His tones betrayed so much feeling that the almost unintelligible words drew tears from the two old men, such tears as are shed over some pathetic song in a foreign tongue.
“He is epileptic,” muttered Porriquet.
“I understand your kind intentions, my friend,” Raphael answered gently. “You would make excuses for me. Ill-health cannot be helped, but ingratitude is a grievous fault. Leave me now,” he added. “To-morrow or the next day, or possibly to-night, you will receive your appointment; Resistance has triumphed over Motion. Farewell.”
The old schoolmaster went away, full of keen apprehension as to Valentin’s sanity. A thrill of horror ran through him; there had been something supernatural, he thought, in the scene he had passed through. He could hardly believe his own impressions, and questioned them like one awakened from a painful dream.
“Now attend to me, Jonathan,” said the young man to his old servant. “Try to understand the charge confided to you.”
“Yes, my Lord Marquis.”
“I am as a man outlawed from humanity.”
“Yes, my Lord Marquis.”
“All the pleasures of life disport themselves round my bed of death, and dance about me like fair women; but if I beckon to them, I must die. Death always confronts me. You must be the barrier between the world and me.”
“Yes, my Lord Marquis,” said the old servant, wiping the drops of perspiration from his wrinkled forehead. “But if you don’t wish to see pretty women, how will you manage at the Italiens this evening? An English family is returning to London, and I have taken their box for the rest of the season, and it is in a splendid position—superb; in the first row.”