The Lost City

“Wonder if this isn't a portion of the glorious climate, broken loose from its native California, and drifting up this way on a lark?”

“If so, said lark must be roasted to a turn,” declared the third (and last) member of that little party, drawing a curved forefinger across his forehead, then flirting aside sundry drops of moisture. “I can't recall such another muggy afternoon, and if we were only back in what the scientists term the cyclone belt--”

“We would be all at sea,” quickly interposed the professor, the fingers of one hand vigorously stirring his gray pompadour, while the other was lifted in a deprecatory manner. “At sea, literally as well as metaphorically, my dear Bruno; for, correctly speaking, the ocean alone can give birth to the cyclone.”

“Why can't you remember anything, boy?” sternly cut in the roguish-eyed youngster, with admonitory forefinger, coming to the front. “How many times have I told you never to say blue when you mean green? Why don't you say Kansas zephyr? Or windy-auger? Or twister? Or whirly-gust on a corkscrew wiggle-waggle? Or--well, almost any other old thing that you can't think of at the right time? W-h-e-w! Who mentioned sitting on a snowdrift, and sucking at an icicle? Hot? Well, now, if this isn't a genuine old cyclone breeder, then I wouldn't ask a cent!”

Waldo Gillespie let his feet slip from beneath him, sitting down with greater force than grace, back supported against a gnarled juniper, loosening the clothes at his neck while using his other hand to ply his crumpled hat as a fan.

Bruno laughed outright at this characteristic anticlimax, while Professor Featherwit was obliged to smile, even while compelled to correct.

“Tornado, please, nephew; not cyclone.”

“Well, uncle Phaeton, have it your own way. Under either name, I fancy the thing-a-ma-jig would kick up a high old bobbery with a man's political economy should it chance to go bu'st right there! And, besides, when I was a weenty little fellow I was taught never to call a man a fool or a liar--”

“Waldo!” sharply warned his brother, turning again.

“So long as I knew myself to be in the wrong,” coolly finished the youngster, face grave, but eyes twinkling, as they turned towards his mistaken mentor. “What is it, my dear Bruno?”

“There is one thing neither cyclone nor tornado could ever deprive you of, Kid, and that is--”

“My beauty, wit, and good sense,--thanks, awfully! Nor you, my dear Bruno, although my inbred politeness forbids my explaining just why.”

There was a queer-sounding chuckle as Professor Featherwit turned away, busying himself about that rude-built shed and shanty which sheltered the pride of his brain and the pet of his heart, while Bruno smiled indulgently as he took a few steps away from those stunted trees in order to gain a fairer view of the stormy heavens.

Far away towards the northeast, rising above the distant hill, now showed an ugly-looking cloud-bank which almost certainly portended a storm of no ordinary dimensions.

Had it first appeared in the opposite quarter of the horizon, Bruno would have felt a stronger interest in the clouds, knowing as he did that the miscalled “cyclone” almost invariably finds birth in the southwest. Then, too, nearly all the other symptoms were noticeable,--the close, “muggy” atmosphere; the deathlike stillness; the lack of oxygen in the air, causing one to breathe more rapidly, yet with far less satisfying results than usual.

Even as Bruno gazed, those heavy cloud-banks changed, both in shape and in colour, taking on a peculiar greenish lustre which only too accurately forebodes hail of no ordinary force.