“We beat the slide,” she cried.
The miniature avalanche cracked and roared, and rattled itself into an inert mass at the base of the incline. Yellow dust like the gloom of the cave, but not so changeless, drifted away on the wind; the roar clapped in echo from the cliff, returned, went back, and came again to die in the hollowness. Down on the sunny terrace there was a different atmosphere. Ring and Whitie leaped around Bess. Once more she was smiling, gay, and thoughtless, with the dream-mood in the shadow of her eyes.
“Bess, I haven’t seen that since last summer. Look!” said Venters, pointing to the scalloped edge of rolling purple clouds that peeped over the western wall. “We’re in for a storm.”
“Oh, I hope not. I’m afraid of storms.”
“Are you? Why?”
“Have you ever been down in one of these walled-up pockets in a bad storm?”
“No, now I think of it, I haven’t.”
“Well, it’s terrible. Every summer I get scared to death and hide somewhere in the dark. Storms up on the sage are bad, but nothing to what they are down here in the cañons. And in this little valley—why, echoes can rap back and forth so quick they’ll split our ears.”
“We’re perfectly safe here, Bess.”
“I know. But that hasn’t anything to do with it. The truth is I’m afraid of lightning and thunder, and thunder-claps hurt my head. If we have a bad storm, will you stay close to me?”