Jean walked slowly away from the farm, so absorbed in his vexation that he found himself in the level plain again without being conscious of the road he was taking. The blue-black sky gleamed with stars, and the night was close and hot. The immobility of the atmosphere told of the approach of a storm now passing afar, and the reflection of lightning could be seen towards the east. As Jean raised his head he caught sight on his left hand of hundreds of phosphorescent eyes gleaming like candles, and turning towards him at the sound of his steps. It was the sheep in the pen, alongside of which he was now passing. Then he heard Soulas ask in his drawling voice: "Well, my lad?"
The dogs, who were lying on the ground, had not stirred, for they had scented that Jean belonged to the farm. The little swine-herd, driven from the wheeled hut by the excessive heat, was sleeping in a furrow; the shepherd standing quite alone on the cropped plain, which was now enveloped in night.
"Well, my lad, have you settled it?"
"He says," replied Jean, without even stopping, "that if she's in the family-way he'll see."
He had already stridden past the pen, when old Soulas's response reached him, sounding solemnly in the deep silence.
"That's true. You must wait."
Jean continued on his way. La Beauce lay stretched around him, buried in a leaden sleep; and there was an overwhelming sense of the silent desolation of the scorched stubble and the baked, parched soil in the burnt smell that floated in the air, and in the chirrup of the crickets which sounded like the cracking of embers among ashes. Nothing but the dim forms of the ricks rose above the melancholy nakedness of the plain; but every twenty seconds or so, low on the horizon, the lightning flashed in violet streaks of mournful aspect, which swiftly disappeared.