. Drink all night, would yuh?" He swore long and fluently at his
horse, spurred him through the shallows, and the two rode on up the
hill, their voices still mingled in desultory argument, with now and
then an oath rising clearly above the jumble of words.

They may have been law-abiding citizens riding home, to families that
were waiting supper for them, but Lorraine crept out from behind her
sagebush, sneezing and thanking her imitation of the jack rabbits.
Whoever they were, she was not sorry she had let them ride on. They
might be her father's men, and they might have been very polite and
chivalrous to her. But their voices and their manner of speaking had
been rough; and it is one thing, Lorraine reflected, to mingle with
made-up villains--even to be waylaid and kidnapped and tied to trees
and threatened with death--but it is quite different to accost
rough-speaking men in the dark when you know they are not being rough
to suit the director of the scene.

She was so absorbed in trying to construct a range of war or something
equally thrilling from the scrap of conversation she had heard that she
reached the hilltop in what seemed a very few minutes of climbing. The
sky was becoming overcast. Already the stars to the west were blotted
out, and the absolute stillness of the atmosphere frightened her more
than the big, dark wilderness itself. It seemed to her exactly as
though the earth was holding its breath and waiting for something
terrible to happen. The vague bulk of buildings was still some
distance ahead, and when a rumble like the deepest notes of a pipe
organ began to fill all the air, Lorraine thrust her grip under a bush
and began to run, her soggy shoes squashing unpleasantly on the rough
places in the road.

Lorraine had seen many stage storms and had thrilled ecstatically to
the mimic lightning, knowing just how it was made. But when that huge
blackness behind and to the left of her began to open and show a
terrible brilliance within, and to close abruptly, leaving the world
ink black, she was terrified. She wanted to hide as she had hidden
from those two men; but from that stupendous monster, a real
thunderstorm, sagebrush formed no protection whatever. She must reach
the substantial shelter of buildings, the comforting presence of men
and women.

She ran, and as she ran she wept aloud like a child and called for her
father. The deep rumble grew louder, nearer. The revealed brilliance