Mandy and the child screamed. For a moment Betty was near panic herself. But she fought down her terror resolutely.
“See. The floor’s level now.” Her voice was steady and calm. “We’ll probably be all right. Stop that noise, Mandy. Didn’t I tell you I wouldn’t have it?”
The housekeeper sniffled. “I’m ce’tainly scared to death, honey, I shorely is.” She folded her short, fat arms and rocked. “I been a mighty triflin’ nigger, but I aims frum now on to get shet uv my scandalacious ways an’ travel de road what leads to de pearly gates. Yas’m. Glory Hallelujah! If de good Lawd evah lets me git outa hyeh alive, I’ll shout for salvation at de mourners’ bench mighty loud.”
The situation was too desperate for Betty to find any amusement in Mandy’s good resolutions, but it occurred to her to turn some of her fear into another channel.
“Let’s sing,” she suggested.
Above the booming of the wild waters she lifted her clear young soprano and sang “Safe in the Arms of Jesus.” The first line she carried alone, then Mandy’s rich contralto quavered in and Ruth’s small piping treble joined.
With an impact that shook every timber the current flung the house against a great boulder. The building swung as on a pivot and was driven into the rocks again. Betty looked out of the window. They were wedged between two great spars of red sandstone. The furious buffeting of the racing tide lifted their frail refuge and dropped it upon the sharp edges of the crags.
“We’re caught at the Steeples,” the girl told the others.
If they could get out and climb the rock spires! But that was impossible. The house was submerged almost to the second floor in the swashing torrent which surrounded it and dragged at it with a violence they could feel.
Again the shipwrecked three sang. This time it was “Rock of Ages.” They held one another’s hands for comfort, and in their prayer, voiced through the words of the old hymn, they found a sustaining strength. Presently Mandy took up “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” and the others came in with support.