there was no thinking; there was only sensation--a terrific roar, as
if the whole universe had suddenly turned to sound; a blinding white
glare, as of all the lightnings of the heavens; a blow that picked
him up as if he had been a piece of thistledown, and flung him
across the street and against the side of a building. Peter fell
upon the sidewalk in a heap, deafened, blinded, stunned; and there
he lay--he had no idea how long-until gradually his senses began to
return to him, and from the confusion certain factors began to stand
out: a faint gray smoke that seemed to lie upon the ground, a bitter
odor that stung the nostrils and tongue, and screams of people,
moaning and sobbing and general uproar. Something lay across Peter's
chest, and he felt that he was suffocating, and struggled
convulsively to push it away; the hands with which he pushed felt
something hot and wet and slimy. and the horrified Peter realized
that it was half the body of a mangled human being.

Yes, it was the end of the world. Only a couple of days previously
Peter Gudge had been a devout member of the First Apostolic Church,
otherwise known as the Holy Rollers, and had listened at
prayer-meetings to soul-shaking imaginings out of the Book of
Revelations. So Peter knew that this was it; and having many sins
upon his conscience, and being in no way eager to confront his God,
he looked out over the bodies of the dead and the writhing wounded,
and saw a row of boxes standing against the building, having been
placed there by people who wished to see over the heads of the
crowd. Peter started to crawl, and found that he was able to do so,
and wormed his way behind one of these packing-boxes, and got inside
and lay hidden from his God.

There was blood on him, and he did not know whether it was his own