tunnel is quite dark.

It was not yet quite dark in the tunnel when Phyllis caught at Bobbie's
skirt, ripping out half a yard of gathers, but no one noticed this at
the time.

"I want to go back," she said, "I don't like it. It'll be pitch dark
in a minute. I WON'T go on in the dark. I don't care what you say, I
WON'T."

"Don't be a silly cuckoo," said Peter; "I've got a candle end and
matches, and--what's that?"

"That" was a low, humming sound on the railway line, a trembling of the
wires beside it, a buzzing, humming sound that grew louder and louder as
they listened.

"It's a train," said Bobbie.

"Which line?"

"Let me go back," cried Phyllis, struggling to get away from the hand by
which Bobbie held her.

"Don't be a coward," said Bobbie; "it's quite safe. Stand back."

"Come on," shouted Peter, who was a few yards ahead. "Quick! Manhole!"

The roar of the advancing train was now louder than the noise you hear
when your head is under water in the bath and both taps are running, and
you are kicking with your heels against the bath's tin sides. But Peter
had shouted for all he was worth, and Bobbie heard him. She dragged
Phyllis along to the manhole. Phyllis, of course, stumbled over the
wires and grazed both her legs. But they dragged her in, and all three
stood in the dark, damp, arched recess while the train roared louder and
louder. It seemed as if it would deafen them. And, in the distance, they
could see its eyes of fire growing bigger and brighter every instant.

"It IS a dragon--I always knew it was--it takes its own shape in here,
in the dark," shouted Phyllis. But nobody heard her. You see the train
was shouting, too, and its voice was bigger than hers.

And now, with a rush and a roar and a rattle and a long dazzling flash
of lighted carriage windows, a smell of smoke, and blast of hot air, the
train hurtled by, clanging and jangling and echoing in the vaulted roof
of the tunnel. Phyllis and Bobbie clung to each other. Even Peter
caught hold of Bobbie's arm, "in case she should be frightened," as he
explained afterwards.

And now, slowly and gradually, the tail-lights grew smaller and smaller,
and so did the noise, till with one last WHIZ the train got itself out
of the tunnel, and silence settled again on its damp walls and dripping
roof.

"OH!" said the children, all together in a whisper.

Peter was lighting the candle end with a hand that trembled.

"Come on," he said; but he had