ey died, the words of absolution.

Three more cars at the cost of two more lives the crew cleared, while
the sheathing of ice spread over the steel inboard, and dissolution of
all the cargo became complete. Cut stone and motor parts, chasses and
castings, furniture and beams, swept back and forth, while the cars,
burst and splintered, became monstrous missiles hurtling forward,
sidewise, aslant, recoiling. Yet men, though scattered singly, tried
to stay them by ropes and chains while the water washed higher and
higher. Dimly, far away, deafened out by the clangor, the steam
whistle of Number 25 was blowing the four long blasts of distress; Alan
heard the sound now and then with indifferent wonder. All destruction
had come for him to be contained within this car deck; here the ship
loosed on itself all elements of annihilation; who could aid it from
without? Alan caught the end of a chain which Corvet flung him and,
though he knew it was useless, he carried it across from one stanchion
to the next. Something, sweeping across the deck, caught him and
carried him with it; it brought him before the coupled line of trucks
which hurtled back and forth where the rails of track three had been.
He was hurled before them and rolled over; something cold and heavy
pinned him down; and upon him, the car trucks came.

But, before them, something warm and living--a hand and bare arm
catching him quickly and pulling at him, tugged him a little farther
on. Alan, looking up, saw Corvet beside him; Corvet, unable to move
him farther, was crouching down there with him. Alan yelled to him to
leap, to twist aside and get out of the way; but Corvet only crouched
closer and put his arms over Alan; then the wreckage came upon them,
driving them apart. As the movement stopped, Alan still could see
Corvet dimly by the glow of the incandescent lamps overhead; the truck
separated them. It bore down upon Alan, holding him motionless and, on
the other side, it crushed upon Corvet's legs.

He turned over, as far as he could, and spoke to Alan. "You have been
saving me, so now I tried to save you," he said simply. "What reason
did you have for doing that? Why have you been keeping by me?"

"I'm Alan Conrad of Blue Rapids, Kansas," Alan cried to him. "And
you're Benjamin Corvet! You know me; you sent for me! Why did you do
that?"

Corvet made no reply to this. Alan, peering at him underneath the
truck, could see that his hands were