From north to south was spanned the sweeping curve of a gray cloud with just a tinge of yellow blended into it.  The ordinary observer would have seen in it no premonition of a storm.  It was smooth, light in tone and restful to the eye as compared with the angry blue from out of which the sun blazed.

The upper edges of this mass were unbroken save at one point near the zenith of its curve.  From this there protruded the sharper edges of a “thunder-head,” as if some titanic and unseen hand were lifting to the firmament a colossal head of cauliflower, its shaded portions beautifully toned with blue.  This description may be homely, but it has the merit of accuracy.

I said no word of my certainty of the oncoming tempest, but threw on full speed and dashed ahead at a rate which startled my fair companion.  From the turn in the road just beyond the clearing we headed directly into the line of march of the storm.  If it were slow-moving I calculated we would reach Oak Cliff before it broke, but I realised it would be close work.

Miss Harding leaned over and said something to me.  The whirr of the machinery and the swaying of the car made conversation difficult.  I presume she thought I was determined to show my nerve and skill as a driver.

“Why this mad haste, Jacques Henri?” she again cried, her head so close to mine that her hair brushed my cheek.

I returned a non-committal smile and fixed my eyes on the road which slipped toward us like a huge belt propelled by invisible pulleys.

The miles kept pace with the minutes.  Of a sudden the sun was blotted out.  When I lifted my eyes from the road I saw birds circling high in the sky.  The cattle in adjacent fields lifted their heads and moved uneasily as if some instinct sounded a warning in their dull brains.  Above the trees I saw the skirmish line of the storm.

In after hours Miss Harding told me that she had quickly solved the secret of my wild dash.  For a quarter of an hour she hung to the swaying seat and said no word.  Once I looked into her eyes and read in them that she understood.

We dashed through a little village and paid no heed to the angry shouts and menacing gestures of a man who wore a huge star on his chest.  Oak Cliff was only ten miles away.  Could we make it?

The restful grays of the cloud had disappeared; and low down on the horizon I saw a belt of bluish black, and as I looked, a bolt of lightning jabbed through it.  We were now running parallel to the storm, and I believed I could beat it to Oak Cliff.  I felt certain I could reach the little hamlet of Pine Top, and from there on it would be easy to get to shelter.  Between us and Pine Top was practically an unbroken wilderness, a part of the country reserved as a source of water supply for the great city far to the south of us.

Into that wilderness we dashed.

We were taking a hill with the second speed clutch on when a grating sound came to my alert ears, and with it an unnatural shudder of the machinery.  I threw off power and applied the brakes.  As the car stopped the deep rolling bass of the thunder rumbled over the hills.