I remained so long here that I had to
run for refuge in a manner quite out of keeping with my solemn train of
thoughts. I entered the first doorway that I saw open, and thus I found
myself in a cobbler's shop. The cobbler was seated on a stool at a low
table covered with tools and odds and ends in the middle of the room,
sewing a boot, which he held to his knee with a strap passed under his
foot. His apprentice was sitting near munching a piece of bread. Both
looked up with an astonished, not to say startled, expression when I
appeared simultaneously with a dazzling flash of lightning, followed
immediately by a terrific thunder-clap. The thought expressed in the eyes
of the cobbler as he looked up was, 'Are you a thunderbolt, or Robert the
Devil?'
I spoke to him and calmed him; but although he was satisfied that I was
human, he evidently could not make me out. Nor was this surprising, for
the village--St. Victor by name--lies quite off the track of all but the
inhabitants of a small district. The man, however, made me welcome,
and offered me a chair. The sky was now the colour of dull lead,
the lightning-flashes were almost momentary, and the thunder roared
incessantly.
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