| OCR Text |
Show 136 as though the end of the world had come. I dashed for safety as heavy rocks crashed along the path behind me, and I kept on running without looking backward until I had gone all the way back to the stone cross. "Who is there?" Hilde screamed. "Who is next to me? Is it you, Geist? Why don't you answer me? What is that awful noise? Please, somebody, talk to me!" I tried to answer her but I was choking for air, and no sound would come out of my throat. I tried again and again to talk, but the effort made my throat ache so much that I wanted to scream with pain, yet I could not scream either- Gast's blow had broken something in my throat. Great clouds of dust rose above what had once been the pass along Calvary Mountain, but the pass was no longer there, just mounds of mud and rock and broken trees. As lightning blazed I tried to see Gast in the distance. He was gone. Nor were any of the children visible. All had vanished into the mountain. I turned again to Hilde, who was lying huddled and sodden on the wet ground, sobbing piteously. As I bent to touch her to give her comfort, she reached up and felt my face with her hands. "It is you, Geist," she wailed, "only why won't you answer me?" I took her hand and placed it against my throat, but she could not understand my meaning. "Where is Gast?" she cried over and over. "What has happened? Why can't I see?" Her moaning was an agony to hear- |
