le astray from the place
where we had unharnessed the horse; but presently, as we were moving
about in the brushwood, we heard a low voice say:

"Is that you, Ad?"

It was Theodora; and immediately we came upon them all, sitting together
forlornly there in the wagon. They had hitched up Old Sol and were
anxiously waiting for us in order to start for home. The strange
phenomenon seemed to have dazed them; they sat there in the dark as
silent as so many mice.

"Hello, girls!" Addison exclaimed. "Are you all there? Quite dark, isn't
it?"

"Oh, Ad, what do you think this is?" Theodora asked, still in the same
hushed voice.

"Well, I think it is _dark_," replied Addison, trying to appear
unconcerned.

"Don't laugh, Ad," said Theodora solemnly. "Something awful has
happened."

"And where have you two been so long?" asked Catherine. "We thought you
were lost. We thought you would never come. What time is it?"

We struck a match and looked. It was nearly half past four.

"Oh, get in, Ad, and take the reins! Let's go home!" Ellen pleaded.

"Yes, Ad, let's go home, if we can get there," said Tom Edwards. "What
d'ye suppose it is, anyhow?"

"_Dark!_" exclaimed Addison hardily. "Just plain dark!"

"Oh, Addison!" exclaimed Theodora reprovingly. "Don't try to joke about
a thing like this."

"It may be the end of the world," Ellen murmured.

"The world has had a good many ends to it," said Addison. "Which end do
you think this is, Nell?"

But neither Ellen nor Theodora cared to reply to him. Their low,
frightened voices increased my uneasiness. I could think of nothing
except that rainbow in the morning; "morning," "warning," seemed to ring
in my ears.

We climbed into the wagon and started homeward, but it was so dark that
we had to plod along slowly. Old Sol was unusually torpid, as if the
ominous obscurity had dazed him, too. After a time he stopped short and
snorted; we heard the brush crackle and caught a glimpse of a large
animal crossing the road ahead of us.

"That's a bear," Thomas said. "Bears are out, just as if it were night."

Some minutes passed before we could make Old Sol go on; and again we
heard owls hooting in the woods.

Long before we got down to the cleared land, however, the sky began
gradually to grow lighter. We all noticed it, and a feeling of relief
stole over us. In the course of twenty minutes it became so light that
we could discern objects round us quite plainly. The night chill