Page:Malot - Nobodys Boy, Crewe-Jones, 1916.djvu/231

 of things, pieces of slate, chimney pots, tiles, etc.

"Oh, the glass frames!" cried Etiennette.

I had the same thought.

"Even if they get there before the hail, they will never have time to cover the glasses with straw. Everything will be ruined."

"They say that hail only falls in places," I said, trying to hope still.

"Oh, this is too near home for us to escape. If it falls on the garden the same as here, poor father will be ruined. And he counted so much on those flowers, he needs the money so badly."

I had heard that the glass frames cost as much as 1800 francs a hundred, and I knew what a disaster it would be if the hail broke our five or six hundred, without counting the plants and the conservatories. I would liked to have questioned Etiennette, but we could scarcely hear each other speak, and she did not seem disposed to talk. She looked at the hail falling with a hopeless expression, like a person would look upon his house burning.

The hurricane lasted but a short while; it stopped as suddenly as it had commenced. It lasted perhaps six minutes. The clouds swept over Paris and we were able to leave our shelter. The hailstones were thick on the ground. Lise could not walk in them in her thin shoes, so I took her on my back and carried her. Her pretty face, which was so bright when going to the party, was