“No, I’d jump the track and run like the dickens,” answered Alf. “I wonder why they don’t put these fool ties the same distance apart.”
“It’s awfully good exercise,” said Dan. “How are you getting on, Gerald?”
“All right,” Gerald replied a trifle breathlessly. “I thought I heard a whistle then, Dan.”
“Old Toby, I’ll bet a hat!” cried Tom.
“Well, if a train comes,” answered Dan, “don’t try to guess which track it’s on but get off on one side as quick as you know how and give it plenty of room.”
Gerald had a chance to profit by Dan’s advice a few minutes later when a local came screeching down on them from the east. The boys drew off at one side of the track and held onto their caps, for the cut was narrow and the engine and cars went by at not much more than arm’s length.
“That engine bit at me,” gasped Alf when the last car had hurtled by in a blinding cloud of dust and smoke. “Gee, but my eyes are full of cinders!”
“Why didn’t you shut them?” asked Tom. “That was a narrow escape, fellows, I tell you. A yard farther that way and we’d have been ground to atoms.”
“I guess the next time I’ll climb the bank,” observed Gerald with a somewhat sickly smile. “I thought that engine was going to reach out and grab me!”
“There probably won’t be any next time,” said Dan. “Not if we foot it a little faster. What time is it, anyway? By Jupiter, Alf, it’s a quarter past four!”