"Ah! it is you? It is a long time since you came to see me."
"Yes, true, but this time I think I have come to see you for a long time," replied Isaure’s guide; "I have brought you some company, as you see."
As he spoke, he pointed to the girl, at whom Charlot glanced indifferently, saying:
"Oh, yes! it’s a woman!"
"But let us go in, first of all; we shall have time enough to talk then," said the vagabond, motioning to Isaure to enter the house. The poor girl had difficulty in determining to comply; she cast a glance backward; she was afraid that she was looking at the sky for the last time; but her companion pushed her roughly, and she was soon in Charlot’s disgusting abode, the door of which was instantly closed behind her.
The interior of the house consisted of a room of considerable size, on the lower floor, with several beams in the centre, supporting the upper floor; on the left was a huge fireplace, in which a man could have stood without stooping; on the right there was a staircase leading to the room above. A few stools, several earthen vessels and some straw composed the furniture.
Isaure could hardly see, her eyes were so full of tears; she seated herself in the corner of the room, where the daylight hardly penetrated, because the cliff hung far over the house. She supposed that she was to be taken to the upper room, and waited silently till she should learn her fate; but the vagabond made a sign to Charlot, who thereupon went to the other end of the room, and, pushing aside one of the boards of the partition, disclosed to view a passage much better lighted than the interior of the house.
"Come this way," said Isaure’s guide, motioning to her to rise; she obeyed; he led her through that narrow opening and she found herself at one end of an excavation, where she was overjoyed to see the sky once more. This excavation, which was thirty feet in circumference, was surrounded on all sides by the earth; it resembled the bottom of a well, except that it was much larger; but the light which came from above was much stronger than it was inside of the house, because there was nothing above to shut it out from that species of quarry. At one end of this place, a second house had been built, also of wood, but it consisted only of a ground floor. It was this retreat, undiscoverable to the eye of travellers, that the young girl, who had always lived in a fertile and lovely valley, was forced to enter.
"This is your lodging from this time," said the vagabond, as he led Isaure into the house at the end of the excavation. "You see that it was not without reason that I chose to bring you here; this retreat can be found only by those who are familiar with it. People might search the house in front, on the path, and never suspect that there was another house behind. This place can be seen only by those who are up yonder on the cliff, eighty feet above us. But as that cliff is frightfully steep and is on the path to nowhere, no one ever thinks of climbing it, only from time to time a wild goat. So I am perfectly easy in my mind, no one will find you here. This is not so charming and cheerful a home as that which you have occupied, I agree; but what would you have? I had no choice. So make the best of it, and try to accustom yourself to your new quarters. You will be entirely free to follow your own devices from morning to night—except as to going out. Here is a room of good size, where you can make yourself at home; there is a bed, a table, a bench—it is the best furnished room in the house. If I can find a small piece of looking-glass, I will bring it to you; I know that women think a great deal of that. Try to calm yourself and to dry your tears; I tell you again, your virtue is safer here than it is in the neighborhood of the White House. This place seems horrible, ghastly to you now! But you will become accustomed to it, because one gets used to everything!"
Having delivered this speech, the vagabond left Isaure alone in her dismal abode, and returned with Charlot to the house on the path. There, seating himself in front of his taciturn friend, he said to him: