ipping the arm-rests of
the rude seat cowered in silence, while the clambering monster rushed
and roared over the level lands and labored up the grades, shrieking now
and again, as if in mingled pain and warning. Johnson and the brakeman,
for the most part, kept to the lookout in the turret, and the girl rode
alone--rode far, passing swiftly from girlhood to womanhood, so full of
enforced meditation were the hours of that ride. It seemed that she was
leaving something sweet and care-free behind her, and it was certain
that she was about to face death. She had one perfectly clear
conception, and that was that the man who had been most kind to her, and
to whom she had given her promise of marriage, was dying and needed
her--was calling for her through the night.

Burdened with responsibility from her childhood, accustomed to make her
own decisions, she had responded to this prayer, knowing dimly that this
journey denoted a new and portentous experience--a fundamental change in
her life.

She had admired and liked Haney from the first, but her feeling even yet
was very like that of a boy for a man of heroic statue--her regard had
very little of woman's passion in it. She was appalled and benumbed by
the thought that she was soon to look upon him lying prone. That she
might soon be called upon to meet those bold eyes closing in death she
had been warned, and yet she did not shrink from it. The nurse, latent
in every woman, rose in her, and she ached with desire of haste, longing
to lay her hand upon the suffering man in some healing way. His
kindness, his gentleness, during the days of his final courtship had
sunk deep--his generosity had been so full, so free, so unhesitating.

She thought of her mother, and as a fuller conception of the alarm and
anxiety she would feel came to her, she decided to send her a telegram.
"She will know it was my duty to go," she decided. "As for the
hotel--what does it matter now?" Nothing seemed to matter, indeed, save
the speed of her chariot.

The night was long, interminably long. Once and again Johnson came down
out of his perch, and spoke a few clumsy words of well-meaning
encouragement, but found her unresponsive. Her brain was too busy with
taking leave of old conceptions and in mastering new duties to be
otherwise than vaguely grateful to her companions. Her mind was clear on
one other point--this journey committed her to Marshall Haney. There
could be no further hesitation. "Som