"Ah! so you are the doctor from the Hotel Dieu."
"Yes, my friend, I am Citizen Naudin."
"Naudin, the chief physician at the Hotel Dieu?" cried Simon. "And you come yourself to see my sick wife?"
"Does that surprise you, Citizen Simon?"
"Yes, indeed, it surprises me. For I have been told so often that Citizen Naudin, the greatest and most skilful physician in all Paris, never leaves the Hotel Dieu; that the aristocrats and ci- devants have begged him in vain to attend them, and that even the Austrian woman, in the days when she was queen, sent to no purpose to the celebrated Naudin, and begged him to come to Versailles.
We heard that the answer was: 'I am the physician of the poor and the sick in the Hotel Dieu, and whoever is poor and sick may come to me in the house which bears the name of God. But whoever is too rich and too well for that, must seek another doctor, for my duties with the sick do not allow me to leave the H6tel Dieu.' And after that answer reached the palace—so the great Doctor Marat told me—the queen had her horses harnessed, and drove to Paris, to consult Doctor Naudin at the Hotel Dieu, and to receive his advice. Is the story really true, and are you Doctor Naudin?"
"The story is strictly true, and, my friend, I am Doctor Naudin."
"And you now leave the Hotel Dieu to come and visit my sick wife?" asked Simon, with a pleasant look and a flattered manner.
"Does your wife not belong to my poor and sick?" asked the doctor. "Is she not a woman of the people, this dear French people, to whom I have devoted my services and my life? For a queen Doctor Naudin might not leave his hospital, but for a woman of the people he does it. And now, citizen, let me see your sick wife, for I did not come here to talk."
Without waiting for Simon's answer, the physician walked up to the bed, sat down on the chair in front of it, and began at once to investigate the condition of the woman, who reached him her feverish hand, and, with an almost inaudible voice, answered his professional questions.