"The extremities of the subject are very cold," said the doctor; "there is but little hope."
"Oh, to die at her age, poor child—it is frightful!"
"The pupil fixed, dilated," answered the immovable doctor, raising with his finger the moveless eyelid of Fleur-de-Marie.
"Strange man," cried the count, almost with indignation; "one would think you without feeling; and yet I have seen you watch by my bedside night after night. If I had been your brother, you could not have been more devoted."
The doctor, quite occupied in administering to Fleur-de-Marie, answered the count, without looking at him, and with settled calmness, "Do you believe that one meets every day with such a malignant fever, so marvelously complicated, so curious to study, as the one you had? It was admirable, my good friend, admirable! Stupor, delirium, twitchings of the sinews, syncopes—your deadly fever united the most varied symptoms. Your constitution was also a rare thing, very rare, and eminently interesting; you were also affected, in a partial and momentary manner, with paralysis. If it were only for this fact, your disease had a right to all my attention; you presented to me a magnificent study; for, frankly, my dear friend, all I desire in this world is to come across just such another fine case—but one has no such luck twice."
[Illustration: FEELING FOR THE BEATING OF THE PULSE]
The count shrugged his shoulders impatiently. It was at this moment that Martial descended, leaning on the arm of La Louve, who had, as the reader knows, thrown over her wet clothes a plaid cloak belonging to Calabash.
Struck with the pale looks of the lover of La Louve, and remarking his hands covered with coagulated blood, the count cried, "Who is this man?"
"My husband!" answered La Louve, looking at Martial with an expression of happiness and noble pride impossible to describe.
"You have a good intrepid wife, sir," said the count to him. "I saw her save this unfortunate child with rare courage."