It will be remembered that when Doctor Jolly paid his visit to Havre in the previous winter, he, after enquiring unsuccessfully for Susan at the house of the Mère Cliquelle, in the Rue Montmartre, went off for a walk (to pass the time until his ward should return) in the very same direction that Markworth and Susan, with Clara Kingscott dogging their heels, had taken—towards the heights of Ingouville.
The Doctor picked his steps carefully, for it was dusk, and he was in a strange place, and he wished to establish certain landmarks in his mind, by which he might regain the Rue Montmartre when his stroll was over, and he should think it time to return.
Doctor Jolly had the address of his hotel on a printed card in his pocket: he was not going to make another mistake, such as he had made earlier in the day; and if any doubts arose in his mind as to his exact latitude and longitude, he had resolved to hand the card of the hotel, which he had previously secured, to the nearest policeman or cabman. Oh! the doctor was very ’cute and business-like.
But he did not wish to return there just yet. He wanted to see Susan, and have his mind set at rest about her before the night was over. And so the doctor walked on in a desultory way, carefully studying the topography of the street as he sauntered along, and pondering over recent events in his mind.
He was wondering at the chain of circumstances which had brought him wandering about “this confounded foreign, outlandish place!” at nightfall, and “in the depth of winter too, by Gad!” he soliloquised, as he inhaled the foggy air of the dull November night, which made him puff and wheeze beneath the comforter, which in remembrance of Deb’s solicitude, he still kept carefully wrapped round his neck.
When he came to one of the roads leading up to the heights above, the doctor paused a moment to recover his breath; he had never been “any great hand at walking,” as he would have told you himself; and the distance he had already traversed, short though it was, had by this time affected his wind.
While he was resting a moment, and debating in his mind whether he should ascend the footpath in front of him, or yet retrace his steps to the Rue Montmartre, he heard a sound near him as of one groaning in pain. It was like the noise of the battle to the war-horse, or the salt smell of the sea to a mariner; and the doctor pricked up his ears, all his senses aroused at the idea of pain and suffering being suggested to him: to minister to the ills of nature was his special vocation.
He searched about and followed the sound—it led him up higher to a ledge on the cliff above; and there in the dim twilight he made out the form of a human figure lying stretched on the débris which had fallen away with it apparently from the summit above.
To see and perceive was, with the staunch old doctor, but secondary to acting.
He climbed up as hastily as his portly form would permit to the ledge, and bent over a figure, which was nearly motionless. “Bless my soul!” he ejaculated in alarm and surprise. “God bless my soul! Why, it is poor Susan! How on earth did she come here?” As he bent to lift her up she lay like a log in his arms.