When he returned, Elizabeth, sitting with her face toward the door, looked up with a welcoming smile, their eyes met, and hers did not drop.  He rushed toward her, his face shining with love.  Scarcely knowing what she did, she sprang to her feet, all her consciousness engrossed in the thrilling prescience that in another instant she would sink into his arms.  But at her very side, as he seized her hand, he stopped with a perceptible rigor of muscles and expression.  His resolution of an hour before had flashed into his mind and he had pulled himself together with a mighty effort.

A little tremor passed through Elizabeth’s body and she drew back a little as he dropped her hand.  “Oh, look!  The train is going!” she exclaimed, and rushed for the door.

They ran at top speed across the road, he lifted her bodily to the front steps of the last car, and swung himself upon the rear platform.  They gained their seats, flushed and panting, and the conductor, coming to see if they had got on without injury, explained that the east-bound train was late and he had been ordered to go on to the next siding and wait there.  He lingered for a few minutes, chatting with them and denying their charge that he had not rung the bell.  After he was gone, Adams turned to Elizabeth with a paling face and said: 

“I hope you will pardon me, Miss Black.  I can only throw myself on your mercy.  My only excuse is that I—­”

She stopped him with a gesture.  “Don’t speak of it,” she said, in a low tone, her eyes on the floor, “and don’t think of it again.  In such an unusual friendship as ours, unusual incidents must be—­”

A thumping jar broke her speech and a sudden stop threw them both violently forward against the other seat.

“Are you hurt?” Adams asked anxiously as they scrambled to their feet.  “There must have been an accident,” he went on, putting his head out of the window.  He drew it back quickly, his face white.  “Don’t look,” he exclaimed.  “There’s been a collision!  It’s horrible!  But don’t be alarmed.  There ’s no more danger now.  I ’ll go out and see just what has happened.”

“Wait a minute, please!  Perhaps you can help me,” Elizabeth exclaimed, reaching for her suit case.  “I’ll be needed, and I ’ll want help.”  She was hurriedly opening the case and taking out articles and packages.  With face intent and manner preoccupied she appeared a different person.  The woman had sunk out of sight and the physician was uppermost.

Adams looked on with an amazed face.  “Then you are a physician!” he exclaimed.  “I did not know—­”

She nodded, without looking up, absorbed in a search for something.  “That package of bandages,” she murmured.  “Oh, here it is.  Yes, I ’m a physician, and I ’ve had practice in surgery.  Come, let’s get out there at once.  If you will carry these packages I ’ll take my surgical case and my medicine bag.  I ’m so glad I put all these things in my suit case.”