“It looks a little bit like a thunderstorm, boys,” said Juarez.
“We had better peg that tent down tighter,” said Jo. “It is going to blow, too, in a short while.”
The boys did not get things ship-shape any too soon. The black clouds were drifting in a gloomy procession over the great valley, then came a flash that showed the expanse of the level meadow in a green-white color and the somber pine-clad slopes, then the wind and rain together.
CHAPTER XXII
HAIL
The storm drifted steadily northward over the valley with its accompanying flashes of lightning, followed by volleys of rain mingled with the shot of hail. As soon as the boys heard the hail on the canvas roof of their tent they hustled out to put blankets on their horses, so as to protect them from the beating hail. They moved them under the protecting branches as much as possible and made them as snug as they could.
“Remember the time we got into a hail storm in Kansas?” questioned Jo, as they walked back through the beating white pellets, that were getting larger every minute.
“That was fun,” laughed Tom. “We pretended that the hail was bullets and the one who was struck on the head was to be dead.”