Rose veiled her fire, and began to coax. “Once a week; just once a week, dear, dear doctor; you know I should never miss it. I am so full of that health, which Heaven denies to her I love.”
“Let us try milder measures first,” said the doctor. “I have most faith in time.”
“What if I were to take her to Frejus? hitherto, the sea has always done wonders for her.”
“Frejus, by all means,” said Edouard, mingling suddenly in the conversation; “and this time I will go with you, and then I shall find out where you lodged before, and how the boobies came to say they did not know you.”
Rose bit her lip. She could not help seeing then how much dear Edouard was in her way and Josephine’s. Their best friends are in the way of all who have secrets. Presently the doctor went to his study. Then Edouard let fall a mock soliloquy. “I wonder,” said he, dropping out his words one by one, “whether any one will ever love me well enough to give a drop of their blood for me.”
“If you were in sickness and sorrow, who knows?” said Rose, coloring up.
“I would soon be in sickness and sorrow if I thought that.”
“Don’t jest with such matters, monsieur.”
“I am serious. I wish I was as ill as Madame Raynal is, to be loved as she is.”
“You must resemble her in some other things to be loved as she is.