"The Princess has given it over to the hospital, I suppose," said Warren. "No one will stop it now. Wonder who drives it? I'm sorry for anyone who rides with the crazy guy who tried to run it last night."
"Here is the chauffeur now," said Ivan, stepping back as a dark, burly man approached the machine and took a package from the tool-box.
"He is a new one," said Warren.
They wandered around the corner of the building and mingled with the throngs waiting for the train. It came puffing in, and as the crowd pressed forward, Warren heard a familiar, coarse, whining voice behind him. He looked; and as he did so, he was conscious of Ivan who, with the quickness of a bird, slipped between two people, and was out of sight. Instantly Warren followed him. They met behind a truck loaded with boxes.
Warren was shaking. "Did you see?" he asked.
"Yes," said Ivan in a low voice. "Elinor and Rika, too! What are we going to do?"
"I don't know," said Warren. "Just do what we have to do when the time comes. Don't risk them another hour. Elinor looks half dead. Keep out of sight and watch for a chance. Don't let the girls see you, any more than the women. They would give it away, sure. Come on!"
He slipped quickly through the crowd, only a boy, and unnoticed. Behind, at his heels, came a thin lad, soiled and ragged. It was Prince Ivan, Prince of one of the greatest houses in Warsaw, but his own father would not have recognized him. Together they slyly watched the two women in front of them who, each with a child, begged pitifully of the travelers. The woman who had Rika held her in her arms, but poor little Elinor, on foot, reached a tiny hand toward the passing throng, and fearfully glanced at her ugly jailer as she did so.
The train remained on the track. It was evidently going to make up a section. The women wandered here and there, and finally approached a big packing case near the station door. Here they stood, evidently consulting. One woman slyly, showed the other a handkerchief full of kopeks. Then while the boys scarcely dared to breathe, they seated the two children on the box, and with a fearful threat which caused the face of Elinor to turn even paler, they hurried into the waiting room, and turned towards the ticket window.
"Now!" said Warren, "and be quick!"