But the derailed car settled over gently on its side, and came to rest. We got out as quickly as possible, not sure that the wrecked train was safe from attack by Bolshevists. Under a cold, clear sky, we saw that the train had been shattered in the center, the wreck occurring on a sharp down grade between the banks of a cut. Several of the small and light box-cars, containing horses and Japanese soldiers, had been smashed, but the damage was not great, due to the fact that the shock had been absorbed by the cars bulging upward into an inverted V. The Japanese were busily engaged in getting out horses, and in checking up their men, to ascertain if any had been killed. There were a few minor injuries. It was too cold to linger outside long in my pajamas, and I went back to the car, and finding our electric flashlights, sorted ourselves out and went back to sleep. In the morning we learned just what had happened. The train had broken open in the middle at the crest of the hill. The engine, with the forward half, had run down into the valley over temporary trackage. Then the engineer discovered what had happened. The tail end of his train was just gaining headway over the crest, and coming down with increasing speed. So, in order to go back and get it, he reversed his engine and came back at top speed, meeting us in the cut when we had acquired good speed from the descending grade. It was a splendid example of how not to recapture the runaway half of a troop-train. [Illustration: RUSSIAN SOLDIERS CLEARING THE TRACK AFTER A WRECK ON THE TRANS-SIBERIAN] [Illustration: JAPANESE OFFICERS TALKING WITH AN AMERICAN OFFICER] That is an impartial description of what happened. But there was every reason to believe that the engineer, working with a confederate aboard the train, knew the train would be split at the proper place to allow the engine to get away, and then come back with the most disastrous results. And I believe that Red Sweater split the train, for when a wrecking train came the next morning to clear the tracks, the engine of our train and such cars as would travel, going ahead to the next station to allow the wreckers to get in at the smashed cars, Red Sweater rode away with the first load of battered cars pulled out. During that day, and the best part of that night, the Russian wrecking crew worked and talked and drank tea, on a job that would have taken an American wrecking crew, two hours. Before a pair of broken trucks could be ditched, there must be a discussion which suggested the Duma in action against the Czar. But the Japanese, stoical and silent, were not fooled--they recognized as fine a piece of sabotage as had ever been produced. When we resumed our journey, we three were nearly famished for want of food. We had brewed tea, and consumed a string-load of pretzels, and as the Japanese had not noticed that we were short of supplies, we had refrained from asking for any of their food.