GEORGE! GEORGE!
Monsieur Roger stayed up all the remainder of that night by the side of
Paul, whose sleep was calm and dreamless, like the sleep which succeeds
to some strong emotion, some great fatigue. Paul was still sleeping in
the morning when Monsieur Dalize softly turned the handle of the door
and entered the room on tiptoe. His entrance was made with so much
precaution that Monsieur Roger himself did not hear him.
Monsieur Dalize had some seconds in which to observe Roger. He saw him
sitting beside the bed, his eyes fixed upon the child, in a thoughtful
attitude. Monsieur Roger was studying the delicate face which lay upon
the pillow. He examined its features one by one, and, thinking himself
alone, thinking that he would not be interrupted in this examination, he
was calling up the mysterious resemblance with which he had already
acquainted his friend. But he had not just now begun this study,--he had
pursued it all night. The light, however, of the lowered lamp had not
been favorable, and the emotion which he felt agitated him still too
much to leave his judgment clear. When the morning sun had risen,
chasing away all the vague images of the darkness and the doubts of the
mind. Roger, having recovered his composure, looked at the child whom he
had saved, and asked himself if the child was not his own. He was drawn
from these reflections by feeling himself touched upon the shoulder.
Monsieur Dalize had approached and asked,--
"Has he passed a good night?"
"Excellent," answered Monsieur Roger, in a low tone; "but we must let
him sleep as long as he can. Give orders that no noise shall be made
around here and that no one shall enter. He must awake of his own
accord. When he awakes he will only feel a slight fatigue."
"Then I am going to give these orders and tell the good news," said
Monsieur Dalize.
He retired as softly as he had entered, but by accident, near the door,
he stumbled against a chair. He stopped, holding his breath; but Roger
made a sign that he could go on. The slight noise had not awakened Paul,
or at least had not awakened him completely; he had turned around upon
his bed for the first time since he had been placed there. Monsieur
Roger, who never took his eyes off him, understood that he was dreaming.
The dream seemed to be a painful one, for some feeble groans and murmurs
escaped him. Then upon the face of the sleeping child appeared an
expression of great fear. Monsieur Roger did not wish to leave Paul a
prey to such a dream. He approached near to raise him a little upon the
bed. The moment that Monsieur Roger's two hands softly touched Paul's
head, the expression of fear disappeared, the features became quiet and
calm, the groans ceased, and suddenly there escaped his lips the single
word "Papa."
Monsieur Roger started. With his trembling hands he still sustained the
child; he bent over, ready to embrace him, forgetting that the child was
sleeping and dreaming. Monsieur Roger was about to utter the name which
choked him,--"My son."
Then Paul Solange opened his eyes. He looked up dreamily; then he
recognized the face before him, and surprise mingled with affection in
his tones.
"Monsieur Roger!" he said.
He looked around him, saw that he was in his own room, and remembered
nothing else. He asked,--
"Why are you here, Monsieur Roger?"
Mastering himself, Monsieur Roger answered that he had come to find out
how Paul was, as he had seen him suffering the night before.
"I, suffering?" asked Paul. Then he sought to remember, and, all of a
sudden, he cried, "The fire over there at the farm!"
Although his memory had not entirely returned, he recollected something.
He hesitated to speak. Then, with an anxious voice, he asked,--
"And Albert?"
"Albert," answered Monsieur Roger, "he is below; and everybody is
waiting until you come down to breakfast."
"Then there were no accidents?"
"No."
"How fortunate! I will dress myself and be down in a minute."
And, in fact, in a few minutes Paul was ready, and descended leaning on
Monsieur Roger's arm.
The latter, as they entered the dining-room, made a sign to them that
they should all keep silence: he did not wish that they should fatigue
the tired mind of the child with premature questions; but when they were
sitting at the table, Paul, addressing Albert, said,--
"Tell me what passed last night. It is strange I scarcely remember."
"No," said Madame Dalize: "we are at table for breakfast, and we have
all need for food,--you, Paul, above all. Come, now, let us eat; a
little later we may talk."
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"It is well said," said Monsieur Dalize.
There was nothing to do but to obey. And, indeed, Paul was glad to do
so, for he was very hungry. He had lost so much strength that the
stomach for the moment was more interesting to him than the brain. They
breakfasted, and then they went out upon the lawn before the chateau,
under a large walnut-tree, which every day gave its hospitable shade to
the Dalize family and their guests.
"Well, my dear Paul," said Monsieur Dalize, "how are you at present?"
"Very well, indeed, sir, very well," answered Paul. "I was a little
feeble when I first awoke, but now,--now----"
He stopped speaking; he seemed lost in thought.
"What is the matter?" asked Albert.
"I am thinking of last night at the farm,--the fire."
"Oh, that was nothing," said Albert.
"But," continued Paul, "how did we get back here?"
"In the carriage. Father came for us and brought us home."
"And how did we leave the farm?"
Monsieur Roger followed with rapt attention the workings of Paul's
memory. He was waiting in burning anxiety the moment when Paul should
remember. One principal fact, only one thing occupied his attention.
Would Paul remember how and by whom he had been borne from the torpor
which was strangling him? Would he remember that cry,--that name which
had had the miraculous power to awake him, to bring him back to life? If
Paul remembered that, then, perhaps---- And again Monsieur Roger was a
prey to his fixed idea,--to his stroke of folly, as Monsieur Dalize
called it.
The latter, besides, knew nothing as yet, and Monsieur Roger counted
upon the sudden revelation of this extraordinary fact to shake his
conviction. But Paul had repeated his question. He asked,--
"How did we leave the farm-house? How were we saved?"
And as Albert did not know whether he should speak, whether he should
tell everything, Paul continued:
"But speak, explain to me: I am trying to find out. I cannot remember;
and that gives me pain here." And he touched his head.
Monsieur Roger made a sign to Albert, and the latter spoke:
"Well, do you remember the turret, where we had our rooms? You slept
above, I below. Do you remember the trap-door that I showed you? In the
middle of the night I felt myself awakened by somebody, and I followed
him. In my half sleep I thought that this some one was you, my poor
friend; but, alas! you remained above; you were sleeping without fear.
Why, it was Monsieur Roger who first saw the danger that you were in."
Paul, while Albert was speaking, had bent his head, seeking in his
memory and beginning to put in order his scattered thoughts. When
Albert pronounced the name of Monsieur Roger, Paul raised his eyes
towards him with a look which showed that he would soon remember.
"And afterwards?" said he.
"And afterwards Monsieur Roger climbed upon the roof, at the risk of his
life, and reached the loop-hole which opened into your chamber. He broke
the glass of the window; but you did not hear him: the smoke which was
issuing through the floor had made you insensible,--had almost
asphyxiated you."
"Ah, I remember!" cried Paul. "I was sleeping, and, at the same time, I
was not sleeping. I knew that I was exposed to some great danger, but I
had not the strength to make a movement. I seemed paralyzed. I heard
cries and confused murmurs, sounds of people coming and going. I felt
that I ought to rise and flee, but that was impossible. My arms, my legs
would not obey me; my eyelids, which I attempted to open, were of lead.
I soon thought that everything was finished, that I was lost; and still
I was saying to myself that I might be raised out of this stupor. It
seemed to me that the efforts of some one outside might be so, that an
order, a prayer might give back to my will the power which it had lost;
but the stupor took hold of me more and more intensely. I was going to
abandon myself to it, when, all of a sudden, I heard myself called. Yes,
somebody called me; but not in the same way that I have been called
before. In that cry there was such a command, such a prayer, so much
faith, that my will at once recovered strength to make my body obey it.
I roused myself; I saw and I understood, and, luckily, I remembered the
trap-door which you had shown me. I could scarcely lift it; but there
was some one there,--yes, some one who saved me."
Paul Solange uttered a great cry.
"Ah," said he, "it was Monsieur Roger!" And he ran to throw himself into
the arms which Monsieur Roger extended to him.
Miss Miette profited by the occasion to wipe her eyes, which this scene
had filled with big tears in spite of herself. Then she turned to Paul,
and said,--
"But the one who called to you? Was it true? It was not a dream?"
"Oh, no; it was some one. But who was it?"
"It was Monsieur Roger," answered Albert.
"And so you understood him?" continued Miette, very much interested.
"And he called you loudly by your name, 'Paul! Paul!'"
Paul Solange did not answer. This question had suddenly set him to
thinking. No, he had not heard himself called thus. But how had he been
called?
Seeing that Paul was silent, Albert answered his little sister's
question:
"Certainly," said he, "he called Paul by his name."
Then he interrupted himself, and, remembering all of a sudden:
"No," cried he; "Monsieur Roger called out another name."
"What other name?" asked Monsieur Dalize, much surprised.
"He cried out, 'George! George!'"
Monsieur Dalize turned his head towards Roger and saw the eyes of his
friend fixed upon his own. He understood at once. Poor Roger was still a
slave to the same thought, the same illusion.
Madame Dalize and Miette, who were acquainted with the sorrows of
Monsieur Roger, imagined that in this moment of trouble he had in spite
of himself called up the image of his child. Paul, very gravely, was
dreamily saying to himself that the name of George was the name which he
had heard, and that it was to the sound of this name that he had
answered, and he was asking himself the mysterious reason for such a
fact.
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