Ellis Meredith

To-night God knows what things shall tide,
The Earth is racked and faint—
Expectant, sleepless, open-eyed;
And we, who from the Earth were made.
Thrill with our Mother's pain.

Kipling.

Along one of the most precipitous of the many Rocky Mountain trails a man and a woman climbed slowly one spring morning. The air was cold, and farther up the mountains little patches of snow lay here and there in the hollows. Two or three miles below them nestled one of the most famous pleasure resorts of the entire region. Three or four times as distant lay the nearest town of any importance. Over the plain and through the clear atmosphere it looked like a bird's-eye-view map rather than an actual town. Far away to the left, gorgeous in coloring and grotesque in outline, could be seen the odd figures of many strangely piled rocks.

The two pedestrians stopped now and then to rest and look away over the matchless scene and take in its wonderful beauty. The woman was tall and slender, with a superb carriage. Even on that steep ascent she moved with the grace and freedom of one who has entire command of her body. She was well gowned also for such an excursion. Her short, green cloth skirt did not impede her movements, and high, stout shoes gave her firm footing. She had removed her jacket, and in her bright pink silk blouse and abbreviated petticoat, with the glow of the morning on her usually pale face, she looked almost girlish; but her face was not that of girlhood. It was without lines, and the heavy masses of her golden-brown hair were quite unstreaked with silver; but her white forehead was serene with the calmness that follows overcoming, and her dark gray eyes saw the world shorn of its illusions. In her there were, or had been, unrealized capacities for life in all its height and depth and breadth. In studying her one became vaguely aware that, having missed these things, she had found a fourth dimension which supplied the loss.

Her companion was younger by several years, and so much taller that she seemed almost small in comparison. In his eyes there danced and shone the light of truth and courage and hope, and he walked with the buoyancy of joy and youth. Israfil, Antinous, Apollo,—he might have stood as the model for any of them, or for a fit representation of the words of the wise man, "Rejoice, oh, young man, in thy youth, and let thine heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart."

The relation between the two was problematic. Certainly there was no question of love on either side. Equally certainly there existed between them a rare and exquisite camaraderie, a perfect comprehension that often made words superfluous. A look sufficed.

They toiled up the steep, narrow path until they reached a wide trail, a carriage road that had been laid out and abandoned. It swept around the mountain-side, miles above the little city on the plain, and terminated suddenly at an immense gateway of stone. Here the mountain had been torn asunder, and two palisades of gray-green rock rose grim and terrible for hundreds of feet, while between them, dashing over boulders and trees and the impedimenta of ages, a little stream rushed along in the eternal night at their base. Far away to the west, range upon range piled themselves against the intense blue sky. Beyond a rustic gate, standing across the path that narrowed to a few feet before the wall of stone, a park, sparkling and green in the sunlight, was visible. They stopped and regarded the two gateways,—one the work of nature, the other the feeble counterfeit of man,—and then swinging open the creaking wooden affair, passed into the peaceful valley. A few yards away stood a small log cabin, but the chimney was smokeless, and though the chickens clucked in the yard, and a collie lay on the doorstep, it seemed desolate and deserted.

Passing along an almost invisible trail, they found themselves in the wildest and most remote part of that wild and remote region. They saw a few stray animals, but no human beings. This was one of the few places where mining was not a universal pursuit, and it was too early to do much in the few mines that did exist. There are entire sections in the Rockies that are deserted for more than half the year, and this was one of them. That day there was no one at the signal station. The keeper had gone down to the valley for fresh stores, and to learn something of the terrific disturbances that were said to be threatening the entire Eastern coast with annihilation. Perhaps the owners of the log cabin had made a similar pilgrimage.

The scene was flooded with moonlight when the travellers passed the gate on their homeward way, and sat down on a boulder a few yards without the frowning portal. The night was cold, and the woman had put on her jacket, and sunk her numbed fingers in its pockets. In spite of her weariness she was troubled and restless, and turning looked first at the beetling crags back of them, then away over the plain at the twinkling lights of the town below. They heard indistinctly the sounds of bells ringing wildly, and overhead flocks of birds circled and called with shrill, uncanny voices. Yet the moonlight was so bright that they saw each other as plainly as if it were day, and its placid radiance seemed strangely at variance with the disturbed wild-fowl, and certain weird and fitful sounds that seemed to be sighed forth from the bosom of the earth.

"It is a pity," she said, "that we cannot pass through this gateway into paradise without descending to earth again."

"I don't believe you are half as tired of life as you say," he answered with an impatient movement of his head. "You may not shrink from death as I do, or enjoy life so keenly, but isn't it a good thing to be alive to-night? Isn't it fine to be a mile or so above the rest of humanity and the deadly conventionalities? Aren't you glad you came?"

She did not answer, but presently said dreamily, "Suppose that plain was the sea."

"It isn't hard to suppose," he answered. "I have seen the Pacific when it looked just so."

"Oh, no," she said quickly. "Nothing is like the sea but itself. You will never persuade me that I love the mountains so well. And the plains,—just imagine if all that gray green silver were gray blue, with here and there a gathering crest of foam, racing to break in spray about these mountains—"

"Why, look," he said, drawing her a little to one side, "there is your liquid blue, with its white crest moving toward us. Could the real sea look more wonderful than that? It is blotting out everything. Now it recedes,—was it not real?"

She started to her feet. "This is a very strange night," she said irrelevantly, in a rather strained voice. "Listen,—and see how many birds are flying about us; I never saw them fly so at night. What does it mean?"

They stood together, looking at each other with startled faces. The whole mountain, all the mountains, seemed to be alive and trembling under them. Overhead thousands of birds wheeled and screamed with terror in their mingled outcries. The little creeping things scuttled away up the mountain. The silver-blue wave widened and spread over the plain from north to south, and the air was full of a dull, terrible roar, as if the fountains of the great deep had broken up, and a thousand white-crested waves rushed toward the hapless city before them. They covered it, and with a wild jangle of bells, faintly audible over the tumult, it sank out of sight, all the gleaming, dancing lights disappearing in an instant. The white crests came on and broke about the mountains, and receded and came on again with a deafening roar. Then the crust of the earth between the mountain range and the spot where the city had been, seemed to crack like a bit of dried orange peel, and the flood rushed over the abyss, and there arose a blinding steam that hid the whole scene below, and ascending circled the mountain peaks in mist.

All about them on the mountain-side rose the cries of terrified wild things, and along the narrow pathway into the park a herd of cattle and horses rushed and disappeared among the aspens that trembled as never before. The collie, scenting their presence, came and crouched whining at their feet, and a bird fell exhausted into the woman's arms. She closed her hands over it, unconsciously giving it the protection none could give them, and in the fog moved toward the figure of her companion. His arm closed about her convulsively.

"Shall we go farther up the mountain?" he asked.

"'If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now,'" she answered, insensibly finding it easier to use another's words than to coin phrases while holding death-watch over a continent.

They sat down on the boulder. After what seemed like countless hours, she said, "I wonder how long we have been here. Perhaps it is years."

He looked at his watch. "I do not know whether we are in time or eternity," he answered simply. "It is nearly four o'clock by this watch."

Through the dense vapor they saw the sun rise, red and sullen, but the mist was so impenetrable that they dared not move about. The day and night passed, almost without their knowledge, and the second morning found them, as the first, by the great boulder. The wind rose with the sun, and when it blew aside the veil of mist, far as the eye could reach, there rolled a sea, white-capped, turbulent, fretful, as if unwilling to leave a single peak to tower above its lordly dominion.

The man and woman followed the collie to the cabin, and there found some food, then they retraced their way until they could look down over the valley where the town had slept. Nothing was left. There was not even a prospector's cabin. The shock which had succeeded the first wild dash had been volcanic. The very caÑons looked strange, and though they called again and again there came no answer.

"Come," the man said imperiously. "Let us go to the Peak. There must be some one there."

They reached the signal station late in the afternoon; no one was there. Looking down from that awful eminence, they saw on the other side of the range the same desolation, the same watery waste. They seemed to be on an island, alone on a wide, wide sea. Nowhere curled a friendly wreath of smoke; nowhere was there sound of any human thing.

They went wearily back. There was nowhere else to go. If the gateway had been awful in its solitude, the Peak was still more desolate. There was nothing living there, except themselves and the dog that followed closely at their heels, making no excursions of its own. The hour was wearing toward midnight when they sank down by the boulder once more to watch the darkness disappear, and wait for they knew not what. The man built a huge fire, so that if any other waifs had been left by this wreck of a world they might see the beacon, and reply in some fashion. They did not talk, except now and then, in a half whisper, they gave monosyllabic queries and replies. The shock that had obliterated a continent seemed to deprive them of all active use of their senses. They moved only in circles, returning always to the place from which they had watched the cataclysm.

It was almost sundown when, with a superhuman effort, they again entered the sunny, beautiful park. The air was balmy, and there all remained quite as before. In front of the cabin stood an Alderney; as they approached her, she lowed uneasily. The woman looked up, and then spoke aloud with the quick sympathy that had always been her greatest attraction. She seemed to understand so readily, whether it was a man's head, a woman's heart, or an animal's wants.

"She needs to be milked," she said, and pushing open the door she entered the cabin. There were two rooms, the farther of which was evidently a bedroom. There was a large fireplace at one end of the main room. At one side of it was a primitive dresser, with such utensils and china as the place afforded; on the other were some miner's implements and a shovel. There was a small table and beside it were placed two chairs. There was a rocker by the one window, and a pot of geraniums on the sill; forming a kind of window seat was a long seaman's chest. At the other end of the room there was a desk covered with green oilcloth, and above it was a shelf containing some books and a clock.

The woman took off her hat and jacket and brushed back her hair, then turning back her sleeves went outdoors again. Under the rude porch on a slab table stood a number of buckets, and there was a stool by the door. She took a bucket and the stool and walked away a few paces, the Alderney following. As she began milking she looked over her shoulder at the man watching her and said, "Won't you build a fire?"

He gathered some wood and went into the cabin. She threw out the first pint or so of milk, then finished milking and strained the foaming contents of her pail into some crocks left sunning by the door, and went into the house. She found some cornmeal and salt, and deftly mixed the dough, and arranging the shovel in the hot ashes, set her hoe-cake to bake. In the mean time the man had brought water from the brook, and as the woman swung the crane over the blaze, he filled the iron kettle hanging therefrom. There was some sour milk, and by a mysterious process she converted it into Dutch cheese. There was some butter and a few eggs, and she found a white cloth and spread the table with the few poor dishes, placing the geranium in the centre. As the water steamed and boiled, she caught up a tin canister.

"See," she said with forced gayety; "let us eat, drink, and be merry, for there is just enough tea in the world for two people to drink once!"

She made the beverage and poured it into the thick cups, and breaking the yellow pone and piling it on a platter, they sat down to the strangest meal they had ever known.

The man watched her with fascinated eyes. He had never before seen her do anything for herself, yet she presided over the simple meal she had prepared as graciously as over the course dinners of her chef. How should she know how to make hoe-cake?

All through the singular feast the sparkle and play of her fancy kept them in hysterical laughter. Afterwards, as she cleared away, the same wild mood possessed her. The man wondered if her mind was going with all else; but as she hung up the towel, her humor changed, and she ran out of the cabin into the dusk as if she could not bear the simple, homely tasks in a homeless world, the firelight and the bounds of a dwelling when doom must be at hand. The man put a fresh log on the fire, and covered the coals with ashes. He would have preferred to remain there, but he knew why she was hurrying back to the mountain-side, and he took her coat and followed her. She was standing by the boulder, looking out over the waters with a despair on her face that made him groan. It was so like what he felt in his heart. She pointed weakly toward the water, but her lips formed no words.

"Yes," he answered, "it was not a dream."

Dawn found them still sitting by the boulder. The man shook her half roughly.

"Come," he said, "let us go back to the cabin."

"No," she answered. "I cannot believe it; we are both mad. We are dreaming the same mad dream; let us go down, and when we feel the spray on our faces, and taste the brine, it will be time enough to believe."

She began the descent with reckless rapidity, and he followed, checking and holding her back. The roar of the surf grew momentarily louder, but though she looked at him with wild, grieved eyes, she went on. A monster wave dashed up over the rocks and wet them to the skin. She flung out her arms, and would have fallen headlong into the greedy, crawling water, but he caught her and made his way back. The hot, bitter tears on her face brought her to herself, and with one great sob she broke down, clinging to him and crying till from sheer exhaustion she fell asleep.

He carried her back to the cottage and laid her gently on the bed in the tiny room. Her hair was falling about her, and he removed her dusty shoes, and covered her over as if she had been a child. Then he went out into the sunlight and sat down on the doorstep and tried to grasp the situation.

He had been a very ambitious man, and she had been as ambitious for him as he was for himself; that had been the main bond of union. He was to have made a great place in the world: the applause of listening senates was to have been his; wealth, fame, position, all the possibilities of life were gone; nothing but barely life itself remained. A living might be wrung from nature, but for ambition,—what? Surely somewhere on earth there were other human beings; the destruction, if irreparable, was not universal. Sooner or later some hardy sailor would find the surviving peaks of this new Atlantis. At least, if the woman within was not his world, he was thankful that no one else was; and having looked the grim truth in the face, he too slept.

It was long past noon when the dog wakened him, and he started to his feet, determined that, having lost all else, they should keep their sound, clear brains. He walked about the park, which contained perhaps five hundred acres. There were half a dozen cows, as many horses, some burros, and a few chickens. There was a rude stable and a few farm implements. There was a large tunnel in the mountain-side, and some mining machinery lying about its entrance. The dog, seeming to realize some of the responsibilities of life, herded the cattle and drove them toward the cabin. When they reached it, she was standing in the doorway. She had made her toilet, and looked fresh and calm.

"These are our flocks and our herds," he said in greeting. "What shall we call them?"

She smiled rather wanly. "Wasn't it Adam who named the animals? You shall have that honor."

"Very well," he answered; "but if this is the garden, there is an angel with a flaming sword at the gateway. Do not pass it again. Our life is here, here,—do you understand? We must give ourselves time to get used to it, time to realize that we are alive. We must be very patient, for whatever has befallen us, whether we are in the body or out of it, this through which we have passed is a miracle, and only time can tell if it is more. Do not look upon the change again, at least not now. You will stay here, and we will work together, and be content for awhile?"

"Content?" she said, "content? We will be happy."