But the moment he WAS awake he leapt to his feet, put his hands to his head "like a mad maniac," as Phyllis said afterwards, and shouted:-- "Oh, my heavens--what's o'clock ?" "Twelve thirteen," said Peter, and indeed it was by the white-faced, round-faced clock on the wall of the signal-box.
The man looked at the clock, sprang to the levers, and wrenched them this way and that.

An electric bell tingled--the wires and cranks creaked, and the man threw himself into a chair.

He was very pale, and the sweat stood on his forehead "like large dewdrops on a white cabbage," as Phyllis remarked later.

He was trembling, too; the children could see his big hairy hands shake from side to side, "with quite extra-sized trembles," to use the subsequent words of Peter.

He drew long breaths.