‘I do not know, father André; I have been looking for her amongst the girls of our society, but I could not find her.’ ‘Do you think she is still in the church?’ ‘That may be, but I do not think it is likely; you know that the lightning struck the spire.’ ‘Was any one killed?’ ‘No; but we were all dreadfully frightened.’ Matthias pushed on. He questioned all who passed, but could gain no tidings of Gabrielle. Several, it is true, had seen her in the procession; some had noticed her in the church; but none remembered to have observed her after the fall of the lightning. André was not, however, alarmed. He thought that possibly his daughter was still in church, praying; probably she was with some friend in a cottage at La Couture. Gabrielle had many acquaintances in that little village, and nothing was more probable than that one of them should have invited the girl home to rest, and take some refreshment, till it was ascertained that the water had sufficiently subsided to permit of her return to the Isle of Swallows. When he reached La Couture, he went direct to the church. He was shocked to see the havoc created there by the bursting of the storm; workmen were already engaged in filling the graves that had been ploughed up by the currents, and covering the coffins which had been exposed; head-crosses lay prostrate and strewn about, and the sites of some graves had completely disappeared. A knot of people stood at the west end of the church, gazing at the ruin effected by the lightning; the summit of the spire was cloven, a portion leaned outward, the lead was curled up like a ram’s horn, and a strip of the metal dissolved by the electric fluid exposed the wooden rafters and framework of the spire. The stroke had then glanced to the apex of the nave gable, thrown down the iron cross surmounting it, had split the wall, shattered the glass, and then had fallen upon and perforated the threshold. Matthias André entered the church, and sought through its chapels for his daughter. She was not there. No one was in the sacred building. Then he entered the village, and visited one house after another. No one had tidings to tell of Gabrielle. The father became anxious. He enquired for the girl who had borne the banner of the Blessed Virgin. He asked her about his daughter, who had stood near her, holding the leading ribbon. She had seen Gabrielle, of course she had, when they entered the church; she sat near her in the aisle during vespers. When the storm came on, Gabrielle seemed to be greatly alarmed; she must have fainted when the lightning fell, because two gentlemen had carried her out of church. Whilst the girl spoke, she stood in the doorway of her cottage, holding the trunk of a vine which was trellised over the front of the house and a small open balcony, to which a flight of stairs outside the dwelling gave access.