Ten minutes passed, but the train gave no sign of moving. Once or twice the driver blew an impatient blast, but the distant signal stood resolutely at danger.
"Nice old biff if the train did happen to jump the rails just here," remarked the engineer-lieutenant.
"Shut up, Tommy!" exclaimed Farrar. "You're making Holcombe jumpy."
"Stow it, Slogger!" protested the sub of the 'Antipas.' "I'm only going to have a look out. Here, I say; cast your eye this way."
"Periscope on the port bow, eh?" inquired Tommy facetiously, as the two men made their way to the window. "Gangway there, Holcombe. You ask us to admire something, and at the same time you block the view with your hulking carcase. I say, something fishy—what?"
Lying on the permanent way, almost abreast the front part of the guard's van, was a small leather suit-case, to the handle of which was attached a thin cord. Evidently some one had an object in wanting to dispose of the case, for an endeavour had apparently been made to swing it under the carriage; but, the cord breaking, the attempt had been frustrated.
"Jolly queer," agreed Farrar. "If any one wanted to get rid of the thing why didn't he heave it over the bridge? Here's the guard. We'll call his attention to it.... Suppose it's all right?"
The guard came hurrying along the permanent way. He had been conferring with the engine-driver as to the probable reason for the delay and had come to the decision to allow the train to proceed at a slow pace as far as the next station—a distance of about a quarter of a mile beyond the bridge—since it was impossible for a train coming in the opposite direction to enter the "block sector" at which the signal was at danger.
"Don't know how it came there, sir," declared the guard, when the derelict bag was brought to his notice. "It certainly wasn't there when I went by five minutes ago. Sure it's not your property, gentlemen?"
He spoke after the manner of a long-suffering official who ofttimes has been the victim of a practical joke on the part of facetious passengers.