Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-11-08

To make it stranger STILL the light was shining
into the niche sidewise.
Cautiously she made her way across the cell,
and after moment of hesitation stepped into
the niche herself. The rock that formed the
vault and floor of the niche like all the rest of
the tunnel, was worn and black; but when she
stopped down and looked through the hole
where the light came in, she saw great white
face of rock, as fresh and dazzling, as sharp
in all the tiny angles it presented, as if it had
been hewed out by Titanic hammer that very
day.
The next moment she understood. She was
beneath the grove of old silk cotton trees where
that last portentous bolt of lightning had
fallen. And this face of rock she saw had never,
since the creation of the world confronted the
light of day before. The line of cleavage had
just missed including the niche where she stood,
had, in fact, taken that part of the vault where
the light came through. The rest of it round
the hole was as thin as cardboard, that it
broke in her hands. The hole would soon be
large enough, was large enough already, to get
out through.
And just below
No. that groove had not been cut by the fall
of the thunderbolt. Weaker and more patient
hands had chiseed it out long ago; for the
lining of it was black and worn like that of the
tunnel itself.
When she had squeezed through the hole in
the niche, she found herself in little cup
shaped pocket in the new face of the cliff,
which glowered and blinked at the light of day
suddenly and rather Imply, Christabel sat
down all in heap, and looked about her and
rubbed her eyes.
TT was nearly six o'clock when Clifford and
Rogers, carrying between them, on a rudely
improvised litter, a man whom it would have
needed more than one glance to identity as
O'Brien, staggered YEARLY up the path to
Fort House. The house was all astir by that
time, and they found willing hands to relieve
0f heir listen
their story.
They told it briefly, ierkily, and with none
of the arts and graces that the narrative per-
haps deserved. They were far too tired to
think of even trying to play the thing up.
They had found o Brien pinned fast under
fallen beam, had succeeded in saving him out
without bringing the rest of the ruin down on
him in the process, and had barely got him ex
treated and more, when the storm burst
the second time.
A projecting ledge in the hillside afforded
them little shelter from the tempest, and here
they had lasted out the night. With the ar
rival of daylight, they had set about construct
ing litter And here they were That was the
sum and substance of it.
But where was Smith? their listeners cho-
rused. Oh, Smith had gone after the doctor.
He hadn't been able to help carry the litter be-
cause falling limb had cracked his collarbone.
He was all right otherwise DR.. Heyl, they sup
posed, would set the broken bone before COM
ing up to Fort House.
The narrative had been accompanied by
rapid preparations and supervisors, largely
effected by Florence Rogers herself. for getting
the injured engineer into comfortable bed and
doing as much for his comfort, what would
have been his comfort had he been conscious,
as they dared to. 1t was beyond any of them
more than to guess at the extent probable
outcome of his injuries.
To the rest of the group about the bed Flor
ence betrayed nothing to indicate that the sus-
pense of waiting meant any more to her than
to them. She was just as they had always
seen her,-quiet, confident. efficient. That the
doctors sentence they were waiting for was
way another to be the greatest fact in
her whole universe, never occurred to any OF
them. But the suspense, or the worst of it,
was soon over
Smith had found DR.. Heyl just starting out,
with the earliest morning light, on what was to
be his biggest days work since the siege of
Yellow Jack four years ago. The doctor had
set his broken collarbone in rough and ready
manner appropriate to field of battle tactics,
which would be all any doctor would be likely
to have time for in several days to come, or
dered him to bed, and set out at once for Fort
House.
He wasted very little more time over O Brien.
An honest physician on such occasions is no
respecter of persons. The manager and the
chief engineer got just much of his attention,
and no more, as if they had been two black
laborers suffering under similar injuries.
a. LII