Page:Paine--J Archibauld McKaney collector of whiskers.djvu/151

  of cars of merchandise were strewn about in frightful confusion. Fire had broken out among the splintered express cars and their contents, and the train crews were fighting it with bucket brigades.

Another passenger train coming in the opposite direction from mine was standing on the other side of the blockade. Its people were also walking along the track to view the interesting scene at close range. Foremost among them I recognized Pillsover, evidently bound for Richmond. His head was bandaged and a strip of plaster gleamed athwart his nose. As I drew nearer the one side of the blazing wreckage, he approached closer to the other until we were glaring across the smoking barrier perhaps a hundred feet apart. He could see that I was a passenger on the train that had left Richmond earlier in the day, and he was forced to conclude, of course, that the parchment envelope and the Royal Whisker were in my pocket. His emotions must have been tormenting in the extreme, for several times he shook his fist at me. I [133