t her to speak, forbore to ask any more
questions, but good-naturedly recommended her to try and sleep. She
slept soundly herself for the greater part of the journey; but Thelma
was now feverishly wide awake, and her eyeballs ached and burned as
though there were fire behind them.

Gradually her nerves began to be wound up to an extreme tension of
excitement--she forgot all her troubles in listening with painful
intentness to the rush and roar of the train through the darkness. The
lights of passing stations and signal-posts gleamed like scattered and
flying stars--there was the frequent shriek of the engine-whistle,--the
serpent-hiss of escaping steam. She peered through the window--all was
blackness; there seemed to be no earth, no sky,--only a sable chaos,
through which the train flew like a flame-mouthed demon. Always that
rush and roar! She began to feel as if she could stand it no longer. She
must escape from that continuous, confusing sound--it maddened her
brain. Nothing was easier; she would open the carriage-door and get out!
Surely she could manage to jump off the step, even though the train was
in motion!

Danger! She smiled at that idea,--there was no danger; and, if there
was, it did not much matter. Nothing mattered now,--now that she had
lost her husband's love. She glanced at the woman opposite, who slept
profoundly--the baby had slipped a little from its mother's arms, and
lay with its tiny face turned towards Thelma. It was a pretty creature,
with soft cheeks and a sweet little mouth,--she looked at it with a
vague, wild smile. Again, again that rush and roar surged like a storm
in her ears and distracted her mind! She rose suddenly and seized the
handle of the carriage door. Another instant, and she would have sprang
to certain death,--when suddenly the sleeping baby woke, and, opening
its mild blue eyes, gazed at her.

She met its glance as one fascinated,--almost unconsciously her fingers
dropped from the door-handle,--the little baby still looked at her in
dreamlike, meditative fashion,--its mother slept profoundly. She bent
lower and lower over the child. With a beating heart she ventured to
touch the small, pink hand that lay outside its wrappings like a softly
curved rose-leaf. With a sort of elf-like confidence and contentment the
feeble, wee fingers closed and curled round hers,--and held her fast!
Weak as a silken thread, yet stronger in its persuasive force than a
grasp of iron, that sof