He scarcely waited for her acquiescence, but lifting her gently in his arms, placed her on the waggon. And then he gave his signal to the mules, and they moved along the carrefour, over which the darkness was now stealing.
They passed along the quays and the Port au Foin, now dimly lighted by the few uncertain and straggling lanterns before alluded to, until the mules turned of their own accord into a court of the Rue St. Antoine. A peasant in wooden shoes clamped forward to receive them, with whom the charlatan exchanged a few words previously to conducting his companion back again, nearly along the same route by which they had arrived at the stables.
‘You may call me Benoit,’ he said, as he perceived that the girl was sometimes at a loss how to address him. ‘Benoit Mousel. Do not stand upon adding maître to it. We are compatriots, as I have told you, and therefore friends. The quays are dark at night, but the river is darker still. You made a good choice of two evils in keeping out of it.’
They walked on, barely lighted through the obscurity, until they came to the foot of the Pont Notre Dame—the most ancient of those still existing at Paris. It is now, as formerly, on the line of thoroughfare running from the Rue St. Jacques, in the Quartier Latin, to the Rue St. Martin. The modern visitor may perhaps recall it to mind by a square tower built against its western side, flanked by two small houses raised upon piles, beneath which are some wheels, by whose working some thirty of the fountains in the streets of Paris are supplied with water. This mechanism was not constructed until a few years after the date of our story. Before that, the Pont Notre Dame, in common with the other bridges we have mentioned, was covered with houses, which remained in excellent condition, to the number of sixty-eight or seventy, up to the commencement of the last century. They were then destroyed; and now the parapets are covered with boxes of old books ranged in graduated prices; whilst shoe-blacks, lucifer-merchants, and beautifiers of lap-dogs occupy the kerb of the pavement.
Benoit descended some rude steps leading from the quay to the river, guiding Louise carefully by the hand; and dragging a boat towards them, which was lying there in readiness, embarked with his trembling companion, as if to cross the river. But he stopped half-way, close to the pier of the bridge, and then the girl saw that they had touched a long low range of what appeared to be houses, which looked as if they floated on the water. And, in effect, they did so; their continuous vibration and the rushing of the river between certain divisions in their substructure, showing that they were boat-mills.
‘Where are you taking me?’ asked Louise timidly.
‘To our house,’ replied Benoit. ‘You have nothing to fear. I told you it was an odd dwelling. Now mind how you place your foot on the timber. So: gallantly done.’
He assisted her from the boat, which was rocking on the dark stream of the river as it rushed through the arches, on to a few frail steps of wood which hung down from one of the buildings to the water. Then making it fast to one of the piles, he passed with her along a small gallery of boards, and, pushing a door open, entered the floating house.
They were in a small apartment, forming one of a long range which had apparently been built in an enormous lighter; and in one of these the large shaft of a mill-wheel could be seen turning heavily round, as it shook the building, whilst the whole mass oscillated with the peculiar vibration of a floating structure. At a small table in the middle of this chamber, a buxom-looking female, in a half-rustic, half-city attire, was busily at work with her needle, at a rude table. There was little other furniture in this ark. A small stove, some seats, and a few hanging shelves, on which were placed some bottles of coloured fluids, retorts, and little earthenware utensils, used in chemical analysis, completed the list of all that was movable in the room. But the circumstance that struck Louise most upon entering, was the sharp, pungent atmosphere which filled the floating apartment—so noxious that it produced a violent fit of coughing as soon as she inhaled it. Nor was her conductor much less affected.
‘Paff!’ he exclaimed, as soon as he could speak; ‘our master is at his work again, brewing devil’s drinks and fly-powder. Never mind, ma pauvrette: you will be used to it directly.’