The car, its hood crumpled up as if it had been made of paper instead of metal, stood at the foot of a tree not far off.
"No wonder we were thrown out," thought Roy, as he gazed at the wreck and considered the speed at which they had encountered the obstruction. "The wonder is we escaped with our lives."
After a brief and ineffectual attempt to arouse the girl the boy looked about him for some means of assistance. The cowardly train crew had not stopped when they saw the accident. Visions of damage suits and summary discharges may have drifted through their minds, for extra freights were supposed to send flagmen to the crossing to warn all traffic of the train's approach.
Suddenly Roy recollected the two men he had seen spring from behind the hedge as the runaway auto approached the gap. What had become of them? Apparently they had taken to their heels also, for not a sign was to be seen of them.
"Odd," thought the boy to himself; "one would think the first instinct of a human being at seeing an accident like this would be to stay and help. But, hold on, maybe they've gone for a doctor. A retired physician, Dr. Mays, lives not far from here. In the meantime if I could only get some cold water."
Suddenly he spied a small brook at the foot of the hill. Ill and dazed as he felt Roy sprinted toward it, and wetting his handkerchief hastened back to Jess. Kneeling by her side he bathed her forehead. He was rewarded in a few moments by beholding her eyelids flutter and open. In a few seconds more she was fully conscious, but weak and shaken. Roy collected the scattered cushions from the wreck, and placing them like a mattress laid the girl upon them.
She thanked him with a wan smile and then lay still once more. Roy wisely did not speak. He judged that perfect quiet was what she wanted at that moment.
While he sat by her side meditating what to do a sudden noise caused him to look upward.
It was a noise like the drone of a giant bumble bee. It came from directly above his head.
"The Golden Butterfly!" shouted Roy, springing to his feet.
Above him, at an elevation of some thousand feet, the yellow wings of the Prescott aeroplane were outlined against the blue, like the form of one of her namesakes.