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The rain began on a Tuesday, but Elias did not recognize it as the beginning of anything other than a storm. He stood at the window of his small stone cottage and watched the gray curtain sweep across the valley. He offered a quiet prayer of thanks. The garden needed the water. He did not yet know that the garden would soon be swallowed whole. He was a man accustomed to solitude. His wife had passed three years ago. His children had moved to the city. The farm was his companion now.