"Mother," said Vic at last, "I've been trying my best not to think of Cal or of father, and I can't."
"It's the best thing we could do," almost sighed Mrs. Evans.
"They may be fighting!" said Vic.
"Most likely they're going into camp somewhere, all tired out," said her mother.
"Oh, I do hope," said Vic, "they are on their way home. I can't read, and I won't."
So all the printed things were put aside, and it may be that some of Vic's thinking made pictures for her a little like the reality that was enacting at Cold Spring and in the Mexican forest. No imagination of hers could have drawn anything quite equal to either of them.
Something almost as well worth making a picture of was taking place a number of long miles farther westward. Away up among the crags and forests of the Sierra, but below the snow-range at that season, there lay all day in the sunshine a very tranquil little lake. All around the lake were the steep sides of mountains, and at no point was there any visible outlet. Streams of various sizes ran into it, and one of them came plunging over the edge of a perpendicular rock, in a foamy, feathery waterfall. There was plenty of room in the valley for the lake to grow larger in, but the trees at its margin seemed to say that this was its customary size. On the northern side the sloping steep went up, up, up, until all its rocks became hidden under a covering of snow.
Just above the snow-line the June sun had been working hard, day after day, melting snow for the lake, until it had undermined a vast icy mass several acres in extent. Nobody could guess how many winters had been required to make that heap of frost so deep and hard, or how many summers had made everything ready for that hot day to finish the work.
Just before sunset a moaning sound came down the mountain and filled the valley. Then something like thunder, or the report or a cannon, echoed among the crags.
The avalanche had broken its bonds! Down it came, slowly at first, then more swiftly, and the tall pines were snapped off and swept away, and great bowlders were caught up and carried with it. Down, down, down it came, and at last, with a great surging plunge, it went head foremost into the lake. Crash! splash! dash! the flying sheets of water reached the tree-tops on the margin. The avalanche found deep water, for it almost disappeared, but it made the lake several feet deeper, and then its own fragments came up from their dive to be floated around and to be dashed against the shore by the waves.