Finally he pulled up at the little corrugated-iron garage which the road-men had dubbed Tin Bam. He got out of the car to stretch. The sun was brilliant overhead; the air was spring-like. The longer the storms held off, some people said, the harder they hit. But the Superintendent cared little for weather-lore—or for official forecasts either. When snow fell, you just turned out your plows and started throwing it off the highway. He cast an unnecessarily defiant look at the harmless, clear blue sky. Let ’er come!

7

The Junior Meteorologist began to map the Pacific area with a feeling of almost paternal interest as to whether Maria had survived the perils of babyhood. As he filled in the map, he saw a small storm in about the expected position, but he reserved judgment.

Sylvia had moved out over the Atlantic beyond range of his map. Reports from Port Nelson, God’s Lake, and Fort Hope vaguely indicated that Felicia was centering over Hudson Bay. Cornelia was beating in fury against the south Alaskan coast. Antonia was not developing as he had expected; she had suddenly matured, and moving off sharply to the north was entering Bering Sea. And certainly—yes—that small storm well to the east of Japan could be nothing else than Maria.

Already, the J. M. noted, Maria was showing personality. She was fast-moving, having traveled a thousand miles in twenty-four hours. This meant an average rate of over forty miles an hour, and yet none of the reporting ships indicated a wind of more than twenty-five miles; Maria, therefore, must be moving as a wave. As another individual quality, Maria was keeping a little to the south of the previous storm-track. He attributed this immediately to the influence of Antonia, which from her position in Bering Sea partly blocked the more northerly route. But he shook his head. Such reasoning got nowhere; it only raised the next question: what caused Antonia to behave as she did? He thought of his old professor’s saying: “A Chinaman sneezing in Shen-si may set men to shoveling snow in New York City.”

He decided that in general Maria might be called a normal child. She had certainly grown in healthy fashion. Along with this growth had come a sharp lowering of pressure, brisker winds, and heavier rainfall. Nevertheless Maria was still young and undistinguished. Along her cold front she might be kicking up some respectable local squalls, but elsewhere ship-captains would log nothing more than Fresh Breeze and Moderate Sea. And as for size, a storm only a thousand miles in diameter rated in the Pacific as a half-grown child. Nevertheless, the J. M. still felt his paternal discoverer’s partiality: “A darn good little storm,” he felt himself wanting to say to someone.

His map was finished, and he called the Chief over.

“Hn-n? Anything special?” said the Chief.