Morton knew that it would stop only for a moment, and plied his horse with merciless blows. The horse plunged through the mire,--the mud and water spouting high above his rider's head,--gained the firm ground, and bounded forward wild with fright and fury. It was too late. The bell rang, and with quicker and quicker pants, the engine began to move. Morton shouted,--gesticulated,--still it did not stop, though the passengers seemed to take alarm, for a head was thrust from every window, while the occupants of an open carriage drawn up on the road were bending eagerly towards him. Morton wheeled to the left, and urged his horse up the embankment in front of the train. With a violent effort, he reached the top. The engineer was running against time, and cared for nothing but winning his match. He blew the steam whistle; and as Morton dragged on the curb with desperate strength, the horse reared upright, pawing the air. But, as he rose, Morton disengaged his feet, slid over the crupper to the ground, and let go the rein. The horse leaped down the bank, and scoured over the meadow, mad with terror. Morton took his stand in the middle of the track, and facing the advancing train, stood immovable as a post. The engineer reversed the engine, brought it to a stand within a few yards of him, and, with a profusion of oaths, demanded what he wanted. Before the breathless Morton could well explain himself, the passengers began to leap out of the cars, and running forward, gathered about him. He soon found words to make the case known. But one object alone engrossed him. He pushed on among the throng of questioning, eager men, mounted the foremost car, and made his way through it, the crowd pushing behind and around him, and plying him with questions, to which, in the confusion and abstraction of his faculties, he gave wild and random answers. He looked at every face. Edith Leslie was not there. He crossed the platform into the next car, passed through it, and still could not find her. It was the last in the train. And now a strange feeling came over him, a bitterness, a sense of disappointment, as if his efforts and his pangs had been uncalled for and profitless; for so intensely had his thoughts been concentred on one object, that he forgot for the moment the hundred men and women whom he had saved from deadly jeopardy. The train rolled back to the station, the distance being only a few rods. Morton got out and leaned against the wall of the house. Men thronged about him with questions, exclamations, thanks, praises. The reaction of his violent emotion produced in him a frame of mind almost childish. He was restless to free himself from the crowd. "It's nothing; it's nothing," he answered, as fresh praises were showered on him. "I saw the train going to the devil, and did what I could to save it. Any of you, I dare say, would have done as much. Be good enough to let me have a little air."