel.

[Illustration: "I STUMP YE!"]

[Illustration: "THE STRONG, BLACK FIST WAS CLINCHED."]

Now for the second time the old man and the locomotive regarded each
other. Her fiery breath was close upon him. Above the uproar of the
reeling earth the shriek of the train sounded in his deafened ears.
Once again, the strong, black fist was clinched in the approaching
monster's face.

"I dare ye!" he cried. "Come on! I dare ye!" He pulled himself up with a
mighty wrench. But the unknown power held him. He felt the claws of the
cow-catcher. He gave one low cry:

"Lord, I'd like to got dar an' seen Juno Soo afore she died--"

Then he closed his eyes, that he might not see what would happen,
clasped his hands above his gray head, and gave his manly soul to God.

[Illustration: "HE LAID ONE TORPEDO ON EACH RAIL."]

IV.

THE anxious and bewildered passengers heard the snap! snap! of the
torpedoes, and half of them rushed to the platforms. The engineer
signalled "Down brakes!" and the train, with a mighty jolt, came to a
stop. A heavy shock shook the night at that instant. The smell of
sulphur was strong in the chilly air. The engineer got out with a
lantern. The crowd gathered in a moment. At the brink of the scattered
track, at the very edge of wreck and death, the train had come to a
stand.

"Who did it?" swept from lip to lip. No one was in sight.

"I thought we hit a man," said the engineer, swinging his lantern far
out into the darkness. But no sign, whether of the dead or of the
living, was in sight,--nothing except a half-starved, collarless dog,
who sat stupidly upon the grass, and who did not even wag his tail when
the stoker spoke to him.

"Who saved us? Who saved the train?"

Ask the disappointed vulture and the mouth of the muttering earth to
tell you, gentlemen passengers! There is no other lip to answer.

* * * * *

Yes, there is one; a little, trembling, ashy lip--a child's--scarcely
able to articulate for grief or terror, and pouring forth confused cries
that nobody can understand. The passengers have left the train, and are
making their way cautiously homeward down the devastated road-bed, where
the track had lain. It is hurled now to every point of the compass in
the wild night.

They come to a halt suddenly, before a little huddling figure, with its
face hidden in its arms, crouched