ittle frame. It bent down over the
Persian and said, in his ear:

"Are you better, daroga? ... You are looking at my furniture? ... It
is all that I have left of my poor unhappy mother."

Christine Daae did not say a word: she moved about noiselessly, like a
sister of charity, who had taken a vow of silence. She brought a cup
of cordial, or of hot tea, he did not remember which. The man in the
mask took it from her hands and gave it to the Persian. M. de Chagny
was still sleeping.

Erik poured a drop of rum into the daroga's cup and, pointing to the
viscount, said:

"He came to himself long before we knew if you were still alive,
daroga. He is quite well. He is asleep. We must not wake him."

Erik left the room for a moment, and the Persian raised himself on his
elbow, looked around him and saw Christine Daae sitting by the
fireside. He spoke to her, called her, but he was still very weak and
fell back on his pillow. Christine came to him, laid her hand on his
forehead and went away again. And the Persian remembered that, as she
went, she did not give a glance at M. de Chagny, who, it is true, was
sleeping peacefully; and she sat down again in her chair by the
chimney-corner, silent as a sister of charity who had taken a vow of
silence.

Erik returned with some little bottles which he placed on the
mantelpiece. And, again in a whisper, so as not to wake M. de Chagny,
he said to the Persian, after sitting down and feeling his pulse:

"You are now saved, both of you. And soon I shall take you up to the
surface of the earth, TO PLEASE MY WIFE."

Thereupon he rose, without any further explanation, and disappeared
once more.

The Persian now looked at Christine's quiet profile under the lamp.
She was reading a tiny book, with gilt edges, like a religious book.
There are editions of THE IMITATION that look like that. The Persian
still had in his ears the natural tone in which the other had said, "to
please my wife." Very gently, he called her again; but Christine was
wrapped up in her book and did not hear him.

Erik returned, mixed the daroga a draft and advised him not to speak to
"his wife" again nor to any one, BECAUSE IT MIGHT BE VERY DANGEROUS TO
EVERYBODY'S HEALTH.

Eventually, the Persian fell asleep, like M. de Chagny, and did not
wake until he was in his own room, nursed by his faithful Darius, who
told him that, on the night before, he was found propped against the
door of his flat, w