We have more than two-and-twenty hours' journey before us." It was half-past five, the sun had risen, radiant in the pure sky of a delightful morning.

It was a Friday, the 19th of August.

On the horizon, however, some small, heavy clouds already presaged a terrible day of stormy heat.

And the oblique sunrays were enfilading the compartments of the railway carriage, filling them with dancing, golden dust.
"Yes, two-and-twenty hours," murmured Marie, relapsing into a state of anguish.

"_Mon Dieu_! what a long time we must still wait!" Then her father helped her to lie down again in the narrow box, a kind of wooden gutter, in which she had been living for seven years past.