Max Pemberton

“ The tunnel was barred by an iron grating!
For what cause this obstacle was so placed, unless it was to prevent the mud silting up into the pool above, I do not pretend to know. But I can never forget the moments I spent beating upon it with my hands, tearing at its bars, feeling myself crushed by the weight of water upon me, fighting in very despair as a man will fight for his life. All around me the current thundered, flowing over my shoulders, running from my face, streaming from my hair. The spray went near to choking me again and again. The darkness was intense; the air fetid. ”

“ A heavy darkness had come down with the storm. The rain and hail cut the face. The willows bent like whips. The lightning leaped from cloud to cloud in paths of blinding light. The rattle of the thunder was like the roar of unnumbered batteries. Determined to find a haven at any cost, and sublimely indifferent to the relations between Maître Chalot and his neighbours, I set down to my work, and, wet and weary as I was, the canoe flew onward to the mill. ”

“ This growing weakness, the knowledge that moments scarce could pass before the end must come, awakened me to my supreme effort. I got my foot upon the tunnel’s bed; and with both hands gripping one of the bars, I drew myself back, having the design to throw all my weight upon the grating. To my inexpressible amazement, the bar, which would yield to no pressure in the direction of the river, came away in my hands as I forced myself back from it. The whole grating, rotting in its frame of brick, fell with the bar. ”

“ The walls were often bulging and split. The door of the parlour—for there was no such luxury as a hall—had lost a hinge. A mangy dog of all known breeds lay asleep on a heap of dirty straw in the yard. I saw that the place was built upon the bank of a little stream here flowing swiftly into the main river; and must once have been a prosperous mill. But that, I judged, was years ago.
I left my canoe in the mill-pool, then whipped into ripples by the storm; and, regardless of the fact that water streamed out of my flannels, I knocked upon the open door of the kitchen. ”

“ If anyone suffers, it will not be Fifine.”
I knew not what to think, what to say in answer to him. I could have sworn that I had heard a child cry out; and yet here was this smiling old cripple appearing to be the spirit of all benevolence and good. The thing was becoming a mystery. I recalled again the pitiful, dazed look of the girl; I remembered her startled exclamation when I had proposed to go to the mill. And I could not drive it out of my mind that I was quite alone with this saintly cripple; that there was no other house within many miles of his. ”

“ It may be, if no other impulse had come, that I had carried out this intention of despair and remained lying upon the palette of the wheel until the end of it. It was only with a shudder that I could look down to the tunnel. The very suggestion that I should face it and risk all in an attempt to swim to the river chilled me to the marrow. And yet as the minutes went, the words, “That is your only hope,” kept ringing in my head and would not be denied. I answered them with a low cry of mental pain; I prayed to God that death might come to me in any shape but this. ”

“ There was now a little more light in the pit. I knew that the dawn had broken, and fell to watching a ray of the sunshine which shone upon the dark pool. For many minutes I watched it in the determination that, whatever should be, I would think no more of the tunnel. The process became interesting, as little things will when great dangers press upon us. I observed the line of the water and the angle at which the beam fell. I looked again and, with a sudden overwhelming despair, I marked a change. ”

“ She will not go to school; she will not work at home. She is a plague to me. Even the clergy speak of her from the pulpit, saying, ‘Be warned by Fifine of the mill.’ What a misfortune for you to speak with her.”
I said nothing in answer to his appeal; but his words seemed to be confirmed by the absence of the girl when we sat down to his poor supper, and afterwards to pipes in the settle. The crisis of the storm had now passed, but the wind still howled dismally in the river valley, and roared under the eaves of the old house with a sound as of human moaning and distress. ”

“ When he had placed the lamp upon the table, Maître Chalot made haste to apologize for his shortcomings and to set supper.
“I have nothing but bread and wine to offer, monsieur,” said he, hobbling about upon his crutches with surprising agility; “but such as I have, I give with all my heart. It was different when my wife was alive—but she died ten years ago. And there is no woman’s hand in this house now. God be merciful to me, I am quite alone!”
“One moment,” said I, feeling myself moved to pity at his obvious distress. “I met a young girl on the river’s bank half a mile from here. ”

“ And not to care if you have a pillow for your head or a dinner to eat! Ma foi! what a nation!”
He laughed at the humour of the thing, and poured me out another glass of the sour wine. He was just about to resume the subject when we both heard a heavy, dull sound as of hammering, a sound which appeared to come from a room next to our own; and at this he sprang up upon his crutches and hobbled away to listen. In the minute that I was alone I heard a sharp cry like the cry of a girl who had been struck, but it was not repeated, and when the old man came back to me he was still smiling. ”

“ Better far to creep out to the river again—better anything than the gloom and chill and silence of that reeking chamber. And this at last I resolved to do, coming to believe, as I reasoned it out again, that the girl was my friend, the cripple my enemy.
Firm in this purpose, I pushed a chair against the door and sat upon the bed. I had taken off my coat in my endeavours to move the wardrobe, and now I sat in my shirt-sleeves, having first got my pocket-book which contained my money and thrust it into my belt. My knapsack lay upon the chair at the door, but I did not open it ”

“ She had broken the cog-wheels of the mill-sluice with a hammer, while I supped with Maître Chalot, and so maimed them that the water but half-filled the tunnel. I owe it to her alone that I was not drowned like a dog. At Roanne, I wired to England for money, borrowing meanwhile of the priest, who heard my tale with little amazement.
“The man has long been suspected,” said he; “but what can we do? ”