"You must drive or be driven then. You cannot walk."
It was true. Pauline's breath was now very short, her articulation difficult, her throat contracted and relaxed by turns.
"It is true!" she gasped. "I cannot walk. I cannot even stand up.
Oh, Dr. Renaud, this is more than weakness or fright. I am very sick,
Doctor. Why cannot I stand up?"
Renaud tore off his coat, the priest and Martin did the same. Folding all three beside the fence where the snow was still thick and dry they laid Miss Clairville down and watched her. Martin fetched brandy while the entire Archambault family flocked out to see the sight, and stood gaping and chattering until rebuked by Father Rielle. The doctor knelt a long time at her side. Knowing her so well, he was secretly astonished at the weakness she had shown and he dealt with her most kindly. Tragedy had at last touched her too deeply; a latent tendency of the heart to abnormal action had suddenly developed under pressure of emotion and strain of shock, and he foresaw what she and the others did not—a long and tedious illness with periods of alarming collapse and weakness. For herself, so ill was she for the first time in her active life, she thought more about her own condition than of her loss; she imagined herself dying and following her lover on the same day to the grave. The image of Ringfield too was absent from her thoughts, which were now chiefly concentrated on her symptoms and sufferings.
"Am I not very ill?" she asked presently, after a little of the brandy had somewhat stilled the dreadful beating of her heart, the dreadful booming in her ears.
"Yes, mademoiselle. But you will recover."
"I have never been sick before."
"You are sure of that? Never had any nervous sensations, no tremors, no palpitations?"
"Ah, those! Yes, frequently, but I never thought much about them.
They were part of my life, my emotional life, and natural to me. Shall
I die?"
"I think not, mademoiselle. I believe not, but you may be ill for a while."