I Drew
In My Breath As I Looked Out And Over Into The Abyss On My Left.
Death And Destruction Seemed To Be The End Awaiting Us All.
Everybody Was Limp, When We Reached The Bottom - That Is, I Was
Limp, And I Suppose The Others Were.
The stage-driver knew I was
frightened, because I sat still and looked white and he came and
lifted me out.
He lived in a small cabin at the bottom of the
mountain; I talked with him some. "The fact is," he said, "we are
an hour late this morning; we always make it a point to 'do it'
before dawn, so the passengers can't see anything; they are
almost sure to get stampeded if we come down by daylight."
I mentioned this road afterwards in San Francisco, and learned
that it was a famous road, cut out of the side of a solid
mountain of rock; long talked of, long desired, and finally
built, at great expense, by the state and the county together;
that they always had the same man to drive over it, and that they
never did it by daylight. I did not inquire if there had ever
been any accidents. I seemed to have learned all I wanted to know
about it.
After a little rest and a breakfast at a sort of roadhouse, a
relay of horses was taken, and we travelled one more day over a
flat country, to the end of the stage-route. Jack was to meet me.
Already from the stage I had espied the post ambulance and two
blue uniforms.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 170 of 274
Words from 45321 to 45588
of 72945
