"Quite safe, and so are the Sisters. Only the linen was upset."
"My 'eavens, but a miraculous escapement!" The supple hands and the expressive eyes and shoulders of Sister Cleophée made great play. "Me and Sister Tobias, 'ow we pray when we 'ear ze great gun, vith knowledge zat you and ze Sisters were upon the vay to ze Women's Laager. My faith, it vas terrible! Me, if I 'ad not make to ascend and learn how it go vid you, Lynette vould 'ave come running up to make discovery for herself. She behave like a little crazy, a little mad sing—I forget your vord for she zat have lost 'er vits! Sister Tobias and me, we 'ave to 'old 'er." The fine, expressive eyes went past the Mother-Superior, and lighted with evident relief on Saxham. "Ah, Monsieur le Docteur, it is incredible vat zat poor child she suffer. Madame 'ave told you——"
"Madame was about to tell me, my Sister," Saxham said, in his smooth, fluent French, "when you appeared upon the scene."
Sister Cleophée launched, unwitting of the Mother-Superior's gesture of vexation, into voluble explanations in that native language which M. le Docteur spoke so well.
Mademoiselle Mildare, the ward of Madame the Mother-Superior, was no coward. But no! the child had courage in plenty—it was the suspense that devoured her in the absence of the Mother, to whom Mademoiselle was most tenderly attached, that reduced her to a state of the most pitiable. The Sisters left at home each day would talk of the work and the fine weather—anything to distract the mind, that presented itself to them—but now, nothing was of any use. When the Reverend Mother came back at nightfall, behold a transformation. Mademoiselle would laugh and sing and chatter. Her eyes would shine like stars, she would be happy, said Sister Cleophée, with dramatic emphasis and gesture, as a soul in Paradise. Next day, taking her guardian from her side, would bring the terrors back, find redoubled the nervous sufferings of Mademoiselle, to-day reaching such a height that Sister Cleophée felt convinced that something must be done.
"Ah, my Sister, if I could do anything!" the Mother-Superior said, with the velvet Southern Irish inflection in the breathing aspirate, and the soft melodious cadence that made her pure, cultivated utterance so exquisite. The voice broke and faltered, and a spasm of mother-anguish wrung the firm mouth, and as a slow tear dimmed each of her underlids and splashed on the white guimpe she put out her hand blindly, and the sympathetic little Frenchwoman took it in both her own.
"Reverend Mozer, you can do zis. You can bring Monsieur le Docteur to see Lynette. You can 'ave his advice upon 'er case, and you can——"
Another fusillade of rifle-fire, sweeping from the west over Gueldersdorp, brought a repetition of the faint moaning cry from below. Saxham consulted the Reverend Mother with a look. She bent her head in silent assent. He hitched the horse's bridle to what had been the gatepost of the railway-official's front-garden, as she signed to him to descend the ladder leading to the Sisters' underground abode. And he went down to meet his Fate there.