“This is the first, mademoiselle,” I said, gripping my hands tight in the effort to maintain my self-control, to resist the temptation to seize her and crush her to me.
“Oh, how you suffer!” she cried, seeing the gesture and misinterpreting it. Yet now that I have written the word, I am wondering if she did misinterpret it. Looking back upon the scene, I am inclined to think that she saw much more than I suspected, and that I was really merely a mouse she played with. Mouse—that was Sergeant Dubosq’s word. But certainly no eyes could have been more guileless than those she turned upon me. “Here,” she added, “perhaps this will help you;” and she held a little inlaid bottle beneath my nostrils.
I was not expecting it and just at that instant drew a full breath, with the consequence that for some moments after I could draw no other. Tears poured from my eyes and I must have been altogether an absurd object; but strange to say my companion did not laugh—or if she did I was too disordered to perceive it.
“Heavens!” cried a voice from the door. “What are you doing to M. de Tavernay, Charlotte?”
“Charlotte!” echoed my heart. “Charlotte! Charlotte!” Then I caught my breath again for fear that I had cried the name aloud.
“M. de Tavernay has just had a very severe seizure of the heart, madame,” answered my companion. “I was letting him smell of my salts and he took a full breath.”
“I am better,” I said, struggling to my feet and bowing to madame. “A thousand thanks, mademoiselle. But for your thoughtfulness I might not have rallied. I needed heroic treatment.”
Madame glanced from one to the other of us, her face alight with amusement and her eyes with a meaning I did not wholly understand.
“I shall have to command Charlotte to remain near you then this evening, monsieur,” she said. “In seizures of that kind it is always well to have prompt aid at hand.”
I bowed my thanks. I was not yet quite sure of my voice.