“Keep quiet, Mr. Tyler,” he said, “or you will have us both over the trestle.”

The miser shuddered, but he made no reply and kept perfectly still till Roy placed him on the grass in the shade of a horse chestnut tree.  The boy threw himself down beside him, and began to fan himself with his straw hat.  The next minute, with a shrill whistle, the train rushed by them.

“You saved my life, Roy Pell,” said Mr. Tyler after the skurrying dust raised from the ballast had settled into place.  “You are a brave boy.”

Roy made no reply.  He was still very hot and he was thinking that his whole adventure was very much like a scene in a book.

“I ought to say ‘Oh, it is nothing,’ I suppose,” he reflected with a half smile.  “But then that wouldn’t be the truth.  From the way I feel now it was a good deal.”

“I’ve missed that train, I suppose,” Mr. Tyler went on.

At this Roy wanted to laugh.  It sounded so ridiculous.  And yet it was quite characteristic of this singular old man.  But young Pell mopped his face vigorously with his handkerchief to hide his mirth and then said, rising to his feet: 

“Do you feel all right, Mr. Tyler?”

“Oh, I guess so,” was the reply, and the old man started to get up too.

But he immediately fell back again and a frightened look came into his face.

CHAPTER II

 In the miser’s home

“Have you hurt yourself, Mr. Tyler?” asked Roy anxiously.  “You didn’t break a limb when you fell, did you?”

“No, no, it is here,” and the old man put his hand up to his head.

“The sun was too hot for you,” went on Roy.  “You haven’t got over it yet.”

“I am afraid I shall never get over it, Roy Pell.”  The miser looked at him in a steady way that would have frightened some boys.  “And I don’t want to die yet, not till I have made my will.  I must have a lawyer.  Where is Sydney Pell, that brother of yours.”

“He isn’t my brother.  He’s a boy that father adopted when he was very young, but he’s better than a good many brothers.  And he’s a good lawyer, too.  Would you like to see him.  He’ll be back on the five-thirty train.”

“Yes, I should like to see him if it won’t be too late.  What time is it now?  You haven’t got a watch, have you?  Look at mine and tell me.”

“Quarter past five, and now you ought to be taken home right away, and have a doctor.”

“You think I am very bad then?” Again the frightened look came into the old man’s face.

“No, of course not.  Lots of people have to call the doctor when they’re not going to die.”

“Don’t speak of dying.  I’m afraid to die.  See, I don’t mind telling you so.  And I ought to be.  I haven’t done very much good in the world.  There isn’t anybody I can think of will be sorry to have me go.  That isn’t the way to live, Roy Pell.  You ought to be happy, so happy, because you are young, and have your life before you to make it the way it should be made.”