Four o’clock struck; a fine rain was falling, a melancholy light filled the apartment.
“This will be nothing!” Sebastião would murmur.
Luiza tossed about on the bed, pressing her head between her hands, tortured by the pain that was momentarily increasing, and burning with thirst.
Marianna went about the room on tiptoe, setting things in order, and wondering at this house in which nothing was to be seen but sickness and sorrow. But even her light steps tortured Luiza as if they were blows of a hammer upon her skull.
Julião did not remain long away. When he entered the bedroom the aspect of the patient alarmed him. He lighted a match and held it close to her face; the light made her give a scream as if a cold steel had pierced her brain. Her dilated eyes shone with a metallic brilliancy. She lay very still, for the slightest movement caused her horrible pains in the back of her neck. Only from time to time she smiled at Jorge with an expression of mute and resigned wretchedness.
Julião placed three pillows, one above the other, under her head, to keep it elevated. Night was falling without, damp and chill. In Luiza’s room they went about cautiously and on tiptoe; they stopped the monotonous ticking of the clock on the wall. The patient began to moan wearily, and to toss about from side to side with sharp cries of pain; then she would lie motionless, uttering groans of anguish. They had applied mustard plasters, but she did not feel them. Towards nine o’clock she grew delirious; her tongue was dry and of a dirty white color. Julião applied cloths wet in cold water to her head, but her delirium continued to increase. At times she would utter a hoarse and indistinct murmur, in which the names of Leopoldina, Jorge, and Bazilio followed one another in rapid succession; then she would toss her arms wildly, and tear her nightgown with her hands; again she would try to sit up in bed, her eyes rolling in their sockets till only the whites were visible. Then she would remain quiet for a time, smiling with an imbecile sweetness; then she would pass her hand caressingly over the quilt with an expression of childish delight. By and by she would begin to gasp for breath, she would mutter some words in a terrified voice, and strive to hide herself among the pillows and bedclothes, as if she were pursued by some frightful phantom; she would press her hands to her head, begging them to open it and relieve her of the weight that tortured her,—to take pity upon her, the tears coursing meanwhile down her cheeks. They put her feet in a hot mustard-bath whose pungent odor filled the room. Jorge poured words of consolation and entreaty into her ear; he supplicated her to be calm, to look at him with recognition in her eyes. Suddenly she flew into a violent passion, demanded her letters, heaped maledictions on Juliana, and in the same breath, in the midst of endearing epithets spoke of sums of money. Jorge feared that in her delirium she would reveal everything to Julião and to the servants, and a cold perspiration covered his brow. At times he would fly like a madman from the room, and throw himself on the sofa in the parlor, sobbing and writhing in anguish.
“Is she in danger?” Sebastião asked Julião.
“Yes,” he answered. “If she had felt the mustard-plasters—but these accursed brain-fevers—”
They were silent on seeing Jorge re-enter the bedroom, his face pale and rigid as that of a corpse. Julião took him by the arm and led him outside. “Listen, we must cut off her hair,” he said.
Jorge gazed at him stupidly.