Allow me to give an exact plan of the house, in order to make the situation clear. It is forty years or more since I entered the house and yet I can see it as though I had just left it.
As can be seen, the house was in reality one long passage, composed of the forge, which opened upon the rue de Soissons; an inner court just behind the forge; the dwelling-house, consisting of a bedroom furnished in the usual style, with a great walnut chest of drawers, a large four-post bed with green serge hangings, a table and several chairs, and, in addition, a little bed that had been improvised for me, on two chairs, for that night, which they had put opposite the big bed. Next after this bedroom came the kitchen, the accustomed home of a big cat called the Doctor, by whose claws I one day nearly lost the sight of one of my eyes. Then after the kitchen was a little garden shaded by some trees and littered with many stones, a garden which never grew anything but nettles, as no one seemed ever to have thought of putting anything else in it—this looked out on the place du Château. It will be seen that the dwelling-house was shut off completely from the rest of the world when the door of the forge, opening on the rue de Soissons and the garden gate, leading into the place du Château were closed; unless, indeed, the walls of the garden were scaled.
I stayed then with my cousin Marianne without raising any objection to doing so. I loved going to the forge, where a lad named Picard was very partial to me. I used to make fireworks there with iron filings, and the workmen, Picard in particular, would tell me thrilling stories.
I stayed in the forge till quite late in the evening; the forge gave me infinite delight that night, with its fantastic reflections and dancing play of light and shadow. About eight o'clock my cousin Marianne fetched me away and put me to bed in the little bed opposite the large one; and I slept the sound sleep that God gives to little children as He gives refreshing dew in spring-tide.
At midnight I was waked up, or rather we were waked up, my cousin and I, by a loud knocking at our door. A night lamp glimmered on a table near the bedside, and by the light of this lamp I could see my cousin sitting up in bed, silent, terrified.
Nobody could knock at that inner door, as the two other doors were shut.
But I, who to-day almost shudder with fear as I write these lines, I, on the contrary, felt no fear: I got out of my cot and approached the door.
"Where are you going, Alexandre?" cried my cousin. "Where are you going, child?"
"You will soon see," I calmly replied. "I am going to open the door for papa, who has come to say good-bye to us."