Read Online Dolan of Sugar Hills by Kate Starr - Free Book Online

already purloined by Carlo, Noel and several other youngsters, and saw unmistakably that it was Cane’s. She recognized his torch placed ready for the night ... several packets of his favorite brand of cigarettes ... boxes of matches. So Cane, too, had given up his room.
    Truda and Marty had reached an agreement. They smiled at Sheila in proud self-sacrifice. “We’ve decided you can sleep near him,” they beamed.
    While Sheila strove for words, Cane Dolan came to the rescue. He had strolled in at that moment and summed up the position.
    “Carlo will sleep here,” he ordered. “In an emergency like this men have to confer together, just as women must also plan.”
    Marty and Truda began to plan at once. They went out, important little heads close together, and across the room Sheila met Cane’s enigmatic glance.
    What would have happened then, who would have spoken first, what would have been said, Sheila was not to know.
    Like a monstrous wave breaking against a rock, like a truck discharging a load of metal, Harriet hit Sugar Hills.
    The fury of the cyclone instantly reached screeching point, the wind flogged madly, the house seemed to be shuddering, for a moment Sheila knew a nerve-paralyzing fear.
    The fear passed quickly. It disappeared as Marty burst into scared tears, as Truda grabbed anxiously at her skirt. In comforting, in reassuring, Sheila forgot her own dismay. Glancing across the room again, she saw that Cane was comforting and reassuring in his turn, comforting a pale but silent Carlo, a flushed but vociferous Nino, a quietly crying Noel. Once more their eyes locked. This time Cane smiled. Sheila smiled back.
    Presently Sheila went to Ann’s mother. The little mother was surprisingly calm. “That’s because of baby,” she admitted, and Sheila looked at the bed. Ann was sleeping peacefully through it all. Just to look at her made one feel calm.
    As abruptly as it had come, the cyclone disappeared. It was not the end. Sheila had been told about that; it was only the eye, or the middle dead calm.
    The children recovered at once, believing everything over. It was better that they think that way, Sheila decided. She knew now why Molly had said that this phase of Harriet was the worst of all. There was something uncanny in the stillness. It was like walking down a dark lane and knowing that something horrible was going to happen, but not knowing at which step...
    When the gale struck again, the children, surprisingly, took little notice. It blew solidly for an hour, and then diminished to a rough squall.
    “It will keep on like this now,” said Cane, “in varying arcs. There’s nothing we can do, so we may as well eat.”
    They ate and waited, waited and ate, the rest of the morning and into the afternoon. Sheila saw Molly’s wisdom in being well prepared. Unconsciously everyone consumed more than they ordinarily did. Perhaps it was nature’s way of building up new nerves.
    Cane phoned the barracks soon afterward. “I didn’t expect the wires still to be aloft,” he shrugged, holding the receiver. “The electricity has long given up.”
    “What will we do, then?” asked Sheila.
    “What our grandfathers did,” he grinned. “Use lamps and candles. Molly fortunately has always preferred the fuel stove for cooking—oh, hello there, Hans, how is it?” He listened closely, nodded, then replaced the phone.
    “They’re managing all right. Can’t tell me how the crops are going because there’s no visibility. One of the unit chimneys is down.”
    By three o’clock the visibility worsened. By four it was night. They lit lamps and candles and ate and sang and told yarns, and presently the children were nodding their heads, and, unmindful for once that they were going to bed hours before their usual time, crawled into their cribs.
    The adults had a final meal in the kitchen, then, because there was nothing else to do, decided to go to bed, as well.
    No one bothered to undress. In a case of