“Dun’no’, boy. I’ve bin more in the woods than in the clearin’ in my day, but I niver heerd the likes o’ that.”
“It am like t’ondre,” said Henri; “mais it nevair do stop.”
This was true. The sound was similar to continuous uninterrupted thunder. On it came with a magnificent roar that shook the very earth, and revealed itself at last in the shape of a mighty whirlwind. In a moment the distant woods bent before it, and fell like grass before the scythe. It was a whirling hurricane, accompanied by a deluge of rain such as none of the party had ever witnessed. Steadily, irresistibly it bore down upon them, while the crash of falling, snapping, trees mingled with the dire artillery of the storm like the musketry on a battlefield.
“Follow me, lads!” shouted Joe, turning his horse and dashing at full speed towards a rocky eminence that offered shelter. But shelter was not needed. The storm was clearly defined. Its limits were as distinctly marked by its Creator as if it had been a living intelligence sent forth to put a belt of desolation round the world; and although the edge of devastation was not five hundred yards from the rock behind which the hunters were stationed, only a few drops of ice-cold rain fell upon them.
It passed directly between the Camanchee Indians and their intended victims, placing between them a barrier which it would have taken days to cut through. The storm blew for an hour, then it travelled onward in its might, and was lost in the distance. Whence it came and whither it went none could tell, but far as the eye could see on either hand an avenue a quarter of a mile wide was cut through the forest. It had levelled everything with the dust; the very grass was beaten flat; the trees were torn, shivered, snapped across, and crushed; and the earth itself in many places was ploughed up and furrowed with deep scars. The chaos was indescribable, and centuries will not quite obliterate the work of that single hour.
While it lasted, Joe and his comrades remained speechless and awe-stricken. When it passed, no Indians were to be seen. So our hunters remounted their steeds, and with feelings of gratitude to God for having delivered them alike from savage foes and from the destructive power of the whirlwind, resumed their journey towards the Mustang Valley.
