Almost with the swiftness of lightning came the calculation:
"Estimating distance and time, the next discharge of electricity will be directly over the house. If there's cause, which God forbid, may I have the nerve and power to serve those who have been so kind!"
As I thought, I ran to an open space which commanded a view of the farmhouse. Scarcely had I reached it before my eyes were blinded for a second by what seemed a ball of intense burning light shot vertically into the devoted home.
"O God!" I gasped, "it is the day of fate." For a moment I seemed paralyzed, but the igniting roof beside the chimney roused me at once.
"Reuben!" I shouted.
A flash of lightning revealed him still seated quietly on the piazza, as if he had heard nothing. I rushed forward, and shook him by the shoulder.
"Come, be a man; help me. Quick!" and I half dragged him to a neighboring cherry-tree, against which I had noticed that a ladder rested.
By this time he seemed to recover his senses, and in less than a moment we had the ladder against the house. Within another moment he had brought me a pail of water from the kitchen.
"Have two more pails ready," I cried, mounting the low, sloping roof.
The water I carried, and rain, which now began to fall in torrents, extinguished the external fire, but I justly feared that the woodwork had been ignited within. Hastening back at perilous speed, I said to Reuben, who stood ready: "Take one of the pails and lead the way to the attic and the rooms upstairs."