“Certainly,” exclaimed one of their number. “I’ll go at once.”
“Ze furniture!” exclaimed Lizzette, suddenly recollecting herself. “In ze little room in ze back zare, vot you can find ze place for. Ze rest in ze hennery—anywhere. I tank you, gentlemen! Zese young people so like my own eet break my heart,” and sobbing bitterly Lizzette sank into a chair.
Elsie and Gilbert, wrapped in blankets, still cowered, dumb with anguish, at Margaret’s side. Antoine lay back in his wheel chair as white as his pillows, but with eyes that glowed like caverns of light in his white face.
“It’s hard, mum,” said one of the men, as with quick glances he took in the scene, “but we’ve saved most of the stuff, and I guess the young lady will come to after a while. Pretty nearly frightened to death, I reckon.”
“This is not a faint from fright,” said the doctor half an hour later. “It is the lethargy of typhoid fever. Has she not seemed tired and languid for several days? Ah, I thought so! You could not wake her? No; it will be some time yet before she realizes her surroundings. A critical case; but not beyond cure. Now, my good madam, can you put her to bed?”
“Oui—oui, at vonce.”
Elsie and Gilbert, by this time aroused from the vague horror and stupefaction which had overtaken them, had managed to equip themselves in the various odds and ends of clothing which the men had dropped on the floor, and now sprang quickly to the aid of Lizzette. In a few moments Margaret was safely bestowed in Lizzette’s bed, and the doctor was pouring directions in Elsie’s ears.
“You are sure you are calm enough to remember instructions?” asked the doctor, intently observing her white face and darkly-circled eyes.
“I am perfectly calm, now that I have hope for my sister. She shall not suffer for want of attention.”
“Non, non,” said Lizzette excitedly. “She ees ze angel of our lives. We sall nevair leave her von moment.”