It was a dull afternoon early in November, and the landscape looked brown and unpicturesque.
The great river flowed sluggishly along, and as they passed a string of canal-boats preceded by a snorting tug, the boys thought of Captain Beasley and the Minnehaha.
During the next hour a large portion of Dick’s attention was centred on the pretty girl who had boarded the train at Poughkeepsie.
“Ever hear of Spuyten Duyvil?” asked Joe.
“Yes,” answered Dick.
“It’s not far above Manhattan Island, and we’ll pass there soon. Guess I’ll have another drink.”
Joe went to the end of the car where the tank was, but whether his numerous drinks since leaving Albany had used up all the water, or because there was something the matter with the cock, certain it is Joe had to go into the next car to get what he wanted.
He had probably been gone a couple of minutes and Dick was watching the pretty stranger for perhaps the hundredth time, when something startling occurred which changed the whole aspect of affairs in the twinkling of an eye.
A tremendous shock stopped the train’s momentum and piled the cars on top of each other, hurling a couple down the embankment into the river, almost every car becoming a shapeless wreck, and human beings, full of life and hope a moment before, were suddenly ushered into eternity or maimed and mangled for life.
It was a rear-end collision.