sked Frances.

The child nodded, grasping the dashboard firmly. With the ease of long
practice, Split got to the big wheel and leaped to the ground. She had
noticed the big stone which Baldy Bob had slipped in front of the hind
wheel, and she fancied it was part of the reason why the stagecoach
could not be moved.

She was mistaken: it was the whole reason. And when Split had pushed and
tugged and kicked with all her strength, laying herself flat at last and
bracing her toes against the other wheel to get a leverage, her first
feeling when she saw the coach move above her head was of delight at the
unexpected. Her second was of unmixed terror; for, gaining an impetus
from its descent on the inclined plane that led from the platform, the
coach rattled briskly down Sutton Avenue, headed for the canon, with
Frank clutching the dashboard and laughing aloud in glee.

Split Madigan had always fancied she could run. She never knew how
impotent human fleetness is till she saw that lumbering coach go
plunging swiftly and more swiftly away from her, across B Street, and
tearing down the next hill with a speed that made her puny efforts
laughable.

Baldy Bob, emerging from the saloon on the corner with that feverishly
distorted view of the world due to never going back home after dinner
downtown, saw his coach come down upon him as if to demand the washing
so long promised. If it had been morning, he would have been properly
afraid of getting in the way of the monster let loose. But in the
evening Bob was accustomed to the occurrence of peculiar things. So he
ran--at that time of day he could run better than walk--out to the
middle of the street, threw up his arms, and called hoarsely upon the
mad thing to stop.

It did--for a moment, when it came in contact with his body; but it was
long enough for its course to be deflected from the steep hill below and
turned northward down the comparatively level cross street.

When Bob picked himself up and followed, he found a thin, white-faced,
red-haired girl running swiftly beside him. Later he accompanied her and
the plucky little Frank (still smiling and chuckling over her fine ride)
up the hill to the home of Mr. Francis Madigan, where he demanded
damages--both personal and mechanical.

"And fa-ther tooked her in his own room," Frank said with shuddering
unction, as she told the tale, "and she's in there yet!"

* * * * *

It was Fom who awakene