.

"Oh! no doubt, no doubt," stammered Doctor Deberle, whose ears were
buzzing.

The elder man, his mind set at rest with regard to all questions of
professional etiquette, then began to affect a puzzled manner, and
expressed his doubts of the meaning of the symptoms. He spoke in a
whisper, and described them in technical phraseology, frequently
pausing and winking significantly. There was coughing without
expectoration, very pronounced weakness, and intense fever. Perhaps it
might prove a case of typhoid fever. But in the meantime he gave no
decided opinion, as the anaemic nervous affection, for which the
patient had been treated so long, made him fear unforeseen
complications.

"What do you think?" he asked, after delivering himself of each
remark.

Doctor Deberle answered with evasive questions. While the other was
speaking, he felt ashamed at finding himself in that room. Why had he
come up?

"I have applied two blisters," continued the old doctor. "I'm waiting
the result. But, of course, you'll see her. You will then give me your
opinion."

So saying he led him into the bedroom. Henri entered it with a shudder
creeping through his frame. It was but faintly lighted by a lamp.
There thronged into his mind the memories of other nights, when there
had been the same warm perfume, the same close, calm atmosphere, the
same deepening shadows shrouding the furniture and hangings. But there
was no one now to come to him with outstretched hands as in those
olden days. Monsieur Rambaud lay back in an arm-chair exhausted,
seemingly asleep. Helene was standing in front of the bed, robed in a
white dressing-gown, but did not turn her head; and her figure, in its
death-like pallor, appeared to him extremely tall. Then for a moment's
space he gazed on Jeanne. Her weakness was so great that she could not
open her eyes without fatigue. Bathed in sweat, she lay in a stupor,
her face ghastly, save that a burning flush colored each cheek.

"It's galloping consumption," he exclaimed at last, speaking aloud in
spite of himself, and giving no sign of astonishment, as though he had
long foreseen what would happen.

Helene heard him and looked at him. She seemed to be of ice, her eyes
were dry, and she was terribly calm.

"You think so, do you?" rejoined Doctor Bodin, giving an approving nod
in the style of a man who had not cared to be the first to express
this opinion.

He sounded the child once more. Jeanne, her limbs quite