"Come, now, don't be worried: it won't kill Ned to have to wait ten or fifteen minutes," she said laughingly, as she stepped into the carriage, and seated herself by Zoe's side.
"No, I dare say not," returned the latter, trying to speak with perfect pleasantness of tone and manner; "and he isn't one of the impatient ones, who can never bear to be kept waiting a minute, like myself," she added with a smile. "Now, Uncle Ben, drive pretty fast, so that we won't be so very far behind time."
"Fas' as I kin widout damagin' de hosses, Miss Zoe," answered the old coachman. "Marso Ed'ard allus tole me be keerful ob dem, and de roads am putty bad sence de big storm."
Zoe glanced at her watch as they entered the village. "Drive directly to the depot, Uncle Ben," she said. "It's fully fifteen minutes past the time for the train to be in."
"I ain't heard de whistle, Miss Zoe," he remarked, as he turned his horses' heads in the desired direction.
"No, nor have I," said Ella; "and we ought to have heard it fully five minutes before it got in. There may have been a detention. That is nothing very unusual," she hastened to add, as she saw that Zoe had suddenly grown very pale.
The carriage drew up before the door of the depot; and the girls leaned from its windows, sending eager, searching glances from side to side, and up and down the track.
No train was in sight, and the depot seemed strangely silent and deserted.
"Oh!" cried Zoe, "what can be the matter?"
"I suppose the train must have got in some time ago,—perhaps before we left Ion," replied Ella, in a re-assuring tone; "and all the passengers have dispersed to their homes, or wherever they were going."