, she reflected. It would
be dark in there too--until the light became a glare of death. Unless
he chanced to hear, through other and fiercer sounds the soft flow of
the myriad kernels, he would have no means of knowing that one
desperate way was being opened to him. Even then his single hope would
lie in quickness of perception and a sureness of judgment that acted
flawlessly and smoothly under a supreme strain.

If he did see that the wheat was running out and did not wait for it
all to spill itself, he would be sucked into its tide only to emerge
dead. For it flowed slowly, pressing in every direction, and it would
inevitably strangle the breath out of his lungs.

Even if he were judging all these odds with a meticulous nicety,
Alexander questioned herself breathlessly, would there be time to wait
for the full store to flow through that narrow channel? It was a race
between a slow tide which could not be hurried and another which rushed
on with the devouring fury of mania.

The girl threw herself down beside an empty freight car and dug her
cold finger nails into her hot temples. She could hear the steady
stream of wheat flowing into the bin there, and the deadly slowness of
its progress through the hopper was driving her mad. The elevator she
could not see, but by lifting her head, she could see out all too
clearly the crimson sky overhead.

CHAPTER XIX

When the first acrid warning of scorched timbers came to his nostrils,
Jerry O'Keefe had recognized the desperation of his plight and he laid
out his simple plans in accordance. He meant to stay where he was till
the last endurable moment, hoping against hope for the coming of the
rescuers. When it was no longer possible to remain, he would go out of
the door and sell his life at a price--but he knew he would have to
sell it, and perhaps cheaply, for they would do their killing from
cover.

He struck a match for a survey of the place where he must make his last
stand and his eye fell on the coil of rope. Then, for the first time,
he remembered its use, and vainly wished that the chute could be opened
from within. By the light of other matches, he looked over into the
great bin and what he saw astonished him. There was a moving suction
at the center of the pile--a slow motion and declivity--though this
afternoon the stuff had been heaped into a well-rounded mound. Further
scrutiny verified the amazing results of his first impression. The
h