In the midst of the riot and confusion of the smash, nothing could be heard or seen distinctly. La Lison, thrown over on the side, the under part rent open, was losing steam in rumbling puffs, similar to a furious rattle in the throat of a giant, at places where taps had been torn away, and where pipes had burst. An inexhaustible white cloud of vapour rolled round and round just on a level with the ground; while the embers, red as blood, fallen from the fire-box, added their black smoke. The chimney, in the violence of the shock, had entered the ground. At the place where it had stood, the frame was broken, bending the two frame-plates; and with the wheels in the air, similar to a monstrous steed, torn open by some formidable rip of a horn, La Lison displayed its twisted connecting-rods, its broken cylinders, its slide valves and their eccentrics flattened out--one huge, frightful wound, gaping in the open air, whence vitality continued issuing with the fracas of enraged despair. Beside the locomotive lay the horse, which had not been killed at once, with his two fore hoofs cut off and his belly ripped up. By his erect head, the neck stiffened in a spasm of atrocious pain, he could be perceived rattling the death agony with a terrible neigh, which failed to reach the ear in the thunder of the agonising engine. The cries were stifled, unheard, lost, wafted away. "Save me! Kill me! I am suffering too atrociously. Kill me! Kill me at once!" In this deafening tumult, and blinding smoke, the doors of the carriages remaining intact opened, and a swarm of bewildered travellers sprang out. Falling down on the line, they struggled with feet and fists to rise again. Then as soon as they found themselves on firm ground, with the open country before them, they fled as fast as they could run, clearing the hedge, cutting across country, ceding to the sole instinct of getting far away from the danger, very, very far. Howling women and men disappeared in the depths of the woods. Séverine, trampled under foot, with her hair about her back and her gown in shreds, at last got free; but she did not flee. Running towards the roaring engine, she found herself face to face with Pecqueux. "Jacques! Jacques! He is safe, is he not?" she inquired. The fireman, who, by a miracle, had not even sprained a joint, was hurrying in the same direction, his heart swelling with pity at the idea of his driver being beneath that heap of wreckage. They had journeyed, they had suffered so much together in the continual fatigue of the high winds! And their engine, their poor engine, the good friend so cherished by both, which lay there on its back, losing its last breath of steam! "I jumped off," he stammered, "and know nothing, nothing at all. Come on, come on, quick!"