A light laughinstantly suppressedat what was at first supposed to be the effect of the overflowing hospitality upon the speaker himself, went around the male circle until it suddenly appeared that half a dozen others had started to their feet at the same time, with white faces, and that one of the ladies had screamed.
What is it? everybody was asking with interrogatory smiles.
It was Judge Piper who replied:
A little shock of earthquake, he said blandly; a mere thrill! I think, he added with a faint smile, we may say that Nature herself has applauded our efforts in good old Californian fashion, and signified her assent. What are you saying, Fludder?
I was thinking, sir, said Fludder deferentially, in a lower voice, that if anything was wrong in the reservoir, this shock, you know, might
He was interrupted by a faint crashing and crackling sound, and looking up, beheld a good-sized boulder, evidently detached from some greater height, strike the upland plateau at the left of the trail and bound into the fringe of forest beside it. A slight cloud of dust marked its course, and then lazily floated away in mid air. But it had been watched agitatedly, and it was evident that that singular loss of nervous balance which is apt to affect all those who go through the slightest earthquake experience was felt by all. But some sense of humor, however, remained.
Looks as if the water risks we took aint goin to cover earthquakes, drawled Dick Frisney; still that wasnt a bad shot, if we only knew what they were aiming at.
Do be quiet, said Virginia Piper, her cheeks pink with excitement. Listen, cant you? Whats that funny murmuring you hear now and then up there?
Its only the snow-wind playin with the pines on the summit. You girls wont allow anybody any fun but yourselves.
But here a scream from Georgy, who, assisted by Captain Fairfax, had mounted a camp-stool at the mouth of the valley, attracted everybodys attention. She was standing upright, with dilated eyes, staring at the top of the trail. Look! she said excitedly, if the trail isnt moving!
Everybody faced in that direction. At the first glance it seemed indeed as if the trail was actually moving; wriggling and undulating its tortuous way down the mountain like a huge snake, only swollen to twice its usual size. But the second glance showed it to be no longer a trail but a channel of water, whose stream, lifted in a bore-like wall four or five feet high, was plunging down into the devoted valley.
For an instant they were unable to comprehend even the nature of the catastrophe. The reservoir was directly over their heads; the bursting of its wall they had imagined would naturally bring down the water in a dozen trickling streams or falls over the cliff above them and along the flanks of the mountain. But that its suddenly liberated volume should overflow the upland beyond and then descend in a pent-up flood by their own trail and their only avenue of escape, had been beyond their wildest fancy.
They met this smiting truth with that characteristic short laugh with which the American usually receives the blow of Fate or the unexpectedas if he recognized only the absurdity of the situation. Then they ran to the women, collected them together, and dragged them to vantages of fancied security among the bushes which flounced the long skirts of the mountain walls. But I leave this part of the description to the characteristic language of one of the party:
When the flood struck us, it did not seem to take any stock of us in particular, but laid itself out to go for that picnic for all it was worth! It wiped it off the face of the earth in about twenty-five seconds! It first made a clean break from stem to stern, carrying everything along with it. The first thing I saw was old Judge Piper, puttin on his best licks to get away from a big can of strawberry ice cream that was trundling after him and trying to empty itself on his collar, whenever a bigger wave lifted it. He was followed by what was left of the brass band; the big drum just humpin itself to keep abreast o the ice cream, mixed up with camp-stools, music-stands, a few Chinamen, and then what they call in them big San Francisco processions citizens generally. The hull thing swept up the canyon inside o thirty seconds. Then, what Captain Fairfax called the reflex action in the laws o motion happened, and darned if the hull blamed procession didnt sweep back againthis time all the heavy artillery, such as camp-kettles, lager beer kegs, bottles, glasses, and crockery that was left behind takin the lead now, and Judge Piper and that ice cream can bringin up the rear. As the jedge passed us the second time, we noticed that that ice cream canhevin swallowed waterwas kinder losing its wind, and we encouraged the old man by shoutin out, Five to one on him! And then, you wouldnt believe what followed. Why, darn my skin, when that reflex met the current at the other end, it just swirled around again in what Captain Fairfax called the centrifugal curve, and just went round and round the canyon like ez when yer washin the dirt out o a prospectin panevery now and then washin some one of the boys that was in it, like scum, up agin the banks.
We managed in this way to snake out the judge, jest ez he was sailin round on the home stretch, passin the quarter post two lengths ahead o the can. A good deal o the ice cream had washed away, but it took us ten minutes to shake the cracked ice and powdered salt out o the old mans clothes, and warm him up again in the laurel bush where he was clinging. This sort o Here we go round the mulberry bush kep on until most o the humans was got out, and only the furniture o the picnic was left in the race. Then it got kinder mixed up, and went sloshin round here and there, ez the water kep comin down by the trail. Then Lulu Piper, what I was holdin up all the time in a laurel bush, gets an idea, for all she was wet and draggled; and ez the things went bobbin round, she calls out the figures o a cotillon to em. Two camp-stools forward. Sashay and back to your places. Change partners. Hands all round.
She was clear grit, you bet! And the joke caught on and the other girls jined in, and it kinder cheered em, for they was wantin it. Then Fludder allowed to pacify em by sayin he just figured up the size o the reservoir and the size o the canyon, and he kalkilated that the cube was about ekal, and the canyon couldnt flood any more. And then Luluwho was peart as a jay and couldnt be fooledspeaks up and says, Whats the matter with the ditch, Dick?
Lord! then we knew that she knew the worst; for of course all the water in the ditch itselffifty miles of it!was drainin now into that reservoir and was bound to come down to the canyon.
It was at this point that the situation became really desperate, for they had now crawled up the steep sides as far as the bushes afforded foothold, and the water was still rising. The chatter of the girls ceased, there were long silences, in which the men discussed the wildest plans, and proposed to tear their shirts into strips to make ropes to support the girls by sticks driven into the mountain side. It was in one of those intervals that the distinct strokes of a woodmans axe were heard high on the upland at the point where the trail descended to the canyon. Every ear was alert, but only those on one side of the canyon could get a fair view of the spot. This was the good fortune of Captain Fairfax and Georgy Piper, who had climbed to the highest bush on that side, and were now standing up, gazing excitedly in that direction.
Some one is cutting down a tree at the head of the trail, shouted Fairfax. The response and joyful explanation, for a dam across the trail, was on everybodys lips at the same time.
But the strokes of the axe were slow and painfully intermittent. Impatience burst out.
Yell to him to hurry up! Why havent they brought two men?
Its only one man, shouted the captain, and he seems to be a cripple. By Jiminy!it isyes!its Tom Sparrell!
There was a dead silence. Then, I grieve to say, shame and its twin brother rage took possession of their weak humanity. Oh, yes! It was all of a piece! Why in the name of Folly hadnt he sent for an able-bodied man. Were they to be drowned through his cranky obstinacy?
The blows still went on slowly. Presently, however, they seemed to alternate with other blowsbut alas! they were slower, and if possible feebler!
Have they got another cripple to work? roared the Contingent in one furious voice.
Noits a womana little oneyes! a girl. Hello! Why, sure as you live, its Delaware!
A spontaneous cheer burst from the Contingent, partly as a rebuke to Sparrell, I think, partly from some shame over their previous rage. He could take it as he liked.
Still the blows went on distressingly slow. The girls were hoisted on the mens shoulders; the men were half submerged. Then there was a painful pause; then a crumbling crash. Another cheer went up from the canyon.
Its down! straight across the trail, shouted Fairfax, and a part of the bank on the top of it.
There was another moment of suspense. Would it hold or be carried away by the momentum of the flood? It held! In a few moments Fairfax again gave voice to the cheering news that the flow had stopped and the submerged trail was reappearing. In twenty minutes it was cleara muddy river bed, but possible of ascent! Of course there was no diminution of the water in the canyon, which had no outlet, yet it now was possible for the party to swing from bush to bush along the mountain side until the foot of the trailno longer an opposing onewas reached. There were some missteps and mishaps,flounderings in the water, and some dangerous rescues,but in half an hour the whole concourse stood upon the trail and commenced the ascent. It was a slow, difficult, and lugubrious processionI fear not the best-tempered one, now that the stimulus of danger and chivalry was past. When they reached the dam made by the fallen tree, although they were obliged to make a long detour to avoid its steep sides, they could see how successfully it had diverted the current to a declivity on the other side.
But strangely enough they were greeted by nothing else! Sparrell and the youngest Miss Piper were gone; and when they at last reached the highroad, they were astounded to hear from a passing teamster that no one in the settlement knew anything of the disaster!
This was the last drop in their cup of bitterness! They who had expected that the settlement was waiting breathlessly for their rescue, who anticipated that they would be welcomed as heroes, were obliged to meet the ill-concealed amusement of passengers and friends at their dishevelled and bedraggled appearance, which suggested only the blundering mishaps of an ordinary summer outing! Boatin in the reservoir, and fell in? Playing at canal-boat in the Ditch? were some of the cheerful hypotheses. The fleeting sense of gratitude they had felt for their deliverers was dissipated by the time they had reached their homes, and their rancor increased by the information that when the earthquake occurred Mr. Tom Sparrell and Miss Delaware were enjoying a pasear in the foresthe having a half-holiday by virtue of the festivaland that the earthquake had revived his fears of a catastrophe. The two had procured axes in the woodmans hut and did what they thought was necessary to relieve the situation of the picnickers. But the very modesty of this account of their own performance had the effect of belittling the catastrophe itself, and the picnickers report of their exceeding peril was received with incredulous laughter.
For the first time in the history of Red Gulch there was a serious division between the Piper family, supported by the Contingent, and the rest of the settlement. Tom Sparrells warning was remembered by the latter, and the ingratitude of the picnickers to their rescuers commented upon; the actual calamity to the reservoir was more or less attributed to the imprudent and reckless contiguity of the revelers on that day, and there were not wanting those who referred the accident itself to the machinations of the scheming Ditch Director Piper!
It was said that there was a stormy scene in the Piper household that evening. The judge had demanded that Delaware should break off her acquaintance with Sparrell, and she had refused; the judge had demanded of Sparrells employer that he should discharge him, and had been met with the astounding information that Sparrell was already a silent partner in the concern. At this revelation Judge Piper was alarmed; while he might object to a clerk who could not support a wife, as a consistent democrat he could not oppose a fairly prosperous tradesman. A final appeal was made to Delaware; she was implored to consider the situation of her sisters, who had all made more ambitious marriages or were about to make them. Why should she now degrade the family by marrying a country storekeeper?
It is said that here the youngest Miss Piper made a memorable reply, and a revelation the truth of which was never gainsaid:
You all wanter know why Im going to marry Tom Sparrell? she queried, standing up and facing the whole family circle.
Yes.
Why I prefer him to the hull caboodle that you girls have married or are going to marry? she continued, meditatively biting the end of her braid.
Yes.
Well, hes the only man of the whole lot that hasnt proposed to me first.
It is presumed that Sparrell made good the omission, or that the family were glad to get rid of her, for they were married that autumn. And really a later comparison of the family records shows that while Captain Fairfax remained Captain Fairfax, and the other sons-in-law did not advance proportionately in standing or riches, the lame storekeeper of Red Gulch became the Hon. Senator Tom Sparrell.
A WIDOW OF THE SANTA ANA VALLEY
The Widow Wade was standing at her bedroom window staring out, in that vague instinct which compels humanity in moments of doubt and perplexity to seek this change of observation or superior illumination. Not that Mrs. Wades disturbance was of a serious character. She had passed the acute stage of widowhood by at least two years, and the slight redness of her soft eyelids as well as the droop of her pretty mouth were merely the recognized outward and visible signs of the grievously minded religious community in which she lived. The mourning she still wore was also partly in conformity with the sad-colored garments of her neighbors, and the necessities of the rainy season. She was in comfortable circumstances, the mistress of a large ranch in the valley, which had lately become more valuable by the extension of a wagon road through its centre. She was simply worrying whether she should go to a sociable ending with a dancea daring innovation of some strangersat the new hotel, or continue to eschew such follies, that were, according to local belief, unsuited to a vale of tears.
Indeed at this moment the prospect she gazed abstractedly upon seemed to justify that lugubrious description. The Santa Ana Valleya long monotonous levelwas dimly visible through moving curtains of rain or veils of mist, to the black mourning edge of the horizon, and had looked like that for months. The valleyin some remote epoch an arm of the San Francisco Bayevery rainy season seemed to be trying to revert to its original condition, and, long after the early spring had laid on its liberal color in strips, bands, and patches of blue and yellow, the blossoms of mustard and lupine glistened like wet paint. Nevertheless on that rich alluvial soil Natures tears seemed only to fatten the widows acres and increase her crops. Her neighbors, too, were equally prosperous. Yet for six months of the year the recognized expression of Santa Ana was one of sadness, and for the other six monthsof resignation. Mrs. Wade had yielded early to this influence, as she had to others, in the weakness of her gentle nature, and partly as it was more becoming the singular tragedy that had made her a widow.