THE QUEEN WAS EXPECTING THE RETURN of Madame de Misery. The doctor entered with his accustomed familiarity. “Madame,” he said, “the patient in whom your majesty and the king are interested is as well as any one can be who has a fever.”
“Is it a slight wound?” asked the queen.
“Slight or not, he is in a fever.”
“You frighten me, dear doctor; you, who are generally so cheering. Besides, you look about you, as though you had a secret to tell.”
“Speak, then, for I am curious.”
“I wait for you to question me, madame.”
“Well, how does the fever go on?”
“No; ask me why I have taken him away from the guard's gallery, where the king left him, to my own room.”
“Well, I ask. Indeed it is strange.”
“Then, madame, I did so, because it is not an ordinary fever.”
The queen looked surprised. “What do you mean?”
“M. de Charny is delirious already, and in his delirium he says a number of things rather delicate for the gentlemen of the guard to hear.”
“Oh, madame! you should not question me, if you do not wish to hear my answers.”
“Well, then, dear doctor, is he an atheist? Does he blaspheme?”
“Oh, no! he is, on the contrary, a devotee.”
The queen assumed a look of sang-froid. “M. de Charny,” she said, “interests me. He is the nephew of M. de Suffren, and has besides rendered me personal services. I wish to be a friend to him. Tell me, therefore, the exact truth.”
“But I cannot tell you, madame. If your majesty wishes to know, the only way is to hear him yourself.”
“But if he says such strange things?”
“Things which your majesty ought to hear.”
“But,” said the queen, “I cannot move a step here, without some charitable spy watching me.”
“I will answer for your security. Come through my private way, and I will lock the door after us.”
“I trust to you, then, dear doctor.” And she followed him, burning with curiosity.
When they reached the second door the doctor put his ear to the keyhole.
“Is your patient in there, doctor?”
“No, madame, or you would have heard him at the end of the corridor. Even here you can hear his voice.”
“No, he speaks loud and distinct.”
“I do not mean you to do so. I only wish you to listen in the adjoining room, where you will hear without being seen.” They went on, and the doctor entered the sick room alone.
Charny, still dressed in his uniform, was making fruitless efforts to rise, and was repeating to himself his interview with the German lady in the coach. “German!” he cried—“German! queen of France!”
“It is frightful,” continued Charny, “to love an angel, a woman—to love her madly—to be willing to give your life for her; and when you come near her, to find her only a queen—of velvet and of gold, of metal and of silk, and no heart.”
“Oh! oh!” cried the doctor again.
“I love a married woman!” Charny went on, “and with that wild love which makes me forget everything else. Well, I will say to her, there remain for us still some happy days on this earth. Come, my beloved, and we will live the life of the blessed, if we love each other. Afterward there will be death—better than a life like this. Let us love at least.”
“Not badly reasoned for a man in a fever,” said the doctor.
“But her children!” cried Charny suddenly, with fury; “she will not leave her children. Oh! we will carry them away also. Surely I can carry her, she is so light, and her children too.” Then he gave a terrible cry: “But they are the children of a king!”
The doctor left his patient, and approached the queen.
“You are right, doctor,” said she; “this young man would incur a terrible danger if he were overheard.”
“Listen again,” said the doctor.
But just then Charny said, in a gentler voice:
“Marie, I feel that you love me, but I will say nothing about it. Marie, I felt the touch of your foot in the coach; your hand touched mine, but I will never tell; I will keep this secret with my life. My blood may all flow away, Marie, but my secret shall not escape with it. My enemy steeped his sword in my blood, but if he has guessed my secret, yours is safe. Fear nothing, Marie, I do not even ask you if you love me: you blushed, that is enough.”
“Oh!” thought the doctor; “this sounds less like delirium than like memory.”
“I have heard enough,” cried the queen, rising and trembling violently; and she tried to go.
The doctor stopped her. “Madame,” said he, “what do you wish?”
“But if the king ask to see my patient?”
“Doctor, I cannot think; this dreadful spectacle has confused me.”
“I think you have caught his fever,” said the doctor, feeling her pulse.
