"From then on, the raving old man just shut himself away in hiswindmill and lived alone like a caged animal. He didn't even wantVivette, his fifteen year old grand daughter, around. She only had hergrandfather to depend on since the death of her parents, so the poorlittle thing had to earn her living from any farm needing help with theharvest, the silk-worms, or the olive picking. And yet, her grandfatherstill displayed all the signs of loving Vivette, and he would oftenwalk in the midday sun to see her in the farm where she was working,and he would spend many hours watching her, and breaking his heart….
"People thought that the old miller was simply being miserly in sendingVivette away. In their opinion, it was utterly shameful to let hisgrand-daughter trail from farm to farm, running the risk that thesupervisors would bully and abuse her and that she would suffer all theusual horrors of child labour. Cornille, who had once been respected,now roamed the streets like a gypsy; bare-footed, with a hole in hishat, and his breeches in shreds…. In fact, when he went to mass onSundays, we, his own generation, were ashamed of him, and he sensedthis to the point that he wouldn't come and sit in the front pews withus. He always sat by the font at the back of the church with the parishpoor."
* * * * *
"There was something mysterious about Cornille's life. For some time,nobody in the village had brought him any wheat, and yet his windmill'ssails kept on turning. In the evenings, the old miller could be seen onthe pathways, driving his flour-sack laden mule along.
—Good evening, Master-Miller Cornille! the peasants called over tohim; Everything alright, then?
—Oh yes, lads, the old fellow replied cheerily. Thank God, there's noshortage of work for me."
"If you asked him where the work was coming from, he would put a fingerto his mouth and reply with great seriousness: "Keep it under your hat!It's for export." You could never get anything more than that out ofhim.
"You daren't even think about poking your nose inside the windmill.
Even little Vivette wouldn't go in there.
"The door was always shut when you passed by, the huge sails werealways turning, the old donkey was grazing on the mill's apron, and astarved-looking cat was sunning itself on the windowsill, and eying youviciously.
"All this gave it an air of mystery causing much gossip. Each personhad his own version of Cornille's secret, but the general view was thatthere were more sacks of money than sacks of flour in the windmill.
"Eventually, though, everything was revealed. Listen to this:
"One day, playing my fife at the youngsters dance, I noticed that theeldest of my boys and little Vivette had fallen in love. Deep down, Iwas not sorry; after all, Cornille was a respected name in our village,and then again, it had pleased me to see this pretty little bundle offluff, Vivette, skipping around the house. But, as our lovers had lotsof opportunities to be alone together, I wanted to put the affair on aproper footing at once, for fear of accidents, so I went up to thewindmill to have a few words with her grandfather…. But, oh, the olddevil! You wouldn't credit the manner of his welcome! I couldn't gethim to open the door. I told him through the keyhole that my intentionswere good, and meanwhile, that damned starved-looking cat was spittinglike anything above my head.
"The old man cut me short and told me, unfairly, to get back to myflute playing, and that if I was in such a hurry to marry off my boy,I'd be better going to look for one of the factory girls. You canimagine how much these words made my blood boil, but, wisely, I wasable to control myself, and left the old fool to his grinding. I wentback to tell the children of my disappointment. The poor lambs couldn'tbelieve it; and they asked me if they could go to speak to him. Icouldn't refuse, and in a flash, the lovers went. When they arrived,Cornille had just left. The door was double locked, but he had left hisladder outside. The children immediately went in through the window tosee what was inside this famous windmill….
"Amazingly, the milling room was empty. Not a single sack; not onegrain of wheat. Not the least trace of flour on the walls or in thecobwebs. There wasn't even the good warm scent of crushed wheat whichpermeates windmills. The grinding machinery was covered in dust, andthe starving cat was asleep on it.
"The room below had just the same air of misery and neglect: a pitifulbed, a few rags, a piece of bread on a step of the stairs, and notably,in one corner, three or four burst sacks with rubble and chalk spillingout.
"So—that was Cornille's secret! It was this plaster that was beingmoved by road in the evenings. All this, just to save the reputation ofthe windmill, to make people believe that flour was still being milledthere. Poor windmill. Poor Cornille! The millers had finished the lastreal work a long time ago. The sails turned on, but the millstonedidn't.
"The children returned tearfully and told me what they had seen. Itbroke my heart to hear them. I ran round to the neighbours straightaway, explaining things very briefly, and we all agreed at once on whatto do, which was to carry all the wheat we could lay our hands on up toCornille's windmill. No sooner said than done. The whole village met upon the way and we arrived with a procession of donkeys loaded up withwheat, but this time the real thing.
"The windmill was open
