No: he was awake and wide awake.
The door was growing redder all the time, the smoke was denser, he heard muffled cracklings as of cane-brake bursting, licked by tongues of flame, and even saw the sparks dance, and cling like flies of fire to the cretonne curtain which closed the room. He heard a desperate steady barking, like a furiously tolling bell sounding an alarm.
Christ!... The conviction of reality suddenly leaped to his mind, and maddened him.
"Teresa! Teresa!... Up!"
And with the first push, he flung her out of bed. Then he ran to the children's room, and with shouts and blows pulled them out in their shirts, like an idiotic, frightened flock which runs before the stick without knowing where it is going. The roof of his room was already burning, casting a shower of sparks over the bed.
To Batiste, blinded by the smoke, the minutes seemed like centuries till he got the door open; and through it, maddened with terror, all the family rushed out in their nightclothes and ran to the road.
Here, a little more serene, they took count.
All; they were all there, even the poor dog which howled sadly as it watched the burning house.
Teresa embraced her daughter, who, forgetting her danger, trembled with shame, upon seeing herself in her chemise in the middle of the huerta, and seated herself upon a sloping bank, shrinking up with modesty, resting her chin upon the knees, and drawing down her white linen night-robe in order to cover her feet.
The two little ones, frightened, took refuge in the arms of their elder brother, and the father rushed about like a madman, roaring maledictions.