It was all we could do to get her out, the timbers were so heavy and so wedged in. They had fallen across each other and made sort of a roof over her. If it hadn't been for that she would have been killed. By all pulling on the rope and cutting some with the hatchet, we finally managed to get her loose.
When we started to lift her out she screamed with pain. We kept on lifting. There was no other way.
"It's my foot," she moaned. "It feels as if it was all broken to pieces."
Two of us made a chair with our hands and carried her carefully up on the river bank; then hurried back to the wreck.
"There is a man groaning somewhere," said Bill. "I think it must be the conductor."
We found him lying under some wreckage and in great pain.
"Where are you hurt?" we asked, when we had lifted the wreck off from him.
"My leg!" he groaned. "It's broken. I'm all in."
I took out my knife and ripped his trouser leg and underclothes to above the spot that hurt him, a little above the knee. Then, by putting one hand above the break and the other below it, just as Mr. Norton had made us practise doing a lot of times, and lifting very gently I could see the broken bone move. He ground his teeth together and great drops of sweat came out on his forehead, it hurt him so much, although I was trying to be careful.
"It's broken, all right," I told him. "We've sent for help. The only thing to do is to lie still and wait."