The Golden Woman: A Story of the Montana Hills

by Ridgwell Cullum

  CHAPTER XXXVI

  THE CATACLYSM

  Two hours later two men and a girl gazed out from the plateau ofDevil's Hill. The whole earth it seemed was a raging sea of fire. Oncemore the forests were ablaze in every direction. The blisteringtongues of fire had licked up the heavy rain, and were again roaringdestruction over the land.

  Far as the eye could reach the lurid pall of smoke was spread out,rolling upward and onward, borne upon the bosom of the gale. In itsmidst, and through it, the merciless flames leapt up and up. Thebooming of falling timbers, and the roar of the flames smote painfullyupon the hearts of the watchers. It was a spectacle to crush everyearthly hope. It was a sight so painful as to drive the mind of mandistracted. In all their lives these people had never imagined such aterror. In all their lives they could never witness such again.

  They stood there silent and awed. They stood there with eyes strainingand ear-drums throbbing with the din of the battle. Their horses wereroaming at will and the still form of Aunt Mercy was at their feet.There was no shelter. There was no hope. Only they knew that wherethey stood was safety, at least, from the fire below.

  Presently Joan knelt at her aunt's side and studied her ashen featuresin the ruddy light. The woman's unconsciousness had remained throughall that journey. Or was she dead? Joan could not make up her mind.

  Once, as she knelt, she reeled and nearly fell across that still body.And when, recovering herself, she looked up at the men she saw thatthey were braced, with feet apart, supporting each other. Then, in theroar of the storm she heard Buck's voice shouting in the Padre's ear.

  "Guess--ther's more to come yet," he said with a profoundsignificance.

  She saw the Padre's nod, and she wondered at the fresh danger he sawahead.

  Buck turned and looked out over the desolate plateau with troubledeyes. She followed his gaze. Strangely she had little fear, even withthat trouble in her lover's eyes.

  The plateau was desperately gloomy. It was hot, too, up there,terribly hot. But Joan had no thought for that except that sheassociated it with the hot wind blowing up from below. Her observationwas narrowed to a complete dependence on Buck. He was her hope, heronly hope.

  Suddenly she saw him reel. Then, in a moment, she saw that both menwere down on hands and knees, and, almost at the instant, she,herself, was hurled flat upon the ground beside the body of her aunt.

  The earth was rocking, and now she understood more fully her lover'strouble. Her courage slowly began to ebb. She fought against it, butslowly a terror of that dreadful hill crept up in her heart, and shelonged to flee anywhere from it--anywhere but down into that caldronof fire below. But the thought was impossible. Death was on every handbeyond that hill, and the hill itself was--quaking.

  Now Buck was speaking again.

  "We'll have to git som'ere from here," he said.

  The Padre answered him--

  "Where?"

  It was an admission of the elder man's weakness. Buck must guide. Thegirl's eyes remained upon her lover's face; she was awaiting hisreply. She understood, had always known it, that all human help forher must come from him.

  Her suspense was almost breathless.

  "There's shelter by the lake," Buck said, after a long pause. "We canget to leeward of the rock, an'--it's near the head of that pathdroppin' to the creek. The creek seems better than anywher'else--after this."

  His manner was decided, but his words offered poor enough comfort.

  The Padre agreed, and, at once, they moved across to Joan. For themoment the earth was still again. Its convulsive shudder had passed.Joan struggled to her feet, but her increasing terror left herclinging to the man she loved. The Padre silently gathered Mercy intohis arms, and the journey across the plateau began.

  But as they moved away the subterranean forces attacked again. Againcame that awful rocking, and shaking, which left them struggling for afoothold. Twice they were driven to their knees, only to stagger on asthe convulsions lessened. It was a nightmare of nervous tension. Everystep of the journey was fraught with danger, and every moment itseemed as though the hill must fall beneath them to a crumblingwreckage.

  With heart-sick apprehension Joan watched the growing form of thegreat rock, which formed the source of the lake, as it loomed out ofthe smoke-laden dusk. It was so high, so sheer. What if it fell,wrecked with those dreadful earth quakings? But her terror found novoice, no protest. She would not add to the burden of these men. Therock passed behind them, and her relief was intense as the shadow wasswallowed up again in the gloom. Then a further relief came to her asthe edge of the plateau was reached, and the Padre set his burden downat the head of the narrow path which suggested a possible escape tothe creek below.

  She threw herself beside her aunt, and heard Buck speaking again tohis friend.

  "Stop right here with the women," he said. "I'm goin' around thatlake--seems to me we need to get a peek at it."

  Joan understood something of what he feared. She remembered theweirdness of that suspended lake, and thought with a shudder of thedreadful earth quakings. So she watched him go with heart well-nighbreaking.

  Buck moved cautiously away into the gloom. He knew the lake shorewell. The evident volcanic origin of it might well answer manyquestions and doubts in his mind. Its rugged shore offered almostpainful difficulties with the, now, incessant quakings below. But hestruggled on till he came to the eminence he sought. Here he took up aposition, lying on his stomach so that he had a wide view of thesurface of the wind-swept water.

  He remained for a long while watching, watching, and striving todigest the signs he beheld. They were many, and alarming. But theirfull meaning was difficult to his untutored mind.

  Here it was that the Padre ultimately found him. He had been gone solong that the elder man's uneasiness for his safety had sent him insearch.

  "What d'you make of it, Buck?" he demanded, as he came up, hisapprehensions finding no place in his manner.

  Buck displayed no surprise. He did not even turn his head.

  "The fires are hotting. The water's nigh boiling. There's goin' to bea mighty bust-up."

  The Padre looked out across the water.

  "There's fire around us, fire above us, and now--fire under us. We'vegot to choose which we're going to face, Buck--quick."

  The Padre's voice was steady. His feelings were under perfect control.

  Buck laughed grimly.

  "Ther's fire we know, an' fire we don't. Guess we best take the firewe know."

  They continued to gaze out across the lake in silence after that. Thenthe Padre spoke again.

  "What about the horses?" he asked.

  The question seemed to trouble Buck, for he suddenly caught hisbreath. But, in a moment, his answer came with decision.

  "Guess they must take their chances," he said. "Same as we have to. Ihate to leave him, but Caesar's got sense."

  "Yes."

  The Padre's eyes were fixed upon one spot on the surface of the water.It was quite plain, even in that light, that a seething turmoil wasgoing on just beneath it. He pointed at the place, but went on talkingof the other things in his mind.

  "Say, you best take this pocketbook. We may get separated before thenight's out. It's half the farm money. You see--ther's no telling," heended up vaguely.

  For one instant Buck removed his eyes from the surface of the lake toglance at the snow-white head of his friend. Then he reached out andtook the pocketbook.

  "Maybe Joan'll need it, anyway," he said, and thrust it in his pocket."We must----Say, git busy! Look!"

  Buck's quick eyes had suddenly caught sight of a fresh disturbance inthe water. Of a sudden the whole surface of the lake seemed to berising in a great commotion. And as he finished speaking two terrificdetonations roared up from somewhere directly beneath them.

  In an instant both men were on their feet and racing in headlongflight for the point where they had left the women.

  "Get Joan!" shouted the Padre from behind. He was less swif
t of footthan Buck. "Get Joan! I'll see to the other."

  Buck reached the girl's side. She had heard the explosions of theunderworld and stood shaking with terror.

  "We're up agin it, Joan," he cried. And before the panic-stricken girlcould reply she was in his strong young arms speeding for the downwardpath, which was their only hope.

  "But the Padre! Aunt Mercy!" cried Joan, in a sudden recollection.

  "They're comin' behind. He'll see to her----God in heaven!"

  A deafening roar, a hundred times greater than the first explosions,came from directly beneath the man's feet. The air was full of it. Tothe fugitives it was as if the whole world had suddenly been rivenasunder. For one flashing moment it seemed to Buck that he had beenstruck with fearful force from somewhere behind him, and as the blowfell he was hurled headlong down the precipitous path.

  A confused, painful sense of cruel buffeting left him onlyhalf-conscious. There was a roar in his ears like the bombardment ofunearthly artillery. It filled his brain to the exclusion of all else,while he hugged the girl close in his arms with some instinct ofsaving her, and shielding her from the cruel blows with his own body.

  Beyond that he had practically no sensation. Beyond that he had norealization whatever. They were falling, falling, and every limb inhis body seemed to find the obstructions with deadly certainty. Howfar, how long they were falling, whither the awful journey wascarrying them, these things passed from him utterly.

  Then, abruptly, all sensation ceased. The limit of endurance had beenreached. For him, at least, the battle for life seemed ended. Thegreater forces might contest in bitter rage. Element might war withelement, till the whole face of the world was changed; for Providence,in a belated mercy, had suspended animation, and spared these two pooratoms of humanity a further witness of a conflict of forces beyondtheir finite understanding.