The pent black smoke from the tunnel rolled in a thick cloud about them, stifling them. The girl, dazed with the roar and blinded by the smoke, could only cling to her protector. For an instant they felt as if they were about to be drawn into the awful power of the rushing monster. Then it had passed, and a roar of silence followed, as if they were suddenly plunged into a vacuum. Gradually the noises of the world began again: the rumble of a trolley-car on the bridge; the "honk-honk" of an automobile; the cry of a newsboy. Slowly their breath and their senses came back.
The man's first thought was to get out of the cut before another train should come. He grasped his companion's arm and started up the steep embankment, realizing as he did so that the wrist he held was slender, and that the sleeve which covered it was of the finest cloth.
They struggled up, scarcely pausing for breath. The steps at the side of the bridge, made for the convenience of railroad hands, were out of the question, for they were at a dizzy height, and hung unevenly over the yawning pit where trains shot constantly back and forth.
As they emerged from the dark, the man saw that his companion was a young and beautiful woman, and that she wore a light cloth gown, with neither hat nor gloves.
At the top of the embankment they paused, and the girl, with her hand at her throat, looked backward with a shudder. She seemed like a young bird that could scarcely tell which way to fly.
Without an instant's hesitation, the young man raised his hand and hailed a four-wheeler across the street.
"Come this way, quick!" he urged, helping her in. He gave the driver his home address and stepped in after her. Then, turning, he faced his companion, and was suddenly keenly aware of the strange situation in which he had placed himself.
"Can you tell me what is the matter," he asked, "and where you would like to go?"
The girl had scarcely recovered breath from the long climb and the fright, and she answered him in broken phrases.
"No, I cannot tell you what is the matter"--she paused and looked at him, with a sudden comprehension of what he might be thinking about her--"but--there is nothing--that is--I have done nothing wrong--" She paused again and looked up with eyes whose clear depths, he felt, could hide no guile.
"Of course," he murmured with decision, and then wondered why he felt so sure about it.