elieve the pressure.
Two girls crowded on at Bleecker, amid shrill laughter and many
smothered exclamations. Their lips were carmined and their eyes bold.
Every swerve of the train brought fresh giggles or stifled screams from
them.

As the train was slowing down for Astor Place Station an express train
passed it, speeding for Fourteenth Street. Mr. Neal turned with an
effort (for he was wedged in tightly) and looked through the glass door
at the brightly lighted cars as they passed, and then slowly gained
upon, his own train. The express was crowded too, with people standing
in the aisles, hanging to straps. The faces were very clearly
distinguishable in the bright light; and Mr. Neal, strangely excited at
this rapid panorama of faces, saw each one distinctly. Suddenly he
leaned forward, close to the glass. He saw it! The face! It was there!
But it was gone in a moment. It had been like a flash in the dark
tunnel. His own train had come to a jarring stop, and the express was
only thunder in the distance.

Mr. Neal felt that he must rush out of the car, must get out into the
open. But the big prize-fighter still pressed against him, and in a
moment they were rushing on again into the darkness.

Now the clerk had no eyes for the occupants of his car. His face was
pressed against the glass door. He saw, out there in the darkness, that
serenely beautiful face, beatific, transcendent. And even as he looked,
he saw again the rear-lights of the express. They were going to overtake
it--to pass it again. It had been halted by the block signals of the
train ahead, perhaps--at any rate it was now moving very slowly. As the
local shot by, the panorama of faces was unfolded much more rapidly than
it had been before, but Mr. Neal caught a glimpse of the face once more.
It looked directly at him, as it had before, and he thought it smiled
upon him a little.

The little clerk was greatly excited. As soon as the local had come to a
stop at the Fourteenth Street Station and the doors had been opened, he
darted out and hurried to the other side of the platform. There he stood
leaning out to watch for the approach of the express. In a moment it
came, rumbling in quite as usual, mechanically and regularly, and the
doors slid open to allow the flood of people to pour out. Mr. Neal
squirmed through the crowd, looking in at the windows and watching the
people coming out; but he did not see the face, and frantic lest he
should lose it onc