n't want Jeanne, I want you." Exhausted by the
excitement he sank back unconscious on his pillow.

Madame's eyes flashed triumphantly at the girl.

"Go," she said in her honey sweet accents which to the sensitive ear of
the girl were full of bitterness. "Go, and let me repair the mischief you
have done. Blame yourself if this proves too much for him. His death will
be upon your shoulders."

With white face Jeanne crept from the room, and lay without the door while
her aunt summoned aid. After a time the lady joined her.

"Unhappy girl," she said, "you have almost killed your brother. It is due
to my skill alone that he lives. I forbid you to enter his room again
until he is beyond danger. If you try to see him I cannot answer for the
consequences. Or perhaps you would rather he would die than to live and
to care for me more than for you. Did you see how he turned from you to
me? How did you like that?"

"Aunt Clarisse," answered Jeanne, every word of the woman going to her
heart like the stab of a knife, "save him, and I will ask nothing more. He
may love you best----" her voice faltered. "Only save him."

"I am going to," said Madame with emphasis. "Do you want to know why,
my dear? Because I took a fancy to Monsieur Dick when you used to talk
so about him. I adore a soldier! Had you been a boy I might have loved
you. When the Orderly told us that you were here with your brother I
came down because I wanted to see him for myself. I saw him, petite.
He is the picture of what my own boy would have been had he lived. I
would not have come on your account, you little mudsill! You might have
been sent to Libby prison for all I cared, but I wanted Dick. I want him
for myself. He cares for me now. By the time he is well he will adore me.
Nay; he will be so fond of me that he will give up father, mother and even
that beloved Union of which you prate so much because I wish it. You
shall see!"

"You will do this? Aunt Clarisse, you cannot. Dick believes in you now,
but he will never love you better than he does mother. And he never will,
no matter how much he likes you, give up his country."

"We shall see," and the lady laughed unpleasantly. "You would have said
yesterday that he loved you better, wouldn't you? Yet see! to-day he
prefers me. He shall yet wear the gray of my own South."

Shaking her finger at the girl with pretended playfulness she reentered
Dick's room leaving Jeanne full of misery.

CHAPTER XX