In front of the house, and almost touching the landing-place, was a small arbour of green trellis-work, intended to support in summer-time the creeping shoots of the young vines and hops,—a cradle of verdure, beneath which were arranged tables for the visitors. At one end of the house, painted white and covered with tiles, a wood-house, with a loft over it, formed at the angle a small wing, much lower than the main body of the building. Almost precisely over this wing there appeared a window, with the shutters covered with iron plates, and strengthened without by two transverse iron bars attached to the wall by strong clamps.
Three boats were undulating in the water, fastened to posts at the landing-place. Seated in one of these boats, Nicholas was making sure that the valve he had introduced performed its part properly. Standing on a bench at the mouth of the arbour, Calabash, with her hands placed over her eyes so as to shade away the sun, was looking out in the direction in which Madame Séraphin and Fleur-de-Marie were to come to reach the isle.
"I don't see any one yet, old or young," said Calabash, getting off the bench and speaking to Nicholas. "It will be just as it was yesterday; we may as well wait for the King of Prussia. If these women do not come in half an hour, we can't wait any longer; Bras-Rouge's 'dodge' is much better, and he'll be waiting for us. The diamond-matcher is to be at his place in the Champs Elysées at five o'clock. We ought to be there before her; the Chouette said so this morning."
"You are right," replied Nicholas, leaving the boat. "May thunder smite the old devil's kin, who has given us all the trouble for nothing! The valve works capitally. It appears we shall only have one instead of two jobs."
"Besides, Bras-Rouge and Barbillon will want us; they can do nothing by their two selves."
"True, again; for, whilst the job is doing, Bras-Rouge must keep watch outside the cabaret, and Barbillon is not strong enough to drag the matcher into the cellar, for the old —— will fight for it, I know!"
"Didn't the Chouette say that, for a joke, she had got the Schoolmaster at 'school' in the cellar?"
"Not in this one; in another much deeper, and which is filled with water at spring-tides."
"How the Schoolmaster must rage and foam there in the cellar! There all alone, and blind, too!"
"That is no matter, for, if he saw as clear as ever, he could see nothing there; the cellar is as dark as an oven."