“More than ever—do you understand?”
“But he is a brute beast.”
“There are madmen who think they are gods. He sometimes imagines he is a dog. His lunacy is, perhaps, therefore less grave, and after all....”
She smiled mysteriously. One would have said that she wanted to drive me wild.
Then followed a scene I dare not describe.
Well, Barbe made an untimely, but fortunate entrance, coughing as loudly as she could.
“Here is Monsieur coming.” Emma dashed from my arms. Lerne was terrorizing her once more. “Off with you! Make haste,” she said. “If he knew, you would be done for, and I, too, most likely. Oh, do go! Go, my little duck! Lerne sticks at nothing.”
I felt she was speaking the truth, for her dear cold hands were shivering in mine, and her mouth was stuttering with terror.