Mexico Missouri message. (Mexico, Audrain County, Mo.) 1899-1918, 1917-05-24

The mutterings above the noun
tains now grew rapidly louder, and
while the two lowered over the fire,
thunder squall, rolling wildly down
the eastern slope, burst over the gap.
Nan knew even better than her COM
panion the tickle nature of q range
storm, and understood uncomfortably
well how a sudden shift might, at any
moment, lay their entire path open to
its ferceness. She warned De Spain
they must be moving, and, freshened
by the brief rest, they set out toward
Ell Captain.
| They had covered more than half
the distance that separated them from
the cliff, when a second thunderstorm
seeming to rush in from the desert,
burst above their heads. Drenched
with rain, they were forced to draw
back under a projecting rock. In an
other moment the two storms, meet
ing in the gap, rushed together. AS If
an unseen hand had touched a thou
sand granite springs above the gap,
every slender crevice spouted
stream that shot foaming out from
the mountainsides. The sound of NOV
| ing waters rose in a dull, vast roar,
broken by the unseen boom of distant
falls, launching huge masses Of water
into caverns far below. The storm
laden wind tore and swirled among
the crowded peaks, and above all the
angry sky moaned and quivered in the
rage of the elements.
1t was only the lulls between the
sharp squalls that enabled them to
cover the trail before daylight. When
they paused before FL Captain the
fury of the night seemed largely to
have exhausted itself, but the over
charged air hung above the noun
tains, trembling and moaning like a
bruised and stricken thing. Light
ming, playing across the inky heavens,
blaZed In constant sheets from end
to end of the horizon. Under it all
the two refugees, high on the noun
tainside, looked down on the flooding
gap.
Their flight was almost ended. Only
the sheer cliff ahead blocked their
descent to the aspen grove. Hardly
a moment passed after they had
started until the eastern sky lightened
before the retreating storm, and with
the first glimmer of daylight the two
were at the beginning of the narrow
foothold which lay for half a mile be-
tween them and safety.
The face of Ell Captain presents,
midway, a sharp convex, Just where
it is thrown forward in this keen
angle, the trail runs out almost to a
knife-edge, and the mountain is so
nearly vertical that 1t appears to
overhang the floor of the valley.
They made half the stretch of this
angle with hardly a misstep, but the
advance for a part Of the way was
a climb, and De Spain, turning once
to speak to Nan, asked her for her
rifle, that he might carry it with his
own. What their story might have
been had she given it to him, none
can tell. But Nan, holding back, re-
fused to let him relieve her. The
dreaded angle which had haunted De
Spain all night was safely turned on
hands and knees, and, as they round
ed it toward the east, clouds scudding
over the open desert broke and shot
the light of dawn against the beetling
arete.
De Spain turned in some relief to
point to the coming day. AS he did
: so a gust of wind, sweeping against
the sheer wall, tipped him sidewise,
and he threw himself on his knees to
avoid the dizzy edge. His rifle, which
: lay. under his hand on the rock,
slipped from reach. In the next in
slant he heard it bouncing from rock
to rock, five hundred feet below.
| Greatly annoyed and Inundated, he
regained his feet and spoke with a
laugh to reassure Nan. Just as she
: answered not to worry, little sing
} ing scream struck their ears; some
thing splashed suddenly close at hand
against the rock wall chips scattered
/ between them. From below, the
sound of a rifle report cracked against
the face of the cliff. They were so
startled, so completely amazed, that
they stood motionless.
De Spain looked down and over the
uneven floor of the gap. The ranch
houses, spread like toys IN the long
perspective, lay peacefully revealed in
the gray of the morning. He could
! discover no sign of life around any of
the houses. But In another moment
: the little singing scream came again,
the blow of the heavy slug against the
splintering rock was repeated, the dis
l tant report of the rifle followed.
5 "Under fire." muttered De SPAIN
: He looked at Nan. ''We'd better keep
D moving" he said. "Come! whoever is
1 shooting can follow us a hundred
a yards either way" In front of De
t Spain fourth bullet struck the rock,
3 "Nan," he muttered, 1--WE got you into
}. fix. If we can't stop that fellow,
! he is liable to stop us. Can you see
t anythingT he asked, waiting for heI