[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.Once at a particularly bad spot Madeline exclaimed involuntarily, "Oh, time isflying!" Link Stevens looked up at her as if he had been reproved for hiscare.His eyes shone like the glint of steel on ice.Perhaps that utteranceof Madeline's was needed to liberate his recklessness to its utmost.Certainly he put the car to seemingly impossible feats.He rimmed gullies, hehurdled rising ground, he leaped little breaks in the even road.He made hismachine cling like a goat to steep inclines; he roundedPage 226 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlcorners with the inside wheels higher than the outside; he passed over banksof soft earth that caved in the instant he crossed weak places.He kept onand on, threading tortuous passages through rock-strewn patches, keeping tothe old road where it was clear, abandoning it for open spaces, and alwaysgoing down.At length a mile of clean, brown slope, ridged and grooved like a washboard,led gently down to meet the floor of the valley, where the scant grama-grassstruggled to give a tinge of gray.The road appeared to become more clearlydefined, and could be seen striking straight across the valley.To Madeline's dismay, that road led down to a deep, narrow wash.It plunged on one side, ascended on the other at a still steeper angle.Thecrossing would have been laborsome for a horse; for an automobile it wasunpassable.Link turned the car to the right along the rim and drove as faralong the wash as the ground permitted.The gully widened, deepened all theway.Then he took the other direction.When he made this turn Madelineobserved that the sun had perceptibly begun its slant westward.It shone in her face, glaring and wrathful.Link drove back to the road,crossed it, and kept on down the line of the wash.It was a deep cut in redearth, worn straight down by swift water in the rainy seasons.It narrowed.In some places it was only five feet wide.Link studied these points andlooked up the slope, and seemed to be making deductions.The valley was levelnow, and there were nothing but little breaks in the rim of the wash.Link drove mile after mile, looking for a place to cross, and there was none.Finally progress to the south was obstructed by impassable gullies where thewash plunged into the head of a canon.It was necessary to back the car adistance before there was room to turn.Madeline looked at the imperturbabledriver.His face revealed no more than the same old hard, immutable character.Whenhe reached the narrowest points, which had so interested him, he got out ofthe car and walked from place to place.Once with a little jump he clearedthe wash.ThenMadeline noted that the farther rim was somewhat lower.In a flash shedivined Link's intention.He was hunting a place to jump the car over thecrack in the ground.Soon he found one that seemed to suit him, for he tied his red scarf upon agreasewood-bush.Then, returning to the car, heclambered in, and, muttering, broke his long silence: "This ain't no air-ship,hut I've outfiggered thet damn wash." He backed up the gentle slope and haltedjust short of steeper ground.His red scarf waved in the wind.Hunching lowover the wheel, he started, slowly at first, then faster, and then faster.The great car gave a spring like a huge tiger.The impact of suddenly formedwind almost tore Madeline out of her seat.She felt Nels's powerful hands onher shoulders.She closed her eyes.The jolting headway of the car gaveplace to a gliding rush.This was broken by a slight jar, and then above thehum and roar rose a cowboy yell.Madeline waited with strained nerves for theexpected crash.It did not come.Opening her eyes, she saw the level valleyfloor without a break.She had not even noticed the instant when the car hadshot over the wash.A strange breathlessness attacked her, and she attributed it to the celeritywith which she was being carried along.Pulling the hood down over her face,she sank low in the seat.The whir of the car now seemed to be aworld-filling sound.Again the feeling of excitement, the poignancy ofPage 227 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlemotional heights, the ever-present impending sense of catastrophe became heldin abeyance to the sheer intensity of physical sensations.There came a timewhen all her strength seemed to unite in an effort to lift her breast againstthe terrific force of the wind--to draw air into her flattened lungs.Shebecame partly dazed.The darkness before her eyes was not all occasioned bythe blood that pressed like a stone mask on her face.She had a sense thatshe was floating, sailing, drifting, reeling, even while being borne swiftlyas a thunderbolt.Her hands and arms were immovable under the weight ofmountains.There was a long, blank period from which she awakened to feel anarm supporting her.Then she rallied.The velocity of the car had been cut tothe speed to which she was accustomed.Throwing back the hood, she breathedfreely again, recovered fully.The car was bowling along a wide road upon the outskirts of a city.Madelineasked what place it could be."Douglas," replied Link."An' jest around is Agua Prieta!"That last name seemed to stun Madeline.She heard no more, and saw littleuntil the car stopped.Nels spoke to some one.Thensight of khaki-clad soldiers quickened Madeline's faculties.She was on theboundary-line between the United States and Mexico, and Agua Prieta, with itswhite and blue walled houses, its brown-tiled roofs, lay before her.Asoldier, evidently despatched by Nels, returned and said an officer would comeat once.Madeline's attention was centered in the foreground, upon the guardover the road, upon the dry, dusty town beyond; but she was aware of noise andpeople in the rear
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
Tematy
IndexAndrew Grey Of Love 3 A Helping of Love
Chris J. Randolph Stars Rain Down (com v4.0)(epub
Jiddu Krishnamurti 13 Collected Works 10 A Light To Yourself
Christie Ridgway [Rock Royalt Light My Fire (epub)
AJ Jarrett Warriors of the Light 4 Garrett's Choice
Christina Jones Seeing Stars (epub)
Lester Del Rey Step to the Stars
AJ Jarrett Warriors of the Light 2 Astrid's Wish
Martin Gail Z Kroniki Czarnoksiężnika 04 Wybraniec Mrocznej Pani
Dick Cudowna broń