"But not with the washing."
Saxham had swung round his binoculars, and brought them to bear upon the vehicle and its late occupants. A grim smile played about his mouth as he handed her the glasses, and heard her cry of womanly distress as she beheld the fruit of late labour scattered on the veld and the Sisters' agonised activity displayed in the gathering up of sheets, pillow-slips, handkerchiefs, babies' shirts and petticoats, with other garments of a strictly feminine and private character. Her grave, discreet eyes avoided his as she handed back the binoculars, but a dimple showed near the edge of the white coif.
"And now," Saxham said, glancing at his watch, "may I know in what I can be of service?" It had seemed to him that the Mother-Superior hesitated to broach the subject. Nor had he been mistaken. The dimple vanished. Her calm eyes became troubled, and she asked, with a slight catching of the breath:
"Yes, there was something.... Doctor, is it possible for a person to die of fear?"
He answered promptly:
"In circumstances like the present? Certainly. Undoubtedly possible. I have seen twenty deaths from pure fright since the bombardment began, and I expect to see more before the siege ends, or people get callous to the possibilities of sudden extermination that are afforded them a hundred times a day. Is the person to whom you refer a woman or a child?"
"A young girl——" she was beginning, when a buxom little figure, black veiled and habited like herself, rose up as if from the bowels of the earth.
"I vill look. But I can see nozing," she called to someone invisible below. "It must be that you vait until my eyes shall become more strong." She shaded them, newly brought from semi-darkness and blinking in the hot, white sunlight. The Mother-Superior hurried to her, saying with a note of anxiety in her usually calm voice:
"Sister—Sister Cleophée; is anything the matter?"
"Mon Dieu! It is ze Reverend Mozer!" ejaculated the other, relief and joy expressed in the rapid movements of pliant hands and expressive eyes. "Nozing is ze matter, Reverend Mozer, if only you are safe."