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This street was just then so obstructed by flying soldiers that Lieutenant Rochas, with Pache, Lapoulle, and Gaude, found himself caught in the throng and unable for the moment to move in either direction.
At all events, she had for some time been ailing, and had finally been removed to the hospital. Mathieu had for a while employed her young sister Cecile, now seventeen, as a servant in the house at Chantebled, but she was of poor health and had returned to Paris, where, curiously enough, she also entered Doctor Gaude's clinic. And Boutan waxed indignant at the methods which Gaude employed.
And there it had rested; and there, stretched on his sofa, he rested, the sneer still edging his lips, not for her but for himself. "She'd have made some respectable man a good mistress," he said. "Here is a most excellent mistress, spoiled, to make a common-place nurse! . . . Gaude! Maria Virgo; gaudent proenomine molles auriculoe. . . . Gratis poenitet esse probum. Burgess!" "Sir?"
But she had elected otherwise, setting all her egotism and pride on that only son whom death had snatched away; and now the motherhood she longed for was denied her. For nearly two years did Constance battle, and at last in despair she was seized with the idea of consulting Dr. Gaude.
He told her the brutal truth; it was useless for her to address herself to charlatans; she would simply be robbed by them; there was absolutely no hope for her. And Gaude uttered those decisive words in a light, jesting way, as though surprised and amused by her profound grief. She almost fainted on the stairs as she left his flat, and for a moment indeed death seemed welcome.
"He is dead, you know," said she. Who was dead? At last they understood that she referred to Dr. Gaude. The celebrated surgeon, had, indeed, been found in his consulting-room struck down by sudden death, the cause of which was not clearly known. In fact, the strangest, the most horrible and tragical stories were current on the subject.
In the distance, at the farmhouse, the candle that lighted the dreary watches of the staff burned up more brightly, with an erect, unflickering flame, as if it had been of wax instead of tallow. But it was ten o'clock, and Gaude, rising to his feet from the ground where he had been lost in the darkness, sounded taps, the first in all the camp.
Another, near at hand, replied, and then a third, in the remote distance, took up the strain. Presently there was a universal blaring, far and near, throughout the camp, whereon Gaude, the bugler of the company, took up his instrument.
Once, indeed, he guides her hand to transcribe in a book the words of her exaltation, the 'Ave, and the 'Magnificat, and the 'Gaude Maria, and the young angels, glad to rouse her for a moment from her devotion, are eager to hold the ink-horn and to support the book.
Seraphine had begun to laugh, showing her white wolfish teeth between her blood-red lips, when she noticed the horrified expression which had appeared on Mathieu's face since Gaude had been spoken of. "Ah!" said she; "there's a man, now, who in nowise resembles your squeamish Dr. Boutan, who is always prattling about the birth-rate.
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