Appallingly, abruptly, came a shattering crash, a streak of blinding fire, an unendurable noise, a searing blast of blaze as if the sun had been dynamite exploded, splintering the very joists of heaven. The whole air rocked like a tidal wave breaking on a reef; the house writhed in all its timbers. Then silence—unbearable silence.
The old woman, made a child again by a paralytic stroke of terror, found herself on her knees, clinging frantically to her husband. The cheek buried in his breast felt the lurch and leap of his pounding heart. Manlike, he found courage in his woman's fright, but his hand quivered upon her hair; she heard his shaken voice saying:
"There, there, Maw, it's all over."
When he dared to open his eyes he was blinded and dazed like the stricken Saul. When he could see again he found the world unchanged. The sky was still there, and still azure; the clouds swam serenely; the road still poured down from the unaltered hills. He tried to laugh; it was a sickly sound he made.
"I guess that was what the fellow calls a bolt from the blue. I've often heard of 'em, but it's the first I ever saw. No harm's done, Maw, except to Susan's feelings. She's pickin' herself up out the dust and hurryin' home like two-forty. I guess the concussion must have knocked her over."
The old woman, her heart still fluttering madly, rose from her knees with the tremulous aid of the old man and opened her eyes. She could hardly believe that she would not find the earth an apocalyptic ruin of uprooted hills. She breathed deeply of the relief, and her eyes ran along the remembered things as if calling the roll. Suddenly her eyes paused, widened. Her hand went out to clutch her husband's arm.
"Look, Paw! The oaks, the oaks!"
The lightning had leaped upon them like a mad panther, rending their branches from them, ripping off great strips of bark, and leaving long, gaping wounds, dripping with the white blood of trees. The lesser of the two oaks had felt the greater blow, and would have toppled to the ground had it not fallen across its mate; and its mate, though grievously riven, held it up, with branches interlocking like cherishing arms.
To that human couple the tragedy of the trees they had looked upon as the very emblems of stability was pitiful. The old woman's eyes swam with tears. She made no shame of her sobs. The old man tried to comfort her with a commonplace:
"I was readin' only the other day, Maw, that oaks attract the lightning more than any other trees," and then he broke down. "Father always called 'em the Twin Oaks, but I always called 'em you and me."