He whistled at the level crossings, at the stations, at the great curves. A red light having appeared in the distance, as daylight vanished, he for a long time inquired if the road was free, and then passed like lightning. It was only from time to time that he cast a glance at the steam-gauge, turning the injector-wheel as soon as the pressure reached ten kilogrammes. But it was always to the permanent way that his eyes returned, bent on observing its smallest peculiarities, and with such attention, that he saw nothing else, and did not even feel the wind blowing a tempest. The steam-gauge falling, he opened the door of the fire-box, raising the bars; and Pecqueux, accustomed to a gesture, understood at once. He broke up coal with his hammer, and with his shovel put on an even layer. The scorching heat burnt the legs of both of them. Then, the door once closed again, they had to face the current of icy air. When night closed in, Jacques became doubly prudent. Rarely had he found La Lison so obedient. He handled the engine as he pleased, with the absolute will of the master; and yet he did not relax his severity, but treated it as a tamed animal that must always be distrusted. There, behind his back, in the train, whirling along at express speed, he saw a delicate, confiding, smiling face. He felt a slight shiver. With a firmer hand he grasped the reversing-wheel, piercing the increasing darkness with fixed eyes, in search of red lights. After the embranchments at Asnières and Colombes, he breathed a little. As far as Mantes all went well, the line was as a sheet of glass, and the train rolled along at ease. After Mantes he had to urge La Lison on, so that it might ascend a rather steep incline, almost half a league long. Then, without slackening speed, he ran down the gentle slope to the Rolleboise tunnel, just about two miles in length, which he negotiated in barely three minutes. There remained but one more tunnel, that of La Roule, near Gaillon, before the station of Sotteville--a spot to be feared, for the complication of the lines, the continual shunting proceeding there, and the constant obstruction, made it exceedingly dangerous. All the strength of his being lay in his eyes which watched, in his hand which drove; and La Lison, whistling and smoking, dashed through Sotteville at full steam, only to stop at Rouen, whence it again set out, a trifle calmer, ascending more slowly the incline that extends as far as Malaunay.