"So it rained all night, did it, Jean?" she said. "See how full of water the courtyard is! All the fields I can see from my window are like ponds." "It's a regular deluge, my dear child," the peasant, who seemed to be an intimate friend of the family, replied from below, "a genuine water-spout! I don't know whether the worst of the storm broke here or somewhere else, but I never saw the fountain so full." "The roads must be all washed out, Jean, and you had better stay here. Is father awake?" "Not yet, Gilberte, but Mère Janille is up and about." "Will you ask her to come up to my room, my old Jean? I have something to ask her." "I will go at once." The girl closed the window without apparently noticing that the traveller's window was open and that he was standing there looking at her. A moment later he was in the courtyard, where the rain had transformed the paths into little torrents, and he found Sylvain Charasson in the stable, cleaning his horse and Monsieur Antoine's, and discussing the effects of such a terrible night with the peasant whose Christian name Emile Cardonnet had learned at last. The night before, this man had caused him a sort of indefinable uneasiness, as if there were something mysterious and fateful about him. He had noticed that Monsieur Antoine had not once called him by name, and that, on several occasions when Janille had been on the point of doing so, he had warned her with a glance to be careful. They called him only _friend_, _comrade_ or _old fellow_, and it seemed that his name was a secret which they did not choose to divulge. Who could this man be, who had the outward aspect and the language of a peasant and who, nevertheless, carried his gloomy anticipations so far, and his severe criticism to such a point. Emile strove to enter into conversation with him, but to no purpose; he was even more reserved than on the preceding day, and when he was questioned concerning the damage done by the storm, he replied simply: "I advise you to lose no time in starting for Gargilesse if you want to find any bridges across the stream, for in less than two hours there'll be a most infernal _dribe_ there." "What do you mean by that? I don't understand that word." "You don't know what a _dribe_ is? Well, you will see one to-day and you'll never forget it. Good-day, monsieur; be off at once for your friend Cardonnet will be in trouble before long." And he turned away without another word. Impelled by a vague feeling of alarm, Emile hastily saddled his horse himself, and said to Charasson, tossing him a piece of money: "Tell your master, my boy, that I have gone without taking leave of him, but that I shall come again soon to thank him for his kindness to me."