A woman, slowly bleeding to death from glass cuts in her leg, while the other three people in the compartment stared helplessly at her face going white. Blade pulled the woman's silk scarf off her head and used it as a tourniquet. «Now-one of you loosen that scarf every ten minutes once the bleeding stops. Understand?»

Vague nods. Blade knew the others were still in shock, but he had to hope for the best. He scrambled out and on upward.

Sometimes there were people who were beyond help-an old woman who lay with her head twisted at an impossible angle and no pulse at all in her bony wrist. As Blade searched for the pulse that wasn't there, a small boy tugged at the woman's other hand.

«Grandma, grandma, wake up! I'm scared!»

Blade had to get out of that compartment quickly.

In other compartments there were people who needed nothing but a little time to recover from the shock of the accident. One of them had the sense to hand Blade a large flask filled with brandy. He passed it around.

«Don't try climbing out unless you feel in the pink,» he said. «It would be bloody silly to fall down the corridor and break your necks now.» The remark drew nervous laughter. «Don't try moving any of the injured, either. We don't know how they're hurt.» They nodded and Blade moved on.

Pick glass out of wounds, wad handkerchiefs over gashes and cuts, apply tourniquets, use mouth-to-mouth respiration, give sips of brandy and words of encouragement-everything blended together in a single swirling chaotic nightmare until Blade no longer remembered details. He didn't care about that. What he did care about was keeping going until there were no more people in the car to look at. Then he would start on the next car, and then on the last, and then-