"Allie's gone out to the old farm to get some stuff for Ma," the father explained in due time. "Some pitchers of her an' Buddy when they was little, an' a rockin'-chair, an' Ma's favorite bedspread, an' some other things she likes."
Gray remembered the portraits, executed by a St. Louis "enlargement" concern. They had wide gilt frames, and were protected from ravaging flies by mosquito netting. He hoped that Ma would not hang them in the hall or the living-room. And that rocker, for which she yearned, was probably the one with the creaking coiled springs—the one that had leaped after him and clashed its jaws like an alligator.
"By the way, how does Buddy like the new home?" the latter inquired.
"He 'ain't seen it yet. Says he's too busy to leave the job. What you done to that boy, anyhow?"
"I'm making a real man out of him—and an oil man, too. He knew how to dress tools when I got him, but he's a pretty good driller now. Before long he'll be able to take charge of your property and run it on practical lines. I told you he had it in him, and that he'd make a 'hand.'"
"You never wrote us nothin' about his—his trouble."
"I left the explaining for him."
Gus smiled meditatively. "First we knew that you an' him had been fightin' was when he wrote us a letter sayin' he was doin' great an' could see out of one eye." Then, more gravely: "It was worryin' over Buddy's affair that got Ma to ailin'. She 'ain't been right well since. Say, wha'd you do with that—woman?" Briskow pronounced the last word with an accent of scorn and hatred.
"I gave her a chance to make an honest, decent living. I set her up in business."
"What?"
"And she is making good." When the elder man shook his head impatiently Gray went on, "I'm pretty worldly and calloused, but if one virtue has been spared me, it is charity."
For a moment the father studied his caller. "Tell me," he began, "was it altogether on Buddy's account that you an' him tied into one another?"
Gray threw back his head and laughed frankly. "Altogether, I assure you. That's why I found it so hard."
"Heoughtabeen licked! Takin' up with a—a thing like her." Gus was groping for words more eloquent of his displeasure at his son and his hatred for the object of Buddy's misplaced affections, when Gray forestalled him.
"Just a minute. You are a rich man and you are growing richer. Careful, frugal, prosperous people like you are apt to become unduly hard and oversuspicious; but you mustn't permit it. Think, for instance, what environment did to your children, then remember that under slightly different circumstances it might have made evildoers even of them. Most people would like to run straight, and would do so if they had a chance. Anyhow, it is an interesting experiment to put the chance in their way. Tell me, Gus, how much money have you got?"
"I dunno. Figgers over a thousand dollars don't mean much to me."
Gray searched the speaker's face with a speculative gaze. "It's mostly liquid, I presume." There was a pause. "I mean it's in cash or the equivalent?"
"Oh, sure! These bonds an' stocks an' things—" Briskow shook his head disapprovingly. "Land ain't any too safe, either. It's rainin' now, an' it 'll keep on rainin' till the farmers is all drowned out. Next year it'll be droughty an' fry 'em to a crisp. No, I'm skeered of land. I'm skeered of everything!" This last was said plaintively. "Why, lookit these Liberty bonds! Goin' down steady. I wouldn't put no money into the gov'ment unless I had something to say about runnin' it. An' s'pose I did? I wouldn't know how it oughta be run."
"How about oil properties? Wouldn't you like to invest in a good, safe proposition, with the prospect of big—"
"Gosh,no!I'm skeerder of oil than anything, 'cause I know somethin' about it. Feller been tryin' to sell me life insurance, lately, but you gotta die to get your money back. No; there's a catch in all them propositions. Sometimes I wake up nights dreamin' we're all back at the old place an' pore again. That ends my sleepin'. You see, Allie's a lady now, an' she's used to silk stockin's, an' Buddy's been out in the world spendin' money on women, an' Ma's gettin' old. I could go back to corn bread, but it would kill them. Worst of it is, the black lime ain't holdin' up, an' our wells will give out some day." Briskow sighed heavily and his brows drew together in an anxious pucker.
"You'll have enough money in bank to do you."
"Banks bust. I tell you the hull world's full of skullduggery. Suspicious? I should say I was! I use' to think if we had money our troubles would be over, but—Lord, that's when they begin! You see, if I was bright an' knew what slick people is up to, I'd be all right; but—Why, I'm like a settin' hen. I can feel the eggs under me, but how am I goin' to keep the skunks away when they smell the nest? I'm 'most tempted to turn everything I got over to some honest man an' let him han'le it. Some feller that had the savvy."
"Unfortunately, such people are rare."
"I don't know but one."
"Indeed? Who is he?"
"I reckon you know," said Briskow.
The listener looked up with quickened interest; there was a sharp ring to his voice when he said: "Let me get this right."
"You're the only man I ever knowed that I'd bank my life on. An' you're smart. You wouldn't take Buddy, but mebbe you'd kinda—take me; take all of us. I tell you I'm skeered!"
"Just how much confidence do I inspire in you?" Gray's expression was peculiar, for amazement, doubt, eagerness were equally blended.
"This much: I'd turn the hull works over to you, if you'd look out for us."
"You—scarcely know me."
"Oh, I know you well enough!" Briskow smiled his slow, shrewd smile."So does Ma. So does Allie an' Bud."
For quite a while the caller sat with head bowed, with his gaze fixed upon the flames; when he looked up his face was red, his eyes were brighter than usual.
"To be trusted is a greater compliment than to be loved. Yes, and it's hell to be born with a conscience." He fell silent again, for this was a moment to be treasured and he could not let it pass too quickly. "You say you want nothing to do with oil?"
"Anything but that. I know it so well, an'—Ma's gettin' feeble." Again silence. "Of course, if you'd do it, I wouldn't ask no questions. I'd rather shut my eyes an' trust you than keep 'em open an'—"
"You don't know how much I'd like to say yes, but I fought Buddy to prevent him from making a mistake, and I sha'n't allow you to make this one."
"Hm-m! Will you keep me from makin'othermistakes?"
"I will, if I can."
"Mebbe that's enough. Anyhow, I'll sleep better to-night for seein' you."
"I think I hear Ma stirring," said Gray, as he rose. "I brought her a few little presents, and I'd like to take them up to her." As he left the room there was the same queer light in his eyes; nevertheless, he moved slowly, like a man tired.
Gray was shocked at the change in Ma Briskow. She had failed surprisingly. Pleasure lit her face, and she fell into a brief flutter of delight at seeing him; but as soon as their first greeting was over he led her to her lounge and insisted upon making her comfortable. He had tricks with cushions and pillows, so he declared; they became his obedient servants, and there was a knack in arranging them—the same knack that a robin uses in building its nest. This he demonstrated quite conclusively.
It was nice to have a great, masterful man like this take charge of one, and Ma sighed gratefully as she lay back. "It does kinda feel like a bird's nest," she declared. "And you kinda look like a robin, too; you're allus dressed so neat."
"Exactly," he chuckled. "Robins are the very neatest dressers of all the birds. But look! Like a real robin, I've brought spring with me." He opened a huge box of long-stemmed roses and held their cool, dewy buds against Ma Briskow's withered face, then, laughing and chatting, he arranged them in vases where she could see them. Next, he drew down the shades, shutting out the dreary afternoon, after which he lit the gas log, and soon the room, whether by reason of his glowing personality or his deft rearrangement of its contents, or both, became a warm and cheerful place.
He had brought other gifts than flowers, too; thoughtful, expensive things that fairly took Ma's breath. No one had ever given her presents; to be remembered, therefore, with useless, delightful little luxuries filled her gentle soul with a guilty rapture.
But these were not gifts in the ordinary sense; they were offerings from the Duke of Dallas, and his manner of presenting them invested every article with ducal dignity. The Princess Pensacola had not played for a long time, and so to recline languidly in a beautiful Japanese kimono, with her feet in a pair of wonderful soft boudoir slippers spun by the duke's private silkworms and knit by his own oriental knitting slaves, while he paid court to her, was doubly thrilling.
The duke certainly was a reckless spender, but thank goodness he hadn't bought things for the house—things just tolookat and to share with other people! He knew enough to buy intimate things, things a woman could wear and feel rich in. Ma hugged herself and tried to look beautiful.
Gray was seated on the side of her couch with her cold hand between his warm palms, and he was telling her about the princess of Wichita Falls when the summons to dinner interrupted them.
Ma was not hungry, and she had expected to have a bite in her own room; but her caller was so vigorous in his objections to this plan that she finally agreed to come downstairs.
The Briskow household was poorly organized as yet, and it was only natural that it should function imperfectly; nevertheless, Gray was annoyed at the clumsy manner in which the dinner was served. Being a meticulous man and accustomed to comfort, incompetent servants distressed him beyond measure, and he soon discovered that the Briskow help was as completely incompetent as any he had ever seen. The butler, for instance, a pleasant-faced colored man, had evidently come straight from the docks, for he passed the food much as a stoker passes coal to a boiler, while the sound of a crashing platter in the butler's pantry gave evidence that the second girl was a house wrecker.
"See here, Ma!" Gray threw down his napkin. "You have a beautiful home, and you want it to be perfect, don't you?"
"Why, of Course. We bought everything we' could buy—"
"Everything except skillful servants, and they are hard to find. You are capable of training your cook and teaching your upstairs girl to sweep and make beds; but the test of a well-run house is a well-served meal. Dish-breaking ought to be a felony, and when I become President I propose to make the spoiling of food a capital offense. Now then, you're not eating a bite, anyhow, and Gus won't mind waiting awhile for his dinner. With your permission, I'd like to take things in hand and add a hundred per cent to your future comfort?"
In some bewilderment Ma agreed that she would do anything her guest suggested, whereupon he rose energetically and called the three domestics into the dining room.
"We are going to start this dinner all over again," he announced, "and we are going to begin by swapping places. I am going to serve it as a dinner should be served, and you are going to eat it as—Well, I dare say nature will have to take its course. I shall explain, as I go along, and I want you to remember every word I say, every move I make. Mr. and Mrs. Briskow are going to look on. After we have finished you are going to serve us exactly as I served you."
Naturally, this proposition amazed the "help"; in fact, its absurdity convulsed them. The man laughed loudly; the cook buried her ebony face in her apron; the second girl bent double with mirth. Here was a quaint gentleman, indeed, and a great joker. But the gentleman was not joking. On the contrary, he brought this levity to an abrupt end, then, gravely, ceremoniously, he seated the trio. They sobered quickly enough at this; they became, in fact, as funereal as three crows; but their astonishment at what followed was no greater than that of the Briskows.
Gray played butler with a correctness and a poise deeply impressive to his round-eyed audience, and as he served the courses he delivered a lecture upon the etiquette of domestic service, the art of cooking, and the various niceties of a servant's calling. Nothing could have been more impressive than being waited upon by a person of his magnificence, and his lecture, moreover, was delivered in a way that drove understanding into their thick heads.
It was an uncomfortable experience for all except Gray himself—he actually enjoyed it—and when the last dish had been removed, and he had given instructions to serve the meal over again exactly as he had served it, the three negroes were glad to obey. Of course they made mistakes, but these Gray instantly corrected, and the results of his dress rehearsal were, on the whole, surprising.
"There!" he said, when the ordeal had finally come to an end. "A little patience, a little practice, and you'll be proud of them. Incidentally, I have saved you a fortune in dishes."
"I wish Allie'd been here. She'd remember everything you said," Ma declared.
"Lord! Think of Mr. Gray waitin' on them niggers!" Gus was still deeply shocked.
"You see what a meddlesome busybody I am," the guest laughed. "I don't know how to mind my own business, and the one luxury I enjoy most of all is regulating other people's affairs." He was still talking, still lecturing his hearers upon the obligations prosperity had put upon them, when he was summoned to the telephone by a long-distance call. He returned in some agitation to announce: "Well, at last I have business of my own to attend."
"Was that Buddy talkin'?"
"It was, and he gave me some good news. He says that well on thirty-five is liable to come in at any minute, and it looks like a big one." The speaker's eyes were glowing, and he ran on, breathlessly, "He says they're betting it will do better than ten thousand barrels!"
"Ten thousand bar'ls!" Briskow echoed.
"That's what he said. Of course, they can't tell a thing about it. Buddy's only guessing, but—I haven't had a big well yet." Gray took a nervous turn about the room.
"Ten thousand barrels! Lord! That would help. That would do the trick. And to think that it should come now, this very day—" He laughed triumphantly and ran on as if talking to himself: "'The wicked are fatted for destruction. Their happiness shall pass away like a torrent.' Pull out and leave me, eh?" A second time he laughed, more loudly. "Luck? It isn't luck, it's Destiny. The mills of the Gods are grinding. Ma Briskow, the fairy ladies danced upon the hearth when I was born. Do you know what that means?"
"Ten thousand bar'ls a day, an' you buttlin' for three niggers!" gasped the head of the house.
"I'm going out on to-night's train and see it come in—if it does come in. I told Buddy to stop work; not to drop another tool until I arrived. 'Fatted for destruction.' I like the sound of that. Ten thousand barrels! Ho! I'll write this day in brass. Why, that lease will sell for a million. It—it may mean the end."
Gray brought himself to with an effort, hastily he kissed Ma Briskow's faded cheek and wrung her husband's hand. A moment later he was gone.
"Thirty-five," where Buddy was working, was only a few miles from the Briskow ranch, therefore the boy was able to meet his sister at Ranger and drive her directly to the old home. The place was much the same as when they had left it, thanks to the watchful attention of the men in charge of the Briskow wells, and there they spent the night. Buddy and his sister had always been close confidants, and their long separation, their varied experiences, left many things to be discussed.
The ranch house seemed very mean, very insignificant to Allie, but she slipped into one of her old dresses and prepared the supper while Buddy straddled a kitchen chair and chattered upon ten thousand topics of mutual interest.
"Doggone!" he exclaimed, finally. "I hardly knew you when you stepped off that train, but it seems like old times now, with you hustlin' around in that gingham."
"I wish it was."
"Hunh?"
"I wish, sometimes, that we'd never struck oil."
"Good Lord! Why?"
"Oh"—Allie turned her back and bent over the stove—"for lots of reasons! Ma never had a sick day till lately. Now she's failin' fast." Buddy frowned at this intelligence. "And Pa's as restless as a squirrel. All the time scared of losing his money."
"Well,yougot no kick coming, sis. You've sure made good."
"How?"
"I dunno—You've got rich ways. An' richlooks, too!"
Allie lifted an interested face, and her brother undertook, somewhat awkwardly, to tell her wherein she had improved. She listened with greedy delight, but when he had finished she shook her head skeptically and declared: "It sounds nice, and God knows I've tried hard enough, but-there's a difference, Bud. We're 'trash' and always will be."
Of course young Briskow's mind was full of business, and he could not long stay off that absorbing topic. When, during their supper, he announced the fact that the well on thirty-five showed signs of coming in shortly, and that he intended to send for Calvin Gray, Allie changed her mind about returning home and decided to wait over until the latter arrived.
She and Buddy talked until a late hour that night, but although she was dying to have him tell her about his romance, his dream of love, he never so much as referred to it, and she could not bring herself to disregard his reticence. Nor could she bear to discuss with him the problem that lay nearest her own heart. She had brooded long over that problem, and her soul was hungry to share its bitter secret; nevertheless, she could not do so, for it is often easier to bare our wounds to strangers than to those we love. If her breedings, her bitterness of spirit manifested themselves, it was in a fixed undertone of pessimism and in an occasional outburst of recklessness that bewildered her brother.
On the morning of Gray's coming she rode with Buddy over to thirty-five. It was a wretched, rainy day, and nothing is more bleak than a rainy day in a drilling camp. Work had been halted and the men were loafing in their bunk house. Brother and sister spent the impatient hours in the mess tent. As usual, they talked a good deal about Calvin Gray.
"Funny, him comin' here a stranger, an' gettin' to run our whole family, ain't it?" Buddy said.
Allie nodded. "Funnier thing than that is your working for him." Buddy was surprised, so she asked him: "Aren't you sore at him for—what he did? For breaking up that affair?" It was a question that had been upon her lips more than once; she could not credit her brother with entire sincerity when he answered, frankly enough:
"Sore? Not the least bit."
"Didn't you—care for her?"
"Why, sure. I was all tore up, at first. But he did me the biggest kind of a favor."
Allie shook her head uncomprehendingly. "Men are queer things. Youmusthave loved her, for a while."
"I reckon I did, if you're a mind to call it that. But he says that sort of thing ain't real love."
"'He says'!" the girl cried, scornfully. "My God, Buddy! Would you lethimtell you—? Is he pickin' out women for you like he picks out a dress for me and a hotel for Ma? How doesheknow what's the real thing?"
"She was a—grafter," the brother explained, with a flush of embarrassment. "She'd of probably took my money an' quit me cold."
"Bah!" The girl rose and, with somber defiance in her smoldering eyes, stared out at the desolate day. "You'd have had her for a while, wouldn't you? You'd have lived while it lasted. What's the difference if she was a grafter? D'you think you're going to fall in love and marry a duchess, or something? I wish I'd had your chance, that's all."
"What d'you mean by that?" Buddy queried, sharply.
"I mean this," Allie flamed at him. "We're nobodies and we've got nothing but our money. A counterfeit is as good as ever we'll get—and it's as good as we're entitled to. I'd rather know what it is to live for an hour than to go on forever just pretending to live. If I've got to be unhappy, then give me something to be unhappy over; something to look back on. I'd rather be—But, pshaw! You don't understand. You couldn't."
"I dunno what's got into you lately," Buddy declared, with a frown.
"Nothing's got into me. Only, what's the use of starving when the world's full of good things and you've got the price to buy them?Iwon't do it. If ever I get my chance, you watch me!"
Gray's trip from the railroad was more like a voyage than a motor journey, for the creek beds, usually dry, were angry torrents, and the 'dobe flats were quagmires through which his vehicle plowed hub deep; nevertheless, he was fresh and alert when he arrived. After a buoyant greeting to Allie, he and Buddy inspected the well, then he issued orders for work to be resumed.
"We're gettin' close to something," young Briskow declared. "She's making gas an' rumblin' like she'd let go any minute. We got reservoys built an' the boiler's moved back, so we can douse the fire when she starts. I figger she'll drownd us out."
"What are the indications at Nelson's well?" Gray turned his eyes in the direction of a derrick on the adjoining property, the top of which showed over the mesquite.
"Nothin' extra. They won't tell us anything, but they're deeper 'n we are."
"How do you know?"
Buddy winked wisely. "We counted the layers of cable on the bull-wheel drum. Checked up their casing, too, an' watched their cuttin's. They got their eye on us, too, an' they'll be over when we blow in."
That was an anxious afternoon, for as the drill bit deeper into the rock it provoked indications of a terrific force imprisoned far below. To the observers it seemed as if that sharp-edged tool was tap-tapping upon the thin shell of some vast reservoir already leaking and charged to the bursting point with a mighty pressure. An odor of gas escaped from the casing mouth, occasionally there came hoarse, throaty gurglings of the thick liquid at the bottom of the well. The bailer was run frequently.
Word had gone forth that there was something doing on thirty-five, and from the chaparral emerged muddy motor cars bringing scouts, neighboring lease owners, and even the members of a near-by casing crew.
Supper was a jumpy meal, and nobody had much to say, Allie Briskow least of all. She was silent, intense; she curtly refused Buddy's offer to send her home, and when the meal was over she followed Gray back to the derrick. He was on edge, of course. It seemed to him that every blow of that bit was struck upon his naked nerves, for he had a deep conviction that this was to prove the night of his life, and the strain of waiting was becoming onerous. This well meant so much. Ten thousand barrels, fifteen, five—even one thousand; it mattered little how heavy the flow, for a good-paying well would see him through his immediate troubles. And this was a well of some sort, or else indications meant nothing and everybody was greatly mistaken. Of course, a big well, something to create a furor—that was what he needed, for that not only would bridge his financial crisis, but also it would mean a frenzy of quick drilling, new wells crowded close together, hundreds of thousands of dollars poured into the earth, and the Nelsons couldn't stand that. It would break them—break them, and he would taste the full sweetness of revenge. Oh, he had waited long! Nor was that all. Once he had Henry Nelson down, and his foot on the fellow's throat, he'd have something to say to Barbara Parker. He could say it then and look her in the eyes. He wished she was here to-night while he stood on the top of the world. Ten thousand barrels! Twenty thousand! Twenty-thousand-barrel gushers were not unknown. A well like that would mean a fortune every day. But why didn't it start?
They were bailing again and curiosity drew the owner in upon the derrick floor. This time the flow might begin; at any moment now oil might come with the water. There is some danger in standing close to a well during this bailing process, but Gray was like a bit of iron in the field of a magnet; spellbound, he watched the cable as it ran smoothly off the drum, flowed up over the crown block and down into the casing mouth. That heavy, torpedolike weight on the end of the line was dropping almost half a mile. Up it came swiftly, as if greased; up, up, until it emerged into the glare of the incandescent overhead and hung there dripping. It was swung aside and lowered, and out gushed its muddy contents.
Water! Black and thick as molasses, but water nevertheless.
Buddy Briskow was running the rig, and the dexterity with which he handled brake and control rod gave him pride. He had seated his sister on a bench out of the way, where she was protected from the drizzle, and he felt her eyes upon him. It gave him a sense of importance to have Allie watching him at such a crisis; he wished his parents were with her. If this well blew in big, as it seemed bound to do, it would be a personal triumph, for not many cub drillers could boast of bringing in a gusher the first time. It was, in fact, no mean accomplishment to make any sort of a well; to pierce the earth with an absolutely vertical shaft a half mile deep and line it with tons upon tons of heavy casing joined air-tight and fitted to a hair's breadth was an engineering feat in itself. It was something that only an oil man could appreciate. And he was an oil man; a darn good one, too, so Buddy told himself.
He eased the brake and the massive bailer slid into the casing as a heavy shell slips into the breech of a cannon. As he further released his pressure, the cable began to pour serpentlike from the drum. Buddy turned his wet, grimy face and flashed a grin at Allie. She smiled back at him faintly. Some lightninglike change in her expression, or perhaps some occult sense of the untoward warned him that all was not as it should be, and he jerked his head back to attention.
There are moments of catastrophe when for a brief interval nature slows, time stops, and we are carried in suspense. Such an instant Buddy Briskow experienced now. He knew at first glance what had happened, and a frightened cry burst from his throat, but it was a cry too short, too hoarse, to serve as a warning.
During that moment of inattention the bailer had stuck. Perhaps five hundred feet below, friction had checked its plunge, and meanwhile the velvet-running drum, spinning at its maximum velocity by reason of the whirling bull wheel, was unreeling its cable down upon the derrick platform. Down it poured in giant loops, and within those coils, either unconscious of his danger or paralyzed by its suddenness, stood Calvin Gray.
Men schooled in hazardous enterprises carry subconscious mental photographs of the perils with which their callings are invested and they react involuntarily to them. Buddy had heard of drillers decapitated by flying cables, of human bodies caught within those wire loops and cut in twain as if made of lard, for when a wedged tool resumes its downward plunge it straightens those coils above ground in the twinkling of an eye. Instinct, rather than reason, warned Buddy not to check the blinding revolutions of the bull wheel. Without thought he leaped forward into the midst of those swiftly forming loops, and as he landed upon the slippery floor he clenched his fist and struck with all the power he could put behind his massive arm. Gray's back was to him, the blow was like that of a walking beam, and it sent the elder man flying as a tenpin is hurled ahead of a bowling ball. Buddy fell, too. He went sprawling. As he slid across the muddy floor he felt the steel cable writhing under him like a thing alive, and the touch of it as it streamed into the well burned his flesh. He kicked and fought it as he would have fought the closing folds of a python, for the bailer was falling again and the wire loops were vanishing as the coils in a whiplash vanish during its flight.
Buddy's booted legs were thrown high, he was tossed aside like a thing of paper, but blind, half stunned, he scrambled back to his post. By this time the whole structure of the derrick was rocking to the mad gyrations of the bull wheel; the giant spool was spinning with a speed that threatened to send it flying, like the fragments of a bursting bomb, but the youth understood dimly the danger of stopping it too suddenly—to fetch up that plunging weight at the cable end might snap the line, collapse the derrick, "jim" the well. Buddy weaved dizzily in his tracks; nevertheless, his hand was steady, and he applied a gradually increasing pressure to the brake. Nor did he take his eyes from his task until the drum had ceased revolving and the runaway bailer hung motionless in the well.
When he finally looked about it seemed to him that he had lived a long time and was very old. Gray lay motionless where he had fallen, and his body was twisted into a shockingly unnatural posture. He was bleeding. Allie Briskow was bending over him. Other dim, dreamlike figures were swarming out of the gloom and into the radiance of the derrick lights; there was a far-away clamor of shouting voices. Buddy Briskow felt himself growing deathly sick.
They carried Gray to the bunk house, and his limbs hung loosely, his head lolled in a manner terrifying to Buddy and his sister. As they stumbled along beside the group, the girl cried:
"Oh, my God! Oh, my God!" She repeated the cry over and over again in a voice strange to her brother's ears.
"It—it wasn't my fault," he told her, hoarsely. "I aimed to save him."
"You killed him!"
"He ain't—" Buddy choked and clung to her. "He's just stunned like. He ain't—that!" The youth was amazed when Allie turned and cursed him with oaths that he himself seldom ventured to employ.
But Gray was not dead. Buddy's blow had well-nigh broken his neck, and he had suffered a further injury to his head in falling; nevertheless, he responded to such medical aid as they could supply, and in time he opened his eyes. His gaze was dull, however, and for a long while he lay in a sort of coma, quite as alarming as his former condition. They brought him to at last long enough to acquaint him with what had happened, and although it was plain that he understood their words only dimly, he ordered the work resumed.
When for a second time he lapsed into semiconsciousness, it was Allie Briskow who put his orders into execution. "You ain't doing any good standing around staring at him and whispering. Bring in that well, as fast as ever you can, and bring it inbig. Now, get out and leave him to me."
Buddy was the last to go. He inquired, miserably: "Honest, he ain't hurt bad, is he? You don't think—"
"Get out!"
"He won't—die? Ain't no chance of him doin' that, is there?"
"If he does, I'll—" The speaker's face was ashen, but her eyes blazed."I'll fix you, Buddy Briskow. I will, so help me God!"
It was late that night when the well came in. It came with a rush and a roar, drenching the derrick with a geyser of muddy water and driving both crew and spectators out into the gloom. Up, up the column rose, spraying itself into mist, and from its iron throat issued a sound unlike that of any other phenomenon. It was a hoarse, rumbling bellow, growing in volume and rising in pitch second by second until it finally attained a shrieking crescendo. Ten thousand safety valves had let go, and they steadily gathered strength and shrillness as they functioned. A shocking sound it became, a sound that carried for miles, rocking the air and stunning the senses. It beat upon the eardrums, pierced them; men shouted at each other, but heard their own voices only faintly.
Calvin Gray had recovered his senses sufficiently to understand the meaning of that uproar, and he tried to get up, but Allie held him down upon his bed. She was still struggling with him when her brother burst into the house, shouting:
"It's a gasser, Mr. Gray! Biggest I ever seen."
"Gas?" the latter mumbled, indistinctly. "Isn't there any—oil?" His words were almost like a whisper because of the noise.
"Not yet. May be later. Say, she's a heller, ain't she? I'll bet she's makin' twenty million feet—"
"Gasser's no good."
"Can't tell yet. We gotta shut her down easy so she don't blow the casing out—run wild on us, understand?" Buddy was still breathless, but he plunged out the door and back into that sea of sound.
With a tragic intensity akin to wildness, Gray stared up into Allie Briskow's face. "Worthless, eh? And they told me ten thousand barrels." He carried a shaking hand to his bandaged head and tried vainly to collect his wits. "What's matter?" he queried, thickly. "Everything whirling—sick—"
"You had an accident, but it's all right; all right—No, no! Please lie still."
"Running wild, eh? Tha's what hurts my head so. Blown the casing out—Bad, isn't it? Sometimes they run wild for weeks, years—ruin everything." He tried again to rise, then insisted, querulously: "Goto get oil in this well! I've got to! Last chance, Allie. Got to get ten thousand barrels!"
"Please! You mustn't—" Allie had her strong hands upon his shoulders; she was arguing firmly but as gently as possible under the circumstances, when something occurred so extraordinary, so unexpected, as to paralyze her. Of a sudden the interior of the dim-lit, canvas-roofed shack was illuminated as if by a searchlight, and she turned her head to see that the whole out-of-doors was visible and that the night itself had turned into day.
With a cry that died weakly amid the chaos of sound beating over her, the girl ran to the window and looked out. What she beheld was a nightmare scene. The well was afire. It had exploded into flame. Where, a moment before, it had been belching skyward an enormous stream of gaseous vapor, all but invisible except at the casing head, now it was a monstrous blow torch, the flaming crest of which was tossed a hundred feet high. Nothing in the nature of a conflagration could have been more awe-inspiring, more confounding to the faculties than that roaring column of consuming fire. It was a thing incredibly huge, incredibly furious, incredibly wild. Human figures, black against its glare, were flying to safety, near-by silhouettes were flinging their arms aloft and dashing backward and forward; faces upturned to it were white and terrified. The scattered mesquite stood against the night like a wall, spotted with inky shadows, and, above, the heavens resembled a boiling caldron.
It was a hellish picture; it remained indelibly fixed upon Allie Briskow's mind. As she looked on in horrid fascination, she saw the derrick change into a latticelike tower of flame, saw its upper part begin slowly to crumble and disintegrate. The force with which the gas issued blew the blaze high and held it dancing, tumbling in mid-air, a phenomenon indescribably weird and impressive. The men who stood nearest bent their heads and shielded their faces from the heat.
Allie tore her eyes away from the spectacle finally. She turned back to the bed, then she halted, for it was empty. The door, still ajar from Buddy's headlong exit, informed her whence her patient had gone, and she flew after him.
She found him not half a dozen paces away. In fact, she stumbled over his prostrate body. With an amazon's strength, she gathered him into her arms, then staggered with him back to his couch, and as she strained him to herself she loudly called his name. Amid that demoniac din, amid the shrieking of those million devils, freed from the black chasms of the rock, her voice was as feeble as the wail of a sick child.
When she had laid her inert burden upon the bed, Allie knelt and took Gray's head upon her bosom. Then, for the first time, those forces imprisoned deep within her being ran wild, and under the red glare of that flaming geyser she kissed his hair, his eyes, his lips. Over and over again she kissed them with the hungry passion of a woman starved.
A subdued but continuous whispering irritated Calvin Gray. When it persisted, minute after minute, he opened his eyes, asking himself, dully, why it was that people couldn't let a fellow sleep. He lay, for some time, trying to recognize his unfamiliar surroundings; oddly enough, he could not discover the origin of that low-pitched murmur, since there was nobody in his bedroom. Evidently he had slept too hard, for his eyes were heavy, his vision was distorted, and an unaccustomed lassitude bore down his body and stupefied his brain. A thousand indistinct memories were moving about in the penumbral borderland of consciousness, but they refused to take shape. They would emerge into the light presently, of course. Meanwhile, it was restful to remain in this state of semi-stupefaction. He was pretty tired.
That whispering, he realized after a while, was nothing more than the monotonous murmur of rain upon a shingle roof, and the gurgle from dripping eaves. Oh yes! It had been pouring for several days; raining buckets, barrels—Ten thousand barrels a day!
Yonder was something familiar; a patent, spring rocking-chair. Gray knew it well. It creaked miserably when you sat in it, and when you got up to look at diamond rings it snapped its jaws at you like an alligator. Odd that they'd let an alligator into the Ajax Hotel. Nelson's doings, probably. Always up to some deviltry, that Nelson. But, thank God, the fire was out, and that ear-splitting racket that hurt his head had changed into the soothing patter of raindrops. There couldn't be any fire with ten thousand barrels of rain falling.
Gray closed his eyes and dozed briefly. But he had dreams; calamity haunted him; he awoke to the realization of some horror. Slowly his brain began to function, then more swiftly, until, like a flood released, memory returned. He groaned aloud.
Allegheny Briskow appeared out of nowhere and laid a soothing hand upon his brow. When she saw the light of sanity in his eyes, her face brightened and she cried, eagerly:
"You're coming around all right, aren't you?"
"Ten thousand barrels!" he mumbled. "They said it would be a big well and I counted on it."
"Don't try to think—"
"But it came in a gasser. I remember it all now—nearly all. I—I'm about ruined, I guess."
"No, no!"
"It caught fire."
"You mustn't talk. Everything is all right—all right, honestly. I'll tell you everything, but just you rest now until Buddy comes." There was magnetism to the girl's touch and comfort in her voice.
It was some time later that Gray opened his eyes and spoke in a more natural voice, saying, "How do I happen to be here in your house, Allie?"
"We brought you over at daylight. Buddy's gone for a doctor, but he'll be back." The girl averted her face quickly and moved toward the window.
"I remember being hurt in some way—derrick fell on me, or something.Then the well caught fire. What time is it?"
"It's afternoon. About four o'clock. Buddy 'll be back—" Allie's voice caught queerly. "He'll get back somehow."
"He ought to be at the well—putting it out. God! What a sight! I see it yet!"
"The well is out!" Allie returned and seated herself beside the bed. "You probably won't understand it or believe it—I can scarcely believe it myself, for it's a miracle. All the same, it is out, shut in, and not much damage done. You're not ruined, either, for Buddy says they're short of fuel here, and a gasser this size is worth a good deal—'most as much as a fair oil well.'"
"How can it be shut in? It was blazing, roaring—a tower of flame. The derrick itself was going—"
"I know, but the strangest thing—" Allie spoke breathlessly. "Let me do the talking, please. You remember the drill stems were standing over in one corner? Well, the fire drove everybody off, of course; there was no facing it, and they thought sure they'd have a job—have to send for boilers and smother it down with steam, maybe, or tunnel under, or something—work for days, maybe weeks, and spend a fortune. Anyhow, they were in a panic, but when the derrick went down what do you think? That stack of drill stems fell in such a way as to close the gate valve at the top of the casing."
Gray frowned, he shook his head. "Impossible. You're trying to ease my mind."
"Of course it's impossible. But it happened, just as I tell you. Buddy had a bar fixed in the valve wheel, like a long handle, so that a half turn, or maybe a quarter, would shut it. Anyhow, those drill stems caught that bar in falling and closed the valve. Somebody said it happened once before, to an oil well over in Louisiana—"
"It—sounds incredible." The speaker made an effort to collect himself, he raised an uncertain hand to his bandaged head. "What ails me? I recall a lot of things, but they're pretty well confused."
Allie made known, the nature of the accident resulting in Gray's injury, and he nodded his understanding. "So Buddy saved my life!" He smiled. "Great boy, Buddy! I'll know better than to mix it with him again—he learns too quickly."
"Oh, it was terrible! I've been so—so frightened!" Allie Briskow suddenly lost control of herself and, bowing her head, she hid her face in the musty patchwork quilt. Her shoulders shook, her whole strong body twitched and trembled. "You've b-been awful sick. I did the best I could, but—"
"There, there!" Gray placed his hand upon the girl's head; he took her palm in his and stroked it. "I'm not worth your tears, child. And, anyhow, I'm all right again; I am, indeed. I'm as well as ever, so far as I can tell. By the way, what set the well afire?"
"Buddy thinks somebody must have dropped a cigarette when the stampede came." The girl raised her face and wiped the tears from it. "It doesn't seem possible anybody would be so careless as to smoke near a well that was coming in, but—Just think, Mr. Gray, those drill stems shut it off! Why, it was the hand of God!"
"It seems so. My luck hasn't run out, that's plain." The speaker pondered briefly, then he said: "Shut in! Safe! Jove, it's wonderful! Buddy can take me to the railroad to-night and—"
"Oh, you can't leave. You're not able."
"I must. This gasser was a great disappointment to me. I allowed myself to count on a big well, and now I have a serious problem to meet. It must be met without delay. Buddy will soon be back, I dare say?" Allie undertook to evade the speaker's eye, but unsuccessfully, and he inquired, sharply: "What's wrong? What's happened to him?"
"Nothing. He's all right, but"—Gray's evident alarm demanded the truth, therefore she explained—"but I don't know when he'll be back. That's why I've been so frightened. It has been raining cats and dogs; the creek has overflowed and everything is under water."
"Under water? Here? Why, that can't be." Gray insisted upon rising, and Allie finally consented to his doing so; then, despite his protest that he was quite able to take care of himself, she helped him to the window. From that position he beheld a surprising scene.
The Briskow farm lay in a flat, saucerlike valley, arid and dusty at most seasons of the year, but now a shallow lake, the surface of which was broken by occasional fences, misty clumps of bushes, or the tops of dead weeds. The nearest Briskow derrick was dimly visible, its floor awash, its shape suggestive of the battle mast of a sunken man-of-war.
"It's not more than a foot or two deep on the level," Allie explained, "but that's enough. And it has come up six inches since Buddy left. He'd have been back before this if he could have made it."
"Did you ever see it like this before?"
"Once, when I was a little girl. Some years the creek never has a drop in it."
"Then we're marooned."
"We were cut off for three days that time."
Gray frowned. What next? he asked himself. Here was a calamity that could not be dodged. He shrugged, finally. "No use to fret. No use to crouch beneath a load. I'd give my right arm to be back in Dallas, but—this is our chance to cultivate the Christian virtue of submission. So be it! One must have a heart for every fate, but," he smiled at the girl, "it is hard to be philosophical when you're hungry. And I'm hungry."
"Oh, youarebetter!"
"I'm well, I tell you, except for the bruises bequeathed me by your brutal brother. Three days—a week, maybe! My God! By the way, is there any food in the house?"
"Plenty."
"Then—we've nothing to do except get better acquainted, and that is something I've wanted to do for some time."
Allegheny Briskow sang while she prepared supper, for the reaction from the strain of the last twelve hours was like an intoxication. Mr. Gray was in no further danger; he was well except for a bandaged head and some bruises. And he was here alone with her. They were as completely cut off from the outside world as if shipwrecked on some island, and, for the time being at least, he was hers to look out for, hers to wait upon and to guard. Allie laughed at the drumming of the rain upon the kitchen roof, and she thrilled at memory of some of the things she had done. She could feel again Gray's head upon her bosom, his lips against hers, his body strained to hers. She had listened to his heartbeats; with her own abundant strength she had shielded him, fought for him, drawn him, by very force of her will, back to life; the anguish she had suffered during those long hours became, in retrospect, a poignant pleasure.
She wondered if by any chance he would remember—there had been times when he had seemed to be almost rational. She hoped not. And yet—why not? If he did remember, if indeed he had felt her kisses or heard her pleadings, that memory, even if subconscious, might serve to awaken him. It might evoke some response to the flaming passion that had finally escaped her control. Gray was a strong man; his emotions, once roused, were probably as wild as hers, therefore who could tell what might happen? Irresistible forces, fire and flood, had thrown them together. They were at the mercy of elemental powers, and they were alone with each other—a man and a woman. Allie hoped against hope; she prayed recklessly, defiantly, that her hour had struck.
Gray came into the kitchen after a while to warm himself over the stove. He was still a little bit unsteady on his feet, and his head felt queer; but he assumed a certain gayety and insisted upon bearing an awkward hand with the cooking and the dishes. He had never seen Allie as she was now, nor in a mood to compare with this, and for the first time he realized how fully she had developed. It was not surprising that her metamorphosis had escaped his attention, for he had never taken time to do more than briefly appraise her. With leisure for observation, however, he noted that she had made good her promise of rare physical charm, and that her comeliness had ripened into real beauty—beauty built on an overwhelming scale, to be sure, and hence doubly striking—moreover, he saw that all traces of her stolidity had vanished. She was an intelligent, wide-awake, vibrant person, and at this moment a genial fire, a breathless excitement, was ablaze within her. Gray complimented her frankly, and she was extravagantly pleased.
"Buddy said almost the same thing," she told him. "I don't care whether it's true or not, if you believe it."
"Oh, it's true! I saw great things in you, but—"
"Even when you saw me hoeing in the garden that first day?"
"Even then; but I wasn't prepared for a miracle. You were an enchanted princess, and it required only a magic word to break the spell."
"It is all your doings, Mr. Gray. Whatever I am I owe it all to you. And it's the same with the rest of the family. I—" Allie hesitated, looked up from her work, then shook her head smilingly.
"What?"
"I feel as if—well, as if you'd made me and I—belonged to you." It was dusk by this time; the girl's face was lit only by the indirect glow from the open door of the stove, therefore Gray could make nothing of her expression.
"How very flattering!" he laughed. "As a real matter of fact, I had almost nothing to do with it."
"All the same that's how I feel—as if I owed you everything and had to give something back. Women are queer, I guess. They love to give. And yet they're selfish—more selfish than men."
"I wouldn't say so."
"You don't know how bad hurt you were, Mr. Gray. I saved your life as much as Buddy did. You'd have died only for—only I wouldn't let you."
"I believe it. So, you see, you have more than evened the score. After all, I merely awakened the Sleeping Beauty, while you—"
"The prince woke her up with a kiss, didn't he?" Allie said, with a smile.
"So the story goes. Fairy stories, by the way, are the only kind one can afford to believe."
"Then I've got—something coming to me, haven't I?"
This time the girl turned her face invitingly to the speaker and waited.
Here was a new Allie Briskow, indeed, and one that amazed, nay, disturbed, Gray. Romance, he told himself. The girl meant nothing by this; nevertheless, her fancy had run far enough. He ignored her invitation, and instead of kissing her he patted her shoulder affectionately, saying:
"You're a dear child, and I can never repay you for mending my poor cracked head."
He turned his back, went to the table and lit the lamp, uncomfortably aware of the fact, meanwhile, that Allie remained motionless where he had left her. He ran on, casually, during the time he adjusted chimney and wick: "I was on the porch just now and found a rabbit crouching there. The poor thing was too wet and frightened to move." Allie did not seem to hear him. "All sorts of things are floating about; dead chickens, rattlesnakes, and—Oh yes, another thing I noticed; there's a good deal of oil on the water! I wonder where it comes from?"
Allie stirred herself; she jerked open the oven door, peered in, then slammed it shut. Her voice was sullen as she said: "They've been expecting a gusher on sixteen. Maybe the reservoirs have overflowed, or a pipe line has broken. Maybe it came in wild, you can't tell. This flood will cost a good many people a lot."
Supper, when the two sat down to it, proved to be a pleasant meal, for the soft glow of the lamp, the warmth from the stove, made of the Briskow kitchen a cozy place, while the drumming of the rain overhead enhanced their feeling of comfort and security. Gray's appetite was not that of a sick man, and Allie, who had regained her agreeable humor by this time, waited upon him with eager face and shining eyes. He paused, finally, to say:
"See here! You're not eating a bite."
"I'm not hungry. I couldn't eat, to-night. Please—I'm perfectly happy. I feel like a slave at the great lord's table; all I care to do is look on." After a moment she continued: "It couldn't have been so bad to be a slave—a girl slave. Somebody owned them, anyhow; they belonged to their masters, body and soul, and that's something. Women are like that. They've got to belong to somebody to be happy."
Gray was a talkative man, therefore he argued this point until he began to suspect that his companion was not heeding his words so much as the sound of his voice. More plainly than before he realized that there was something about Allie to-night utterly strange and quite contrary to his conception of her, but, because he believed her to be unlike other women, he did not try to understand it.
During the night an explosive crash followed by a loud reverberation awoke Calvin Gray and brought him up sitting. His room was lit by white flickers, against which he saw that the rain still sheeted his windows; he fumbled for his watch and found that it was two o'clock. This was a storm, indeed, and he began to fear that this deluge might swell the waters to a danger point; therefore he rose, struck a light, and dressed himself. Sleep was out of the question, anyhow, amid such an uproar. As he stepped out upon the front porch, his attention was instantly drawn to a yellow glow in the west, a distant torch, the flame of which illuminated the angry night. He stared at it for a moment before he realized its meaning. A well was afire! Lightning had wrecked a derrick and ignited the stream of oil. No wonder, he told himself, for this field was dotted with towers well calculated to lead lightning out of the skies, and amid a play of destructive forces such as this nothing less than a miracle could have prevented something of the sort. But it was a pity, for yonder a small-sized fortune was going up in smoke.
By the next flare he saw that the waters had crept higher. They were nearly up to the porch floor now, and, obviously, they were still rising. That rabbit was crouched where he had last seen it, a wet ball of fur with round, black eyes. The heavens echoed almost constantly, now to a thick, distant rumble, again to an appalling din directly overhead; for seconds at a time there was light enough to read by. The house, Gray decided, was in no danger, except from a direct bolt, for the valley was nothing more than a shallow lake; nevertheless—
A blinding, blue-white streak came, and he counted the seconds before the sound reached him. Sound traveled something like a thousand feet a second, he reflected; that bolt must have struck about a mile distant. Nothing alarming about that, surely. A moment, then he blinked and rubbed his eyes, for out of the murk was born another bonfire like that to the westward.
Hearing an exclamation behind him, Gray turned to behold AllieBriskow's dim figure in the door.
"Hello!" he cried, excitedly. "Did you see that? Yonder are two wells afire."
"I know. I haven't closed my eyes. You can see another one from my window." Allia snapped the light from a pocket flash upon Gray, and, noting that he was only partly clad, she urged him to come into the house. When he ignored the request she joined him, and together they stared at the mounting flames.
"Jove! That's terrible!" he muttered.
"Look here." Allie directed the beam of her light down over the edge of the porch, and moved it slowly from side to side. The surface of the water was not only burdened with debris, but also it was thick with oil. "It's just like that on the other side. That gusher on sixteen must be wild."
"Why didn't you call me?" the man inquired, sharply.
"What was the use? There's no chance for us to get out."
"How far is it back to high ground?"
"Quite a ways. Too far to wade. It would be over our heads in places, too. I don't like the look of it, do you? Not with those fires going, and—"
"I dare say it won't get any worse." Gray spoke with a carelessness that he was far from feeling, but his tone did not deceive the girl.
"It doesn't have to get any worse," she declared, im patiently."There's oil enough here to burn. We're in the middle of a lake of it.What 'll happen if it catches fire?"
"Frankly, I don't know. I've never been marooned in a lake of oil.Probably this rain would quench it-"
"You know better than that!" Allie cried. "Don't act as if I were a kid. We're in a bad fix, with fire on three sides of us."
"At least we'll be as well off inside as out here," Gray declared, and his companion agreed, so together they went into her room, where, side by side, they peered through her window. What Allie had said was true, and the man pinched himself to see if he were dreaming. This conflagration was even closer than the others, and he could not doubt that there was every likelihood of its spreading to the surface of the lake itself. Here was a situation, truly. For the life of him he could think of no way out of it.
"I've read about this sort of thing," Allie was saying. "Tanks bursting and rivers afire. It spreads all over, the fire does, and there's no putting it out."
"One thing sure, this lightning won't last long—"
A blue glare and a ripping explosion gave the lie to Gray's cheering words. Allie Briskow recoiled from the window.
"We'll be burned alive!" she gasped. "Roasted like rats in a trap.I—I'm frightened, Mr. Gray." She drew closer to him.
"No need of that. We'll get out of this scrape somehow—people always do." A flicker lit the room, and he saw that the face upturned to his was wide eyed, strained. That brief glimpse of Allie, like a picture seen through the shutter of a camera, remained long with the man, for her hair was unbound, her lips were parted, and her dark eyes were peculiarly brilliant; through the opening of her lacy negligee her round, white neck and swelling bosom were exposed. It was a head, a bust, to be remembered.
"I—You got to—hold me," she said, huskily, and he felt her body shrink close to his. She clung tightly to him, trembling at first, then shaking in every limb. Fright, it seemed, had suddenly mastered Allie Briskow.
Gray endeavored for a moment to soothe her, then gently to loosen her hold; he spoke to her as he would have spoken to a terrified child, but the wildness of her emotion matched the wildness of the night, and her strength was nearly equal to his. Knowing her as he did, this abysmal terror was inexplicable; such abandon was entirely out of keeping with her. But she had acted queerly ever since—Gray was ashamed of the thought that leaped into his mind; he hated himself for harboring it. He hated himself also for the thrill that coursed through him at contact with this disheveled creature. The touch of her flesh disturbed him unbearably. Roughly he tore her arms from about his neck and put her away from him; by main strength he forced her into a chair, then snatched a covering of some sort from the bed and folded it around her shoulders. His voice was hoarse—to him it sounded almost brutal as he said:
"Get hold of yourself! We're in no great danger, really. Now then, a light will help us both." With clumsy hands he struck a match and lit the lamp. "Light's a great thing—drives away foolishness—nightmares and fancies of all sorts." Without looking at her he seized the electric torch and muttered: "I'll take a look around, just to see that things are snug. Back presently."
Gray despised himself thoroughly when the turmoil within him persisted; when he still felt the unruly urge to return whence he had come. Wild horses! That was how Gus Briskow had described his children. Well, Allie had followed Buddy's example and jumped the fence. Here was something unique in the way of an experience, sure enough; here were forces at play as savage and as destructive as those that lit the heavens. The girl was magnificent, maddening—and he was running away from her! He, a man of the world, as ruthless as most men of his type! It was a phenomenon to awaken sardonic mirth. He wondered what had come over him. He had changed, indeed.
Could it be that he had read a wrong significance into Allie's actions? Thus his mind worked when he grew calmer. He tried to answer in the affirmative, but already he hated himself sufficiently. No, the night had done it. Texas cattle stampede on stormy nights. They run blindly to destruction. The very air was surcharged, electric, and the girl was untamed, only a step removed from the soil. The possibility that she could be seriously interested in him, strangely enough, never presented itself.
Gray laid strong hold of himself, but it is not easy to subdue thought, and he could feel those strong, smooth, velvet arms encircling him. Disorder without and chaos within this house! The heavens rumbled like a mighty drumhead, the lightning made useless the feeble ray in his hand. It was the place, the hour of impulse. Gray swore savagely at himself, then he stumbled into his room and dressed himself more fully.
"Well, there doesn't seem to be much change," he said, cheerfully, as he opened Allie's door awhile later. "The fires don't seem to be spreading." She was sitting where he had left her, she had not moved. "Anything new on this side?"
Allie shrugged; slowly she turned, exposing a face tragic and stony. "I guess you don't think much of me," she said.
"Indeed!" he declared, heartily. "This is enough to frighten anybody. I don't mind saying it has upset me. But the worst is over." He laid a reassuring hand upon her shoulder.
Allie moved her body convulsively. "Lemme be!" she cried, sharply. "I don't mind the lightning. I ain't scared of the fire, either—hell fire or any other kind. I ain't scared of anything, and yet—I'm a dam' coward!"
She rose, gathered her loose robe more closely about her, and made blindly toward the bed. She flung herself upon it and buried her face in the pillows. "Just a—dam' coward!" she repeated, in a muffled wail. "My God, I wish the blaze would come!"
Buddy Briskow had difficulty in getting out of the valley on his way for a doctor, for never had the roads been like this. He drove recklessly; where necessary he disregarded fences and pushed across pastures that were hub deep; he even burst through occasional thickets in defiance of axle and tire. It was a mad journey, like the ride in a death-defying movie serial; only by some miraculous power of cohesion did the machine hold together and thus enable him to keep it under way and bring it out to high ground. Since he had not taken time before leaving to change into dry clothing, he was drenched to the skin; he was, in fact, sheeted with mud like the car itself.
To find a doctor, however, was a problem. Buddy tried first one camp, then another, but without success. Meanwhile, the downpour continued and the creeks rose steadily, obliging him to make numerous detours and to follow the ridge roads wherever possible. He was aching in every bone and muscle from the pounding he had received, his arms were numb, his back was broken. He drowned his motor finally in fording a roily stream and abandoned the car.
He came into Ranger that afternoon on the back of a truck horse that he had borrowed—without the owner's consent. For a time it seemed that if he got a doctor at all he would have to follow a similar procedure, but the Briskow name was powerful, and Buddy talked in big figures, so eventually he set out on the return journey—this time in a springless freight wagon drawn by the stoutest team in town. A medical man was on the seat beside him.
Progress was maddeningly slow, incredibly tedious; creek beds, long dry, had become foaming torrents; in places even the level roads were belly deep and the horses floundered. When one of them fell, it required infinite labor and patience to get it upon its feet again.
It was after midnight when Buddy and his miserable companion gained the comparatively easy going of the last ridge, that flinty range beyond which lay the Briskow farm. Here they drove in the glare of lightning and under a sky that rumbled almost steadily, for a frightful electric storm had broken. Here it was that they saw what havoc was being wrought—they counted several blazing wells ahead of them.
Buddy stopped at a drilling camp where lights showed the occupants to be astir, and there he received confirmation of his fears. The flats beyond were inundated to a depth rendering travel impossible, and although some of the men stationed out there had managed to work their way back, others were, for the time being, hopelessly cut off. What was more alarming by far, in view of these blazing beacons, was the news that a huge gusher on sixteen was wild and pouring its inflammable flood out upon the surface of the water.
Buddy stood in the midst of a spreading puddle from his streaming clothes, and through chattering teeth announced: "My sister and Mr. Gray are out there. Igottaget through!"
"How you going to get through, kid?" one of the drillers inquired. "Our men had to swim in places."
"I guess I can swim, if I try. Feller can do 'most anything if he has to. How about you, Doc?" Buddy turned to his traveling companion.
The latter shook his head positively. "You're crazy, Briskow. We'd probably drown. If we didn't, we'd be burned alive when that loose oil catches fire."
"Looks like it's bound to catch if this lightning keeps up," some one declared. "Listen to that!"
Buddy cursed furiously and lurched toward the door. It took force to restrain him from going.
That was indeed a night of terror in the oil fields, for destruction was wholesale, and to those who were fortunate enough to be in no danger it was scarcely less trying than for the luckless ones out in the flooded area. Buddy Briskow was half demented. At one time it seemed certain that the surface oil was aflame near his father's farm, and the pictures he conjured up were unbearable.
The rain ceased with the passing of the electrical storm, but the late hours of the night were thick and the fires continued to burn. It seemed as if morning would never come. With the first light Buddy mounted one of his horses, and, regardless of admonitions, set out. In miles he had no great distance to go; nevertheless, it was midday before he came in sight of his father's unpainted farmhouse, and when he dismounted at the front porch he fell rather than walked through the door.
He broke down and blubbered weakly when he saw Calvin Gray up and around and apparently well. He collapsed into a chair and huddled there in a wet heap, the while he sobbed and laughed hysterically. He was considerably ashamed of his show of feeling.
Even after he had been helped into the kitchen and his wet clothes had been stripped from him, he could tell little about his trip, but hot food and drink brought him around and then, indeed, his story was one that deeply touched the elder man.
Already the waters had ceased to rise, but Buddy's difficulty in getting through proved the folly of attempting escape for the time being; his horse had been forced to swim with him in more than one place; in others he had waded waist deep, stumbling through thickets, hauling the animal after him by main strength. There was nothing to do, it seemed, but await a subsidence of the flood. Then, too, the boy was half dead for sleep.
Under the circumstances it was not easy for the elder man to face this delay. His affairs were in a precarious condition and more in need of his immediate attention than ever before; to be cut off, therefore, to be lost for several days at this particular time was more than a misfortune—it was a catastrophe. Such vague plans as he had considered he was now forced to abandon. He could see ruin ahead.