The mill was rebuilt, and Pere Merlier had a new wheel upon which to
bestow whatever tenderness was not engrossed by his daughter and her
husband.
CAPTAIN BURLE
CHAPTER I
THE SWINDLE
It was nine o'clock. The little town of Vauchamp, dark and silent,
had just retired to bed amid a chilly November rain. In the Rue des
Recollets, one of the narrowest and most deserted streets of the
district of Saint-Jean, a single window was still alight on the third
floor of an old house, from whose damaged gutters torrents of water were
falling into the street. Mme Burle was sitting up before a meager fire
of vine stocks, while her little grandson Charles pored over his lessons
by the pale light of a lamp.
The apartment, rented at one hundred and sixty francs per annum,
consisted of four large rooms which it was absolutely impossible to keep
warm during the winter. Mme Burle slept in the largest chamber, her
son Captain and Quartermaster Burle occupying a somewhat smaller one
overlooking the street, while little Charles had his iron cot at the
farther end of a spacious drawing room with mildewed hangings, which was
never used. The few pieces of furniture belonging to the captain and his
mother, furniture of the massive style of the First Empire, dented and
worn by continuous transit from one garrison town to another, almost
disappeared from view beneath the lofty ceilings whence darkness fell.
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