here for only about ten minutes
until the next ferry boat comes across from New York."

When fifteen minutes had passed and there was still no sign of Tom, Madge
began to feel worried.

"Madge, I am sure you have made some kind of mistake," argued Eleanor
plaintively. "I know Mrs. Curtis would not fail to have some one here on
time to meet us for anything in the world. Perhaps Tom wrote for us to
come across the ferry, and that he would meet us on the New York side.
Where is his letter?"

"It is in my trunk, Nellie," replied Madge in a crestfallen manner. She
was not nearly so grown-up or so sure of herself as she had been half an
hour before. "I know it was silly in me not to have brought Tom's letter
with me, but I was so sure that I knew just what it said. Perhaps we had
better go on over to New York. Let's hurry. Perhaps that boat is just
about to start."

The two young women hurried aboard the boat, which left the dock a moment
later, just as a tall, fair-haired young man, accompanied by two girls,
hurried upon the scene. The young man was Tom Curtis and the young women
were Phyllis Alden and Lillian Seldon.

In the meantime Madge and her cousin had crossed the river and had landed
on the New York side. What was the dreadful roar and rumble that met
their ears? It sounded like an earthquake, with the noise of frightened
people shrieking above it. After a horrified moment it dawned on the two
little strangers that this was only the usual roar of New York, which Tom
Curtis had so often described to them.

"There isn't any use of our staying here very long, Eleanor," declared
Madge, feeling a great wave of loneliness and fear sweep over her. "An
accident must have happened to Tom's automobile on his way to the train
to meet us. I am afraid we were foolish not to have stayed at the Jersey
City station. I am sure Tom wrote he would meet us there. I have behaved
like a perfect goose. It is because I boasted so much about not being
frightened and knowing what to do. But I _do_ know Mrs. Curtis's address.
We can take a cab and drive up there."

Eleanor would fall in with Madge's plans to a certain point; then she
would strike. Now she positively refused to get into a cab. Her mother
and father and Miss Jenny Ann had warned her never to trust herself in a
cab in a strange city. New York was too terrifying! Eleanor would search
for Mrs. Curtis's home on foot, in a car, or a bus, but in a cab she
would not ride.

Ma