d one's ears.

I went to the window, and Gaspard joined me there.

"Is there no news up your way?" I asked him.

"No," he answered. "There is considerable talk about the heavy rains of
the last few days. Some seem to think that they will cause trouble."

In effect, it had rained for sixty hours without stopping. The Garonne
was very much swollen since the preceding day, but we had confidence in
it, and, as long as it did not overflow its banks, we could not look on
it as a bad neighbor.

"Bah!" I exclaimed, shrugging my shoulders. "Nothing will happen. It is
the same every year. The river puts up her back as if she were furious,
and she calms down in a night. You will see, my boy, that it will amount
to nothing this time. See how beautiful the weather is!"

And I pointed to the sky. It was seven o'clock; the sun was setting.
The sky was blue, an immense blue sheet of profound purity, in which the
rays of the setting sun were like a golden dust. Never had I seen the
village drowsing in so sweet a peace. Upon the tiled roofs a rosy tint
was fading. I heard a neighbor's laugh, then the voices of children at
the turn in the road in front of our place. Farther away and softened by
the distance, rose the sounds of flocks entering their sheds. The great
voice of the Garonne roared continually; but it was to me as the voice
of the silence, so accustomed to it was I.

Little by little the sky paled; the village became more drowsy. It
was the evening of a beautiful day; and I thought that all our
good fortune--the big harvests, the happy house, the betrothal of
Veronique--came to us from above in the purity of the dying light. A
benediction spread over us with the farewell of the evening.

Meanwhile I had returned to the center of the room. The girls were
chattering. We listened to them, smiling. Suddenly, across the serenity
of the country, a terrible cry sounded, a cry of distress and death:

"The Garonne! The Garonne!"

II.

We rushed out into the yard.

Saint-Jory is situated at the bottom of a slope at about five hundred
yards from the Garonne. Screens of tall poplars that divide the meadows,
hide the river completely.

We could see nothing. And still the cry rang out:

"The Garonne! The Garonne!"

Suddenly, on the wide road before us, appeared two men and three women,
one of them holding a child in her arms. It was they who were crying
out, distracted, running with long strides. They turned at times,