The Sisters-In-Law | Page 5

lashes as fine and lusterless as her hair, and very
narrow black polished eyebrows. Her skin was a pale olive lightly
touched with color, although the rather large mouth with its definitely

curved lips was scarlet. Her long throat like the rest of her body was
white.
All the other children had been clean-cut Ballingers or Groomes,
consistently dark or fair; but it would seem that Nature, taken by
surprise when the little Alexina came along several years after her
mother was supposed to have discharged her debt, had mixed the colors
hurriedly and quite forgotten her usual nice proportions.
The face, under the soft lines of youth, was less oval than it looked, for
the chin was square and the jaw bone accentuated. The short straight
thin nose reclaimed the face and head from too classic a regularity, and
the thin nostrils drew in when she was determined and shook quite
alarmingly when she was angry.
These more significant indications of her still embryonic personality
were concealed by the lovely curves and tints of her years, the brilliant
happy candid eyes (which she could convert into a madonna's by the
simple trick of lifting them a trifle and showing a lower crescent of
devotional white), the love of life and eagerness to enjoy that radiated
from her thin admirably proportioned body, which, at this time, held in
the limp slouching fashion of the hour, made her look rather small. In
reality she was nearly as tall as her mother or the dignified Mrs. Abbott,
who rejoiced in every inch of her five feet eight, and retained the free
erect carriage of her girlhood.
Alexina, with a sharp glance about her disordered room, hastily
disarranged her bed, and, sending her ball slippers after the gown, ran
across the hall and threw herself into her mother's arms.
"Some earthquake, what? You are sure you are not hurt, mommy dear?
The plaster is down all over the house."
"More slang that you have learned from Aileen Lawton, I presume. It
certainly was a dreadful earthquake, worse than that of
eighteen-sixty-eight. Is anything valuable broken? There is always less
damage done on the hills. What is that abominable noise?"

The cook, who had recovered from her first attack, was emitting
another volley of shrieks, in which the word "fire" could be
distinguished in syllables of two.
Mrs. Groome rang the bell violently and the imperturbable James
appeared.
"Is the house on fire?"
"No, ma'am; only the city. It's worth looking at, if you care to step out
on the lawn."
Mrs. Groome followed her daughter downstairs and out of the house.
Her eyebrows were raised but there was a curious sensation in her
knees that even the earthquake had failed to induce. She sank into the
chair James had provided and clutched the arms with both hands.
"There are always fires after earthquakes," she muttered. "Impossible!
Impossible!"
"Oh, do you think San Francisco is really going?" cried Alexina, but
there was a thrill in her regret. "Oh, but it couldn't be."
"No! impossible, impossible!"
Black clouds of smoke shot with red tongues of flame overhung the
city at different points, although they appeared to be more dense and
frequent down in the "South of Market Street" region. There was also a
rolling mass of flame above the water front and sporadic fires in the
business district.
The streets were black with people, now fully dressed, and long
processions were moving steadily toward the bay as well as in the
direction of the hills behind the western rim of the city. James brought
a pair of field glasses, and Mrs. Groome discovered that the hurrying
throngs were laden with household goods, many pushing them in baby
carriages and wheelbarrows. It was the first flight of the refugees.

"James!" said Mrs. Groome sharply. "Bring me a cup of coffee and
then go down and find out exactly what is happening."
James, too wise in the habits of earthquakes to permit the still
distracted cook to make a fire in the range, brewed the coffee over a
spirit lamp, and then departed, nothing loath, on his mission. Mrs.
Groome swallowed the coffee hastily, handed the cup to Alexina and
burst into tears.
"Mother!" Alexina was really terrified for the first time that morning.
Mrs. Groome practiced the severe code, the repressions of her class,
and what tears she had shed in her life, even over the deaths of those
almost forgotten children, had been in the sanctity of her bedroom.
Alexina, who had grown up under her wing, after many sorrows and
trials had given her a serenity that was one secret of her power over this
impulsive child of her old age, could hardly have been more appalled if
her mother had been stricken with paralysis.
"You cannot