“I say, I believe we’re stopping after all!”

They let down the window and looked out.  They were still about a mile from Powerscroft, but the train drew up, probably in obedience to an adverse signal.  Then the girls did a terrible and awful thing.  They never remembered afterwards which suggested it, probably the idea occurred to both simultaneously, but in defiance of the law of the realm and the rules of the railway company, they opened the door of the carriage and climbed down on to the line.  There were some railings near, and they scrambled over these and dodged down an embankment into a coppice before anybody in the train had time to give an alarm.  They hoped their flight had not been noticed, but of that they could not be sure.  They hid behind some bushes until they heard the train rumble away.

“That was the smartest thing we’ve ever done in our lives!” chuckled Garnet.  “I believe we could be fined about ten pounds each if they caught us!”

“Let us hurry on and try to find the road,” said Winona, who was rather frightened at her own temerity, and had a nervous apprehension lest a guard or a signalman or some other railway official might even now be in pursuit and arrest them on a charge of breaking the law.

After crossing a field they struck a path which led them eventually into a by-lane.

“I know where we are,” affirmed Garnet.  “I bicycled this way once.  Monkend Woods are in that direction, and if we turn to the left and through this village we shall get there sooner than the others, I believe, and be waiting for them when they arrive.  Their train won’t have reached Powerscroft yet.”

“We’d better step out all the same,” urged Winona.

Fortunately Garnet possessed the bump of locality.  Her recollection of the district was correct, and after a brisk walk of about a mile they found themselves in the high road close to the wood, and sat down on a wall to wait.  Their fast train and short cut had given them an advantage:  it was nearly half an hour before they spied the rest of the party strolling leisurely up the hill with baskets and vasculums.  The surprise of the League at seeing them was immense, and naturally there were many inquiries as to how they had thus stolen a march upon their friends.

“Oh, we came in an aeroplane!” said Garnet jauntily.  “It just dropped us in the field over there.  Very pleasant run, though a little chilly in the clouds!”

She was obliged to own up, however, in answer to Miss Lever’s inquiries, give a precise account of their adventure, and cry “peccavi.”

“Of course Dollikins had to be orthodox and preach a short sermon,” she confided afterwards to Winona, “but I’m sure she’d have done the same thing herself in the circumstances.  I could see admiration in her eye, although she talked about running risks and the possibility of broken necks.”