I wanted Marion to come live with us the year her heart broke. She refused, right off, just like I knew she would. "Why do you want to stay way out there?" I asked, not wantin' to really go into all the many reasons why a woman should have family about her, after such a tragedy. "It's my home," she replied, "where else would I go?" I really did understand, but it tore into me, thinking of her out there in that crushed, and battered house. Broken, torn, and battered as it was, it kinda matched her heart, you know?

Marion was the youngest of the Laurence girls. I already told you about Ada, the oldest girl, who went off to New York, and became an architect. Marion was as opposite her big sister as fire and ice. No grand schemes and dreams of big cities for Marion! She was as country as they come, and as addicted to livin' in a small town as anyone I've ever seen. She married Ronald Dahl, and they had three children - two boys and a girl. It wasn't much of a farm, as farms go, just a few acres planted, some cows and chickens, but it was a profitable one, because of what they did with the leftover land that wasn't any good for farmin'.

Marion and Ronald raised alpacas. They raised 'em, sheared 'em, and sold their wool all over the world through mail order houses. In those days, there were few farmers in the states that had switched to alpaca ranching, Ronald was a sort of early pioneer in the area, and ran a herd of about 50 animals towards the end. Most of their land was rocky, right up against the the little hills we call mountains, and really was perfectly suited to the animals.

Ronald did the shearing and dying, Marion did the washing, carding, and spinning of the fur, and the children helped out with skeining the yarn, and  packaging the end product. Quite a little business they had going too. Being able to say "100% U.S. Raised" meant that they didn't have to pay the import taxes that other yarn importers had to pay, nor was the yarn subject to the same government regulations that foreign products were. Of course, there was still always the danger of anthrax, and such, that's just life in the country, when you're dealin' with animal fur, but Marion was real careful, and wouldn't let those kids of hers near the fur until it had all been washed in a special bath, and dried. Those children all had their tetanus shots up to date too.

The kids must have been about 12, 10, and 6, and as good natured a bunch as you ever did see. I sometimes wonder if all that farmin' and ranchin' they had to help with wasn't just plain good for their souls and characters. They certainly were a darn sight more polite than some of the "townie" children I've run across lately!

July was hot that year, and we'd all been praying' for rain to cool things off a mite. Now, rain in July isn't much of a problem, it rains near every day in July around here. The problem was, it isn't supposed to keep on rainin', and rainin'. It's supposed to start, and stop, every day. That July, it started, and it just wouldn't stop. Those poor creatures! The alpacas, I mean. They weren't used to bein' wet all the time, day and night. Their fur kinked up, and the stink of that wet fur, why I'd swear you could smell it a half mile away.

Ronald and the boys tried to keep the alpacas sheltered, but they're independent, headstrong animals, and more inclined to kick holes in the fencing, then leap over then remnants, than stay penned up. Where one leaps, the others follow, and those critters were bound and determined to get out of the rain. That stand of trees about a half mile up was lookin' pretty good to them, so they took off, leavin' Ronald and the boys to fix the corral fencing in the pouring rain. Little Arden was out there too, in her bright yellow slicker and hat, holdin' the halter of one of the babies that they were hand-raising after her mama died.

Flash floods are as much a part of nature as hurricanes, tornadoes and blizzards. Only thing is, with a flash flood you never get no warning at all. Ronald, the two boys, Arden - all gone in an instant. They couldn't have known but for a moment what happened. Marion was in the house, and though it was battered mightily, it was strong, and held ground. Turned out a small dam a bit further up in the hills broke after all the weeks of soaking rain, and contributed to the flood, makin' it more dangerous than it would have already been.

Can't account for Marion's strength. She lost her entire family in that flood, lost half the herd animals, and all of the crop they'd had growin'. Her house was battered by rocks and trees and water. She stayed in that house, though, wouldn't hear of movin' in with me, though I offered time and time again. "Where would I go?" she'd say, when someone suggested she should give the place up. And you know, she's right. She was home. Her whole family was buried out there, her livelihood - the alpacas were there. Battered and torn, but still alive, and survivin', both her, and the alpacas.