At last, as the air in the car grew cooler, she fell asleep, and did not waken till the sun was down, and a great bank of black clouds was looming up in the west, with mutterings of thunder, and an occasional flash of lightning showing against the dark sky.  She might not have wakened then if the car had not given a lurch, with a jar which brought every one to his feet.  The train was off the track, and it would be two or three hours before it was on again, the conductor said to the crowd eagerly questioning him.  There was nothing to do but wait, and Eloise did it philosophically.  She had dined from her lunch box in the middle of the day, and was now glad that her grandmother had put so much in it, as it not only served her for supper, but also a tired mother and two hungry children.  As the car began to grow close again, she left it for a breath of the fresh air, which blew over the hills as the storm came nearer.  She heard some one say it was time for the New York Express, which was to pass them at Crompton, and it soon came thundering on, but stopped suddenly when it found its progress impeded.  She saw the passengers alight to ascertain the cause of the hindrance, and heard their impatient exclamations at the delay, which would seriously inconvenience some of them.

“It may be midnight before we reach Crompton.  I wonder if Howard will meet me at that late hour,” she heard a young man say, the smoke from his cigar blowing in her face as he passed where she was sitting on a stump.

“He is sure to be there.  I saw him day before yesterday, and he is wild to have you come.  I fancy he finds it rather dull with only a cranky old man and a half-crazy woman for associates.  Howard wants life and fun,” was the reply of his companion, and then the two young men were out of hearing.

Who Howard was, or the cranky old man and half-crazy woman, Eloise had no idea, nor did she give them a thought.  One thing alone impressed her,—­the late hour when she would probably arrive at Crompton.  Would any one be there to meet her, or any conveyance, and if not, how was she to find her way to Mrs. Biggs?

“Grandma says never cross a river till you reach it, when you will probably find a plank, if nothing more,” she thought, and settled herself to wait through the long hours which elapsed before the welcome “All aboard!” was sounded, and the two trains were under way,—­the accommodation in front, and the express in the rear.

The storm had broken before the trains started, and it increased in such violence that when Crompton was reached it was raining in torrents.  The wind was like a hurricane, with alternate flashes of lightning which lit up the darkness, and peals of thunder which seemed to shake the trains as they stopped to let off their passengers.  There were but two, the young man from the parlor car, and the girl from the accommodation.  The girl was almost drenched to the skin in the downpour before she could open her