prisoners and their
captors. He saw a group alighting from a carriage a little ahead.
First came Harry Rivers, stepping out quite gayly, as though it was a
picnic. On reaching the ground, he turned and assisted the ladies to
descend. This he did by the simple yet pleasing process of lifting
them down bodily--first Katie, then Dolores. At this sight Ashby
gnashed his teeth with jealous rage. Then came Russell, whom, it is
perhaps unnecessary to state, Harry did not lift down. Nor did that
gallant and chivalrous youth venture to lift down Mrs. Russell, being
at that particular moment engaged in conversation with Katie.

Dolores, having descended, stood apart, and her dark-glancing eyes,
as they wandered searchingly about, fell full upon Ashby. It was a
glance full of that same deep, earnest meaning which he had noticed
in the morning; and so she stood looking at him, too far away to
speak, while Ashby looked at her also. After a time Harry's roving
eyes rested upon his friend, and with a laugh he drew Katie's
attention to him. At this Katie looked, and smiled brightly, and
nodded her pretty little head half a dozen times. To Ashby this
seemed like mockery. Katie, he saw, could very well bear this
separation, which was so painful to himself, and could laugh and be
happy with others, and could, perhaps, jest about his own melancholy
face. So Ashby bowed sulkily, and turned away his head.

It was rather a novelty--this sort of thing. Brigands in every age
had stopped travellers, but then they had always been in coaches or
carriages, on horseback or on foot. Never before had they tried to
stop a railway train. And yet in the progress of civilization the
world had to come to this. The manners of man easily accommodate
themselves to the inventions of man, and highway robbery can be done
as easily on a railroad as on a carriage road. Nevertheless, these
particular men who stopped this particular train were not brigands:
on the contrary, they were soldiers, forming part of the army of one
who called himself King of Spain--in short, Carlists.

The passengers were now ordered to come forward for examination, one
by one. Here, on a little knoll, on one side of the locomotive, stood
the leader of the band. He was a stout, thick-set man, with dark hair
and bushy beard. Around him were a score or so of armed men. The rest
of the band stood guarding the train. One by one the passengers came
forward. Each one was then ordered to hand