So two years passed,—­years liberally interspersed with expeditions into the mountains and elsewhere, and nights spent in the company of Tom Gaylord and others.  During this period Austen was more than once assailed by the temptation to return to the free life of Pepper County, Mr. Blodgett having completely recovered now, and only desiring vengeance of a corporal nature.  But a bargain was a bargain, and Austen Vane stuck to his end of it, although he had now begun to realize many aspects of a situation which he had not before suspected.  He had long foreseen, however, that the time was coming when a serious disagreement with his father was inevitable.  In addition to the difference in temperament, Hilary Vane belonged to one generation and Austen to another.

It happened, as do so many incidents which tend to shape a life, by a seeming chance.  It was a Tune evening, and there had been a church sociable and basket picnic during the day in a grove in the town of Mercer, some ten miles south of Ripton.  The grove was bounded on one side by the railroad track, and merged into a thick clump of second growth and alders where there was a diagonal grade crossing.  The picnic was over and the people preparing to go home when they were startled by a crash, followed by the screaming of brakes as a big engine flew past the grove and brought a heavy train to a halt some distance down the grade.  The women shrieked and dropped the dishes they were washing, and the men left their horses standing and ran to the crossing and then stood for the moment helpless, in horror at the scene which met their eyes.  The wagon of one—­of their own congregation was in splinters, a man (a farmer of the neighbourhood) lying among the alders with what seemed a mortal injury.  Amid the lamentations and cries for some one to go to Mercer Village for the doctor a young man drove up rapidly and sprang out of a buggy, trusting to some one to catch his horse, pushed, through the ring of people, and bent over the wounded farmer.  In an instant he had whipped out a knife, cut a stick from one of the alders, knotted his handkerchief around the man’s leg, ran the stick through the knot, and twisted the handkerchief until the blood ceased to flow.  They watched him, paralyzed, as the helpless in this world watch the capable, and before he had finished his task the train crew and some passengers began to arrive.

“Have you a doctor aboard, Charley?” the young man asked.

“No,” answered the conductor, who had been addressed; “my God, not one, Austen.”

“Back up your train,” said Austen, “and stop your baggage car here.  And go to the grove,” he added to one of the picnickers, “and bring four or five carriage cushions.  And you hold this.”

The man beside him took the tourniquet, as he was bid.  Austen Vane drew a note-book from his pocket.

“I want this man’s name and address,” he said, “and the names and addresses of every person here, quickly.”