But Providence was with us, and in a few moments the car drew up in front of a hotel in Kearney, while the half-drunken owner staggered out and, conducting me within, engaged and paid for the best room in the house for Dan and me. The other poor woman, who had been picked up from the roadside like myself, made her escape.
Dan came in, drenched and weary from the buffeting of the storm, and threw himself on the bed. I heard a terrific, roaring, crashing, rending sound, and rushing to the window saw another cyclone sweeping through the outskirts of the town. Large trees swayed and whipped madly, then were whirled into the air.
“Cyclone! Cyclone! Quick, Dan, here comes another cyclone,” I screamed above the roar of the tempest.
“Darn the cyclone,” Dan replied; “I’ve seen enough for one day.”
Nevertheless, he came to the window just as the great, black, swirling funnel passed from view, and, gazing at the sky, enquired where all the books had come from. Sure enough, something floated in the heavens that resembled the scattered leaves of volumes. An instant later these pages came down and disclosed themselves as the sides and roofs of houses.
Next morning Dan took the wheel to the repair shop while I studied the ravages of the storm. No lives were lost in that immediate neighbourhood, but much property had been destroyed. The brick foundation of one home had been scattered in every direction, while the wooden frame, apparently unharmed, had been set down on its original site. In another instance a parlour wall had been neatly removed and a marriage license torn from the frame which still hung in its place, while furniture and pictures remained untouched. This peculiar phenomenon gave rise to considerable comment and jokes concerning the domestic felicity of the married pair.
We were eating our lunch in a vacant lot when our friend from Gibbon drove up. He called Dan over for a short talk, then drove rapidly away. When Dan returned and held out his palm, I cried out in surprise, for in his hand lay four shining five dollar gold pieces. When we had gone and the storm came up, this man had worried over our probable fate, and early next morning had driven the twelve miles into Kearney to overtake and give us this money to ease the journey across the Rockies. Thus we were able to renew our shoes and stockings, which were in shreds, pay for new parts for the wheel, lay in a stock of groceries and still have a little money in our pockets.
If grateful, loving thoughts have power to benefit the recipient, then surely our benefactor will receive some reward, for my whole soul pours itself out in deepest gratitude for his gracious, generous act.
Leaving Kearney, we were able to do a good deal of riding, but suffered severely from heat in the middle of the day. For miles we rode beside stock fences where groups of horses with heads tossing, nostrils flaming, manes and tails floating like pennons in a breeze, raced beside us to the confines of their pastures, there to stand with stamping hoofs and outstretched noses, eyeing us with the greatest curiosity. Once a steer, grazing by the roadside, started to run ahead of us, and lumbered along a full mile, then, in a panic of fear, he reared and up-ended over the fence in a comical fashion and stood blowing wildly, watching his strange pursuer glide past.
The road became wretchedly poor. Again and again the wheel would slip into the deep ruts filled with choking dust in spite of every effort. In places where the surface was hard, innumerable small gullies from the winter rains crossed at right angles, so that riding became unsafe from the strain on the heavily-laden tandem.