Belington progressive. [volume] (Belington, W. Va.) 1912-1927, 1913-10-02

kiskH NOISE ana ali others near and dis
fant. was suddenly lost In loud clat-
ter Of writhing and twisting boughs
which set the forest In roar and
seemed to heave the air about them.
A wind had swooped down from the
east. bending everything before IL and
rsttling the huge oval on which their
eyes were fixed as though 1t would
tear 1t from its hinges.
The three caught at each others
hands In dismay. The storm had come
Just on the verge of the enterprise.
and no one might guess the result.
win he dare7 VIII he daref"
whispered Doris, and Oswald an
swered, though II seemed next to Inn
possible that he could have heard her:
HE will dare. But win he survive
it? Mr.. Challoner," he suddenly shout
ed In that gentlemar's ear. what time
is 1t nowY"
Mr.. Challoner, disengaging himself
from their mutual grasp. kneit down
by the lantern to consult his watch
"one minute to eight" he shouted
back.
The forest was now pandemonium.
Great boughs. split from their parent
trunks. fell crashing to the ground in
all directions. The scream of the wind
reused echoes which repeated them
selves, here, there and everywhere No
rain had fallen yet. but the sight of the
clouds skurrying pell-mell through the
YrH I,n cts
ated such havoc In the already over
strained minds of the three onlookers,
that they hardly needed, when with a
clatter and crash which at another
time would have startled them into
fight, the swaying oval before them
was whirled from It's hinges and
thrown back against the trees already
tempest. Destruction seemed the nat
,ural accompaniment of the moment
and the only prayer which sprang to
Oswald's lips was that the motor
whose throb yet fingered In their
blood though no longer taken In by
the ear, would either refuse to work
or prove insufficient to lift the heavy
ring forces. His brothers life hung
in the balance against his fame, and
he could not but choose life for him.
Yet, as the muItitudinous sounds about
him yielded for moment to that
brothers shout. and he knew that the
moment had come. which would soon
settle all. he found himself staring at
the elliptical edge of the hangar. with
an anticipation which held In 1t as
much terror as Joy, for the end of a
great hope or the beginning of great
triumph was compressed into this
trembling instant and IT,
Great God! he sees It'll They all
see I'll Plainly against that portion Of
the disk which still lifted itself above
the further wall, curious moving
mass appears, lengthens. takes on
shape, then shoots suddenly aloft,
clearing the encircling tops OF the
bending, twisting and tormented trees,
straight into the heart OF the gale,
where for one breathless moment It
whirls madly about like thing dis
traught, then In slow but triumphant
guides it, steadies and mounts majes-
tically upward till 1t is lost to their
view In the depths of impenetrable
darkness.
Orlando Brotherson has accom-
,plished his task. He has invented
mechanism which can send an air-car
straight up from It's mooring place.
Ar 10 .toI. Il
valid utters cry of triumph, and Dor
is throws herself into Mr.. Chafloner's
arms. Then they all stand transfixed
again, waiting for descent which
may never come.
But bark; new sound, mingling its
clatter with all the others. 1t Is the
rain. Quick, maddening, drenching,
1T comes; enveloping them In wet in
moment. Can they hold their faces
up against It'll
And the windl Surely it must toss
that aerial messenger before 1t and
fling 1t back to earth, broken and
despised toy.
"Orlando?" went up in shrek. "Or-
] lando?"
Ohy LII q ibJ VI lBut III tuO6G ldI~
off heavens! For lull In the ire
mendous sounds shivering the heavens
and shaking the earth! But the tenn
pest RACES on, and they can only wait,
five minutes, ten minutes, looking,
hoping, fearing, without thought of
self and almost without thought OF
I each other, till suddenly as 1t had
come. the rain ceases and the wind.
with one Anal wall Of rage and defeat,
rushes away into the west, leaving be-
hind it sudden silence which, to
their terrified hearts, seems almost
more dreadful to bear than the accu-
mulated noises of the moment just
gone.
Orlando was in that shout of natural
forces, but he is not in this stiffness.
They look aloft, but the heavens are
void. Emptiness is where life was
Oswald begins to sway, and Doris, re-
membering him now and him only,