Picture-Play Magazine (Oct-Nov 1915)

PICTURE-PLAY WEEKLY 11 hen the train stopped in the midst of oods and meadows, with only a small at of a station, a freight shed, and ro or three farmhouses to mar the ndscape, she dropped the magazine to e floor and leaned close to the winjw, her great eyes shining with enthuasm. Five small children, barefooted and gingham pinafores, were playing with |ud pies and bits of broken crockery 1 the farther side of the wooden plat)rm, and she smiled as He saw them engage in a drited altercation, evi ntly on the all-important bject of mud-pie conruction. Lili smiled until one of westbound track as a long freight train swept by, with a clangor of bell ringing and whistle blowing. It was the longest train of cars that she had ever seen, and she counted twenty-seven of them as they pounded along the rails. Then the tiny caboose flashed by her, and she saw her own train on the other track. But the sight of it brought a cry of consternation to her lips. It was several hundred yards down the track, on ie urchins lost his temper id plastered a moist mud Jrt upon the freckled pug ise of the smallest of the ud-pastry cooks ; then her '"etty face showed almost k much distress as the etim was attesting with s shrill cries of rage and la*. Impulsively she sprang ttt of her seat and darted !' the vestibule of the car. "Trairi'll be a-startin' in tout half a minute, miss," ud the jolly negro porter : the steps, but she did not iderstand a word of his arning, and she had no tought of the train leav Is' Lili ran across the tracks > the squabbling children 'id caught the grievously tended one up in her -ms. She crooned to him id expostulated with his iivenile enemies in her )irited way, and she was irprised and abashed hen she realized that not ne of her words was ineligible to the little New nglanders. Her beauty id tenderness had a sooth\g effect on the belgerents, however, and 'uiet was restored. ''Look out, lady ; ye'll get it!" cried a small boy suddenly, and Lili took alarm " his look and gesture, nd sprang away from the After a walk of four miles they discovered a vacant farmhouse that served as shelter. its way to Boston, and gathering speed with every second. She started after, but only for a few steps, when she realized the futility of what she was doing. She was not a distinguished person of wealth, and train schedules cannot be ignored for the sake of pretty girls in distress. She stopped, her lips quivered, and a little sob rose in her throat, as she stood and watched the rear car swing around a curve and disappear. Lili realized that she was alone and lost, and, there being nothing else to do, she turned back and walked slowly along the track, wondering if any one would give her aid in finding her relatives again. Suddenly two men appeared on the track, near the little station, and came toward her. Her heart bounded with hope. 1 f they were gentlemen she would tell them her extraordinary story, and ask them to help her. She walked a little faster, but as the men drew nearer and she could see them clearly, she stopped, and uttered a little gasp of alarm. They were not gentlemen ! Their tattered, soiled clothes, their unkempt beards and red faces, proclaimed them to be tramps. As she stared at them, alarm growing to terror, she saw one of the strangers point her out to the others, and quicken his pace. Lili turned and ran, her imagination forming every kind of possible cause for fright. A glance behind her proved what she most feared — both men were running after her, and she heard them call to her. Where the railroad embankment sloped away into a meadow, she left the tracks and dashed wildly into the brush and long grass, making for a road that paralleled the tracks at no great distance. She gained the road, and,