Bob set out at a brisk gait. He felt like groaning at every step, but ground his teeth together and kept on. Either he would cover the necessary distance or drop dead on the road.
“They will find that I am not so easily overcome as they expected,” he muttered, grimly. “And now, with hundreds of lives at stake, what sort of a chap would I be to show the white feather?”
Bob had to make a guess as to which was the shortest way to the nearest station, and praying that he was right and would arrive in time he pushed on and on.
Over the rough fields and through the brooks, now swollen high from the recent rain, went Bob, half walking and half running. He was hatless, and the jump from the window had nearly sprained his ankle, but what did he care? If those lives were to be saved, he alone must accomplish the task.
At last a long, low rumble reached his ears.
“The track can’t be far off, and that is a train.”
Bob paused for only a second to listen and to locate the sound. He was right. It was a train, going in the opposite direction.
“It’s the last train through that way to-night,” he said to himself. “Now the only one to pass the other way is the express, and that must be almost due.”
Off through a patch of woods Bob heard the train slow up, come to a stop, and then start off again.
“That means a station of some sort most likely,” was his mental comment. “Oh, if I can only reach it in time!”