ventured to
ask.

"If there be any need, you shall share both," he answered, in a tranquil
tone, "though your life should be the penalty. Life is nothing in
comparison with duty. When it is thy duty, my daughter, to be beside thy
husband, I will call thee without fail."

Slowly I retraced my steps to the village. The news had already spread,
from Pierre--for no one else knew it--that the Englishman, who had been
turned away from their doors the day before, had spent the night in the
infected dwelling. A group of weavers, of farmers, of women from their
household work, stopped me as I entered the street. I delivered to them
their cure's message, and they received it with sobs and cries, as
though it bore in it the prediction of a great calamity. They followed
me up the street to the presbytery, and crowded the little court in
front of it.

When mademoiselle had collected the things Monsieur Laurentie had sent
me for--a mattress, a chair, food, and medicine--every person in the
crowd wished to carry some small portion of them. We returned in a troop
to the factory, and stood beyond the stone, a group of sorrowful, almost
despairing people. In a few minutes we saw the cure open the door, close
it behind him, and stand before the proscribed dwelling. His voice came
across the space between us and him in distinct and cheerful tones.

"My good children," he said, "I, your priest, forbid any one of you to
come a single step nearer to this house. It may be but for a day or two,
but let no one venture to disobey me. Think of me as though I had gone
to England, and should be back again among you in a few days. God is
here, as near to me under this roof, as when I stand before him and you
at his altar."

He lifted up his hands to give them his benediction, and we all knelt to
receive it. Then, with unquestioning obedience, but with many
lamentations, the people returned to their daily work.

CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH.

A MALIGNANT CASE.

For three days, morning after morning, while the dew lay still upon the
grass, I went down, with a heavy and foreboding heart, to the place
where I could watch the cottage, through the long, sultry hours of the
summer-day. The first thing I saw always was Monsieur Laurentie, who
came to the door to satisfy me that he was himself in good health, and
to tell me how Richard Foster had passed the night. After that I caught
from time to time a momentary glimpse of his white head, as he p