The girl had again raised her head, and was holding it a little to one side, while the sound that had attracted my attention seemed to proceed from a different direction—in fact from the lips of the man supposed to be dead.
I lowered my ear to his face, and listened for a repetition of the sound. It came in a moment as I had before heard it—a sort of sigh half suppressed, like the breath struggling from a bosom over-weighted.
“Lola,” I whispered, “your Calros is not dead. He still breathes.”
I needed not to communicate this intelligence. The ear of affection had been bent, keenly as my own. By the sudden brightening of her countenance, I could perceive that Lola had heard that same sound, and was listening to catch it again, as if her life depended on its repetition.
She had mechanically pushed me aside, so that her ear might be closer to the mute lips of Calros.
“One moment,” I said, gently raising her from her recumbent position; “perhaps he has only fainted I have a remedy here; a stimulant that may serve to restore him. Permit me to administer it.”
I drew forth the flask which providentially I had brought from the tent. It contained “Catalan brandy,” one of the most potent of spirits.
Silently but readily she glided out of the way, watching my movements like some affectionate sister who assists the physician by the couch of an invalid brother.
I felt the pulse of the wounded man. My medical skill was not extensive; but I could perceive that its beating, though feeble, was not irregular—not flickering, like a lamp that was destined soon to become extinguished.
Lola read hope in my looks: her own became brighter.