nominal duty, and the girl turned to follow Endicott. "It would have
been easier to walk through the train," he ventured, as he picked his
way over the rough track ballast.

"Still seeking the line of least resistance," mocked the girl. "We can
walk through a train any time. But we can't breathe air like this,
and, see,--through that gap--the blue of the distant mountains!"

The man removed his hat and dabbed at his forehead with a handkerchief.
"It's awfully hot, and I have managed to secrete a considerable portion
of the railroad company's gravel in my shoes."

"Don't mind a little thing like that," retorted the girl sweetly.
"I've peeled the toes of both of mine. They look like they had scarlet
fever."

Passengers were alighting all along the train and hurrying forward to
join those who crowded the scene of the wreck.

"It was a narrow escape for us," said Endicott as the two looked down
upon the mass of broken cars about which the rapidly falling waters of
the stream gurgled and swirled. "Had we not been running an hour late
this train would in all probability, have plunged through the trestle."

"Was anybody hurt?" asked the girl. The train conductor nodded toward
the heap of debris.

"No'm, the crew jumped. The fireman an' head brakeman broke a leg
apiece, an' the rest got bunged up a little; but they wasn't no one
hurt.