"Horrible!" cried the comte. "See, doctor, how his hands are hacked!"
Doctor Griffon, turning his head slightly, and looking over his shoulder at Martial's hands, said to him, "Open and shut your hand."
Martial did so with considerable pain. The doctor shrugged his shoulders, and continued his attentions to Fleur-de-Marie, saying merely, and as if with regret:
"There's nothing serious in those cuts,—there's no tendon injured. In a week the subject will be able to use his hands again."
"Then, sir, my husband will not be crippled?" said La Louve, with gratitude.
The doctor shook his head affirmatively.
"And La Goualeuse will recover—won't she, sir?" inquired La Louve. "Oh, she must live, for I and my husband owe her so much!" Then turning towards Martial, "Poor dear girl! There she is, as I told you,—she who will, perhaps, be the cause of our happiness; for it was she who gave me the idea of coming and saying to you all I have said. What a chance that I should save her—and here, too!"
"She is a providence," said Martial, struck by the beauty of La Goualeuse. "What an angel's face! Oh, she will recover, will she not, doctor?"
"I cannot say," replied the doctor. "But, in the first place, can she remain here? Will she have all necessary attention?"
"Here?" cried La Louve; "why, they commit murder here!"