midnight
But the high walls hid all this from the valley and the heedless young folk took the full time limit of their holiday in the sheltering gloom of the old Kickapoo Corral . _ Rock and moan , and roar alone , And the dread of some nameless thing unknown _ . -- LOWELL THE silence following Dennie 's story was broken by a sudden peal of thunder overhead . At the same instant the blackness of midnight lifted itself above the stone ledges and dropped down upon the Corral , smothering everything in darkness . A rushing whirlwind , a lurid blaze of lightning , and a second peal of thunder threw the camp into blind disorder . In the minute 's lull following the first storm herald , there was a wild scrambling for wraps and lunch baskets . Then the darkness thickened and the storm 's fury burst upon the crowd -- a mad lashing of bending tree tops , a blinding whirl of dust filling the air , the thunder 's terrific cannonade , the incessant blaze of lightning , the rattling of the distant rain ; and above all these , unlike them all , a steady , dreadful roaring , coming nearer each moment .