“What has Charlie done with himself?” was the pleasant question, met with a smile so bewitching that the watcher was hopelessly ensnared.

“So, there’s a party of them,” he mused.  “And who the deuce is Charlie?”

But when that youth appeared he proved to be only a brother, and not a very big brother, at that.

Settling himself back in a corner from whence he could use his eyes and ears as he dared, young Leslie drew forth a letter which he perused with interest; in fact, he already knew it by heart.  It ran thus: 

  “My dear son,

  “Congratulate me.  The all-important day is fixed for the 24th inst. 
  Come at once.  Mrs. Dana is anxious to cultivate you, and my own
  impatience is an old story.

  “Your affectionate father,

  “H.J.  Leslie.”

“Confound Mrs, Dana!” was the son’s comment, for upon the subject of his father’s second marriage he was distinctly undutiful.

For a while he lost himself in pictures of the new home, and mentally resolved to absent himself as much as possible.  He knew how his opposition was grieving his father, who thought him most unreasonable:  but he persisted in refusing to see the lady until after the ceremony.

Suddenly with a terrific lurch the train was derailed and plunged down an embankment, not steep but rocky.  The heavy Pullman toppled over, then planted itself firmly in a bed of fresh earth, and was still.  There were wild cries of fear and pain, a loud crashing of glass lamps, and some wrenching of seats.  Leslie fell into a pile of great-coats, and flung out his right arm just as the two ladies were dashed against him, and a sudden sharp twinge made him oblivious of everything.

When he recovered consciousness he found himself being pulled out of his corner, and realized by the agony of the motion, that something was broken somewhere.  With one mighty protest against such vigorous handling, he relapsed into a dead faint.  When he next opened his eyes he was lying between cool sheets in a pleasant room, and bending over him was the elder lady of the Pullman.  The first bewildered look was rapidly merged into a frown of pain, as a sense of discomfort made itself felt.

“He is coming round, doctor;” said the lady.

Then to him she said;—­“you must be very quiet.  Your shoulder has been set.  It is all right now.  Heaven be praised that we did not kill you as we fell!” she added aside, and her sweet motherly face showed the sympathy he was in need of.

Then a voice at the door said timidly, yet eagerly,—­“Mamma, come—­Charlie wants you.”

The ladies vanished, leaving the doctor in charge.

Hervey soon gathered that they were at a farm-house near Columbus, Ohio; that Charlie had a broken leg, that his mother and sister, along with the others who had escaped injury, were stopping over to render service to the wounded.