"There was an old gentleman in the seat back of me," cried Polly, in distress. "Hasn't any one seen him?" running up and down the track; "an old gentleman with a black velvet cap"—amid shouts of "Keep out—the car is taking fire. Don't go near it."
A little tongue of flame shooting from one of the windows at the further end of the car proclaimed this fact, without the words.
"Has no one seen him?" called Polly, in a voice so clear and piercing that it rose above the babel of the crowd, and the groans of one or two injured people drawn out from the ruin, and lying on the bank, waiting the surgeon's arrival. "Then he must be in the car. Oh, Ben—come, we must get him out!" and she sprang back toward the broken car end.
"Keep back, Polly!" commanded Ben, and "I shall go," cried Pickering Dodge. But Polly ran too, and clambered with them, over the crushed car seats and window frames of the ruin.
"He's not here," cried Ben, while the hot flame seemed to be sweeping with cruel haste, down to catch them.
"Look—oh, he must be!" cried Polly wildly, peering into the ruin. "Oh,
Ben, I see a hand!"
But a rough grasp on her shoulder seized her as the words left her mouth. "Come out of here, Miss, or you'll be killed," and Polly was being borne off by rescuers who had seen her rush with the two young men, in amongst the ruin. "I tell you," cried Polly, struggling to get free, "there is an old gentleman buried in there; I saw his hand."
"Everybody is out, Miss," and they carried her off. But Ben and Pickering were already in a race with the flames, for the possession of the old gentleman, whose body, after the car seat was removed, could plainly be seen.
"There's the axe," cried Ben hoarsely, pointing to it, where it had fallen near to Pickering.
Pickering measured the approach of the flames with a careful eye. "He is probably dead," he said to Ben. "Shall we?"