“Who knows, with a thing so dangerous as a train? Perhaps at midnight: perhaps at dawn. Sometimes it is two days.”
“Good heaven. Is the engine-driver likely to refuse to take me?”
“Hernando says that soldiers were searching the line yesterday.”
“What soldiers?”
“Red soldiers: State soldiers from Meruel. They were looking to see if the Whites were coming by train.”
“Has there been any battle yet?”
“We have heard of none. They expected none till they are close to the city.”
“Thank heaven,” Hi said, “perhaps I shall be with them in time, after all. And, oh, will you ask your Uncle Philip to beseech the engine-driver to take me? Say it’s very, very important: for a woman’s life may depend on it.”
“He ask all right.”
“Suppose he refuse,” Hi said.