Bennington awoke early the next morning, a pleased glow of anticipation1 warming his heart, and almost before his eyes were opened he had raised himself to leap out of the bunk2. Then with a disappointed sigh he sank back. On the roof fell the heavy patter of raindrops.
After a time he arose and pulled aside the curtains of a window. The nearer world was dripping; the farther world was hidden or obscured by long veils of rain, driven in ragged3 clouds before a west wind. Yesterday the leaves had waved lightly, the undergrowth of shrubs4 had uplifted in feathery airiness of texture5, the ground beneath had been crisp and aromatic6 with pine needles. Now everything bore a drooping7, sodden8 aspect which spoke9 rather of decay than of the life of spring. Even the chickens had wisely remained indoors, with the exception of a single bedraggled old rooster, whose melancholy10 appearance added another shade of gloom to the dismal11 outlook. The wind twisted his long tail feathers from side to side so energetically that, even as Bennington looked, the poor fowl12, perforce, had to scud13, careened from one side to the other, like a heavily-laden craft, into the shelter of his coop. The wind, left to its own devices, skittered across cold-looking little pools of water, and tried in vain to induce the soaked leaves of the autumn before to essay an aerial flight.
The rain hit the roof now in heavy gusts14 as though some one had dashed it from a pail. The wind whistled through a loosened shingle15 and rattled16 around an ill-made joint17. Within the house itself some slight sounds of preparation for breakfast sounded the clearer against the turmoil18 outside. And then Bennington became conscious that for some time he had _felt_ another sound underneath19 all the rest. It was grand and organlike in tone, resembling the roar of surf on a sand beach as much as anything else. He looked out again, and saw that it was the wind in the trees. The same conditions that had before touched the harp20 murmur21 of a stiller day now struck out a rush and roar almost awe-inspiring in its volume. Bennington impulsively22 threw open the window and leaned out.
The great hill back of the camp was so steep that the pines growing on its slope offered to the breeze an almost perpendicular23 screen of branches. Instead of one, or at most a dozen trees, the wind here passed through a thousand at once. As a consequence, the stir of air that in a level woodland would arouse but a faint whisper, here would pass with a rustling24 murmur; a murmur would be magnified into a noise as of the mellow26 falling of waters; and now that the storm had awakened27, the hill caught up its cry with a howl so awful and sustained that, as the open window let in the full volume of its blast, Bennington involuntarily drew back. He closed the sash and turned to dress.
After the first disappointment, strange to say, Bennington became quite resigned. He had felt, a little illogically, that this giving of a whole day to the picnic was not quite the thing. His Puritan conscience impressed him with the sacredness of work. He settled down to the fact of the rainstorm with a pleasant recognition of its inevitability28, and a resolve to improve his time.
To that end, after breakfast, he drew on a pair of fleece-lined slippers29, donned a sweater, occupied two chairs in the well-known fashion, and attacked with energy the pages of Le Conte's _Geology_. This book, as you very well know, discourses30 at first with great interest concerning erosions. Among other things it convinces you that a current of water, being doubled in swiftness, can transport a mass sixty-four times as heavy as when it ran half as fast. This astounding31 proposition is abstrusely32 proved. As Bennington had resolved not to make his reading mere33 recreation, he drew diagrams conscientiously34 until he understood it. Then he passed on to an earnest consideration of why the revolution of the globe and the resistance of continents cause oceanic currents of a particular direction and velocity35. Besides this, there was much easier reading concerning alluvial36 deposits. So interested did he grow that Old Mizzou, coming in, muddy-hoofed and glistening37 from a round of the stock, found him quite unapproachable on the subject of cribbage. The patriarch then stumped38 over to Arthur's cabin.
After dinner, Bennington picked up the book again, but found that his brain had reached the limit of spontaneous mental effort. He looked for Old Mizzou and the cribbage game. The miner had gone to visit Arthur again. Bennington wandered about disconsolately39.
For a time he drummed idly on the window pane41. Then he took out his revolver and tried to practise through the open doorway42. The smoke from the discharges hung heavy in the damp air, filling the room in a most disagreeable fashion. Bennington's trips to see the effect of his shots proved to him the fiendish propensity43 of everything he touched, were it never so lightly, to sprinkle him with cold water. Above all, his skill with the weapon was not great enough as yet to make it much fun. He abandoned pistol shooting and yawned extensively, wishing it were time to go to bed.
In the evening he played cribbage with Old Mizzou. After a time Arthur and his wife came in and they had a dreary44 game of "cinch," the man speaking but little, the woman not at all. Old Mizzou smoked incessantly45 on a corncob pipe charged with a peculiarly pungent47 variety of tobacco, which filled the air with a blue vapour, and penetrated48 unpleasantly into Bennington's mucous49 membranes50.
The next morning it was still raining.
Bennington became very impatient indeed, but he tackled Le Conte industriously51, and did well enough until he tried to get it into his head why various things happen to glaciers52. Then viscosity53, the lines of swiftest motion, relegation54, and directions of pressure came forth55 from the printed pages and mocked him. He arose in his might and went forth into the open air.
Before going out he had put on his canvas shooting coat and a pair of hobnailed leather hunting boots, laced for a little distance at the front and sides. He visited the horses, standing56 disconsolate40 under an open shed in the corral; he slopped, with constantly accruing57 masses of sticky earth at his feet, to the chicken coop, into which he cast an eye; he even took the kitchen pails and tramped down to the spring and back. In the gulch58 he did not see or hear a living thing. A newly-born and dirty little stream was trickling59 destructively through all manner of shivering grasses and flowers. The water from Bennington's sleeves ran down over the harsh canvas cuffs60 and turned his hands purple with the cold. He returned to the cabin and changed his clothes.
The short walk had refreshed him, but it had spurred his impatience61. Outside, the world seemed to have changed. His experience with the Hills, up to now, had always been in one phase of their beauty--that of clear, bright sunshine and soft skies. Now it was as a different country. He could not get rid of the feeling, foolish as it was, that it was in reality different; and that the whole episode of the girl and the rock was as a vision which had passed. It grew indistinct in the presence of this iron reality of cold and wet. He could not assure himself he had not imagined it all. Thus, belated, he came to thinking of her again, and having now nothing else to do, he fell into daydreams62 that had no other effect than to reveal to him the impatience which had been, from the first, the real cause of his restlessness under the temporary confinement63. Now the impatience grew in intensity64. He resolved that if the morrow did not end the storm, he would tramp down the gulch to make a call. All this time _Aliris_ lay quite untouched.
The next day dawned darker than ever. After breakfast Old Mizzou, as usual, went out to feed the horses, and Bennington, through sheer idleness, accompanied him. They distributed the oats and hay, and then stood, sheltered from the direct rain, conversing65 idly.
Suddenly the wind died and the rain ceased. In the place of the gloom succeeded a strange sulphur-yellow glare which lay on the spirit with almost physical oppression. Old Mizzou shouted something, and scrambled66 excitedly to the house. Bennington looked about him bewildered.
Over back of the hill, dimly discernible through the trees, loomed67 the black irregular shape of a cloud, in dismal contrast to the yellow glare which now filled all the sky. The horses, frightened, crowded up close to Bennington, trying to push their noses over his shoulder. A number of jays and finches rushed down through the woods and darted68 rapidly, each with its peculiar46 flight, toward a clump69 of trees and bushes standing on a ridge70 across the valley.
From the cabin Old Mizzou was shouting to him. He turned to follow the old man. Back of him something vast and awful roared out, and then all at once he felt himself struggling with a rush of waters. He was jammed violently against the posts of the corral. There he worked to his feet.
The whole side of the hill was one vast spread of shallow tossing water, as though a lake had been let fall on the summit of the ridge. The smaller bushes were uprooted71 and swept along, but the trees and saplings held their own.
In a moment the stones and ridgelets began to show. It was over. Not a drop of rain had fallen.
Bennington climbed the corral fence and walked slowly to the house. The blacksmith shop was filled to the window, and Arthur's cabin was not much better. He entered the kitchen. The floor there was some two inches submerged, but the water was slowly escaping through the down-hill door by which Bennington had come in. Across the dining-room door Mrs. Arthur had laid a folded rug. In front of the barrier stood the lady herself, vigorously sweeping72 back the threatening water from her only glorious apartment.
Bennington took the broom from her and swept until the cessation of the flood made it no longer necessary. Mrs. Arthur commenced to mop the floor. The young man stepped outside. There he was joined a moment later by the other two.
They offered no explanation of their whereabouts during the trouble, but Bennington surmised73 shrewdly that they had hunted a dry place.
"Glory!" cried Old Mizzou. "Lucky she misses us!"
"What was it? Where'd it come from?" inquired Bennington, shaking the surface drops from his shoulders. He was wet through.
"Cloud-burst," replied the miner. "She hit up th' ridge a ways. If she'd ever burst yere, sonny, ye'd never know what drownded ye. Look at that gulch!"
The water had now drained from the hill entirely74. It could be seen that most of the surface earth had been washed away, leaving the skeleton of the mountain bare. Some of the more slightly rooted trees had fallen, or clung precariously75 to the earth with bony fingers. But the gulch itself was terrible. The mountain laurel, the elders, the sarvis bushes, the wild roses which, a few days before, had been fragrant76 and beautiful with blossom and leaf and musical with birds, had disappeared. In their stead rolled an angry brown flood whirling in almost unbroken surface from bank to bank. Several oaks, submerged to their branches, raised their arms helplessly. As Bennington looked, one of these bent77 slowly and sank from sight. A moment later it shot with great suddenness half its length into the air, was seized by the eager waters, and whisked away as lightly as though it had been a tree of straw. Dark objects began to come down with the stream. They seemed to be trying to preserve a semblance78 of dignity in their stately bobbing up and down, but apparently79 found the attempt difficult. The roar was almost deafening80, but even above it a strangely deliberate grinding noise was audible. Old Mizzou said it was the grating of boulders81 as they were rolled along the bed of the stream. The yellow glow had disappeared from the air, and the gloom of rain had taken its place.
A fine mist began to fall. Bennington for the first time realized he was wet and shivering, and so he turned inside to change his clothes.
"It'll all be over in a few hours," remarked Arthur. "I reckon them Spanish Gulch people'll wish they lived up-stream."
Bennington paused at the doorway.
"That's so," he commented. "How about Spanish Gulch? Will it all be drowned out?"
"No, I reckon not," replied Arthur. "They'll get wet down a lot, and have wet blankets to sleep in to-night, that's all. You see the gulch spraddles out down there, an' then too all this timber'll jam down this gulch a-ways. That'll back up th' water some, and so she won't come all of a rush."
"I see," said Bennington.
The afternoon was well enough occupied in repairing to some extent the ravages82 of the brief storm. A length of the corral had succumbed83 to the flood, many valuable tools in the blacksmith shop were in danger of rust25 from the dampness, and Arthur and his wife had been completely washed out. All three men worked hard setting things to rights. The twilight84 caught them before their work was done.
Bennington found himself too weary to attempt an unknown, _debris_-covered road by dark. He played cribbage with Old Mizzou and won.
About half past nine he pushed back his chair and went outside. The stars had come out by the thousand, and a solitary85 cricket, which had in some way escaped the deluge86, was chirping87 in the middle distance. With a sudden uplift of the heart he realized that he would see "her" on the morrow. He learned that no matter how philosophically88 we may have borne a separation, the prospect89 of its near end shows us how strong the repression90 has been; the lifting of the bonds makes evident how much they have galled91.
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anticipation
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| n.预期，预料，期望 | |
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bunk
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| n.(车、船等倚壁而设的)铺位；废话 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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shrubs
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| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
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texture
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| n.(织物)质地；(材料)构造；结构；肌理 | |
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aromatic
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| adj.芳香的，有香味的 | |
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drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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sodden
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| adj.浑身湿透的；v.使浸透；使呆头呆脑 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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dismal
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| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
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fowl
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| n.家禽，鸡，禽肉 | |
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scud
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| n.疾行；v.疾行 | |
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gusts
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| 一阵强风( gust的名词复数 )； （怒、笑等的）爆发； （感情的）迸发； 发作 | |
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shingle
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| n.木瓦板；小招牌(尤指医生或律师挂的营业招牌)；v.用木瓦板盖（屋顶）；把（女子头发）剪短 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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turmoil
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| n.骚乱，混乱，动乱 | |
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underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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harp
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| n.竖琴；天琴座 | |
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murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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impulsively
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perpendicular
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| adj.垂直的，直立的；n.垂直线，垂直的位置 | |
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rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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rust
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| n.锈；v.生锈；(脑子)衰退 | |
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mellow
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| adj.柔和的；熟透的；v.变柔和；(使)成熟 | |
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awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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inevitability
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| n.必然性 | |
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slippers
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| n. 拖鞋 | |
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discourses
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| 论文( discourse的名词复数 )； 演说； 讲道； 话语 | |
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astounding
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| adj.使人震惊的vt.使震惊，使大吃一惊astound的现在分词) | |
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abstrusely
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| adv.难解地，深奥地 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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conscientiously
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| adv.凭良心地；认真地，负责尽职地；老老实实 | |
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velocity
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| n.速度，速率 | |
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alluvial
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| adj.冲积的；淤积的 | |
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glistening
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| adj.闪耀的，反光的v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的现在分词 ) | |
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stumped
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| 僵直地行走，跺步行走( stump的过去式和过去分词 )； 把（某人）难住； 使为难； （选举前）在某一地区作政治性巡回演说 | |
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disconsolately
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| adv.悲伤地，愁闷地；哭丧着脸 | |
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disconsolate
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| adj.忧郁的，不快的 | |
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pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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propensity
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| n.倾向；习性 | |
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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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incessantly
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| ad.不停地 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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pungent
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| adj.（气味、味道）刺激性的，辛辣的；尖锐的 | |
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penetrated
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| adj. 击穿的，鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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mucous
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| adj. 黏液的，似黏液的 | |
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membranes
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| n.（动物或植物体内的）薄膜( membrane的名词复数 )；隔膜；（可起防水、防风等作用的）膜状物 | |
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industriously
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glaciers
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| 冰河，冰川( glacier的名词复数 ) | |
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53
viscosity
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| n.粘度，粘性 | |
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relegation
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| n.驱逐，贬黜；降级 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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accruing
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| v.增加( accrue的现在分词 )；（通过自然增长）产生；获得；（使钱款、债务）积累 | |
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gulch
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| n.深谷，峡谷 | |
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trickling
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| n.油画底色含油太多而成泡沫状突起v.滴( trickle的现在分词 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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cuffs
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| n.袖口( cuff的名词复数 )v.掌打，拳打( cuff的第三人称单数 ) | |
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impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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daydreams
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| n.白日梦( daydream的名词复数 )v.想入非非，空想( daydream的第三人称单数 ) | |
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confinement
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| n.幽禁，拘留，监禁；分娩；限制，局限 | |
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intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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conversing
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| v.交谈，谈话( converse的现在分词 ) | |
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scrambled
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的过去式和过去分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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loomed
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| v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的过去式和过去分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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clump
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| n.树丛，草丛；vi.用沉重的脚步行走 | |
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ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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uprooted
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| v.把（某物）连根拔起( uproot的过去式和过去分词 )；根除；赶走；把…赶出家园 | |
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sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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surmised
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| v.臆测，推断( surmise的过去式和过去分词 )；揣测；猜想 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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precariously
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| adv.不安全地；危险地；碰机会地；不稳定地 | |
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76
fragrant
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| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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77
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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78
semblance
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| n.外貌，外表 | |
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79
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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80
deafening
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| adj. 振耳欲聋的, 极喧闹的 动词deafen的现在分词形式 | |
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81
boulders
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| n.卵石( boulder的名词复数 )；巨砾；（受水或天气侵蚀而成的）巨石；漂砾 | |
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82
ravages
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| 劫掠后的残迹，破坏的结果，毁坏后的残迹 | |
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83
succumbed
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| 不再抵抗（诱惑、疾病、攻击等）( succumb的过去式和过去分词 )； 屈从； 被压垮； 死 | |
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84
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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85
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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86
deluge
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| n./vt.洪水，暴雨，使泛滥 | |
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87
chirping
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| 鸟叫，虫鸣( chirp的现在分词 ) | |
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88
philosophically
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| adv.哲学上；富有哲理性地；贤明地；冷静地 | |
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89
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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90
repression
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| n.镇压，抑制，抑压 | |
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91
galled
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| v.使…擦痛( gall的过去式和过去分词 )；擦伤；烦扰；侮辱 | |
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