Then I turned my eyes northward along the straight level track, and just as I did so I caught in the distance the first glimpse of the third train, in which I knew, as certainly as if I could already see him, that the Czar was travelling.
As the train loomed nearer and the moment for action approached, my spirits rose also. Uncertainty was at an end. A few minutes would decide whether I was to live or die.
I braced myself for the biggest effort of my life.
I was like a man whose nostrils expand as they breathe in the scent of deadly fight.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE ATTACK ON THE CZAR.
Though I did not now care whether the rails were disturbed again or not, seeing that I knew where the mechanism was and could point to my having discovered, as the reason for what I was about to do, I kept glancing at the spot, while I let the train approach unchecked near enough to have all eyes drawn to my actions.
I guessed the distance which the brakes would take to act and when the train had reached a point such as I judged necessary, I sprang on the track between the rails and waving my arms excitedly, thundered out at the top of my voice a warning to stop the train.
This was taken up by the soldiers who repeated the shouts and cries, and a moment later the shrieking whistle of the engine told us the warning had been heeded and that the brakes were on at full pressure.