"'As you choose,' I rejoined, a little mortified. His scornful audacity stung me; I knew that he was going straight into a veritable gulf, and yet, as I am not naturally a coward, and as I did not like the idea of being called one, I declined his offer to allow me to get down. I would have liked him to be punished by having reason to be well frightened, even at the expense of having a dip in the river myself, although I don't like water.
"But I had neither the satisfaction nor the mortification: the cabriolet did not founder. In the centre of the stream, which has dug out a channel with beveled edges, so to speak, in that spot, the horse was in up to his nostrils; the carriage was lifted up by the current. The gentleman in the green overcoat—for it was green, Janille—lashed the horse; she lost her footing, floundered, swam, and by a miracle landed us on the bank, with no other injury than a rather cool foot-bath. I did not lose my wits, I can swim as well as any man, but my companion admitted that he knew no more about it than a stick of wood; and yet he had neither faltered, nor swore, nor changed color. He's a plucky fellow, I thought, and his self-possession did not displease me, although there was something scornful in his perfect tranquillity as there is in the devil's laugh.
"'If you are going to Gargilesse, we can go on together, for I am going there too,' I said.
"'Very good,' he replied. 'Where is Gargilesse?'
"'Oh! then you are not going there?'
"'I am not going anywhere to-day,' said he, 'and I am ready to go anywhere.'
"I am not superstitious, monsieur, and yet my old nurse's stories came into my mind, I don't know why, and I had a moment of idiotic distrust, as if I were sitting beside Satan in a cabriolet. I glanced furtively at this individual who travelled thus across mountains and rivers, with no end in view, apparently just for the pleasure of exposing himself or me with him to danger; and I, like a booby, had let him persuade me to get into his infernal gig!
"Seeing that I did not speak, he thought it advisable to reassure me.
"'My way of travelling about the country surprises you, I see,' he said; 'the fact is that I propose to set up a manufacturing establishment in whatever place seems to me the most suitable. I have some money to invest—whether for myself or for other people is of little consequence to you, I suppose; but you can help me, with a few hints, to attain my object.'
"'Very good,' I said, my confidence being fully restored when I found that he talked sensibly; 'but, before advising you, I must know what sort of an establishment you propose to set up.'