“Yes, you may expect me; did you say the child was ailing?” he added with some anxiety.
Pepa was on the point of replying when a servant hurried into the room who had just arrived tired and breathless from Suertebella. Pepa gazed at him in horror. What had happened? A very simple matter. The little girl had suddenly been taken ill—very ill indeed.
“Good God!” cried Pepa starting from her seat. “And I here, idling ... amusing myself! I must be off at once. Order the carriage ... Lola, my cloak ... make haste! What is the matter? She coughs you say—is choking?... Has she had a fall? or caught cold. She got wet in the park. My poor darling. A doctor ... send at once to Dr. Moreno.”
“I will see to that, go at once,” said Leon, not less alarmed than the mother.
“She has been in a draught and I told them again and again to take the greatest care ... but servants will always give a child everything it cries for....”
“Oh go at once, do not delay. I will see that Moreno follows you in my carriage as quickly as possible ... and perhaps it will be nothing after all!”
Pepa started, and Leon went in search of the doctor.
We must go no farther in our story without explaining that Leon Roch visited at the Fúcar’s house as the friend of the marquis, no less than as a true and loyal friend of his daughter’s. Theirs was not the only house in which he was intimate; he went to many in search of some diversion from his melancholy in pleasant society and worthy friendships. At the same time it must be owned that his visits to Pepa had of late been long ones. Why? Some people would have answered the question promptly, to his discredit; but their answer lacks evidence. There had budded in Leon’s soul, without his dreaming of its strength, a pure and tender passion of which more will be told presently.