She drew in her breath suddenly and shivered. For the first time in her life she was afraid, not of the storm, or the consequences of her escapade, but of herself. She was afraid of the quick, sweet shiver that ran over her whenever Mac touched her, of the strange weakness that came over her even now, as his hands claimed hers. "Say, I'm going to get out," she said suddenly. "Stop the car! Don't you hear me? I want to get out!" "Nonsense!" said Mac, "you don't even know where you are! You are coming with us to Monte's; that's what you are going to do." But Nance knew more than he thought. In the last flash of lightning she had seen, back of them on the left, startlingly white for the second against the blackness, the spire of Calvary Cathedral. She knew that they were rapidly approaching the railroad crossing where Uncle Jed's signal tower stood, beyond which lay a region totally unfamiliar to her. She waited tensely until Mac had sped the car across the gleaming tracks, just escaping the descending gates. Then she bent forward and seized the emergency brake. The car came to a halt with a terrific jerk, plunging them all forward, and under cover of the confusion Nance leapt out and, darting under the lowered gate, dashed across the tracks. The next moment a long freight train passed between her and the automobile, and when it was done with its noisy shunting backward and forward, and had gone ahead, the street was empty. Watching her chance between the lightning flashes, she darted from cover to cover. Once beyond the signal tower she would be safe from Uncle Jed's righteous eye, and able to dash down a short cut she knew that led into the street back of the warehouse and thence into Calvary Alley. If she could get to her old room for the next two hours, she could change her clothes and be off again before any one knew of her night's adventure. Just as she reached the corner, a flash more blinding than the rest ripped the heavens. A line of fire raced toward her along the steel rails, then leapt in a ball to the big bell at the top of the signal tower. There was a deafening crash; all the electric lights went out, and Nance found herself cowering against the fence, apparently the one living object in that wild, wet, storm-racked night. The only lights to be seen were the small red lamps suspended on the slanting gates. Nance waited for them to lower when the freight train that had backed into the yards five minutes before, rushed out again. But the lamps did not move. She crept back across the tracks, watching with fascinated horror the dark windows of the signal tower. Why didn't Uncle Jed light his lantern? Why hadn't he lowered the gates? All her fear of discovery was suddenly swallowed up in a greater fear. At the foot of the crude wooden stairway she no longer hesitated. "Uncle Jed!" she shouted against the wind, "Uncle Jed, are you there?" There was no answer.