"The Charing Cross Metropolitan Station!" she resumed, waving her hand towards the entrance as if she were introducing her niece to a friend. "The Bayswater and Birmingham Extension is just completed, and the trains now run round and round continuously--skirting the border of Wales, just touching at York, and so round by the east coast back to London. The way the trains run is _most_ peculiar. The westerly ones go round in two hours; the easterly ones take three; but they always manage to start two trains from here, opposite ways, punctually every quarter-of-an-hour."
"They part to meet again," said Clara, her eyes filling with tears at the romantic thought.
"No need to cry about it!" her aunt grimly remarked. "They don't meet on the same line of rails, you know. Talking of meeting, an idea strikes me!" she added, changing the subject with her usual abruptness. "Let's go opposite ways round, and see which can meet most trains. No need for a chaperon--ladies' saloon, you know. You shall go whichever way you like, and we'll have a bet about it!"
"I never make bets," Clara said very gravely. "Our excellent preceptress has often warned us----"
"You'd be none the worse if you did!" Mad Mathesis interrupted. "In fact, you'd be the better, I'm certain!"
"Neither does our excellent preceptress approve of puns," said Clara. "But we'll have a match, if you like. Let me choose my train," she added after a brief mental calculation, "and I'll engage to meet exactly half as many again as you do."
"Not if you count fair," Mad Mathesis bluntly interrupted. "Remember, we only count the trains we meet _on the way_. You mustn't count the one that starts as you start, nor the one that arrives as you arrive."
"That will only make the difference of _one_ train," said Clara, as they turned and entered the station. "But I never travelled alone before. There'll be no one to help me to alight. However, I don't mind. Let's have a match."
A ragged little boy overheard her remark, and came running after her. "Buy a box of cigar-lights, Miss!" he pleaded, pulling her shawl to attract her attention. Clara stopped to explain.
"I never smoke cigars," she said in a meekly apologetic tone. "Our excellent preceptress----," but Mad Mathesis impatiently hurried her on, and the little boy was left gazing after her with round eyes of amazement.