"Couldn't we get in that way?"
"Ma foi! That's an idea, now. Many's the time I got in that way as a boy, when the wheel was stopped--just a boy's devilry, you understand. You could get in that way yet, if the woodwork isn't too rotten to bear your weight. You would have to wade the stream, but that isn't deep or swift except in winter. Old as I be I'll show you the way myself."
"We could get in without being heard?"
"To be sure, if the woodwork doesn't crack and give way. The kitchen is the nearest room; old Jules, the handy man, is as deaf as a post, and his wife, who does the cooking, isn't much better."
"And where is the entrance to the underground passages?"
"To the left of the kitchen, in the floor of the hoist."
As the miller answered his questions, Pariset sketched a rough plan of the building.
"Is that something like it?" he asked, handing the paper over.
The old man put on his spectacles deliberately, and examined the sketch.
"Near enough," he said. "Ma foi! But I couldn't have done that myself."