“Inza!” he gasped. “Where are you? I pray she has not been killed—she, my own sweetheart!” A man with an ax began to smash furiously with it to break a way to freedom. It was Roy Swift, and he seemed frantic with terror. In his furious haste to escape from the wreck he several times came near hitting Frank on the head with the ax. “Hold on, Swift!” cried Merry. “You can get out there all right in a moment. Just help me get my foot free here, will you?” The young soldier gave him a look, and then snarled: “Take care of yourself!” Then, having made an opening large enough, he dropped the ax and crawled out. “You cur!” said Frank. “That’s the kind of a man I fancied you were!” Then he managed to reach the ax, with which he set about freeing his foot. He was forced to work carefully, in order not to injure himself, but he set the foot at liberty very soon. All this time he had been thinking of Inza, and now he set out to find her. He called her name, crawling and forcing his way through the wrecked car toward the point where he fancied she must be. A shrieking woman caught hold of him. He saw she, also, was held fast by broken timbers. “Help me!” implored the woman. Frank’s clear eyes discovered that there was a way to set her free. Out came his knife, and he quickly cut away a part of her skirt that had held her helpless. Three blows with the ax knocked aside a timber and enabled Merriwell to lift her to her feet. He told her how to find her way out. Then he continued his search for Inza. His heart sank lower and lower with each moment. Before him seemed an impassable barrier of splintered and broken timbers. Was she beneath that mass? The thought was enough to sicken him, but his heart did not fail. Selecting a weak point, he began his assault, and soon cleared a space through which he could force his body. “Inza!” Was that an answer? No, it was one of the many cries of distress coming from every side. Then the terrible conviction that she must be somewhere beneath that twisted and splintered mass fastened on him again. For once in his life, Frank seemed to lose his head. For once he was not his usual cool, calculating self. He smote the timbers with the ax, he tore at them with his fingers, he flung his body against them. “Inza!” he huskily shouted. Then, almost beneath his feet, he found her! Down on his knees he went, seeing her pale face dimly, finding her still and senseless. “Inza, my sweetheart!” he groaned. “Merciful Heaven! is she dead? Have I lost her thus?” He lifted her beautiful head and kissed her unresponsive lips. He whispered loving words in her ears. He pressed her to his throbbing heart and begged her to give one sign of life. She had not been crushed beneath the timbers, but had fallen between two of the seats, which had served to protect and shield her. Still, something must have injured her severely, for she was not a girl to faint from fright.