"Very well. I will not tell anybody. I did not intend to."
And he smiled in his peculiar way. Pauline could not help smiling a little too, seeing clearly that the old wizard knew all.
Batoche's pleasant manner deserted him, however, on the way, and he thus discoursed with himself, as he trudged along:
"I could not insist on Montmorenci or Pointe-aux-Trembles, but Valcartier is a mistake. Pauline will not find there what she seeks. I have promised silence and will keep it. Indeed, I did not mean to divulge her retreat, for it is no business of a rough old fellow like me to interfere in the affairs of young people. But all the same Pauline's solitude must be found out, and I have no doubt it will be found out. If it is not, the poor child will pine and perish there just as certainly as she would have done within the walls of Quebec."
These previsions almost at once entered upon their fulfilment. Scarcely had Batoche turned his back on Valcartier, than an overpowering feeling of loneliness fell upon Pauline. The improvement which the excitement of the journey and the company of the aged soldier had induced disappeared immediately. M. Belmont's hopefulness was replaced by a new alarm, which was increased when he discovered that there was no physician in the village. This contingency he had not foreseen, having been assured by his own family doctor that Pauline, with the exception of a few tonics and restoratives which he furnished, needed no other treatment than rest and a change of air. In his anxiety M. Belmont called in an Indian doctor from the neighbouring village of Lorette, equal, he was told, to any member of the profession in the Province. The Huron, after visiting the patient, took M. Belmont aside and said:—
"The pain is here," pointing to the heart. "The Great Spirit alone can cure it."
Was it fated then that the gentle Pauline must die?