Although our bedroom was immediately overhead, we had to pass through the mill to reach it, and the journey was a roundabout one. The lame miller was our guide, and on our way we learnt the cause of his lameness. About a year before he had been caught up by some of his machinery and mangled in a frightful manner. We came to a brick wall plastered over, and a little below a shaft that ran through it was a ragged hole nearly three feet in diameter.
Said the miller: 'You see that hole?'
'Yes.'
'You wouldn't think a man's body could make that? Mine did: and all those dark splashes on the plaster are the marks of my blood!'
The poor fellow had been brought within a hair's-breadth of death, and the long months during which he could do nothing but lie down or sit in a heap after his accident had, he said, nearly ruined him.
This night, although we had but one room, we had two beds. I lingered at the open window, and watched the swiftly-running mill-stream a few feet below. It had an evil sound. Then I felt the bad power that lies in water; above all, its treachery. Had not this small stream, by lending its strength to a wheel that turned other wheels, taken up a man as if he were a feather, and dashed him through a wall? When the morning light and sunshine returned, the chant of the running water was as soothing as the song of birds.
We contrived, after infinite torture, to put on our boots again, and then walked up the hill to the village-like town. Besides the church of mixed Romanesque and Gothic, there was nothing worth seeing there, unless the spectacle of a woman holding up a rabbit by the hind-legs, while her daughter, a tender-hearted damsel of about sixteen, whacked it behind the ears with a fire-shovel, may be thought improving to the mind. At a shop where we bought some things, Hugh was deeply offended by a woman who insisted that some rather small bathing-drawers were large enough for him, and especially for speaking of him as the petit garçon. He talked about her 'cheek' all the way back to the boat. It was on returning that I noticed the picturesque charm of our mill, with the old Gothic bridge adjoining it, a weather-beaten, time-worn stone cross rising from the parapet. Fresh provisions having been put on board the boat, we wished our friends of the mill good-bye. They and their children, with about a dozen neighbours and their children, assembled upon the bank to see us off. A long line of dancing rapids lay in front of us, so that we were really able to astonish the people by the speed at which we went away where any boat of the Dronne would have quickly gone aground. In a few minutes the strong current had carried us a mile, and then, looking back, we saw the little crowd still gazing at us. A turn of the stream, and they had lost sight of us for ever.
Under the next mill-dam was some deep water free from reeds and weeds. On the banks were tall trees; behind us was the rocky weir, over which the stream fell in a thousand little rivulets and runnels, and less than a hundred yards in front rose the seemingly impenetrable reedy forest. The spot so enclosed had a quiet beauty that would have been holy in days gone by when the mind of man peopled such solitudes with fluvial deities. Here the desire to swim became irresistible. What a swim it was! The water was only cold enough to be refreshing, while its transparency was such that even where it was eight or ten feet deep every detail could be seen along the gravelly bottom, where the gudgeons gambolled. After the bath we paddled until we saw a very shady meadow-corner close to the water. Here we spread out upon the grass eggs that had been boiled for us at the mill, bread, cheese, grapes, and pears, and what other provisions we had. Now and again the wind carried to us the sound of water turning some hidden, lazy wheel. Those who would prefer a well-served lunch in a comfortable room to our simple meal in the meadow-corner under the rustling leaves should never go on a voyage down the Dronne.
Some time in the afternoon we came to a broad weir that was rather difficult to pass, for there was no water running over, and a dense vegetation had sprung up during the summer between the rough stones. The miller saw us from the other end of his dam, which was a rather long way off, for these weirs do not cross at right angles with the banks, but start at a very obtuse one at a point far above the mill. After a little hesitation, inspired by doubtfulness as to what manner of beings we were, he came towards us over the stones and through the water-plants with a bog-trotting movement which we, who had scraped most of the skin off our own bare ankles, quite understood.
He was a rough but good fellow, and he lent us a helping hand, which was needed, for every time we lifted the boat now it seemed heavier than it was before. The hard work was telling upon us. The sound of voices caused another head to appear on the scene. It came up from the other side of the weir, and it was a cunning old head, with sharp little eyes under bushy gray brows, overhanging like penthouses. Presently the body followed the head, and the old man began to talk to the miller in patois, but failing, apparently, to make any impression upon him, he addressed me in very bad French.