1

The Storm (1898)

Kate Chopin
I

The leaves were so still that even Bibi thought it was going to rain. Bobinôt, who
was accustomed to converse on terms of perfect equality with his little son, called the
child’s attention to certain sombre clouds that were rolling with sinister intention from
the west, accompanied by a sullen, threatening roar. They were at Friedheimer’s store
and decided to remain there till the storm had passed. They sat within the door on two
empty kegs. Bibi was four years old and looked very wise.
“Mama’ll be ‘fraid, yes,” he suggested with blinking eyes.
“She’ll shut the house. Maybe she got Sylvie helpin’ her this evenin’,” Bobinôt
responded reassuringly.
“No; she ent got Sylvie. Sylvie was helpin’ her yistiday,” piped Bibi. Bobinôt arose
and going across to the counter purchased a can of shrimps, of which Calixta was very
fond. Then he returned to his perch on the keg and sat stolidly holding the can of shrimps
while the storm burst. It shook the wooden store and seemed to be ripping great furrows
in the distant field. Bibi laid his little hand on his father’s knee and was not afraid.

II

Calixta, at home, felt no uneasiness for their safety. She sat at a side window
sewing furiously on a sewing machine. She was greatly occupied and did not notice the
approaching storm. But she felt very warm and often stopped to mop her face on which
the perspiration gathered in beads. She unfastened her white sacque at the throat. It
began to grow dark, and suddenly realizing the situation she got up hurriedly and went
about closing windows and doors.
Out on the small front gallery1 she had hung Bobinôt’s Sunday clothes to dry and
she hastened out to gather them before the rain fell. As she stepped outside, Alcée
Laballière rode in at the gate. She had not seen him very often since her marriage, and
never alone. She stood there with Bobinôt’s coat in her hands, and the big rain drops
began to fall. Alcée rode his horse under the shelter of a side projection where the

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porch, or passageway along a wall, open to the air but protected by a roof supported by
columns.
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chickens had huddled and there were plows and a harrow piled up in the corner.
“May I come and wait on your gallery till the storm is over, Calixta?” he asked.
“Come ‘long in, M’sieur Alcée.”
His voice and her own startled her as if from a trance, and she seized Bobinôt’s
vest. Alcée, mounting to the porch, grabbed the trousers and snatched Bibi’s braided
jacket that was about to be carried away by a sudden gust of wind. He expressed an
intention to remain outside, but it was soon apparent that he might as well have been out
in the open: the water beat in upon the boards in driving sheets, and he went inside,
closing the door after him. It was even necessary to put something beneath the door to
keep the water out.
“My! what a rain! It’s good two years since it rain’ like that,” exclaimed Calixta as
she rolled up a piece of bagging and Alcée helped her to thrust it beneath the crack.
She was a little fuller of figure than five years before when she married; but she
had lost nothing of her vivacity. Her blue eyes still retained their melting quality; and her
yellow hair, dishevelled by the wind and rain, kinked more stubbornly than ever about her
ears and temples.
The rain beat upon the low, shingled roof with a force and clatter that threatened
to break an entrance and deluge them there. They were in the dining room—the sitting
room—the general utility room. Adjoining was her bed room, with Bibi’s couch along side
her own. The door stood open, and the room with its white, monumental bed, its closed
shutters, looked dim and mysterious.
Alcée flung himself into a rocker and Calixta nervously began to gather up from
the floor the lengths of a cotton sheet which she had been sewing.
“If this keeps up, Dieu sait2 if the levees goin’ to stan it!” she exclaimed. “What
have you got to do with the levees?”
“I got enough to do! An’ there’s Bobinôt with Bibi out in that storm—if he
only didn’ left Friedheimer’s!”
“Let us hope, Calixta, that Bobinôt’s got sense enough to come in out of a cyclone.”
She went and stood at the window with a greatly disturbed look on her face. She
wiped the frame that was clouded with moisture. It was stiflingly hot. Alcée got up and
joined her at the window, looking over her shoulder. The rain was coming down in sheets
obscuring the view of far-off cabins and enveloping the distant wood in a gray mist. The
playing of the lightning was incessant. A bolt struck a tall chinaberry tree at the edge of
the field. It filled all visible space with a blinding glare and the crash seemed to invade
the very boards they stood upon.
2
God only knows.
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Calixta put her hands to her eyes, and with a cry, staggered backward. Alcée’s
arm encircled her, and for an instant he drew her close and spasmodically to him.
“Bonté!”3 she cried, releasing herself from his encircling arm and retreating from
the window, the house’ll go next! If I only knew w’ere Bibi was!” She would not compose
herself; she would not be seated. Alcée clasped her shoulders and looked into her face.
The contact of her warm, palpitating body when he had unthinkingly drawn her into his
arms, had aroused all the old-time infatuation and desire for her flesh.
“Calixta,” he said, “don’t be frightened. Nothing can happen. The house is too
low to be struck, with so many tall trees standing about. There! aren’t you going to be
quiet? say, aren’t you?” He pushed her hair back from her face that was warm and
steaming. Her lips were as red and moist as pomegranate seed. Her white neck and a
glimpse of her full, firm bosom disturbed him powerfully. As she glanced up at him the
fear in her liquid blue eyes had given place to a drowsy gleam that unconsciously betrayed
a sensuous desire. He looked down into her eyes and there was nothing for him to do but
to gather her lips in a kiss. It reminded him of Assumption.4
“Do you remember—in Assumption, Calixta?” he asked in a low voice broken by
passion. Oh! she remembered; for in Assumption he had kissed her and kissed and kissed
her; until his senses would well nigh fail, and to save her he would resort to a desperate
flight. If she was not an immaculate dove in those days, she was still inviolate; a
passionate creature whose very defenselessness had made her defense, against which
his honor forbade him to prevail. Now—well, now—her lips seemed in a manner free to be
tasted, as well as her round, white throat and her whiter breasts.
They did not heed the crashing torrents, and the roar of the elements made her
laugh as she lay in his arms. She was a revelation in that dim, mysterious chamber; as
white as the couch she lay upon. Her firm, elastic flesh that was knowing for the first time
its birthright, was like a creamy lily that the sun invites to contribute its breath and
perfume to the undying life of the world.
The generous abundance of her passion, without guile or trickery, was like a white
flame which penetrated and found response in depths of his own sensuous nature that had
never yet been reached.
When he touched her breasts they gave themselves up in quivering ecstasy,
inviting his lips. Her mouth was a fountain of delight. And when he possessed her, they
seemed to swoon together at the very borderland of life’s mystery.

3
Heavens!
4
a parish (i.e., a county) in southeast Louisiana.
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He stayed cushioned upon her, breathless, dazed, enervated, with his

III

The rain was over; and the sun was turning the glistening green world into a
palace of gems. Calixta, on the gallery, watched Alcée ride away. He turned and smiled at
her with a beaming face; and she lifted her pretty chin in the air and laughed aloud.
Bobinôt and Bibi, trudging home, stopped without at the cistern to make themselves
presentable.
“My! Bibi, w’at will yo’ mama say! You ought to be ashame’. You oughta’ put on
those good pants. Look at ‘em! An’ that mud on yo’ collar! How you got that mud on yo’
collar, Bibi? I never saw such a boy!” Bibi was the picture of pathetic resignation. Bobinôt
was the embodiment of serious solicitude as he strove to remove from his own person and
his son’s the signs of their tramp over heavy roads and through wet fields. He scraped the
mud off Bibi’s bare legs and feet with a stick and carefully removed all traces from his
heavy brogans. Then, prepared for the worst—the meeting with an over-scrupulous
housewife, they entered cautiously at the back door.
Calixta was preparing supper. She had set the table and was dripping coffee at the
hearth. She sprang up as they came in.
“Oh, Bobinôt! You back! My! but I was uneasy. W’ere you been during the rain? An’
Bibi? he ain’t wet? he ain’t hurt?” She had clasped Bibi and was kissing him effusively.
Bobinôt’s explanations and apologies which he had been composing all along the way, died
on his lips as Calixta felt him to see if he were dry, and seemed to express nothing but
satisfaction at their safe return.
“I brought you some shrimps, Calixta,” offered Bobinôt, hauling the can
from his ample side pocket and laying it on the table.
“Shrimps! Oh, Bobinôt! you too good fo’ anything!” and she gave him a smacking
kiss on the cheek that resounded, “J’vous réponds,5 we’ll have a feas’ to-night! umph-
umph!”
Bobinôt and Bibi began to relax and enjoy themselves, and when the three seated
5
Take my word; let me tell you.
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themselves at table they laughed much and so loud that anyone might have heard them as
far away as Laballière’s.

IV

Alcée Laballière wrote to his wife, Clarisse, that night. It was a loving letter, full
of tender solicitude. He told her not to hurry back, but if she and the babies liked it at
Biloxi, to stay a month longer. He was getting on nicely; and though he missed them, he
was willing to bear the separation a while longer—realizing that their health and pleasure
were the first things to be considered.

As for Clarisse, she was charmed upon receiving her husband’s letter. She and the babies
were doing well. The society was agreeable; many of her old friends and acquaintances
were at the bay. And the first free breath since her marriage seemed to restore the
pleasant liberty of her maiden days. Devoted as she was to her husband, their intimate
conjugal life was something which she was more than willing to forego for a while.
So the storm passed and every one was happy.