Page:Restless Earth.djvu/123

from complete! Only a section of the town burned. He could see a church spire standing where it had always stood. Save that all the houses were minus their chimneys, the suburbs appeared little changed. The dignified row of Norfolk Island pines still rose in perfect alignment along the Marine Parade.

Harley sat up alertly, and chafed audibly at the low speed of the car.

There was a chance that Grace and Joan had survived, after all. There was a chance that the broken-nosed fellow had guessed correctly—that Grace and Joan were out on the beach at the time of the ’shake.

“Step on it!” he snapped at Roy.

“We’re going all out for this class of country,” Roy growled.

Harley laughed in a curious manner and patted Roy’s sleeve by way of apology.

Roy glanced at Harley with something of apprehension in his eyes. He was thinking that the strain had been too much for his passenger.

Harley’s hope grew as they drew nearer to their destination. He remembered that Grace was an ardent lover of the sunshine and a devotee of the morning walk. The weather had been perfect yesterday. Grace would never have wasted such a glorious morning indoors.

He reconstructed her morning, basing his deductions on his knowledge of her. Breakfast at nine o’clock, or a little before. Allowing a full hour for preparation, she and Joan would have been ready to leave the hotel by ten. Possible delay, speaking to acquaintances in the hotel and so forth, say fifteen or twenty minutes. That still left half-an-hour before the shake.

He remembered Grace’s passion for the beach at Fitzroy. Every fine day she had made time to visit it. He smiled as he recalled the wiggings he had received for keeping her waiting on various of her