ught in, and stretched a wall of privacy across
the corner thus occupied; but tante-gra'mere as promptly had them
rearranged to give her a tunnel for observation. In chaotic anger and
terror she snapped her whip at intervals.

"What is it, dear tante-gra'mere?" Angelique would inquire.

"Send Wachique down to bring up my bedstead."

"But, dear tante-gra'mere, Wachique would drown. The water is already
half way up the attic stairs."

"Am I to lie here on the floor like a slave?"

"Dear, there are six feather beds under you."

"How long is this to last?"

"Not long, I hope."

Peggy stood at the gable window and looked out at the seething night. To
her the peninsula seemed sinking. She could not see anything distinctly.
Foam specked the panes. The bells kept up their alarm. Father Olivier
was probably standing on the belfry ladder cheering his black ringer,
and the sisters took turns at their rope with that determined calmness
which was the rule of their lives. Peggy tried to see even the roof of
her home. She was a grateful daughter; but her most anxious thoughts
were not of the father and mother whose most anxious thoughts would be
of her.

When the fury of the cloudburst had passed over, and the lightning no
longer flickered in their faces, and the thunder growled away in the
southeast, the risen water began to show its rolling surface. A little
moonlight leaked abroad through cloudy crevices. Angelique was bathing
her mother's face with camphor; for Madame Saucier sat down and fainted
comfortably, when nothing else could be done. Something bumped against
the side of the house, and crept crunching and bumping along, and a
voice hailed them.

"That is Colonel Menard!" cried Angelique.

Her father opened one of the dormer windows and held the lantern out of
it. Below the steep roof a boat was dashed by the swell, and Colonel
Menard and his oarsman were trying to hold it off from the eaves. A
lantern was fastened in the prow.

"How do you make a landing at this port?"

"The saints know, colonel. But we will land you. How dared you venture
out in the trail of such a storm?"

"I do not like to wait on weather, Captain Saucier. Besides, I am a good
swimmer. Are you all safe?"

"Safe, thank Heaven," called Madame Saucier, reviving at the hint of
such early rescue, and pressing to the window beside her husband. "But
here are twenty people, counting our slaves, driven to the roof almost
without warning; and w