Page:Barbour--Peggy in the rain.djvu/18

 than equal to his memory for girls, and now it annoyed him that he couldn't place the sorrel. Then there came the first patter of rain on the leaves, and the problem, which was an unimportant one in any case, was forgotten. A great flash of intense white light flooded the forest, turning the leaves to a strange and ghastly shade of arsenical green, and then a clap of thunder, deafening, appalling, rent the heavens and shook the earth, and the deluge began.

It is one thing to get moderately wet and quite another to be soaked to the skin. Gordon ran. Already the soft sand was heavy with water, and every hoof-print was a tiny puddle. The drops pelted down in great white streaks, blinding him. Leaves, stripped from their branches, splotched the ground. It was like a cloudburst. With the deserted cabin in mind, Gordon plunged on along the winding path, his shotgun tucked under his arm in an attempt to protect the breech. The lightning flashed almost incessantly, and the thunder, following the livid radiances, seemed to rip the sky in its terrific crashes. The cabin was still some distance away, how far he couldn't even guess, and already he was mentally likening his