"At last!"
"Why, Doctor, what is the matter?"
"Nothing, I hope. It may go clear of us. Listen--carefully. Come apart
from the crowd; my ears are not as keen as they used to be. Do you hear
any sound in that direction?"
"Nothing--except buzz-buzz, as if a hive of bees were swarming."
"I'm glad of it; it mayn't be so bad as I feared. I'm not acquainted
with the things, except through common report. Where's Mr. Truett?
He had field-glasses slung from his shoulder this morning. Here, you
boys!" the Doctor shouted to several youngsters who were playing
leap-frog near by, "scatter--find Mr. Truett--the man who bossed the
big ditch, and ask him to come here--right away!"
"Doctor!" exclaimed Grace. "Do tell me what you fear."
"Tell me first about that noise. Is it any louder?"
"Yes. It sounds now like a distant railway train. What does it mean?"
"It means a cyclone. How bad a one, we can't tell until it has passed.
If it keeps its present course, it will pass north of the crowd, but I
am afraid it will strike the town."
By this time many of the people had noticed the great cloud in the
west, and soon the entire assemblage heard a deep, continuous roar.
Then men, women, and children began to run, for the cloud increased in
blackness and noise at a terrifying rate, but the Doctor shouted:--
"Stay where you are! Get to the windward of the platform, and wagons
and horses! Pass the word around--quick! Ah, Mr. Truett! What do you
see?"
"All sorts of things," said Truett, from behind his field-glasses.
"Lightning--and tree boughs--and corn-stalks--and boards--and something
that looks like a roof. Also, oceans of rain. We're in for a soaking
unless we hurry back to town."
"The soaking's the safer," said the Doctor, adjusting the proffered
glasses to his own eyes. "Ah, 'tis as I feared: it is tearing its way
through the town. There goes the court-house roof--and the church
steeple." Abruptly returning the glasses, the Doctor shouted as the
great cloud passed rapidly to the northward and rain fell suddenly in
torrents:--
"Men--only men--hurry to town, and keep close to me when you get
there." Then he found his horse and buggy and led a wild throng of
wagons, horsemen, and footmen, behind whom, despite the Doctor's
warning, came the remaining components of the procession, and up to
heaven went an appalling chorus of screams, prayers, and curses, for
the word "cyclone"--the word most dreaded in the West since the Indian
outbreaks ended--had passed through the crowd.
The outskirts of the town were more than a mile distant, and before
they were reached, the throng saw that several buildings were burning,
though the rainfall seemed sufficient to extinguish any ordinary
conflagration. Philip, who was riding with several other men in a farm
wagon, saw, when the wagon turned into the main street, that one of
the burning buildings was his own store. Apparently it had been first
unroofed and crushed by the storm, for all that remained of it and its
contents seemed to be in a pit that once was the cellar, and from which
rose a little flame and a great column of smoke and steam.
"Let's save people first; property afterward!" he replied to the men
in the wagon when they offered to remain with him and fight the fire.
Afterward he received for his speech great credit which was utterly
undeserved, for after an instant of angry surprise at his loss he was
conscious of a strange, wild elation. A week earlier, such a blow
would have been a serious reverse--perhaps ruin; now, thanks to his
long-forgotten mining stock, he was fairly well off and could start
anew elsewhere, entirely by himself and unhampered by conditions.
He had tried hard to accept Claybanks as his home for life, and
thought he had succeeded; but now, through the gloom of the storm,
the outer world, especially all parts out of the cyclone belt, seemed
delightfully inviting.
"Where'll we find the people to save?" This question, from a man in the
wagon, recalled Philip's better self, and he replied quickly:--
"In the path of the storm, and wherever Doctor Taggess is."
It soon became evident that the cyclone path had been quite
narrow,--not much wider, indeed, than the business street,--but the
whirling funnel had gone diagonally over the town and thus destroyed or
injured more than forty houses, the débris of which did much additional
injury. Philip and the men passed rapidly from house to house along
the new, rude clearing, and searched the ruins for dead and wounded.
Fortunately almost all of the inhabitants of the town had taken part
in the celebration. Those who remained were numerous enough to provide
many fractures and bruises to be treated by Doctor Taggess and his
corps of volunteer nurses, but apparently not one in the town had been
killed outright. To obtain this gratifying assurance required long
hours of searching far into the night, for some missing persons were
found far from their homes, and with extraordinary opinions as to how
their change of location had been effected.
Philip worked as faithfully as any one until all the missing were
accounted for and all the houseless ones fed and sheltered. Grace had
given all possible help to many women and children by taking them into
her own home. At midnight, when husband and wife met for the first time
since the storm, they reminded each other of what might have happened
had there been no celebration and they had been in the store and
unconscious of the impending disaster. Together they looked at their
own ruins, for which Philip had hired a watchman, so that he might be
roused if the smouldering fire should gain headway and threaten the
house.
"It might have been worse," Grace said. "We have a roof to shelter us."
"Yes, and we may select a new roof elsewhere in the world, if we like.
Perhaps the cyclone was, for us, a blessing in disguise--eh?"
Grace did not answer at once, though her husband longed for a reply in
keeping with his own feelings. He placed his arm around his wife, drew
her slowly toward the house, and said:--
"You deserve a better sphere of life than this, dear girl. You know
well that you would never have accepted this if we had not foolishly
committed ourselves to it without forethought or knowledge. Your energy
and sympathy will keep you fairly contented almost anywhere, but you
shouldn't let them make you unjust to yourself. For my own part, I've
done no complaining, but my life here has been full of drudgery and
anxiety. Now it seems as though deliverance had been doubly provided
for both of us--first by the sale of our mining stock, and to-day
through the destruction of our principal business interest. We can
injure no one by going away; if the property reverts to the charities
which were to be the legatees in case I declined, Caleb will be
provided for, even if he, too, chooses to leave Claybanks. What shall
it be--stay, or go? Dear girl, there are tears in your eyes--they are
saying 'Go!' Let me kiss them away, in token of thanks."
"Tears sometimes tell shocking fibs," said Grace, trying to appear
cheerful. "I wouldn't trust my eyes, or my tongue, or even my heart
to decide anything to-night, after such a day. There's but one place
in the whole world I shall ever care to be, after this, and that is in
your arms--close to your heart."
"And that is so far away, and so hard to reach!" said Philip,
forgetting in an instant the day and all pertaining to it.