"Go straight home with Honore, Billy, as straight as ever you can," said
Father Honore to eight-year-old Billy McCann who for the past year had
constituted himself protector of five-year-old Honore Googe; "I'll watch
you around the power-house."
Little Honore reached up with both arms for the usual parting from the
man he adored. The priest caught him up, kissed him heartily, and set
him down again with the added injunction to "trot home."
The two little boys ran hand in hand down the road. Father Honore
watched them till the power-house shut them from sight; then he waited
for their reappearance at the other corner where the road curves
downward to the highroad. He never allowed Honore to go alone over the
piece of road between the point where he was standing and the
power-house, for the reason that it bordered one of the steepest and
roughest ledges in The Gore; a careless step would be sure to send so
small a child rolling down the rough surface. But beyond the
power-house, the ledges fell away very gradually to the lowest slopes
where stood, one among many in the quarries, the new monster steel
derrick which the men had erected last week. They had been testing it
for several days; even now its powerful arm held suspended a block of
many tons' weight. This was a part of the test for "graduated
strain"--the weight being increased from day to day.
The men, in leaving their work, often took a short cut homeward from the
lower slope to the road just below the power-house, by crossing this
gentle declivity of the ledge. Evidently Billy McCann with this in mind
had twisted the injunction to "go straight home" into a chance to "cut
across"; for surely this way would be the "straightest." Besides, there
was the added inducement of close proximity to the wonderful new derrick
that, since its instalment, had been occupying many of Billy's waking
thoughts.
Father Honore, watching for the children's reappearance at the corner of
the road just beyond the long low power-house, was suddenly aware, with
a curious shock, of the two little boys trotting in a lively manner down
the easy grade of the "cross cut" slope, and nearing the derrick and its
suspended weight. He frowned at the sight and, calling loudly to them to
come back, started straight down over the steep ledge at the side of the
road. He heard some one else calling the boys by name, and, a moment
later, saw that it was Sister Ste. Croix who was coming up the hill.
The children did not hear, or would not, because of their absorption in
getting close to the steel giant towering above them. Sister Ste. Croix
called again; then she, too, started down the slope after them.
She noticed some men running from the farther side of the quarry. She
saw Father Honore suddenly spring by leaps and bounds down over the
rough ledge. What was it? The children were apparently in no danger. She
looked up at the derrick--
_What was that!_ A tremor in its giant frame; a swaying of its cabled
mast; a sickening downward motion of the weighted steel arm--then--
"Merciful Christ!" she groaned, and for the space of a few seconds
covered her eyes....
The priest, catching up the two children one under each arm, ran with
superhuman strength to evade the falling derrick--with a last supreme
effort he rolled the boys beyond its reach; they were saved, but--
Their savior was pinioned by the steel tip fast to the unyielding
granite.
A woman's shriek rent the air--a fearful cry:
"Jean--mon Jean!"
A moment more and Sister Ste. Croix reached the spot--she took his head
on her lap.
"Jean--mon Jean," she cried again.