They opened the door and listened, standing together on the low step. There was, indeed, a hoarse murmur from the hills, which grew louder as they listened.
“Now she's comin'! There goes the stable-door. There was only one hinge left, anyway,” said Reuby. “Mighty! Look at that wave!”
It crashed through the gate, swept across the garden and broke at their feet, sending a thin sheet of water over the floor of the porch.
“Now it's gone into the entry. Why didn't thee shut the door, Shep?”
“Well, I think we'd better clear out, anyhow. Let's go over to the mill. Say, Dorothy, shan't we?”
“Wait. There comes another wave.”
The second onset was not so violent; but they hastened to gather together a few blankets, and the boys filled their pockets with cookies, with a delightful sense of unusualness and peril almost equal to a shipwreck or an attack by Indians. Dorothy took her unlucky chickens under her cloak, and they made a rush all together across the road and up the slope to the mill.
“Why didn't we think to bring a lantern?” said Dorothy, as they huddled together on the platform of the scale. “Will thee go back after one, Shep?”
“If Reuby'll go, too.”
“Well, my legs are wet enough now. What's the use of a lantern? Mighty Moses! What's that?”