-Phyllis faltered--"you're not going to TEAR them?"

"Shut up," said Peter, with brief sternness.

"Oh, yes," said Bobbie, "tear them into little bits if you like. Don't
you see, Phil, if we can't stop the train, there'll be a real live
accident, with people KILLED. Oh, horrible! Here, Peter, you'll never
tear it through the band!"

She took the red flannel petticoat from him and tore it off an inch from
the band. Then she tore the other in the same way.

"There!" said Peter, tearing in his turn. He divided each petticoat into
three pieces. "Now, we've got six flags." He looked at the watch again.
"And we've got seven minutes. We must have flagstaffs."

The knives given to boys are, for some odd reason, seldom of the kind
of steel that keeps sharp. The young saplings had to be broken off. Two
came up by the roots. The leaves were stripped from them.

"We must cut holes in the flags, and run the sticks through the holes,"
said Peter. And the holes were cut. The knife was sharp enough to cut
flannel with. Two of the flags were set up in heaps of loose stones
between the sleepers of the down line. Then Phyllis and Roberta took
each a flag, and stood ready to wave it as soon as the train came in
sight.

"I shall have the other two myself," said Peter, "because it was my idea
to wave something red."

"They're our petticoats, though," Phyllis was beginning, but Bobbie
interrupted--

"Oh, what does it matter who waves what, if we can only save the train?"

Perhaps Peter had not rightly calculated the number of minutes it would
take the 11.29 to get from the station to the place where they were, or
perhaps the train was late. Anyway, it seemed a very long time that they
waited.

Phyllis grew impatient. "I expect the watch is wrong, and the train's
gone by," said she.

Peter relaxed the heroic attitude he had chosen to show off his two
flags. And Bobbie began to feel sick with suspense.

It seemed to her that they had been standing there for hours and hours,
holding those silly little red flannel flags that no one would ever
notice. The train wouldn't care. It would go rushing by them and tear
round the corner and go crashing into that awful mound. And everyone
would be killed. Her hands grew very cold and trembled so that she could
hardly hold the flag. And then came the distant rumble and hum of the
metals, and a puff of white steam showed far away along the stretch of
line.

"Stand firm," said Peter, "and wa