San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1890-09-02

In her desire to be alone and to evade the
now significant attentions of Emile she
took advantage of the hustle that followed
the hurried transfer Of furniture and
articles from the house to escape through
the garden to the outlying fields. Strik-
ing into one of the dusty lanes that she re-
membered, she wandered on for half an
hour until her progress and meditation
were suddenly arrested. She had come
upon long chasm or crack in the soil,
fully twenty feet wide and as many in
depth, crossing her path at right angles.
She did not remember having seen it be-
fore: the track of wheels went up to it's pre-
cipitous edge, she could see the track re-
peated on the other side, but the hiatus re-
manned, unbridged and uncovered. 1t
was not there yesterday. She glanced right
and left; the assure seemed to extend like
moat or ditch from the distant road to the
upland between her and the great wheat
valley below, from which she was shut off.
An odd sense of being in some way
prisoner confronted her She drew back
with an impatient start and perhaps her
first real sense of indignation. A voice be-
hind her, which she at once recognized,
scarcely restored her calmness.
L GU GILL S6J dCTOSS HISS
She turned 1t was the young inventor
from the wheat ranch on horseback, and
with clean face He had just ridden out
of the grain on the same side of the chasm
as herself.
But you seem to have got over" she
said bluntly.
Eyes, but it was further up the field. l
reckoned that the split might be deeper
but not so broad in the rock outcrop over
there than in the adobe here. found it so
and jumped it."
He looked as if he might-alert, intelli-
gent and self contained. Yet she said moth
ing. He fingered a moment.
I'm afraid you must have been badly
shaken and little frightened up there be-
fois the chimneys came down"
NO" she was glad to say briefly, and
she believed truthfully; Il wasn't fright
eHed. l didn't even know it was an earth
quake"
"Ah," he reflected, that was because
you are stranger. It's odd-they're all
like that. l suppose it's because nobody
really expects or believes in the unlocked
for thing, and yet that's the thing that
always happens. And then of course that
other affair, which really is serious, startled
you the more"
She felt herself ridiculously and angrily
blushing Il don't know what you mean,"
she said icily. "What other affair.""
"Why, the we'll"
"Fhe well?" she repeated vacantly.
Eyes, the artesian well has stopped.
Didn't the major tell you"
NO" said the girl. "He was away.
haven't seen him yet"
"Well, the flow of water has ceased com
pletely. That's what Pm here for. The
major sent for me, and I've been to examine
it."
"And is that stoppage so very impOr,
tant?" she said obviously.
1t was his turn to look at her wonder
ingly. IF it's lost entirely it means ruin
for the rancho" he said seriously. He
wheeled his horse, nodded gravely and
trotted off.
Maj. Randolph's figure of the life blood
of the rancho flashed across her suddenly.
She knew nothing of irrigation or the
costly appliances by which the Californian
agriculturist opposed the long summer
droughts. She only vaguely guessed that
the dreadful earthquake had struck at the
prosperity of those people whom only
few hours ago she had been proud to cal:
her friends. The underlying goodness Of
her nature was touched. Should she let a
momentary fault-if it were not really,
after all, only a misunderstanding
between her and them at such a moment?
She turned and hurried quickly toward
che hD'reo