"You will not weep any more, will you?" she asked him, anxiously, and on hearing him say "no," she kissed his hand again and again.
In the morning the consultation of physicians was held. One at a time they went in to see the sick woman.
"How tired I am of showing my tongue!" she exclaimed, with a comic gesture which made him laugh in spite of his tribulations.
The doctors could not come to a definite decision as to the seat of the fever; they all were inclined, however, to the opinion that it was in the nervous centre. They were perfectly agreed that at all hazards the temperature must be in some way reduced. For this they prescribed an antipyretic remedy.
Miguel himself went in search of it. Its effect was very quick. Within a few hours after taking it the fever had subsided two degrees; in the morning the thermometer indicated only thirty-nine and a few decimals; her restlessness and delirium had entirely disappeared. She felt so much better that Miguel had no doubt that in four or five days she would be up and about.
He was so excited by his excess of joy, that, being unable to stay in the house, he went out to enjoy the coolness of the morning, although he had been watching the night before. He took a turn through the Retiro; the weather was cool and beautiful; the joy that filled his soul to overflowing made him see in the bright sun, in the songs of the birds, in the foliage of the trees, mysterious beauties which he had never before realized. It was as much as he could do not to throw his arms around the solitary pedestrians whom he met.
But alas! he did not know that the remedy that the doctors had prescribed fulfilled its work merely in cooling the blood, and had not the power of overcoming the malady. Toward the end of the afternoon her temperature began to rise again. So deceived was he that he attributed it to the natural increase that all diseases tend to show at that time of day, and did not regard it with apprehension.
The doctor likewise said nothing that was calculated to alarm him. At eleven o'clock he went to bed, leaving Juana to watch.
Her voice aroused him from the deep sleep in which he was plunged.
"Señorito! señorito! the señorita is worse."