She was dressed in some clinging stuff of soft black, with a diamond at her breast, and a deep-red cloak thrown over her feet. She must have been past middle age, for her thick, brown hair was already touched with silver, and one lock of snow-white lay above her forehead. But her face was one of those which time enriches; fearless and tender and high-spirited, a speaking face in which the dark-lashed grey eyes were like words of wonder and the sensitive mouth like a clear song. She looked at the young doctor and held out her hand to him.
“I am glad to see you,” she said, in her low, pure voice, “very glad! You are Roger Carmichael’s son. Oh, I am glad to see you indeed.”
“You are very kind,” he answered, “and I am glad also to be of any service to you, though I do not yet know who you are.”
The Baron was bending over the fire rearranging the logs on the andirons. He looked up sharply and spoke in his strong nasal tone.
“Pardon! Madame la Baronne de Mortemer, j’ai l’honneur de vous presenter Monsieur le Docteur Carmichael.”
The accent on the “doctor” was marked. A slight shadow came upon the lady’s face. She answered, quietly:
“Yes, I know. The doctor has come to see me because I was ill. We will talk of that in a moment. But first I want to tell him who I am—and by another name. Dr. Carmichael, did your father ever speak to you of Jean Gordon?”
“Why, yes,” he said, after an instant of thought, “it comes back to me now quite clearly. She was the young girl to whom he taught Latin when he first came here as a college instructor. He was very fond of her. There was one of her books in his library—I have it now—a little volume of Horace, with a few translations in verse written on the fly-leaves, and her name on the title-page—Jean Gordon. My father wrote under that, ‘My best pupil, who left her lessons unfinished.’ He was very fond of the book, and so I kept it when he died.”
The lady’s eyes grew moist, but the tears did not fall. They trembled in her voice.
“I was that Jean Gordon—a girl of fifteen—your father was the best man I ever knew. You look like him, but he was handsomer than you. Ah, no, I was not his best pupil, but his most wilful and ungrateful one. Did he never tell you of my running away—of the unjust suspicions that fell on him—of his voyage to Europe?”
“Never,” answered Carmichael. “He only spoke, as I remember, of your beauty and your brightness, and of the good times that you all had when this old house was in its prime.”
“Yes, yes,” she said, quickly and with strong feeling, “they were good times, and he was a man of honour. He never took an unfair advantage, never boasted of a woman’s favour, never tried to spare himself. He was an American man. I hope you are like him.”
The Baron, who had been leaning on the mantel, crossed the room impatiently and stood beside the bed. He spoke in French again, dragging the words in his insistent, masterful voice, as if they were something heavy which he laid upon his wife.
Her grey eyes grew darker, almost black, with enlarging pupils. She raised herself on the pillows as if about to get up. Then she sank back again and said, with an evident effort:
“Rene, I must beg you not to speak in French again. The doctor does not understand it. We must be more courteous. And now I will tell him about my sudden illness to-night. It was the first time—like a flash of lightning—an ice-cold hand of pain—”
Even as she spoke a swift and dreadful change passed over her face. Her colour vanished in a morbid pallor; a cold sweat lay like death-dew on her forehead; her eyes were fixed on some impending horror; her lips, blue and rigid, were strained with an unspeakable, intolerable anguish. Her left arm stiffened as if it were gripped in a vise of pain. Her right hand fluttered over her heart, plucking at an unseen weight. It seemed as if an invisible, silent death-wind were quenching the flame of her life. It flickered in an agony of strangulation.
“Be quick,” cried the doctor; “lay her head lower on the pillows, loosen her dress, warm her hands.”
He had caught up his satchel, and was looking for a little vial. He found it almost empty. But there were four or five drops of the yellowish, oily liquid. He poured them on his handkerchief and held it close to the lady’s mouth. She was still breathing regularly though slowly, and as she inhaled the pungent, fruity smell, like the odour of a jargonelle pear, a look of relief flowed over her face, her breathing deepened, her arm and her lips relaxed, the terror faded from her eyes.
He went to his satchel again and took out a bottle of white tablets marked “Nitroglycerin.” He gave her one of them, and when he saw her look of peace grow steadier, after a minute, he prepared the electric battery. Softly he passed the sponges charged with their mysterious current over her temples and her neck and down her slender arms and blue-veined wrists, holding them for a while in the palms of her hands, which grew rosy.
In all this the Baron had helped as he could, and watched closely, but without a word. He was certainly not indifferent; neither was he distressed; the expression of his black eyes and heavy, passionless face was that of presence of mind, self-control covering an intense curiosity. Carmichael conceived a vague sentiment of dislike for the man.
When the patient rested easily they stepped outside the room together for a moment.
“It is the angina, I suppose,” droned the Baron, “hein? That is of great inconvenience. But I think it is the false one, that is much less grave—not truly dangerous, hein?”
“My dear sir,” answered Carmichael, “who can tell the difference between a false and a true angina pectoris, except by a post-mortem? The symptoms are much alike, the result is sometimes identical, if the paroxysm is severe enough. But in this case I hope that you may be right. Your wife’s illness is severe, dangerous, but not necessarily fatal. This attack has passed and may not recur for months or even years.”
The lip-smile came back under the Baron’s sullen eyes.
“Those are the good news, my dear doctor,” said he, slowly. “Then we shall be able to travel soon, perhaps to-morrow or the next day. It is of an extreme importance. This place is insufferable to me. We have engagements in Washington—a gay season.”
Carmichael looked at him steadily and spoke with deliberation.
“Baron, you must understand me clearly. This is a serious case. If I had not come in time your wife might be dead now. She cannot possibly be moved for a week, perhaps it may take a month fully to restore her strength. After that she must have a winter of absolute quiet and repose.”
The Frenchman’s face hardened; his brows drew together in a black line, and he lifted his hand quickly with a gesture of irritation. Then he bowed.
“As you will, doctor! And for the present moment, what is it that I may have the honour to do for your patient?”
“Just now,” said the doctor, “she needs a stimulant—a glass of sherry or of brandy, if you have it—and a hot-water bag—you have none? Well, then, a couple of bottles filled with hot water and wrapped in a cloth to put at her feet. Can you get them?”
The Baron bowed again, and went down the stairs. As Carmichael returned to the bedroom he heard the droning, insistent voice below calling “Gaspard, Gaspard!”
The great grey eyes were open as he entered the room, and there was a sense of release from pain and fear in them that was like the deepest kind of pleasure.
“Yes,