Silenced, and perhaps a little hurt, I rose to take my leave.
"I wish you a safe journey, mademoiselle," I said, "and a safe return,"
"And think me, at the same time, an ungrateful patient."
"I did not say that."
"No--but you thought so. After all, it is possible that I seem so. I am undemonstrative--unused to the amenities of life--in short, I am only half-civilized. Pray, forgive me."
"Mademoiselle," I said, "your apology pains me. I have nothing to forgive. I will send Madame Bousse to you immediately."
And with this I had almost left the room, but paused upon the threshold.
"Shall you be long away?" I asked, with a.s.sumed indifference.
"Shall I be long away?" she repeated, dreamily. "How can I tell?" Then, correcting herself, "Oh, not long," she added. "Not long. Perhaps a fortnight--perhaps a week."
"Once more, then, good-night."
"Good-night," she answered, absently; and I withdrew.
I then went down, sent Madame Bousse to wait upon her, and sat up anxiously listening more than half the night. Next morning, at seven, I heard Madame Bousse go in again. I dared not even go to her door to inquire how she had slept, lest I should seem too persistent; but when they left the room and went downstairs together, I flew to my window.
I saw her cross the street in the gray morning. She walked feebly, and wore a large cloak, that hid the disabled arm and covered her to the feet. Madame Bousse trotted beside her with a bundle of cloaks and umbrellas; a porter followed with her little portmanteau on his shoulder.
And so they pa.s.sed under the archway across the trampled snow, and vanished out of sight.
CHAPTER XLIV.
A PRESCRIPTION.
A week went by--a fortnight went by--and still Hortense prolonged her mysterious absence. Where could she be gone? Was she ill? Had any accident befallen her on the road? What if the wounded hand had failed to heal? What if inflammation had set in, and she were lying, even now, sick and helpless, among strangers? These terrors came back upon me at every moment, and drove me almost to despair. In vain I interrogated Madame Bousse. The good-natured _concierge_ knew no more than myself, and the little she had to tell only increased my uneasiness.
Hortense, it appeared, had taken two such journeys before, and had, on both occasions, started apparently at a moment"s notice, and with every indication of anxiety and haste. From the first she returned after an interval of more than three weeks; from the second after about four or five days. Each absence had been followed by a long season of despondency and la.s.situde, during which, said the _concierge_, Mademoiselle scarcely spoke, or ate, or slept, but, silent and pale as a ghost, sat up later than ever with her books and papers. As for this last journey, all she knew about it was that Mam"selle had had her pa.s.sport regulated for foreign parts the afternoon of the day before she started.
"But can you not remember in what direction the diligence was going?" I asked, again and again.
"No, M"sieur--not in the least,"
"Nor the name of the town to which her place was taken?"
"I don"t know that I ever heard it, M"sieur."
"But at least you must have seen the address on the portmanteau?"
"Not I, M"sieur--I never thought of looking at it."
"Did she say nothing to account for the suddenness of her departure?"
"Nothing at all."
"Nor about her return either. Madame Bousse? Just think a moment--surely she said something about when you might expect her back again?"
"Nothing, M"sieur, except, by the way--"
"Except what?"
"_Dame_! only this--as she was just going to step into the diligence, she turned back and shook hands with me--Mam"selle Hortense, proud as she is, is never above shaking hands with me, I can tell you, M"sieur."
"No, no--I can well believe it. Pray, go on!"
"Well, M"sieur," she shakes hands with me, and she says, "Thank you, good Madame Bousse, for all your kindness to me.... Hear that, M"sieur, "good Madame Bousse,"--the dear child!"
"And then--?"
"Bah! how impatient you are! Well, then, she says (after thanking me, you observe)--"I have paid you my rent, Madame Bousse, up to the end of the present month, and if, when the time has expired, I have neither written nor returned, consider me still as your tenant. If, however, I do not come back at all, I will let you know further respecting the care of my books and other property."
If she did not come back at all! Oh, Heaven! I had never contemplated such a possibility. I left Madame Bousse without another word, and going up to my own rooms, flung myself upon my bed, as if I were stupefied.
All that night, all the next day, those words haunted me. They seemed to have burned themselves into my brain in letters of fire. Dreaming, I woke up with them upon my lips; reading, they started out upon me from the page. "If I never come back at all!"
At last, when the fifth day came round--the fifth day of the third week of her absence--I became so languid and desponding that I lost all power of application.
Even Dr. Cheron noticed it, and calling me in the afternoon to his private room, said:--
"Basil Arbuthnot, you look ill. Are you working too hard?"
"I don"t think so, sir."
"Humph! Are you out much at night?"
"Out, sir?"
"Yes--don"t echo my words--do you go into society: frequent b.a.l.l.s, theatres, and so forth?"
"I have not done so, sir, for several months past."
"What is it, then? Do you read late?"
"Really, sir, I hardly know--up to about one or two o"clock; on the average, I believe."
"Let me feel your pulse."
I put out my wrist, and he held it for some seconds, looking keenly at me all the time.
"Got anything on your mind?" he asked, after he had dropped it again.