"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 now grief-stricken and the tears rolled down her cheeks.
Before long we reached the house. The big gates were open and we went quickly into the garden. What a sight met our eyes! All the glass frames were smashed to atoms. Flowers, pieces of glass and hailstones were all heaped together in our once beautiful garden. Everything was shattered!
Where was the father?
We searched for him. Last of all we found him in the big conservatory, of which every pane of glass was broken. He was seated on a wheelbarrow in the midst of the débris which covered the ground. Alexix and Benjamin stood beside him silently.
"My children, my poor little ones!" he cried, when we all were there.
He took Lise in his arms and began to sob. He said nothing more. What could he have said? It was a terrible catastrophe, but the consequences were still more terrible. I soon learned this from Etiennette.
Ten years ago their father had bought the garden and had built the house himself. The man who had sold him the ground had also lent him the money to buy the necessary materials required by a florist. The amount was payable in yearly payments for fifteen years. The man was only waiting for an occasion when the florist would be late in payment to take back the ground, house, material; keeping, of course, the ten-year payments that he had already received.