"Munta!" answered the river dwellers.
And the water was indeed slowly rising, already threatening the city that had so audaciously taken root in the very middle of its bed.
But despite the danger, the townspeople seemed to be feeling nothing more than uneasy curiosity. No one thought of moving across the bridges to take refuge on the high land. Nonsense! The Júcar was always flooding. You had to expect something of the sort every once in a while. Thank heaven there was something to break the monotony of life in that sleepy town! Why complain at a week's vacation? It was hard to disturb the placid complacency of those descendants of the Moors. Floods had been coming since the days of their fathers, their grandfathers and their great-grandfathers, and never had the town been carried off. A few houses at the worst. Why suppose the catastrophe would be due now?... The Júcar was a sort of husband to Alcira. As happens in any decent family, there would be a quarrel now and then—a thrashing followed by kisses and reconciliation. Just imagine—living seven or eight centuries together! Besides,—and this the lesser people thought—there was Father San Bernardo, as powerful as God Himself in all that concerned Alcira. He was able, single-handed, to tame the writhing monster that wound its coiling way underneath the bridges.
It rained day and night; and yet the city, from its animation, seemed to be having a holiday. The young ones, sent home from school because of the bad weather, were all on the bridges throwing branches into the water to see how swift the current was, or playing along the lanes close to the river, planting sticks in the banks and waiting for the ever-broadening torrent to reach them.
Under the shelter of the projecting eaves, whence broken water-spouts were belching streams as thick as a man's arm, loungers in the cafés would slip along the streets toward the river-front; and after glancing at the flood from the scant protection of their umbrellas, would make their way proudly back, stopping in every drinking place to offer their opinions on the rise that had taken place since their previous inspection.
The city from end to end was one seething storm of heated, typically "Southern" argument and prophecy. Friendships were being made and broken, over questions as to whether the river had risen four inches the past hour, or only one, and as to whether this freshet were more important than the one five years before.
Meantime the sky kept on weeping through its countless eyes; the river, roaring more wrathful every moment, was now licking at the ends of the low-lying streets near the bank, creeping up into the gardens on the shore, stealing in between the orange-trees, opening holes in the hedges and the mudwalls.
The main concern of the populace was whether it were raining also in the mountains of Cuenca. If much water came down from there, the flood would become serious. And experienced eyes studied the color of the waters carefully. If there was any black in them, it meant they came from the upper provinces.
The cloud-burst lasted for two whole days. The night of the second day closed, and the roar of the river sounded forebodingly in the darkness. On its black surface lights could be seen reflected like restless flashes of flame—candles from the shore houses and lanterns of watchmen on guard along the banks.
In the lower streets the water was coming under the doors into the houses. Women and children were taking refuge in the garrets while the men, with their trousers rolled up to their knees, were splashing about in the liquid silt, carrying their farming tools to places of safety, or tugging at some donkey who would be balking at going too deep into the water.