She shut from her eyes the strangely moving sight, returned to her
compartment, closed her door and lay down. It was quieter within the
little room and the fury of the storm was less appalling.
Half dreaming as she lay, mountains shrouded in a deathly lightning
loomed wavering before her, and one, most terrible of all, she strove
unwillingly to climb. Up she struggled, clinging and slipping, a
cramping fear over all her senses, her ankles clutched in icy fetters,
until from above, an apparition, strange and threatening, pushed her,
screaming, and she swooned into an awful gulf.
"Gertrude! Gertrude! Wake up!" cried a frightened voice.
The car was rocking in the wind, and as Gertrude opened her door Louise
Donner stumbled terrified into her arms. "Did you hear that awful,
awful crash? I'm sure the car has been struck."
"No, no, Louise."
"It surely has been. Oh, let us waken the men at once, Gertrude; we
shall be killed!"
The two clung to one another. "I'm afraid to stay alone, Gertrude,"
sobbed her companion.
"Stay with me, Louise. Come." While they spoke the wind died and for
a moment the lightning ceased, but the calm, like the storm, was
terrifying. As they stood breathless a report like the ripping of a
battery burst over their heads, a blast shook the heavy car and howled
shrilly away.
Sleep was out of the question. Gertrude looked at her watch. It was
four o'clock. The two dressed and sat together till daylight. When
morning broke, dark and gray, the storm had passed and out of the
leaden sky a drizzle of rain was falling. Beside the car men were
moving. The forward door was open and the conductor in his stormcoat
walked in.
"Everything is all right this morning, ladies," he smiled.
"All right? I should think everything all wrong," exclaimed Louise.
"We have been frightened to death."
"They've got the cutting stopped," continued O'Brien, smiling. "Mr.
Glover has left the dike. He just told me the river had fallen six
inches since two o'clock. We'll be out of here now as quick as we can
get an engine: they've been switching with ours. There was
considerable wind in the night----"
"Considerable wind!"
"You didn't notice it, did you? Glover loaded the bridge with freight
trains about twelve o'clock and I'm thinking it's lucky, for when the
wind went into the northeast about four o'clock I thought it would take
my head off. It snapped like dynamite clear across the valley."
"Oh, we heard!"
"When the wind jumped, a crew was dumping stone into the river. The
men were ordered off the flat cars but there were so many they didn't
all get the word at once, and while the foreman was chasing them down
he was blown clean into the river."