It was like the distant roar of the sea, but there was no sea within many miles.  It did not sound in the least like wind, yet wind it must be, she thought, and in the space of a half minute the roar had so gained in volume that it appeared to be approaching with great rapidity.  Sally rose and peered up toward the sky, for usually she could see a small patch of it beyond the grove.  But she could discern no appearance of the sky, although a few minutes before the stars had been shining brilliantly.

She had no time within which to take any further observations.  Before she had fairly begun to wonder what might be coming, and to tell herself that she had heard no growl of thunder and that therefore this could not be the approach of one of those severe electrical storms with which a period of intense heat sometimes terminates, the thing had happened.  With a burst, a tremendous blast of wind struck the tent.  It swayed and strained at its guy-ropes, the poles creaked and cracked, and in less time than it takes to tell it, the whole flapping structure had gone down with one ballooning heave, flat upon the ground, covering its inmates with billowing canvas.

Then came a terrific clap of thunder and a flash of the fiercest lightning Sally had ever seen.  Instantly there was a sudden and overwhelming downpour of rain, as if the heavens had opened.  Then everybody was shouting or calling.  Outside the tent, Jarvis, in his hammock, and Bob, on his blankets on the ground, had been soaked to the skin before they knew what had happened, and were trying to discover a place where they could crawl under the wrecked canvas and find a shelter from the deluge.

“Where are you all?  Anybody hurt?” cried Jarvis, groping in the blackness.

“All right!” screamed Josephine, who had put her hand under the canvas partition and found her mother, whose bed was next her own.

“All right!” shrieked Sally, who had received a soaking by having been close to the open tent-flap when the flood came.  But she did not mention that just now.

“Here’s a place to get under!” cried Bob to Jarvis, and the two managed to work themselves under cover.  A convenient table made a nook to receive them, and kept the tent off their heads.

“I’ve crawled under my cot!” announced Alec, at the top of his lungs.

“So have I!” called Mr. Rudd.  He was congratulating himself that he had not slept in the hammock, but he was much worried concerning Jarvis and Bob.

Then Max fired the shot that, sooner or later, he might have been expected to fire.  As loudly as he could vociferate against the roar of the storm, he sent a triumphant challenge to the party:  “I hope you’re all—­satisfied—­with the beauty of sleeping in the—­open air!”

CHAPTER VIII

PROBLEMS AND HEARTS

The storm had passed almost as abruptly as it had come.  The rain ceased as if a trap-door in the heavens had been suddenly closed.  The wind had gone when the rain came, so that the moment the downfall was over the whole affair was ended.  It had not occupied the space of more than four minutes, but it had managed to make as complete a wreck of the sleeping arrangements in the pine grove as if it had been of an hour’s duration.