But all at once those in the car began to realize that something else was occurring.Somehow, they could feel the accommodation car wavering as if on the brink of a precipice.Then it began to settle slowly and the mystified performers and car hands thought it was going to rest where it was on the ties.
Instead, the car took a sudden lurch.
"We're going over something!" cried a voice.
Phil, who had scrambled quickly to his feet, half-dazed from the fall, stood irresolutely for a few seconds then began making his way toward where Little Dimples had fallen.At that moment young Forrest was hurled with great force against the side of the car.Everything in the car seemed suddenly to have become the center of a miniature cyclone.Dishes, cooking utensils, tables and chairs were flying through the air, the noise within the car accompanied by a sickening, grinding series of crashes from without.
Groans were already distinguishable above the deafening crashes.
Those who were able to think realized that the accommodation car was falling over an embankment of some sort.
Through accident or design, what is known as a "blind switch" had been turned while the engine was shunting the accommodation car about the yards.The result was that the car had left the rails, bumped along on the ties for a distance, then had toppled over an embankment that was some twenty feet high.
It seemed as if all in that ill-fated car must be killed or maimed for life.A series of shrill blasts from the engine called for help.
The crash had been heard all over the railroad yards.Railroad men and circus men had rushed toward the spot where the accommodation car hadgone over the embankment, Mr.Sparling among the number.He had just arrived at the yards when the accident occurred.
Fortunately, the wrecking crew was ready for instant service, and these men were rushed without an instant's delay to the outskirts of the yard where the wreck had occurred.
However, ere the men got there a startling cry rose from hundreds of throats.
"Fire!The car is on fire!"
"Break in the doors!Smash the sides in!"
Yet no one seemed to have the presence of mind to do anything.Phil had been hurled through a broken widow, landing halfway down the bank, on the uphill side of the car, else he must have been crushed to death.But so thoroughly dazed was he that he was unable to move.
Finally someone discovered him and picked him up.
"Here's one of them," announced a bystander."It's a kid, too." Mr.Sparling came charging down the bank.
"Who is it?Where is he?" he bellowed."Here.""It's Phil Forrest," cried one of the showmen, recognizing the lad, whose face was streaked where it had been cut by the jagged glass in the broken window.
"Is he killed?"
"No; he's alive.He's coming around now." Phil sat up and rubbed his eyes.
All at once he understood what had happened.He staggered to his feet holding to a man standing beside him.
"Why don't you do something?" cried Phil."Don't you know there are people in that car?" "It's burning up.Nobody dares get in till the wreckers can get here and smash in the side of the car," was the answer.
"What?" fairly screamed Phil Forrest."Nobody dares go in that car? Somebody does dare!""Come back, come back, Phil! You can't do anything," shouted a fellow performer.
