The water in the gorge was rising.
Vikram told her at eight-thirty. He had been monitoring it from the right-side window — the gorge-side window, which she had told the younger children to stay away from but which Vikram occupied with the quiet, focused attention of someone doing a job. "It's come up about a metre since we stopped," he said. "That's — in an hour, that's faster than I thought it would be."
"How far below us now?" she said.
"Maybe eight metres. Was fifteen when we first stopped." He paused. "The ledge we're on is at about twelve metres above normal river level. If the flood goes over normal—"
"What's the normal flood level for this gorge in August?"
He thought about it. "My father said eight to ten metres above normal. In a bad year." He paused. "He said in the 2013 flood it went to fifteen."
Fifteen metres above normal river level. They were at twelve. She did the arithmetic without wanting to. She did it anyway because ignoring arithmetic in an emergency was how you got killed by arithmetic.
"Okay," she said. "We need to think about higher ground."
