"Yes, madam, upon my honour."
There was a long and painful silence, only broken at last by these words in a low voice:—
"Let God's will be done!"
And with downcast eyes she withdrew.
The day after this scene, about eight in the morning, I was pacing up and down in Hugh Lupus's tower, thinking of the count's illness, of which I could not foretell the issue—and I was thinking too of my patients at Fribourg, whom I might lose by too prolonged an absence—when three discreet taps upon my door turned my thoughts into another channel.
"Come in!"
The door opened, and Marie Lagoutte stood within, dropping me a low curtsey.
This old dame's visit put me out, and I was going to beg her to postpone her visit, when something mysterious in her countenance caught my attention. She had thrown over her shoulders a red-and-green shawl; she was biting her lips, with her head down, and as soon as she had closed the door she opened it again, and peeped out, to make sure that no one had followed her.
"What does she want with me?" I thought; "what is the meaning of all these precautions?"
And I was quite puzzled.