At this Paula rose, and following the impulse of her generous heart, offered the leech her hand in all sincerity; he grasped it in both his, pressing it so tightly that it almost hurt her, and his eyes glistened with moisture as he exclaimed: “That is as I hoped; that is splendid, that is noble! Let me but be your brother, high-souled maiden!—Now, come. That poor, crazy, lovely girl will heal of her death-wound under your hands if under any!”
“I will come!” she replied heartily; and there was something healthy and cheerful in her manner as they entered the sick-room; but her expression suddenly changed, and she asked pensively:
“And supposing we restore the unhappy girl—what good will she get by it?”
“She will breathe and see the sunshine,” replied the leech; “she will be grateful to you, and finally she will contribute what she can to the whole body. She will be alive in short, she will live. For life—feel it, understand it as I do—life is the best thing we have.” Paula gazed with astonishment in the man’s unlovely but enthusiastic face. How radiantly joyful!
No one could have called it ugly at this moment, or have said that it lacked charm.
He believed what he had asserted with such fervent feeling, though it was in contradiction to a view he had held only yesterday and often defended: that life in itself was misery to all who could not grasp it of their own strength, and make something of it worth making. At this moment he really felt that it was the best gift.
Paula went forward, and his eyes followed her, as the gaze of the pious pilgrim is fixed on the holy image he has travelled to see, over seas and mountains, with bruised feet.
They went up to the sick girl’s bed. The nun drew back, making her own reflections on the physician’s altered mien, and his childlike, beaming contentment, as he explained to Paula what particular peril threatened the sufferer, and by what treatment he hoped to save her; how to make the bandages and give the medicines, and how necessary it was to accept the poor crazy girl’s fancies and treat them as rational ideas so long as the fever lasted.
At last he was forced to go and attend to other patients. Paula remained sitting at the head of the bed and gazing at the face of the sufferer.
How fair it was! And Orion had snatched this rose in the bud, and trodden it under foot! She had, no doubt, felt for him what Paula herself felt. And now? Did she feel nothing but hatred of him, or could her heart, in spite of her indignation and scorn, not altogether cast off the spell that had once bound it?