down
low so that every one could sleep, Stuart sat up and began unbuckling
the strap around my box. I knew enough to keep still when he took the
lid off and gently stroked me. I had no intention of being sent back
to the baggage-car, if keeping quiet would help me to escape the
conductor's eyes.

Stuart stroked me for a moment, and then, cautiously drawing aside his
curtains, thrust his head out and looked up and down the aisle.
Everything was quiet. Then he gave the softest kind of a whistle, so
faint that it seemed little more than the echo of one; but Phil
heard, and instantly his head was poked out between his curtains.
Stuart held me up and grinned. Immediately Phil held up Matches and
grinned. After a funny pantomime by which, with many laughable
gestures, each boy made the other understand that he intended to allow
his pet freedom all night, they drew in their heads and lay down.

Stuart wanted me to sleep on the pillow beside him, but I was still
sulky, and retired to my box at his feet. In spite of the jar and
rumble of the train I slept soundly for a long time. It must have been
somewhere about the middle of the night when I was awakened all of a
sudden by a fearful crash and the feeling that I was pitching headlong
down a frightful precipice.

The next instant I struck the floor with a force that nearly stunned
me. When I gathered my wits together I found myself in the middle of
the aisle, bruised and sore, with the bandbox on top of me.

We had been going with the usual terrific speed of a fast express,
down steep mountain grades, sweeping around dizzy curves, and now we
had come to a sudden stop without reason or warning. It gave the train
such a tremendous jar that windows rattled, baggage lurched from the
racks, the porter sprawled full-length on the floor as I had done, and
more than one head was bumped unmercifully against the hard woodwork
of the berths. Everybody sprang up to ask what was the matter. Babies
cried and women scolded and men swore. All I could do was to whimper
with pain and fright until Stuart came scrambling after me. My
shoulder was bruised and my head aching, and no one can imagine my
terrible fright at such a rude awakening. If I had not been in the
box, I might have saved myself when the crash came, but I was
powerless to catch at anything when it went bump over on to the floor.

The brakeman and conductor came running in to see what was the matter.
Nobody knew why the train