"Oh, sir, you are too good."
"I am only desirous of rewarding your zeal, my dear fellow; but mark the subject—take possession; there are so many who covet it."
As the doctor passed onwards, the pupil, with his scalpel, incised very delicately an F. and D. (his initials) on the arm of the defunct actress, in order "to take possession," as the doctor termed it. And the round continued.
"Lorraine," said Jeanne Duport, in a low voice, to her neighbour, "who is all this crowd of people with the surgeon?"
"It is pupils and students."
"Oh, will all these young men look on whilst the doctor asks me questions and examines me?"
"Alas, yes!"
"But it is in my chest that I am ill; will they examine me before all these men?"
"Yes—yes—it must be so. I cried bitterly the first time, and thought I should have died of shame. I resisted, and they threatened to send me away, and that made me so ill. Only imagine, almost naked before everybody! It is very painful."
"Before the doctor alone I can easily comprehend it is necessary, and even that is a great deal to submit to; but why before all these young men?"