Chapter Fifteen.
“They serve God well,
Who serve His creatures.”
The Lady of La Garaye.
The first person who confronted them within the hospital doors was Nannon. She had learned Thérèse’s intentions from Madame Roulleau, and had come away at once with the hope of changing what she fancied was no more than a girl’s foolish excited whim. Thérèse’s delay had frightened her even more than the first hearing of her scheme; and now, when she saw her enter with M. Deshoulières, after a momentary sensation of relief, her heart sank with the conviction that if M. Deshoulières was in favour of her being so cruelly sacrificed, not all the talking in the world would take her away from the place. And, indeed, Thérèse stopped her first exclamation.
“Hush, Nannon. It is of no use. Every thing is decided.”
The old woman was so aghast that she fell back at once upon her strongest card, which she had intended reserving for the end of her argument.
“Mademoiselle—listen then—mademoiselle, what would M. Fabien say?”
“M. Fabien!” M. Deshoulières, who was a little in advance, turned round and said this. They all looked at one another for a moment, and then he went on slowly and quietly: “She is right. We have not thought enough. I implore you, mademoiselle, for the sake of Monsieur Saint-Martin, to return with her to the upper town.” The light from a lamp fell on his head. Nannon said to herself admiringly, “After all he has a noble face, that man.” Thérèse answered quickly, holding herself at her full height as she spoke, “Do you think I have not thought of him? Do you think any one I loved would keep me back?”
At another moment she could not have spoken out her heart’s affection in such a manner, shyness and custom would have prevented it; but now something seemed to demand it, her allegiance to Fabien, she thought. Max Deshoulières, looking at her reverently, said, within himself, “I pray, I pray to Heaven, she is not judging him from her own capacities only.” Nannon was silent, as people are when some strong feeling makes itself known in their presence; Thérèse was resolute and decided, her step light, she did not look like one who would consent to change; and M. Deshoulières, if he had been moved, was quiet again. All the old woman could do was to ask to share the nursing; and, finally, she gained permission to become a sort of medium of communication between the hospital and the outer world, to fetch what was needed, and carry messages to a house about a kilometre away, where convalescents were tended by one of the trained sisters. After which M. Deshoulières, who felt an uncomfortable conviction that he had been persuaded against his judgment and his wishes, fetched another sister, and delivered Thérèse into her keeping.
“No work to-night, remember,” was his last order as he hurried away.
“Then you will be on day duty,” said the Sister, kissing her at once, and looking at the pretty young face with a little brisk wonder. “That is best. You shall sleep with me and with Sister Gabrielle. We want more nurses sadly, only—my child, I look at you because you are so young, and I wonder. Did your mother let you come?—ah, ah, I guess what you would say. You are right. Yes, there were many of the blessed saints younger than you; let me see, there was S. Lucy, S. Faith, S. Prisca—”
She ran on with a long list of names, all the while leading the girl up the broad staircase, with its stone balustrade. It was impossible to put in a word; but her cheery voice and bright little apple-face looking out of its black drapery gave the best welcome that Thérèse could have received. Every thing was hopeful. The patients were better, a great many of them. It was only a fever, and what was that to the plague? Now, if they had lived in the East, it might have been the plague. It was certain there would be rain soon. And those who were ill were so patient and so good it was a delight to nurse them. All that she touched grew bright; it was Thérèse’s turn to look at her in wonder. But when Sister Gabrielle came in to the clean, tiny room to take her appointed hours of sleep, Thérèse gave a little jump of glad surprise. It was the same réligieuse as she had watched and heard on the day when she felt so sad and so desolate under the great Cathedral; the one whose sweet calm voice she remembered with its quieting, “Soyez tranquille, mon enfant.” She remembered also the beautiful face, paler and thinner now, but only more beautiful still. There was a rare fascination and power about this woman,—the clearest common-sense, and a spirituality which exalted it. Little Sister Annette became more silent directly, and treated her with affectionate reverence. She acted as head alike to the sisters and the lay nurses, and said a few words to Thérèse upon her duties which touched and strengthened the girl unspeakably. She was half-frightened, half-glad, to be there; but she would not have gone back for the world, and although she went to bed assured that sleep would never come, the “Soyez tranquille” returned in dreams.
After that night she had no more dreams. She slept too heavily when the time for sleeping came. M. Deshoulières had done well to warn her, Sister Gabrielle to strengthen her for it; there was so much that was terrible and ghastly and full of horror. Not fear. There was no time for fear. But she was very young and tender-hearted, and somehow, at first, she had expected to see more relief, and to have the consolation of soothing these poor souls more than she found by experience to be the case. By and by she understood her position better, and was content to look for less, and yet Sister Gabrielle told her, smiling, that she was one of the most popular nurses among them all.
French organisation is the most perfect in the world, but the fever beat the organisation. If all that M. Deshoulières wanted had been done, there would scarcely have been room enough for the fresh patients. As it was, there was over-crowding and over-work. Now and then a nurse failed, and was carried away to the infirmary at the convent. It was found that such as fell ill for the first time at the hospital could not recover there, and so they were taken away at once. The precautions to avoid spreading the infection were strongly enforced. Still it spread. People went about the streets softly, with an awe-struck look on their faces. There were special services, litanies. Day after day the fierce sun beat down on Charville; day after day the fever smote its victims; day after day such doctors and such nurses as were spared were at their posts, fighting it.
M. Deshoulières seldom spoke to Thérèse, unless it was to give special orders, and she was quite unconscious how narrowly he watched her during this terrible time. He was ready to interfere at once if she flagged But she did not flag. Her eye was brighter, her face was alive with keener energy than he had seen in it yet. At first she had a great deal to learn, but by and by it became evident that among all the brave women who laboured there as women can labour, there was not one more self-denying, more courageous, more tender than Mademoiselle Veuillot. Where patient watching was needed, in cases where it seemed impossible not to shrink, she stood her ground. When speech failed, and only mute gestures, difficult to interpret, remained to the sufferer, those pitiful grey eyes were quick to read the hidden meaning. When these, too, ceased, and death followed upon his shadow, more than once dying looks or dying lips faltered blessings upon the faithful nurse who stood there faithful to the last.
And so it arrived that Sister Gabrielle told her that she was one of the most popular nurses among them all.
M. Deshoulières watched and wondered. She was different from what she had been. He had known her well enough to know that. But he was ignorant how the change had come, or, rather, how her character had thus ripened and opened out. Perhaps it was the outbreak of a heart tender enough to overcome selfishness. Perhaps there was a touch of shame about it that her own trials had seemed so unendurable, now that she was brought face to face with what we call life’s great realities. Least of all did he think, when he had time to think, which was not often, that his own example had any thing to do with it. Yet so it was. Thérèse had never been the same since that day when he and she had spoken together; and, seeing him in the heart of his work at the hospital, she owned that even yet she had not done him justice.
For now she could understand more fully what a great, noble heart was this man’s. She could understand why a soft light came into Sister Gabrielle’s eyes when she spoke of him—the sort of reverence with which the attendants in the wards obeyed his bidding. It seemed to her as if he, single-handed, did more to keep them all at work in the most efficient manner, than the other members of the staff put together. It seemed to her as if a great deal of the bravery and the cheerfulness which distinguished the workers grew in some fashion out of this bravery and cheerfulness which never failed. Always at his post, ready with keen promptitude to decide the crowd of doubtful questions brought for his opinions, accepting responsibilities from which others shrunk,—“My friend, the Minister of Health is in Paris, and I am here,” Thérèse heard, him say one day, in answer to a timid objection from little M. Pinot,—quick to note the first symptom of over-fatigue among the band of nurses; encouraging Sister Annette’s merry little sayings; swift, patient, tender, inflexible, all at once. It was here that she first realised Max Deshoulières’ kingdom.
Fanchon was well again. M. Deshoulières found means to let her know that. Nannon told her that the fever had not spread in the upper town; there were only a few isolated cases. Madame Roulleau had said that when there had been a little rain to cool the air, M. Roulleau would return.
“Otherwise I think she will fetch him,” said Nannon, laughing; “and, dame, I believe the fever would be less terrible to him than madame with her claws out.”
“But will it ever rain again!” answered Thérèse, who was walking by a cornfield in the early morning. All the nurses were compelled to be in the open air for half air hour daily, and she had been on night duty lately.
People asked that question a hundred times in the day. The sky, with its bright sunny beauty, had grown quite terrible and fierce in their eyes. Water was becoming scarce, the air was so heated that the nights scarcely cooled it at all; while all this continued it was scarcely possible that the fever should subside.
One day there was great sorrow in the hospital. Kind little Sister Annette, whom every one loved, became dull, lost her appetite, and complained of headache. Within an hour, M. Deshoulières had taken her himself to the convent, and a rumour got about that it was a bad case. They missed her terribly. Her kindly, hopeful chatter had done more than any of them knew to keep their spirits from sinking. Somehow it was difficult to imagine her to be ill. Thérèse said so to Sister Gabrielle one day in their little room, which two other sisters shared with them now; and then Sister Gabrielle took her in her arms, and kissed her, and said, with a spasm of pain working her beautiful face, “She is not ill any longer, our dear sister; she is at rest.”
Thérèse nearly broke down herself after this. Probably she would have done so altogether if it had not been for M. Deshoulières and Sister Gabrielle, who watched her wisely and tenderly, and sent her more into the cornfields with Nannon. The days came and went, she scarcely knew how time passed, or that it was nearly five weeks since first she came to the hospital. It seemed, at last, as if the fever was stationary—the number of cases neither diminished nor increased.
But the sky was as fierce as ever.
One afternoon it changed. A greyness gathered over it, not big satisfactory clouds, but still something of the nature of cloud. A few scattered drops fell, enough to make large round holes in the white dust, and then it all cleared away, and the stars came out, and on the next morning the sun was braving it as undauntedly as he had done for those weary weeks past, and the Charville world was gasping and panting, and trying to make merry, with the thermometer at 90 degrees in the shade, with pestilence upon them, and drought at their very doors. Madame Roulleau, who had said that Ignace should not return until there had been rain, was frantic at the delay. There were cases of sunstroke among the reapers, a few old feeble people died literally of exhaustion from the stifling heat. Monseigneur at the Evêché had been at death’s door, and had driven them all distracted by refusing to allow M. Deshoulières to be called away from his other work, until he became so weak that his will had no longer any power of influencing them, and M. l’Abbé took matters into his own hands. But, indeed, those evil days brought out rare instances of devotion.
There came, at last, one day and night which exceeded every day and night that had gone before. Each door and window in the hospital was open, but it seemed as if all the air had gone out of the world. One or two of the patients who were thought to be doing well failed again, and sank rapidly on that terrible night. Great revolving fans had been placed in the wards, and were kept in motion continually, but nothing seemed to break the oppression; the very nurses lost heart under it. “Is it the end of the world?” one said, wearily. Thérèse, who had kept up bravely, when morning came was so spent and languid, that she could hardly drag herself across the ward. She flung herself across her little bed, too exhausted to speak to the sister, who shared her turn of rest, and fell into a dead, heavy sleep; when she awoke Sister Sara was standing at the window.
“It has rained!” she cried out, joyfully, hearing Thérèse stir.
Thérèse had not heard the thunder or the heavy drops, but all the air was cool, moist, and exquisitely delicious. Pools of water lay on the leads, the sun just gleamed out from between dark clouds, and birds chirped exultantly.
“Now we can breathe again, the saints be praised!” said the sister, with her little commonplace face made beautiful by thankfulness.
“Poor Sister Annette! Her rain has come at last,” said Thérèse, more slowly.
There was a Te Deum at the Cathedral, but grateful hearts did not wait for that to sing their own little special Te Deums. Never had the great plains been so delightful in their eyes as now, when a dense grey pall lay over them, blurring the outlines, creeping up thicker and thicker, dark, watery, heavy masses. The thunder-clouds had come first, great mountainous forms, with white mists floating across them; then followed a few hours of clear, cool, enchanting weather, and afterwards the plains were folded in the thick, close low rain, more beautiful to the people than the most gorgeous colouring could have been. It made itself felt upon the fever at once.
Not many days after, Thérèse was sent for to the little room in the lobby, where Nannon was allowed to enter. Nannon was there, and M. Deshoulières also. Something in their faces made her ask quickly what was the matter. It was very soon told. Nannon had come from Rue St. Servan, where little Adolphe had the fever, and was crying out piteously for his mademoiselle, his dear Mademoiselle Thérèse.
“Shall you go, mademoiselle?” asked Nannon. M. Deshoulières said nothing, he only looked at her.
“Of course I shall go,” answered Thérèse; “that is, if you think I can be spared,” she went on, appealing to him.
“That can be arranged,” he said, gravely. “But do you understand what you are doing? I fear these people have not treated you well.”
“My poor little Adolphe!” was the girl’s only answer. She had learned something in these six weeks.
They were obliged to keep her departure a secret from the patients who had been especially under her care. The nurses all kissed her; some of them had tears in their eyes. With all her bravery, she was so young that, when she went away, she clung to Sister Gabrielle and sobbed. “I have been happier here than I ever was in my life before,” she said, between her sobs. I do not know whether it was really thus, but looking back she thought so; and M. Deshoulières, who could not bear to hear her say it, went back to the ward suddenly, so that when she looked round to wish him good-by, he was not there.
“Has that woman no perception, then,” Nannon said, indignantly, as they toiled up through the steep streets, “that she will not allow our doctor to come? Monsieur Pinot is not bad, no, he is not bad, but he is like the gosling waddling after the gander. Mademoiselle need not laugh, she knows what I mean. What would you have? Charville could not expect to see two M. Deshoulières.”
Nannon had been converted utterly, and like other converts she was not fond of hearing her former opinions quoted.
“After all,” she went on, “I am glad mademoiselle is out of that place.”
“Is the poor child very ill?”
“I believe so,” said the old woman, shrugging her shoulders. “Madame fought against it for days, she said it should not be the fever; she was like a mad woman. But now she is frightened. She loves her children, that wild-cat! Ouf, I am out of breath! Such a summer as this does not make one younger.”
So they went their way, picking their road over the wet stones, and keeping clear of little torrents of water that here and there spouted out wildly from the eaves. The flowers were gratefully drinking in the soft rain; a beautiful rich geranium flamed out against a grey stone background; the terrible oppressive cloud was lightened; there were people moving about again; little children playing; one little mite in a pink frock and a tight black cap, Thérèse longed to kiss, but she dared not let them approach her. Presently a girl standing at a door smiled and nodded and kissed both hands. It was Fanchon. The apparition gave Thérèse a little thrill of delight. “It is so odd to think how horribly frightened I was,” she said to Nannon, “and now it all seems so natural.” She went on with a lightened heart. That little glimpse of Fanchon, and afterwards the ever steadfast loveliness of the Cathedral, did her good. At the door of the Roulleaus’ house, Nannon detained her for a moment.
“Listen, mademoiselle,” she said. “Do you know last night I dreamed that Monsieur Fabien was come!”
“And so did I,” said Thérèse, smiling.
Madame in her linen camisole was at little Adolphe’s bedside copying a letter when Thérèse went softly into the room. Was she glad to see her? The girl could not tell. She was rigid and defiant, and yet every now and then an expression resembling terror flashed out from her eyes. Adolphe was glad at all events. He knew her directly, and put out his poor little weak arms. “Now you will tell me stories, mademoiselle,” he said, with a feeble triumph at having carried his own way. Thérèse knew well by this time what to do, and she changed the whole aspect of the uncomfortable little room in a few minutes. Every thing was put in order and ready for use. Poor Adolphe did not really want any stories, but, as he grew a little delirious in the evening, he said over and over again, “il y avait un géant, il y avait un géant.” Tears came into her eyes as she heard the little thin voice wandering on. Nothing soothed him so much as to have her close to his bedside, singing to him; and madame, who was very silent, sat and watched them with a fierce, jealous sorrow pulling at her heart. She knew little better than a baby what to do in a sick-room, but she loved her children passionately. It cut her to the heart that Adolphe should turn from her to another. It cut more deeply still that this other should be Mademoiselle Veuillot.