CHAPTER VI.
Three or four more days of strain, and then the abscess in the ear broke, causing speedy relief. The first thing that Roy did was to fall into a profound sleep, which lasted some hours.
When he woke up, feeling markedly better, his murmur was for "Den!" as usual; and since no reply came, he said "Den!" more loudly.
Then he took a good look round. The light from the window was getting dim, and the pain in his ear was gone. He saw Denham near, leaning back in the only pretence at an easy-chair which the room could boast of. Ivor's head was resting against the wall, and he seemed to be in a heavy slumber. Boys of twelve or thirteen are not always thoughtful about other people; but an odd feeling came over Roy, as he noted the fine-looking young soldier in that attitude of utter weariness. All these days and nights of his illness he had actually never once seen Ivor asleep until now.
"He must be tired, I'm sure," Roy said aloud. "But I think I'm hungry. I wish he would wake up."
The room door opened very slowly and softly, and Roy's eyes grew round with astonishment. Nobody entered this infected place except the doctor and the old Frenchwoman in the mornings, and the latter always got away as fast as she could. This new-comer seemed to be in no hurry. She stepped inside, closed the door, and advanced towards the bed. There she stood still to look at Roy; and then she turned to gaze pityingly at Ivor.
Roy stared hard, fascinated. She was quite a girl, perhaps two or three years older than Polly. She was very slight, with a plain neatly-fitting dress. The lighted candle in her hand threw a strong glow upon her face. It was a particularly sweet face, delicate and gentle; and it would have been exceedingly pretty, but for the very evident ravages of a long-past attack of small-pox. There were no "pits" on her skin, but a certain soft roughness characterised the whole, as if, once upon a time, it had been covered with pits. Now it was pale, and the features were even, while short black hair curled over a wide forehead, and the dark eyes were full of an intense sadness. Even Roy could not but see that great sadness. As he looked at her she looked at him, and then she sighed.
"Pauvre petit!" she said softly.
She came close to the bed, and Roy put out his hand, only to snatch it back.
"Oh, I mustn't; I forgot. Den told me I must not touch anybody except him, not even that ugly old woman who comes in, because I'm all small-poxy, you know. And oh! I'm so thirsty. I wish he would wake up."
"Pauvre enfant!" She went to the table, and brought back a glass of milk, which she held to his lips. Roy drank eagerly. Then she smoothed his bed-clothes, and put his pillow straight.
"But you oughtn't to be here, you know; you might catch it," Roy's weak voice said. "Den would tell you to go. Can you talk English? I only know a wee bit of French."
"Yes; I can talk English." She said the words in foreign style, with a slow distinctness and separation of the syllables, but with a pure intonation. "I learnt English in your country. Yes, I have been there, for three, four years. Monsieur votre frère—your brother—il a l'air d'être très fatigué."
"Den isn't my brother. He's only—he's just Den, you know. Captain Denham Ivor, of His Majesty's Guards. He hasn't been to sleep for ever so long, and that's why he's tired. My ear has been so awfully bad, oh! for days and days. And I couldn't get to sleep, and Den was always by me—always."
The girl left Roy, and went closer to the sleeping man. He remained motionless; his arms loosely folded; a slight dew of exhaustion upon the brow; the face extremely pale. She sheltered the light from his eyes with her hand, and looked steadily. Then, turning away, she began putting things straight in the room. A few womanly touches altered wondrously the aspect of the whole. Roy lay and watched her.
"What's your name?" he asked. "Are you M. de Bertrand's daughter? I'm deaf in one ear still, so please don't whisper."
"No; I am Lucille de St. Roques. M. and Mme. de Bertrand are my good friends." She flushed slightly. "They are my best friends in all Paris."
"And do you live here?"
"No; I am come unexpected—quite sudden. My friends did not look for me. When they tell me of the English boy upstairs, and of the kind Monsieur who nurses him, then I say I will go and help. I have had the complaint, and I do not fear."
"I wonder where your home is?" Roy said, interested.
"Ah, for that, I have not now a true home. My home was in the south of France, but it is my home no longer. Cependant, I have kind friends at Verdun, where I live." She laid a hand on Roy kindly, murmuring, "Pauvre petit!"
"You don't call me 'little,'" protested the insulted Roy. "I'm nearly thirteen; almost a man. And I am going to fight Napoleon soon. Do you like Napoleon?" She shook her head. "That's right. Then you're Royalist; and I am glad, for I like you, and I don't like Napoleon. I shall soon be an officer in King George's Army. I'm going to have a commission as soon as I'm sixteen. And then I shall be a brave soldier, you know, like Denham. And have you a father and mother at that place, Ver—something?"
"Verdun." Little dreamt Roy how familiar a name it would soon become in his ears. "My father and mother, they were of the old noblesse, and they lost their lives in the Revolution, hélas! Thirteen years ago they were guillotined."
"Oh, I say, how horrid!" exclaimed Roy, at a loss to express the sympathy which he really felt. "How dreadful! Why, you must have been quite a child then."
"I was not yet eight years old. But that was in truth a terrible time. I was in prison with them for many, many weeks, before they went out to die."
Ivor woke suddenly, opening his eyes without warning. Then he stood up, leaning against the solid four-poster for support, since the room went round with him dizzily. He saw a girlish figure, and he vaguely felt that she had no business there, but a momentary pause before speech was necessary.
"Do not make so great haste. Will you not rest a little longer?" a kind voice said, and a soft hand came on his wrist.
"But indeed, mademoiselle, you must go away at once," he urged earnestly. "It is small-pox. It is——" And he tried in vain to recall the French word, though ready enough usually in talking French. "Pray go. You will take the infection."
"But me, I do not intend to go," she replied cheerfully, with her pretty foreign accent. "You need not be afraid for me, monsieur. See, I have had it. I am not in danger, not at all. You are fatigué, n'est-ce pas? It has been a long nursing—yes, so I have heard. When did you take food last?"
Denham confessed that he had not eaten for some time; he had not been hungry. Well, perhaps he was a trifle fatigué, but 'twas nothing, nothing at all. He was ready now for anything. If Mademoiselle would only not put herself in danger! By way of showing his readiness, he made a movement forward, but he was compelled to sit down, resting his forehead on his hand. The long strain had told upon even his vigorous constitution.
"Ah! C'est ça!" she murmured. "But you will be better, monsieur, for a cup of coffee."
Ivor had no choice but to yield, and she moved daintily about, making such coffee as only a Frenchwoman can, and bringing it presently to his side.
"This is not right," he protested. "I cannot allow you to wait upon me, mademoiselle."
She would listen to no remonstrances, however, and when he had disposed of it, she insisted that he should lie down on a couch in the small adjoining room, while she undertook to look after Roy. She had her friends' permission, she said, not explaining that she had refused to be forbidden, and Monsieur in his present state could do no more. How long was it since he had slept? Ah, doubtless some days!
Ivor gave in, after much resistance, and in ten minutes he was again heavily asleep, not to wake for many hours. Nature at last was claiming her revenge.
When he woke, after five hours' unbroken rest, he was another man. Roy seemed much better. The doctor had paid a visit and was gone; the room could scarcely be recognised as the same; and Ivor warmly expressed his gratitude, wondering as he did so at Lucille's look of steady sadness. She insisted on coming again the next day, while he should rest and have an hour's walk.
"Isn't she nice and jolly?" Roy demanded, when the door closed behind Lucille. "I like her, don't you? She has told me lots of things while you were asleep. Only think, her father and mother were both guillotined. Both of them had their heads cut off. And they hadn't done one single thing to make them deserve it. They were awfully good and kind to everybody, she says. And she was only a little girl then, and when they were dead, somebody took her away to England, and she was there three or four years. And then she came back to France, and she lives with some people at a place called Verdun. She says they give her a home, and she works for them. And she would like to go to England again some day."
But Lucille de St. Roques had not told Roy the most recent sorrow which had come to her. She let it out to Captain Ivor a day or two later. Only one year before this date she had become engaged to young Théodore de Bertrand, son of the old couple downstairs; and three months later he had been drawn for the conscription. No use to plead that he was practically an only son, since the second son Jacques was a ne'er-do-well, who had taken himself off, nobody knew whither. More soldiers were wanted by the First Consul for his schemes of foreign conquest, and young De Bertrand had to go. Scarcely four months after his departure, news came that he had been shot in a sortie in the Low Countries. Large tears filled Lucille's eyes, and dropped slowly.
"Ah, so many more!" she said. "Thousands, thousands, called upon to be slain, for nothing! Not for their country, but for the ambition of one bad man. It makes no difference, Monsieur, that they love not the usurper. My Théodore was of the Royalist party, yet he had to go. And the poor old father and mother—they are left without one son in their old age!"
(To be continued.)
[SOME PRACTICAL HINTS ON COSMETIC MEDICINE.]
By "THE NEW DOCTOR."