Thelma raised herself slowly, and with a sudden impulse kissed the good woman's honest, rosy face, to her intense astonishment and pleasure.
"You are very kind to me!" she said tremulously. "I am so sorry to have troubled you. I do feel ill--but it will soon pass."
And she smoothed her ruffled hair, and sitting up erect, endeavored to smile. Her companion eyed her pale face compassionately, and taking up her sleeping baby from the shawl on which she had laid it while ministering to Thelma's needs, began to rock it slowly to and fro. Thelma, meanwhile, became sensible of the rapid movement of the train.
"We have left London?" she asked with an air of surprise.
"Nearly half an hour ago, my dear." Then, after a pause, during which she had watched Thelma very closely, she said-"I think you're married, aren't you, dearie?"
"Yes." Thelma answered, a slight tinge of color warming her fair pale cheeks.
"Your husband, maybe, will meet you at Hull?"
"No,--he is in London," said Thelma simply. "I am going to see my father."
This answer satisfied her humble friend, who, noticing her extreme fatigue and the effort it cost her to speak, forbore to ask any more questions, but good-naturedly recommended her to try and sleep. She slept soundly herself for the greater part of the journey; but Thelma was now feverishly wide awake, and her eyeballs ached and burned as though there were fire behind them.
Gradually her nerves began to be wound up to an extreme tension of excitement--she forgot all her troubles in listening with painful intentness to the rush and roar of the train through the darkness. The lights of passing stations and signal-posts gleamed like scattered and flying stars--there was the frequent shriek of the engine-whistle,--the serpent-hiss of escaping steam. She peered through the window--all was blackness; there seemed to be no earth, no sky,--only a sable chaos, through which the train flew like a flame-mouthed demon. Always that rush and roar! She began to feel as if she could stand it no longer. She must escape from that continuous, confusing sound--it maddened her brain. Nothing was easier; she would open the carriage-door and get out! Surely she could manage to jump off the step, even though the train was in motion!
Danger! She smiled at that idea,--there was no danger; and, if there was, it did not much matter. Nothing mattered now,--now that she had lost her husband's love. She glanced at the woman opposite, who slept profoundly--the baby had slipped a little from its mother's arms, and lay with its tiny face turned towards Thelma. It was a pretty creature, with soft cheeks and a sweet little mouth,--she looked at it with a vague, wild smile. Again, again that rush and roar surged like a storm in her ears and distracted her mind! She rose suddenly and seized the handle of the carriage door. Another instant, and she would have sprang to certain death,--when suddenly the sleeping baby woke, and, opening its mild blue eyes, gazed at her.