Middletown transcript., 1912-03-23

/ make the journey, difhcult as II nigh
prove, back to the camp. She forced
herself to take the first mouthful Of
bread and meat she had brought with
her, but when she mad tasted she
needed no further incentive, she ate
to the last crumb; she thought this
was the time she needed stimulants
too, and mingling the cold water from
the brook with a little of the ardent
spirit from the flask, she drank. Some
Of the chill had worn on, some Of the
fatigue had gons.
She rose to her feet and started
down the canon; her bloody sweater
still lay on the ground with other
things Of which she was needless. II
had grown colder, but she realized
that the climb down the canon would
put her stagnant blood in circulation
and all would be well.
Before she began the descent Of the
pass, she cast one long glance back
ward whittier the man had gone.
Whence came he, who was he, what
had he seen, where was he now? She
thanked God for his interference in
J one breath and hated him for his
presence in the other. 4
The whole sky was now black with
drifting clouds, lightning flashed above
her head, muttered peals Of thunder,
terrifcally ominous, rocked through
the silent hills. The noise was low
and subdued, but almost continuous.
With singular and uneasy feeling
that she was being observed, she
started down the canon, plunging des-
perately through the trees, leaping the
brook from side to side where 1t mar
rOwed, seeking ever the easiest way.
She struggled on, painting with sud.
den inexplicable terror almost as bad
as that which had overwhelmed her
an hour beforehand growing more
intense every moment, to such a tragic
pass had the day and its happenings
brought her.
Poor girl, awful experience really
was to be hers that day. The fates
sported with her-bodily fear, out
ragged modesty, mental anguish and
now the terror of the storm.
The clouds seemed to sink lower,
until they almost closed about her.
Long gray ghostly arms reached out
toward her. It grew darker and dark.
er in the depths of the canon. She
screamed aloud-in vain.
Suddenly the rolling thunder peals
concentrated, balls Of fire leaped out
Of the heavens and struck the noun
tains where she could actually see
them. There were not words to de-
scribe the tremendous crashings
which seemed to splinter the hills, to
be succeeded by brief periods Of 81.
lence, to be followed by louder and
more terrific detonations.
In one Of those appalling alterna,
tons from sound to silence she heard
a human cry-an answering cry to
her own? It came from the hills be,
hind her. It must proceed, she
thought, from the man, She could,
not meet that man, although she
craved human companionship as never
before, she did not want his. She could
not bear It Better the wrath Of
God, the fury Of the tempest.
Needless Of the sharp note Of warn
ing, Of appeal, in the voice ere it was
drowned by another roll Of thunder,
she plunged on in the darkness. The
canon narrowed here; she made her.
way down the lodges, leaping reck-
lessly from rock to rock, slipping,
falling, grazing now one side, now
the other, hurting herself forwarI with
white face and bruised body and torn
hands and throbbing he that would
fain burst its bonds. There was once
an ancient legend, a human creature, .
menaced by all the furies, pitilesslyI
pursued by every malefic spirit Of
earth and air; like him this sweet
young girl, innocent, lovely, erstwhile,
happy, fed before the storm.
Then the heavens burst, and the
fountains Of the great deeps were
broken open and with absolute lit |
teralness the foods descended. The
bursting clouds, torn asupder by the |
wild winds, driven by the pent-up
lightning within their black and turgid, |
breasts, disburdened themselves. The; !
water came down, as it did of old |
when God washed the face Of the !
world, in food. The narrow Of the !
canon was filed ten, twenty, thirty !
feet in a moment by the cloud burst
The black water rolled and foamed,
surging like the rapids at Niagara.
The body Of the girl, utterly unpre-
pared, was caught up in moment and
flung like a bolt from a catapult down
the seething sea filed with the trunks
Of the trees and the debris Of the
mountains, tossing ABOUT humanity in.
the wild confusion. She struck out
swimming more because Of
the instinct of life than for any other
reason. A helpless atom in the boil
ing food. growing every minute great
er and greater as the angry skies dis
gorged themselves Of their pent-up
torrents upon her devoted head.