In the sky, where the sun is setting, a noiseless destruction of an unknown city, of an unknown land, is taking place; structures, magnificent palaces with towers, are crumbling; mountains are silently splitting asunder and, bending slowly, are tumbling down.  But no cry, no moan, no crash of the fall reaches the earth—­the monstrous play of shadows is noiseless; and the great surface of the ocean, as though ready for something, as though waiting for something, reflecting it faintly, listens to it in silence.

Silence reigns also in the fishermen’s settlement.  The fishermen have gone fishing; the children are sleeping and only the restless women, gathered in front of the houses, are talking softly, lingering before going to sleep, beyond which there is always the unknown.

The light of the sea and the sky behind the houses, and the houses and their bark roofs are black and sharp, and there is no perspective:  the houses that are far and those that are near seem to stand side by side as if attached to one another, the roofs and the walls embracing one another, pressing close to one another, seized with the same uneasiness before the eternal unknown.

Right here there is also a little church, its side wall formed crudely of rough granite, with a deep window which seems to be concealing itself.

A cautious sound of women’s voices is heard, softened by uneasiness and by the approaching night.

“We can sleep peacefully to-night.  The sea is calm and the rollers are breaking like the clock in the steeple of old Dan.”

“They will come back with the morning tide.  My husband told me that they will come back with the morning tide.”

“Perhaps they will come back with the evening tide.  It is better for us to think they will come back in the evening, so that our waiting will not be in vain.

“But I must build a fire in the stove.”

“When the men are away from home, one does not feel like starting a fire.  I never build a fire, even when I am awake; it seems to me that fire brings a storm.  It is better to be quiet and silent.”

“And listen to the wind?  No, that is terrible.”

“I love the fire.  I should like to sleep near the fire, but my husband does not allow it.”

“Why doesn’t old Dan come here?  It is time to strike the hour.”

“Old Dan will play in the church to-night; he cannot bear such silence as this.  When the sea is roaring, old Dan hides himself and is silent—­he is afraid of the sea.  But, as soon as the waves calm down, Dan crawls out quietly and sits down to play his organ.”

The women laugh softly.

“He reproaches the sea.”

“He is complaining to God against it.  He knows how to complain well.  One feels like crying when he tells God about those who have perished at sea.  Mariet, have you seen Dan to-day?  Why are you silent, Mariet?”

Mariet is the adopted daughter of the abbot, in whose house old Dan, the organist, lives.  Absorbed in thought, she does not hear the question.