Hope Macdonald describes, in When Angels Appear (1982), an incident in which a young mother sees that her three-year-old daughter, Lisa, has escaped from the garden and is sitting on the railway line beyond. At that moment, a train comes around the bend, its whistle blowing. "As she raced from the house screaming her daughter's name, she suddenly saw a striking figure, clothed in pure white, lifting Lisa off the track with an arm around the child… When the mother reached the daughter's side, Lisa was standing alone."

Not many tales of guardian angels are as dramatic as this one, but a surprising number of people attest to some experience or other that they ascribe to the action of a guardian angel, whether it's a single word of warning or, as is commonly reported, a simple touch on the shoulder or tug on the sleeve.