She stood, looking me in the face, and it was plain, from a certain convulsed effort at deglutition, that she was striving to swallow back the big grief that heaved itself up from her heart. She wavered as if half inclined to reveal something. There was the noise of a carriage at the door; and, pressing my hand gently, she said, with an effort at a smile that should have been a sob, “Thank you; you cannot—help me; my mistress is at the door; good by.” And dropping my hand, she glided out of the room.
I can never forget her as she then appeared in her virginal, spring-like beauty, with her profuse silky hair parted plainly in front, and folded in a classic knot behind, with her dress of a light gauze-like material, and an unworked muslin collar about her neck having a simple blue ribbon passing under it and fastened in front with a little cross of gold. How unpretending and unadorned,—and yet what a charm was lent to her whole attire by her consummate grace of person and of action!
Mrs. Dufour entered, and I did not see Estelle again that day.
It was that fearful summer when the fever seemed to be indiscriminate in its ravages. Not only transient visitors in the city, but old residents long acclimated, natives of the city, physicians and nurses, were smitten down. Many fled from the pest-ridden precincts. Whole blocks of houses were deserted. There were few doors at which Death did not knock for one or more of the inmates.
My pupil, Henri Dufour, was taken ill on a Saturday, and on Wednesday his mortal remains were conveyed to the cemetery. I had tended him day and night, and was much worn down by watchings and anxiety. Jane, a hired black domestic, was wanted by her owner, and left us. All the work of our diminished household now fell on Estelle. As for Madame Dufour, she lived in a hysterical fear lest the inevitable summoner should visit her next. She was continually imagining that the symptoms were upon her. One day she fell into an unusual state of alarm. I was alone with her in the house. Estelle had gone out without asking permission,—an extraordinary event. I did what I could for the invalid, and, by her direction, called in a physician whose carriage she had seen standing at a neighboring door.
The poor little doctor seemed flurried and overworked, and an odor of brandy came from his breath. He assured Mrs. Dufour that her symptoms were wholly of the imagination, and that if she would keep tranquil, all danger would speedily pass. He administered a dose of laudanum. It afterwards occurred to me that he had given three times the usual quantity. He received his fee and departed; and I sat down behind the curtain of an alcove so as to be within call.
Three minutes had not elapsed when Estelle burst into the room, and in a voice low and husky, as if with overpowering agitation, exclaimed: “You have deceived me, Madame! Mr. Semmes tells me you never gave him any orders about a will. Do you mean to cheat me? Beware! Tell me this instant! tell me! Will you do it? Will you do it?”
“Estelle! how can you?” whined Mrs. Dufour. “At such a time, when the slightest agitation may bring on the fever, how can you trouble me on such a subject?”
“No evasion!” exclaimed Estelle, in imperious tones. “I demand it,—I exact it,—now—this instant! You shall—you shall perform it!”