Just then Madelon opened her eyes.
"Do you not know me, Madame?" she said. "I am Madeleine Linders, and papa is dead; he sent me to be with Aunt Thérèse, but she is dead too—Oh, save me, save me!" she cried, springing up with all the old terror upon her; "don't let them take me, papa, you made me promise that I would not stay there. Tell Aunt Thérèse to go away, papa; papa, save me!" and she clung to the doctor's arm. "Besides, you know," she went on, speaking fast and eagerly, "I promised him—Monsieur Horace, you know—and I must keep it, I must keep my promise to Monsieur Horace,—I must, I must!"
"You hear?" said Jeanne-Marie, as Madelon fell back on the pillow again muttering to herself.
"I hear," answered the doctor, "and I see that she is in a high fever, and it may go hard with her, poor child! It is fortunate she is with you, Jeanne-Marie," he went on, kindly, "for you are a capital nurse, I know; but I am afraid it will be a long business."
"That is no matter," she answered.
"If you would like to have her removed to the hospital at Liége," continued the doctor, doubtfully, "it might still be done. It may injure your business to have her here. Still, as you say she is your niece——"
"As I say she is my niece," returned Jeanne-Marie, abruptly, "it is not likely I should turn her out of the house, and that is enough. My business will take care of itself. And now tell me what I am to do, doctor?"
He prescribed for Madelon, said he would call again, and left the house, pondering on the woman who kept so apart from her neighbours, and on her small visitor, who he knew well enough was not her niece, for had not Jacques Monnier told him how Jeanne-Marie had suddenly come in out of the rain, carrying the girl in her arms, and had taken her upstairs without a word of explanation?
"There is a mystery somewhere," thought the doctor; "but it is no concern of mine." And so he went his way to visit his next patient.
Jeanne-Marie had no fears concerning the doctor's discretion; he was a man too busy in his scattered district to have much time or inclination for gossip. But she had far less confidence in Jacques Monnier's wisdom, and thought it not inexpedient to go downstairs, after the doctor's departure, and give her customer a word of exhortation. He was seated at the table as before, twirling the glass in his fingers, and gazing vacantly out of window.