over
me that my own home might be there, in strips and fragments, to beat me
down and kill me; and with the thought came a swift little vision out of
my geography of the Arabs in a sand-storm on the desert. I gathered up
my fluttering dress skirt, held it tight about my head, and lay flat
upon the ground.

It seemed as if a long time passed, a time in which I knew very little
except that I was fighting for my breath as I never had fought for
anything. There were more hurts and bruises now, but they did not
matter. Just to draw my own breath in my own way seemed to be the only
thing in the world that was of any account. And then there was a shaft
of flame, an earsplitting roar, and the rain was upon us in sheets, in
streams, in visible rivers.

I imagined that it would last a long time, and wondered in a daze how
I could get home in a rain like that--for I should have to face it. I
could see that in a few seconds the gutters had begun to race, the road
where I lay was a stream, and then--then the rain ceased. Never was
anything so astonishing. The sky came out blue, tattered rags of cloud
raced across it, and I had time to conclude that, whipped and almost
breathless though I was, I was still alive.

And then I saw a curious sight. Down the street in every direction came
rushing hatless men and women. Here and there a wild-eyed horse was
being lashed along. All the town was coming. They were in their work
clothes, in their slippers, in their wrappers--they were in anything
and everything. Some of them sobbed as they ran, some called aloud names
that I knew. They were fathers and mothers looking for their children.

And who was that--that woman with a white face, with hair falling about
her shoulders, where it had fallen as she ran--that woman whose breath
came between her teeth strangely and who called my name over and
over, bleatingly, as a mother sheep calls its lamb? At first I did not
recognise her, and then, at last, I knew. And that creature with the
rolling eyes and the curious ash-coloured face who, mumbling something
over and over in his throat, came for me, and snatched me up and wiped
my face free of mud, and felt of me here and there with trembling
hands--who was he?

And breaking out of the crowd of men who had come running from the
street of stores and offices, was another strange being, with a sort of
battle light in his eyes, who, seeing me, gathered me to him and bore me
away toward home. Looking b