"Yes, eet ees as you t'ink, Jean Marcel. She ees ver' seek."
Marcel's hands closed on Jules' arms as he demanded hoarsely:
"Mon Dieu! W'at ees eet, Jules? Tell me, w'at ees eet?"
"She has de bad arm. Cut de han' wid a knife."
Blood-poisoning, because of his medical ignorance, held less terror for Marcel than some strange fever, insidious and mysterious. He had feared that Julie Breton had a dread disease against which the crude skill of the north is helpless. So, as he hastened to the Mission where he found Mrs. Gillies installed as nurse, his hopes rose, for a wound in the hand could not be fatal.
From the anxious-eyed Père Breton who met him at the door, Jean learned the story.
Ten days before, Julie had cut her hand with a knife while preparing frozen fish for cooking. For days she had ignored the wound, when the hand, suddenly reddening, began to swell, causing much pain. Gillies and her brother had opened the inflamed wound, cleansing it with bichloride, but in spite of their efforts, the swelling had increased, advancing to the elbow.
She was now running a high fever, suffering great pain and frequently delirious. They realized that the proper treatment was an opening of the lymphatic glands of forearm and elbow to reach the poison slowly working upward, but did not dare attempt it. The priest told Marcel that in such cases if the poison was not absorbed into the circulation or reached by operation, it would extend to the arm-pit, then to the neck, with fatal termination.
Jean Marcel listened with head in hands to the despairing brother. Then he asked:
"Is there at Fort George or East Main, no one who could help her?"