CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH.
A FEVER-HOSPITAL.
The fever! What fever? Was it any thing more than some childish malady brought on by exhaustion? I stood silent, in amazement at his solemn manner, and looking from him to the delirious child. He was the first to speak again.
"It will be impossible for you to go to-day," he said; "the child cannot be removed. I must tell Jean to put up the horse and char à bancs again. I shall return in an instant to you, madame."
He left me, and I sank down on a chair, half stupefied by this new disaster. It would be necessary to stay where we were until Minima recovered; yet I had no means to pay these people for the trouble we should give them, and the expense we should be to them. Monsieur le Curé had all the appearance of a poor parish priest, with a very small income. I had not time to decide upon any course, however, before he returned and brought with him his sister.
Mademoiselle Thérèse was a tall, plain, elderly woman, but with the same pleasant expression of open friendliness as that of her brother. She went through precisely the same examination of Minima as he had done.
"The fever!" she ejaculated, in much the same tone as his. They looked significantly at each other, and then held a hurried consultation together outside the door, after which the curé returned alone.
"Madame," he said, "this child is not your own, as I supposed last night. My sister says you are too young to be her mother. Is she your sister?"
"No, monsieur," I answered.
"I called you madame because you were travelling alone," he continued, smiling; "French demoiselles never travel alone before they are married. You are mademoiselle, no doubt?"
An awkward question, for he paused as if it were a question. I look into his kind, keen face and honest eyes.
"No, monsieur," I said, frankly, "I am married."
"Where, then, is your husband?" he inquired.
"He is in London," I answered. "Monsieur, it is difficult for me to explain it; I cannot speak your language well enough. I think in English, and I cannot find the right French words. I am very unhappy, but I am not wicked."
"Good," he said, smiling again, "very good, my child; I believe you. You will learn my language quickly; then you shall tell me all, if you remain with us. But you said the mignonne is not your sister."
"No; she is not my relative at all," I replied; "we were both in a school at Noireau, the school of Monsieur Emile Perrier. Perhaps you know it, monsieur?"
"Certainly, madame," he said.
"He has failed and run away," I continued; "all the pupils are dispersed. Minima and I were returning through Granville."'
"Bien! I understand, madame," he responded; "but it is villanous, this affair! Listen, my child. I have much to say to you. Do I speak gently and slowly enough for you?"
"Yes," I answered; "I understand you perfectly."'
"We have had the fever in Ville-en-bois for some weeks," he went on; "it is now bad, very bad. Yesterday I went to Noireau to seek a doctor, but I could only hear of one, who is in Paris at present, and cannot come immediately. When you prayed me for succor last night, I did not know what to do. I could not leave you by the way-side, with the night coming on, and I could not take you to my own house. At present we have made my house into a hospital for the sick. My people bring their sick to me, and we do our best, and put our trust in God. I said to myself and to Jean, 'We cannot receive these children into the presbytery, lest they should take the fever.' But this little house has been kept free from all infection, and you would be safe here for one night, so I hoped. The mignonne must have caught the fever some days ago. There is no blame, therefore, resting upon me, you understand. Now I must carry her into my little hospital. But you, madame, what am I to do with you? Do you wish to go on to Granville, and leave the mignonne with me? We will take care of her as a little angel of God. What shall I do with you, my child?"
"Monsieur," I exclaimed, speaking so eagerly that I could scarcely bring my sentences into any kind of order, "take me into your hospital too. Let me take care of Minima and your other sick people. I am very strong, and in good health; I am never ill, never, never. I will do all you say to me. Let me stay, dear monsieur."
"But your husband, your friends—" he said.
"I have no friends," I interrupted, "and my husband does not love me. If I have the fever, and die—good! very good! I am not wicked; I am a Christian, I hope. Only let me stay with Minima, and do all I can in the hospital."
He stood looking at me scrutinizingly, trying to read, I fancied, if there were any sign of wickedness in my face. I felt it flush, but I would not let my eyes sink before his. I think he saw in them, in my steadfast, tearful eyes, that I might be unfortunate, but that I was not wicked. A pleasant gleam came across his features.
"Be content, my child," he said, "you shall stay with us."
I felt a sudden sense of contentment take possession of me; for here was work for me to do, as well as a refuge. Neither should I be compelled to leave Minima. I wrapped her up warmly in the blankets, and Monsieur Laurentie lifted her carefully and tenderly from the low bed. He told me to accompany him, and we crossed the court, and entered the house by the door I had seen the night before. A staircase of red quarries led up to the second story, and the first door we came to was a long, low room, with a quarried floor, which had been turned into a hastily-fitted-up fever-ward for women and children. There were already nine beds in it, of different sizes, brought with the patients who now occupied them. But one of these was empty.
I learned afterward that the girl to whom the bed belonged had died the day before, during the curé's absence, and was going to be buried that morning, in a cemetery lying in a field on the side of the valley. Mademoiselle Thérèse was making up the bed with homespun linen, scented with rosemary and lavender, and the curé laid Minima down upon it with all the skill of a woman. In this home-like ward I took up my work as nurse.
It was work that seemed to come naturally to me, as if I had a special gift for it. I remembered how some of the older shepherds on the station at home used to praise my mother's skill as a nurse. I felt as if I knew by instinct the wants of my little patients, when they could not put them into coherent words for themselves. They were mostly children, or quite young girls; for the older people who were stricken by the fever generally clung to their own homes, and the curé visited them there with the regularity of a physician. I liked to find for these suffering children a more comfortable position when they were weary; or to bathe their burning heads with some cool lotion; or to give the parched lips the titane Mademoiselle Thérèse prepared. Even the delirium of these little creatures was but a babbling about playthings, and fétes, and games. Minima, whose fever took faster hold of her day after day, prattled of the same things in English, only with sad alternations of moaning over our poverty.
It was probably these lamentations of Minima which made me sometimes look forward with dread to the time when this season of my life should be ended. I knew it could be only for a little while, an interlude, a brief, passing term, which must run quickly to its conclusion, and bring me face to face again with the terrible poverty which the child bemoaned in words no one could understand but myself. Already my own appearance was changing, as Mademoiselle Thérèse supplied the place of my clothing, which wore out with my constant work, replacing it with the homely costume of the Norman village. I could not expect to remain here when my task was done. The presbytery was too poor to offer me a shelter when I could be nothing but a burden in it. This good curé, who was growing fonder of me every day, and whom I had learned to love and honor, could not be a father to me as he was to his own people. Sooner or later there would come an hour when we must say adieu to one another, and I must go out once again to confront the uncertain future.
But for the present these fears were very much in the background, and I only felt that they were lurking there, ready for any moment of depression. I was kept too busy with the duties of the hour to attend to them. Some of the children died, and I grieved over them; some recovered sufficiently to be removed to a farm on the brow of the hill, where the air was fresher than in the valley. There was plenty to do and to think of from day to day.