And the petrifying little hand which
had left its fistling in the train,--the
thick mitten that should have grasped
the balancing stick in all the wild swallow-fun
of climbing, stemming, darting amid
slope and snow upon a wintry hillside--could
not hold on very long to the glacial
spur.

The ice-cake was threatening to slip
away, to seesaw, turn turtle and waltz
off, to the tune of blood-curdling sounds:
screams for help here, there, everywhere,
always with the background of that menacing
hiss of steam in the great engine's
boilers--that low, sneezing uz-z-z! as if it
were taking cold from its bath--the engine
that, at any moment, might explode.

Frantically she would have struck out,
the little girl-mechanic, and fought the
whole ice-pack to get away from that
threat, to reach a solid crust, but she
knew that she could not "swim" two,
herself and Una.

Yet would they go under--one or both
[[34]]

p033 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p034w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p035

v?