“Don’t talk!” he desperately commanded. “The third one will come. That’s the worst. Wait!”
The seconds dragged through an awful silence. Beelo’s breath struggled spasmodically through the repression under which he tried to hold it.
The third shock came, and then, though I had never felt one before, I knew what it was. The whole world seemed to heave and writhe and jolt and grind, all with a fearful noise. The earthquake, grim brother of the boiling cauldron we had left, had us in its jaws, and its power was manifest in the ease with which it crushed and ground the rocks about us. Fragments of these began to splash in the water and rattle on the raft. Just in front, a huge block plunged into the stream and dashed us with water.
Beelo flung himself upon me; I again bent over him to shield him.
Another heavy stone struck the raft in the narrow space between Christopher and us, and tore through it into the water, sending up a geyser through the hole.
A stiffening wave of terror overswept Beelo. He sprang to his knees and tightly embraced my neck in both arms.
“We are going to die!” he feebly cried, and pressed his lips to mine, sinking inert into my arms. My fingers anxiously sought his pulse. It was fluttering.
“Christopher!” I called in alarm,—not realizing that the earthquake had passed and that a dim light made visible the rocks in a turn ahead,—“Christopher! Something has happened to Beelo!”
“Yes, sir,” came with the steady old calm.
“Stop! We must do something for him.”