"Let me ask you to wait in the boat-house," he said; "I will come to you directly." He pointed round the corner of the new cottage; indicating of course the side of it that was farthest from the old building. Following his directions, I first passed the door that he used in leaving or returning to his room, and then gained the bank of the river. On my right hand rose the mill building, with its big waterwheel--and, above it, a little higher up the stream, I recognized the boat-house; built out in the water on piles, and approached by a wooden pier. No structure of this elaborate and expensive sort would have been set up by my father, for the miller's convenience. The boat-house had been built, many years since, by a rich retired tradesman with a mania for aquatic pursuits. Our ugly river had not answered his expectations, and our neighborhood had abstained from returning his visits. When he left us, with his wherries and canoes and outriggers, the miller took possession of the abandoned boat-house. "It's the sort of fixture that don't pay nohow," old Toller remarked. "Suppose you remove it--there's a waste of money. Suppose you knock it to pieces--is it worth a rich gentleman's while to sell a cartload of firewood?" Neither of these alternatives having been adopted, and nobody wanting an empty boat-house, the clumsy mill boat, hitherto tied to a stake, and exposed to the worst that the weather could do to injure it, was now snugly sheltered under a roof, with empty lockers (once occupied by aquatic luxuries) gaping on either side of it. I was looking out on the river, and thinking of all that had happened since my first meeting with Cristel by moonlight, when the voice of the deaf man made itself discordantly heard, behind me. "Let me apologize for receiving you here," he said; "and let me trouble you with one more of my confessions. Like other unfortunate deaf people, I suffer from nervous irritability. Sometimes, we restlessly change our places of abode. And sometimes, as in my case, we take refuge in variety of occupation. You remember the ideal narratives of crime which I was so fond of writing at one time?" I gave the affirmative answer, in the usual way. "Well," he went on, "my literary inventions have ceased to interest me. I have latterly resumed the chemical studies, associated with that happy time in my life when I was entering on the medical profession. Unluckily for you, I have been trying an experiment to-day, which makes such an abominable smell in my room that I dare not ask you to enter it. The fumes are not only disagreeable, but in some degree dangerous. You saw me at the window, perhaps, with my nose and mouth protected before I opened the bottle?" I repeated the affirmative sign. He produced his little book of blank leaves, and opened it ready for use. "May I hope," he said, "that your visit is intended as a favorable reply to my letter?" I took the pencil, and answered him in these terms: