Once, during a silence in the room, a whinny was distinctly heard.
“Dat my ole horse!” wailed Peter. “He done dead in he stall now, an’ dat he woice goin’ by. Oh, my Gawd!”
They all wailed out at that; and Porgy, remembering his goat, whimpered and turned his face to the wall.
“I gots uh home in de rock, don’t yuh see?”
With a feeling of infinite relief, Porgy turned to his Jesus. It was not a charm that he sought now for the assuaging of some physical ill, but a benign power, vaster perhaps even than the hurricane. He lifted his rich baritone above the others:
“Oh, between de eart’ an’ sky,
I kin see my Sabior die.
I gots uh home in de rock,
Don’t yuh see!”
Then they were all in it, heart and soul. Those who had fallen into a fitful sleep, awoke, rubbed their eyes, and sang.
Hour after hour dragged heavily past. Outside, the storm worked its will upon the defenceless city. But in the great ball-room of Catfish Row, forty souls sat wrapped in an invulnerable garment. They swayed and patted, and poured their griefs and fears into a rhythm that never missed a beat, which swept the hours behind it into oblivion, and that finally sang up the faint grey light that penetrated the storm, and told them that it was again day.