When Madeline recovered her senses she was lying upon her bed, with
her maid bending anxiously above her. As she opened her eyes the girl
uttered a cry.
‘Oh, thank God, you have awakened, dear Mademoiselle. I feared your eyes
were closed for ever.’
But, without replying, Madeline only closed her eyes and became
insensible again.
What was happening nobody knew, and the servants became very alarmed. It
was strange, they thought, that at such a time, when the young lady was
sick to death, her mother and cousin should leave the house; and yet
they had gone, and had only just left a little note for Mademoiselle.
It was well for Madeline that her own maid was kindly. She kept by her
mistress’s side, although, one by one, the other servants fled.
Two days after the departure of Monsieur Belleisle, a strange English
gentleman called at the hotel and asked for him. On being told that he
was gone, and that the only occupant of the rooms now was a young lady
who was supposed to be dying, he asked to be allowed to see her, and was
conducted at once to Madeline’s apartment.
The young man walked up the stairs with the memory of his last meeting
with the girl still in his mind. He felt very bitter against her, but
the moment he entered the room where she was lying his bitterness melted
away. How pale and ill she looked! How wasted, wretched, and sad! He
bent for a moment to sadly regard the unconscious face, he pressed the
wasted hand, felt the pulse; then turned to the maid, who stood looking
on in mute amazement.
When Madeline was apparently prosperous, she did not enter into his
calculations at all. Once, when he thought her in need of help, he had
offered it--now, when he knew her to be in need, he gave it. By a few
well-applied questions he extracted from the maid such facts as, coupled
with those in his own knowledge, gave him a pretty correct idea of how
things stood.
He still believed Madeline to be culpable--there was nothing to convince
him to the contrary; but she was a countrywoman in distress, and he was
still man enough to assist her. He announced his intention of looking
after her, until such time as her relations could be communicated with
and she could be left in proper hands.
He provided a proper doctor, and sent a professional nurse to share the
vigils of Madeline’s French maid.
It was during these nights of nursing that the poor parched lips of the
invalid muttered words which astonished the Englishman. For, little
by little, word by word, she told him all. Sometimes she called on
Belleisle for mercy, begging him to take her back to school; then she
reproached him for having forced her into a marriage; then she cried
and sobbed, vowing vehemently that she was his wife. She spoke again
and again of the forged letters to the Marquis de Vaux; then she cried
passionately, saying she could never face her guardian any more.
‘Delirious people never lie,’ said the young man to himself one evening,
as he stood by the bed, plaintively regarding the pale, pinched face.
‘If she had not been so ill I could not have extracted so much from her
by days of cross-questioning. Poor, misguided, miserable child--another
instance of the martyrdom of woman to the treachery of man. God help
her! God help her!’
Having told this much, Madeline told more. By interrogating her during
her saner moments, he learned that her guardian was a Mr. White, who
lived in a studio in St. John’s Wood. He risked sending a telegram, and
somewhat to his amazement got a reply--
‘God bless you for the information. I am starting for Paris forthwith.’
Having read the telegram, which came to his lodgings, he folded it, put
it in his pocket, and walked up to the house where Madeline still lay.
Good news awaited him there. The maid’s face was very bright, and the
cause of that brightness was that Mademoiselle had awakened, taken some
nourishment, and fallen into a natural sleep. The fever had abated, and
the doctor said that the crisis was now past.
‘Would Monsieur like to see Mademoiselle?*
He shook his head.
‘You must not mention to her that I have been here at all. But there
will be an English gentleman here to-morrow, whom she will be glad to
see.’
Having arranged everything to his satisfaction, he returned to his
lodgings, sat down before a roaring wood fire, lit a cigar, and began to
think.
His watching was at an end; his long, sad looks at Madeline were over;
and, to his own surprise, he felt a sort of regret. During the last few
days he had never been free from self-reproach. He had met her at a time
when his help might have saved her--yet, because she repulsed him, he
had quietly stood aloof and let her drift to her ruin. Yes, although his
reason told him he was not to blame, in his own mind he felt culpable.
Well, it was all over now; self-accusation and recrimination would
never obliterate that dark past from the girl’s life--she must live and
suffer--but he vowed to himself that it should be his endeavour to make
that suffering easy for her to bear.
During that night he slept little, but when he did sleep he dreamed of
Madeline. Now he clasped her in his arms and plunged with her into
wild waters--again he drew her from some darkly surging river, or with
uplifted knife stood waiting to plunge it into the heart of the grinning
Frenchman. He was glad when daylight relieved him from such dreams.
His first care was to ascertain how his charge was thriving. The report
was favourable again; she had passed a peaceful night, and in the
morning she had lain for half an hour talking rationally to her maid.
She heard with perfect equanimity of the departure and continued absence
of Madame de Fontenay and Monsieur Belleisle. She opened and read the
letter which Monsieur had left for her, then quietly burned it in
the candle which stood beside her bed. She thanked her maid for her
kindness, said she must be removed from that place, and then dropped
into an exhausted sleep again.
Well satisfied with the account, the young man again returned home to
await the arrival of Mr. White. In the afternoon White came. ’Twas
no other, of course, than our old acquaintance, but so changed that his
nearest friend would hardly know him. His cheeks were ghastly, his eyes
sunken, his hair and beard unkempt, and his clothes in a deplorable
condition with the long and tedious travel. Despite his disreputable
appearance, however, the young man’s heart went out to him at once. He
gave him a cordial welcome, and tenderly told him all that he knew about
his ward. In return, White gave his confidence, and then the two men
walked together to the house where Madeline lay. White’s hands trembled,
his cheeks turned very pale, when the maid came to conduct him to
Madeline’s room. He went up alone.
In one of the lower salons the other awaited his return.
One hour passed, then another; he read one, read all the papers, walked
restless up and down in growing excitement--till White returned to him,
with cheeks more pinched and ghastly than they had been before, and
pitiful tears in his eyes. He laid his tremulous hand upon the young
man’s shoulder.
‘She has sobbed herself to sleep,’ he said. ‘Would you like to see
her now?’ The other, unable to resist, went again into the room where
Madeline lay. She was quite unconscious of his presence, in a deep but
troubled sleep. Her loose fair hair was scattered upon the pillow--her
breath came in short quick pants, which sometimes turned to sobs.
Upon one hand her cheek was resting, the other lay carelessly upon the
coverlet.
The young man raised her hand gently, and pressed it to his lips.
‘Farewell!’ he murmured. ‘God knows if we shall meet again!’