The femme-de-chambre continued to pay Paul her curious attentions, one evening smuggling him some extra food, another evening drawing up her skirts, kicking her legs in the air, laughing and going out of the room. Delmuth and Mme. Anniette called for a short period each day. Everyone said: “It will be better when the patients arrive from the Universel.”
Whatever the time of day, it seemed as if it was always that time of day. The hour after breakfast barely glanced across the abyss of the middle morning to the hour before lunch; the remaining hours conceded at best a funeral pace with many halts, each, as it were, in mourning for its own passing. Each day, as to the ephemeron, seemed as long as life.
The wretchedness of this cycle of days and nights became in some way apparent to Dr. Bruneau. One evening, making his routine visit, he felt constrained to try to divert Paul by demanding his opinion of modern painting; his motive was so explicit that Paul felt too embarrassed and self-conscious to reply. Good-naturedly implying by his attitude that the next quarter of an hour was to be devoted to Paul’s pleasure whether or not the latter had the capacity to appreciate it, Dr. Bruneau proceeded to describe canvases which he had seen, outlining rapidly and with nervous, impatient gestures the nature of each composition, the technique employed, the degree of anatomical distortion (and the organic disorders it would provoke), the deviation from established laws of perspective, the disregard of accepted criteria in respect of the balance of masses, the texture of the paint surface and the method of its application. In this way he appeared to re-create rather than to describe each painting, an illusion which he sustained consciously, for when at the close of a description he indicated the canvas’s height and width, he retained his hands in the position in which they had demonstrated one or other of the dimensions, curled his fingers as though about a frame and proudly suspended the completed picture before Paul, who, staring between Dr. Bruneau’s hands at his white-draped chest and stomach, felt compelled to murmur: “Comme c’est étonnant,” or “Oui, oui, très, très bien …”
One evening Sœur Rose thought she saw a ghost in the linen cupboard (it was the inevitable bolster) and ran screaming down the passage; Sœur Miriam declared that désœuvrement was sending her as dotty as Sœur Rose; the laborantine caught a cold and, her hair in curlers, was to be encountered half a dozen times a day swinging along from her bedroom to the laboratory with a bottle of her own urine for analysis. (In the latter context Sœur Miriam declared that, whilst she had heard of people living by taking in each other’s washing, it was the first time she had heard of people living by taking in their own.)
The over-all function of each of Paul’s days was the sum of its immediate activities—the morning injection or aspiration and the evening garnering of another pill for his match-box. There had already been a difficulty: as if he had penetrated Paul’s intentions, Dr. Bruneau had forbidden him any more sedatives. Paul’s protestations having been disregarded, he had been forced to ring for the night sister (who, like the day sister, was Sœur Rose) at two o’clock in the morning in order to re-demand the pill which he had been earlier refused. Sœur Rose, understandably outraged by the prospect of potentially broken sleep every night, had contracted secretly with Paul to maintain his supply.
Most of the day and night at least one of the levels of his mind would be occupied with Michèle, and in consequence he frequently had an hallucinatory impression of her presence—that moment in a waking dream when the light becomes many times more brilliant and the cerebral image, three-dimensionally solid, emerges into independent existence. When he went out of the door of his room (there was nothing to distinguish the passage from the passage of his former floor and his new room corresponded with the one which had then been occupied by Manniez), it was as though he had just visited Manniez and was now returning to his own room or to Michèle’s. And, once in the empty passage, he could not repress the conviction that Michèle had preceded him by a moment, that as he had opened his door her own door had closed, or that, the hem of her cherry-coloured, polka-dotted dressing-gown swirling about the calves of her white linen trousers, she had, a few seconds earlier, passed through the swing doors halfway down the passage.
This impression, co-existing as it did with the acknowledgement of its utter falsity, was so painful that Paul looked forward to when it must be dissipated by the arrival of the patients from the Universel; indeed frequently he would have welcomed an additional summons to the Service Médical for the relief that the incidental company would have brought him. When at the end of the week, and by chance on a day when both Mme. Anniette and Delmuth had failed to visit him, he was told that the arrival was to be delayed still longer, he relapsed into so palpable a state of despair that on his evening round Dr. Bruneau felt constrained to interrogate him.
“What have you in mind, monsieur? What are you thinking of?”
“Nothing particularly.”
“No thoughts that you should not have?”
“No.”
“Then what, monsieur, is the matter?”
“Nothing.”
“You are sure?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” Dr. Bruneau went over to the door, then stopped. “You are not telling the truth,” he said, returning to the foot of the bed. He studied Paul’s face whilst Paul stared expressionlessly at the bottom of his bed.
“Well, what is it? What are you planning?”
“I’ve told you. Nothing.”
Dr. Bruneau walked up and down the room, glancing about him for unfamiliar objects. “Let me see your temperature chart,” he said suddenly. Secure in the knowledge that Sœur Rose had not marked down the sleeping pills, Paul handed it to Dr. Bruneau.
“So you are managing without sedatives,” said Dr. Bruneau, slowly.
“You stopped my having them.”
“Are you sleeping?”
“No.”
“Why haven’t you complained?”
“What would be the use?”
“It would be no use.”
“That is why I haven’t complained.”
“I should think not. You’ve lived on sedatives—for two years they’ve been your daily bread.”
“I have never needed them more than at present.”
“Have you ever asked Sœur Rose for any?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“She refused.”
“Of course she refused—she’s under orders!” Dr. Bruneau went over to Paul’s bed-table and pressed the bell for Sœur Rose; a minute later he re-pressed it, retaining his finger on the bell-push.
Sœur Rose stumbled angrily into the room like a diver hurrying through water.
“What’s the matter?” she demanded. “I gave you your——”
“Dr. Bruneau wants you,” interrupted Paul hurriedly.
“Dr. Bruneau! Where?”
“What did you give him?” cried Dr. Bruneau, stepping forward and seizing Sœur Rose’s arm.
“Ah! Ah!” Sœur Rose raised her eye-shade and gaped at Dr. Bruneau.
“What did you give him?”
“Ah! You’re hurting my arm.”
“I said, what did you give him?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re lying.”
“No.”
“What did you give him?”
“I gave him——” She swallowed. Paul held his breath.
“What?”
“I gave him a vitamin pill.”
“A vitamin pill!”
“Yes.”
“You mean you gave him a sleeping pill!”
“I didn’t! I didn’t!”
“You did!”
“Never!”
“If you have given him sleeping pills you will be out of here tomorrow.”
“I haven’t! I didn’t!”
“Tell the truth!”
“I am telling the truth!” Sœur Rose started to sob. Then she pointed accusingly at Paul. “He drives me mad, it’s always pills, pills, pills—he wakes me up at two in the morning asking for them. But I won’t ever give him one, not a single one.” She hid her face in her hands.
“All right,” said Dr. Bruneau suddenly. He reflected a moment, then added: “Well, take care you never give in to him—he can sleep perfectly well if he wants to.” His tone changed and he smiled from Sœur Rose to Paul.
“Always remember that Monsieur Davenant is our number one patient, in fact our only patient. We must not lose him.”
“He always gets me into trouble. When you asked for his chart he handed me a newspaper,” wailed Sœur Rose.
“There! There!” Dr. Bruneau winked at Paul.
“He’s sending me mad.”
“That’s enough, Sœur Rose. Go away and don’t forget your orders.”
Sœur Rose scowled at Paul and left the room. Dr. Bruneau resumed his pacing.
“Monsieur!” he said at last, pleadingly, engagingly. Paul looked up. Dr. Bruneau stopped at the bottom of the bed, leant confidentially forward with his elbows resting on the bed-rail, his chin on his clasped hands; his sickly face looked as white as a property moon.
“Your condition is a little better: your temperature is down and the pus is definitely thinner. Why are you getting up to your tricks?”
“I am not.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Well, I hope not; it would be bad for you, bad for me, bad for the sanatorium and—it wouldn’t work.” Dr. Bruneau’s index fingers reached and elevated the corners of his eyes, transforming his face into an Asiatic mask; his chin sunk forward until it rested on the bed-rail.
“Put it all out of your mind,” he said. He closed his eyes. “Look upon the treatment we are giving you as sport, cher monsieur, as a gamble in which you stand to win or lose everything. And if you don’t like to see it in those terms, then consider yourself an experiment of the gods in what a man can endure.” The eyes opened. He stood up and straightened his jacket. “Are you a believer, monsieur?”
“A believer?”
“Yes. Do you believe?”
“No. Not really.”
“I thought not. Then if you intended to kill yourself, you would have no special little scruples or doubts?”
“I don’t know.”
Dr. Bruneau laughed.
“Everyone agrees that the idea of another life is ridiculous, but, like Talleyrand, no one ever quite cares to close the door. Still, it doesn’t matter, one has very little to lose.”
“To lose?”
“I mean one has no need to shout one’s credulity from the house-tops.”
“No.”
“No.” Dr. Bruneau sat down on the edge of the bed. “Have you reflected much on these matters? Have you ever reflected, for example, that the idea of another life is really no more ridiculous than the idea of this one? If one, why not another?”
“I see what you mean.”
“But of course we can equally argue that our view of what is or is not likely does not necessarily correspond to the opinion or working of the Absolute.”
“That is so.”
“Obviously it is not so simple as all that.”
“No.”
“Nevertheless we can isolate and identify certain general principles in respect of life itself. Let us do so.” Dr. Bruneau’s brow creased into the external pattern of relentless inner dialectical activity. “The primary principle, the governing principle, the over-riding principle, in a word the principal principle——” He broke off to give greater emphasis to what he was going to say. “The principal principle is——” He paused again, puffed out his cheeks: “Blind will!” His cheeks went hollow. “Blind will, monsieur! Blind will, the core, the central pivot of the philosophy of Schweitzer——”
“Schopenhauer.”
“Schweitzer, Schopenhauer, whoever you like. Where was I? Blind will! Do you doubt it, monsieur, do you doubt it?”
“No.”
“If you ever do, reflect on the battle for supremacy going on night and day in your own chest—ravenous hordes of rudimentary organisms gnawing their way to survival! The outcome could change the whole trend of evolution! We compliment ourselves that we are the end-product of evolutive life—look at the fate of the double-brained Diplodocus who lorded it over the earth for ten thousand times the length of historical time! For all we know, we are mere sports, mere temporal detritus, mere homœostasic projections of some of the lesser amphibia washed up on the Devonian and early Carboniferous beaches. For all we know—” Dr. Bruneau paused to take breath—“the future of the world will be bacterial, and I, in bringing my science to your aid, am being retrogressive and anachronistic.” He laughed in uninhibited delight at his capacity for intellectual paradox. “Do you ever spare a thought for Judgement Day?” he added.
“Judgement Day!”
“I mean if you kill yourself. There is an old superstition, monsieur, that one is best advised to live out one’s life. Or don’t you mind running the risk of having it all over again? In any case why is it that when people think in terms of another world they always assume that it will be governed on different principles from those which God—if He exists—saw fit to establish in this one?” He paused for comment, but received none. “Don’t bring up the Fall of Man!” he cautioned (unnecessarily). Then as if Paul had brought it up: “Man could not have fallen if he had not been equipped to fall, and one does not instal equipment where one does not intend it to be used.” A sudden suspicion occurred to Dr. Bruneau. “What am I talking about?” he demanded.
“About there not being another world,” said Paul with a start.
“Absolutely not! The exact contrary, in fact,” said Dr. Bruneau tartly. “Does this sort of thing not interest you?”
“It interests me very much.”
“Would you prefer me to stop?”
“No. Not at all.”
“Very well, then. I was urging you, monsieur, to consider that inability to adapt yourself to this world was perhaps not the best recommendation for prematurely moving on to the next. Can you not see that if there is a grain of truth in the Scriptures it is in the assessment of life as a test? What do you think the next world will be? Harps? Angels?” Dr. Bruneau dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand. “Believe me,” he continued very warmly, “the next world won’t be all that different from this one, and the man who gets on will still be the one who knows where to look for his opportunities. In a word—same set-up, bigger scale.”
“Yes.”
“Or same set-up, smaller scale, size being purely relative. Yet how many people, divines and theologians included, have ever conceived of a heaven the size of a pin-head?”
“Very few.”
“Very few! Cher monsieur, none! And whilst heaven may be neither microscopic nor gargantuan, the faculty for formulating such concepts is apportioned to the humble man of science!” He bowed. “I think——” he resumed, but broke off as he caught sight of the time. “I must go,” he said hastily. He stopped at the door. “There are people who claim that scientists have no capacity for abstract thought.”
“Yes.”
“Is that your opinion?”
“No. Not at all.”
For a moment it appeared that Dr. Bruneau was on the point of further elaboration. Then he shrugged his shoulders in humorous resignation. “Good-night, monsieur.”
“Good-night.”
“And spare a little thought for what I have been telling you.” Dr. Bruneau closed the door. Whilst the latter had been discussing the problems of adjustment in this world and the next, Paul had only been concerned in attempting to adjust himself to his revised situation. After what had happened, would Sœur Rose supply him with pills? Instinctively he reached for the match-box in which he kept his present stock. Then he realised that he had not heard the sound of Dr. Bruneau’s departing footsteps. He withdrew his hand and waited. The door shot open.
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
Dr. Bruneau stared at Paul’s hand, which the latter opened.
“You are going to settle down and sleep?”
“Yes—if I can.”
“Why shouldn’t you be able to?”
Paul shrugged his shoulders.
“Monsieur—on your honour you have no pills?”
“None.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Why are you so concerned?”
“Because I’m your doctor.”
“Once you told me I could jump out of the window.”
“That was different. I wasn’t in charge.”
“Isn’t Dr. Dubois in charge?”
Dr. Bruneau smiled mysteriously. “That is another matter,” he said. He gazed round the room. “You haven’t your books here,” he commented.
“No.”
“Why not? Have you stopped reading?”
“Yes.”
“You ought to do something with your hands.”
“Yes.”
“Can you paint?”
“No.”
“Would you like to make a rug or a basket?”
“Not really.”
“Have you ever made a leather purse?”
Paul shook his head.
“Why not try?”
“Perhaps I will.”
“You do nothing to help yourself.”
“No.”
“Well, good-night.”
“Good-night.”
This time the footsteps resounded down the corridor.
Paul woke up at three and lay without sleep for the remainder of the night; when he heard the first sounds of the new day—the banging of a door, a snatch of shouted conversation, the distant moan of a vacuum cleaner—he got up and sponged his body. Then he drew apart the curtains and glanced at the moonlit landscape with which he associated all his troubles; so to the damned, he thought, must appear the mountains of hell.
After breakfast he was summoned to the Service Médical for his injection. Dr. Bruneau was in a good mood.
“New long needles specially for swollen pleuras! Now I won’t have to drive it right up to the hilt!” he cried, waving a packet in the air. After the injection he gave his drenched-dog shimmy and demanded in English:
“You shake always ze bot-tel two times a day?”
Paul nodded gravely.
Towards the middle of the morning Sœur Rose came into the room to change the hand-towels.
“Sœur Rose,” said Paul. She paid no attention. “Sœur Rose,” he repeated, raising his voice. She left the room.
When she came in with the lunch her eye-shade was so low that in order to see where she was going she was forced to walk with her tortoise neck thrust forward and her head thrown back. “Sœur Rose,” said Paul very urgently. Because she still took no notice, he seized her wrist as she set the tray on the table. “You’ve got to listen to me,” he said.
“Ah! Let me go.”
“I’ll let you go if you listen to me.”
“What is it?”
“You’re not going to stop giving me my sleeping pills because of what happened last night?”
Sœur Rose freed herself with a sudden twist of her body, and fell sprawling to the floor. She scrambled to her feet and ran out of the door, her scream marking each stage of her progress down the passage. Three minutes later, still howling, she returned at a jog-trot with Dr. Bruneau, whose face had turned the colour of his hair.
“Out!” he cried, waving his hand at the door.
“What!”
“Out! Today!”
“Let me explain——”
“Not necessary. Out!”
“Look!” howled Sœur Rose, rolling up her sleeve and exhibiting the marks on her arm to Dr. Bruneau. She burst again into her neurotic, self-pitying wail.
“Be quiet, Sœur Rose. Monsieur, you will make other arrangements. Today! This morning!”
“But just listen——”
“Don’t waste your time. You’re not going to kill yourself here and you’re not going to assault my staff.”
“He nearly broke my arm! Ahhhhh!”
“Stop that noise or get out!” cried Dr. Bruneau, clapping his hands over his ears.
“Ahhhhh!”
In exasperation Dr. Bruneau gave Sœur Rose a push. She staggered and her eye-shade fell over her nose.
“Ahhhhh!”
“Get out!” cried Dr. Bruneau. He bundled Sœur Rose through the door.
“Now, monsieur,” he resumed, kicking the door shut, but controlling his voice. “Now decide your arrangements. Emile will do your telephoning for you.”
“But listen——”
“I won’t listen!” Dr. Bruneau’s voice soared.
At that moment Sœur Rose’s head appeared round the door. “He asked me—Ahhhhh!” She broke off and slammed the door as Dr. Bruneau turned and strode, fist raised, towards her.
“You see! You see what you’ve done!” he cried, turning back to Paul.
“What I’ve done?”
“Who else?”
“I only asked her for a sleeping pill because I can’t sleep at night.”
“I don’t believe you. Why shouldn’t you be able to sleep at night?”
“Can’t you think?”
“No.”
“Because I lie rotting here, day after day, year after year.”
“Well, it’s all over now.” Dr. Bruneau turned to the door but stopped, outraged.
“Is it my fault that you’re lying here?” he demanded.
“I didn’t say it was.”
“I’ve told you to occupy yourself. I’ve told you to take up handicrafts.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve taken you into my confidence. I’ve discussed by the hour the things which interest you.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve given you devoted medical attention. Did Dr. Vernet ever do any more for you?”
“No.”
“Well?”
“But don’t you see——”
“No!” cried Dr. Bruneau, again raising his hands to his ears. “I don’t see and I don’t know and I don’t understand and I don’t listen and YOU LEAVE TODAY!” The last words were shouted from behind the slamming door.
Paul lay against his pillow, breathing rapidly. Another sanatorium? Would Mme. Anniette take him back in the châlet? The rate of his breathing increased; his chest rose and fell. The window! He looked towards it. This was the moment! No more thought! Quickly! Now! Now! He drew back the duvet and swung his legs to the ground, but the sudden effort made his heart beat too quickly for him to stand; he lay sideways, his hand pressed against his chest. The door opened and in came Delmuth.
“Hello, sick mans!” he cried enthusiastically. Then: “What have you? You go mad?”
Paul sat up, gasping.
“Leave me, Delmuth! Leave me!” He tried to get to his feet.
“Leave you? Dieu merci! What have you? Daymares?”
Delmuth seated himself placidly at the side of Paul’s bed. “What happens? Tell, please.”
“Not now. Leave me for three minutes.”
“Ho-ho! You make pi pi in the wash-basin! Don’t bother for me!”
“No, I——” Paul again tried to get to his feet.
“Your face is dripping.”
Paul took out a handkerchief and dabbed his cheeks and forehead.
“And I can hear your heart!” Delmuth went over to Paul and placed his hand on Paul’s chest. “Is displaced. Is much displaced by the fluids,” he announced censoriously. “Now say please what is with you.”
“I can’t. Not now.”
“Say, please.”
“Do go away.”
“I not leave till you say.”
Dully Paul recounted what had happened; Delmuth listened in a sort of ecstasy.
“This Bruneau say you must go today?” he said when Paul had finished. Paul nodded.
“He will not change his intentions?”
“No.”
“You are sure!”
“Yes.”
“I go see.”
Delmuth left the room. Paul looked across to the window, but the fit, and with it the strength, had gone. He lowered his head in his hands. Delmuth returned several minutes later.
“Is true what you say. Is all true.” He stood with his buttocks pressed against the rim of the wash-basin.
“Of course it’s true.”
“Yes. I had thought perhaps you exaggerate.”
“What did he say?”
“He say is all true.”
“I must go today?”
“No. No. He say you must go today.”
“Today?”
“No. No. Today!” He smiled encouragingly. “Is a good thing I see him,” he added.
“A good thing?”
“Yes. I think otherwise he let you stay. Is not a cruel man, Bruneau.”
“What did you say to him?” cried Paul.
“No. No. I not tell you.”
“Delmuth!”
“No. Is private. Is our secret.”
“Delmuth, for God’s sake!”
“Well, all right. I tell him you kill yourself one moment to the next!”
“You told him that!”
“Yes.”
“And that is why you went to see him!”
“Yes.”
Paul stared at Delmuth, who started to pick at his thumb-nail with his teeth.
“You see, I know Bruneau have plans. Yes.” Delmuth nodded significantly as though agreeing with what he had said.
“Plans? For me?”
“No, for him. He plan to propose himself against Dubois as candidate for Médecin Chef. If something happen now like you killing yourself, the Société say he have no control.” He examined with interest his moist and shining finger-tip. “Is logical,” he added reasonably.
“I see.”
“Is nothing personal,” resumed Delmuth hurriedly. “In fact Bruneau tell me just now is probably best for you if you do go out of the window, but not while he is in charge.”
“He said that?”
“Yes. He say if Dubois was here, very good, but Dubois is already retarded three days, and how he know you wait till Dubois come back?”
“What did he mean when he said it would be best for me to go out of the window?”
“You not know, sick mans?”
“No.”
“Yes, you know. You joke again.”
“I tell you I don’t know,” cried Paul desperately, the palms of his hands growing moist.
“Everyone know, Emile, femme-de-chambre, all …. Your pleura is foutue!”
“But——”
“No buts, is foutue. Always now you make liquide till your lung pops!”
The colour mounted to Paul’s cheeks.
“Now is time to pack. You like me to help you?” Half of Delmuth’s thumb-nail came adrift and he spat it on to Paul’s duvet.
“No. Please leave me, Delmuth.” The urge and the strength to destroy himself sent vivid messages of collaboration up and down his arteries.
“Come! I prepare your cases.” Delmuth opened the wardrobe.
“Please go away.”
“Silly mans!”
“I mean it. Go!”
“You mean it? You really mean it?” And as Delmuth began to attack another nail, he added casually: “If you wanted pills why did you never ask me?”
“You!”
“Yes. Your friend!”
“You’re mad!”
“So are you. I attend your request since some weeks.”
“And if I had made it?”
“I would have given you what you ask. But instead you prefer to get yourself thrown out of the sanatorium.”
“How would you have pills?”
“That is a secret.”
“Get out, Delmuth!”
“No, no. I get them from my landlady. She was a nurse. She give me pills when I not sleep.”
“Well?”
“I not always use them.” Delmuth smiled insinuatingly.
“What are you suggesting?”
“That I might help you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I would give you one or two pills each week. Perhaps more.”
“I know you too well! Get out!”
Delmuth opened his wallet and took out a small blue capsule, which he tossed on to Paul’s bed.
“Swallow it or save it—as you wish. Is just a first instalment.” He threw a second capsule after the first. “To show good intentions,” he added.
Paul took the two capsules and was about to put them with his other pills when he became aware that Delmuth’s eyelids had almost disappeared in the fixity of his gaze. He replaced the capsules on the duvet.
“Don’t leave them there, you fool! Someone come in and we are both in troubles.”
Paul took the capsules and dropped them into an envelope, which he tucked under his pillow.
“That’s no good. Put them with the others.”
“What do you mean, the others?”
“The other pills you’ve kept.”
“There aren’t any others.”
“Like Bruneau, I say you lie.”
The door opened and the femme-de-chambre came into the room; seeing Delmuth, she ran across to him. Delmuth threw his arms about her and raised her from the ground, at the same time winking at Paul over her shoulder. He carried her to the armchair, sat down and pulled her on to his knees.
“Since three days we make ourselves the happiest of living peoples,” he explained. He translated the phrase into French. The femme-de-chambre nodded energetic confirmation. Delmuth bounced her up and down. “Oooooo! Eeeeee!” she cried, waving to Paul.
“Is nice, no?” Bounce. Bounce. “She wash twice daily in first quality eau-de-Cologne!”
“Qu’est-ce que tu dis, chéri?”
“Des bêtises!” he said, pointing to Paul. He raised her skirt and slapped her thigh. “Ooooo!” She folded with laughter. He slapped her again. She gave a smothered scream.
“She have not much hair but her scalp is good!”
“Tu dis?”
“Encore des bêtises!”
“Petit farceur, va!”
Delmuth suddenly parted his knees and she landed on the floor. “Oooooo! Ça fait mal! Saligaud!” She rubbed her haunches. There was a sound in the passage and Delmuth helped her quickly to her feet. The door opened and in came Dr. Bruneau.
Signalling to the femme-de-chambre to leave, he said:
“Monsieur, Dr. Dubois has just arrived back and he is coming to see you immediately. Now ring for Sœur Rose and tell her to straighten your bed and to be on hand if Dr. Dubois sends for her.”