“Rouse up the fire,” says Kinko, calmly; “shut down the safety valves, and blow up the engine.”
And was that the only way—a desperate way—of stopping the train before it reached the viaduct?
Kinko scattered the coal on to the fire bars. He turned on the greatest possible draught, the air roared across the furnace, the pressure goes up, up, amid the heaving of the motion, the bellowings of the boiler, the beating of the pistons. We are going a hundred kilometres an hour.
“Get back!” shouts Kinko above the roar. “Get back into the van.”
“And you, Kinko?”
“Get back, I tell you.”
I see him hang on to the valves, and put his whole weight on the levers.
“Go!” he shouts.
I am off over the tender. I am through the van. I awake Popof, shouting with all my strength:
“Get back! Get back!”