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Page 11
"The doctor is right," she said. "I am quite of his opinion. I prefer
to drink with my meat, and to take a glass of cognac afterwards. That
is what the ladies do in France. Cognac is more fashionable than
kirschwasser!"
Marie Lagoutte had hardly finished with her dissertation when Sperver
opened the door quietly and beckoned me to follow him.
I bowed to the "honourable company," and as I was entering the passage
I could hear that lady saying to her husband--
"That is a nice young man. He would have made a good-looking soldier."
Sperver looked uneasy, but said nothing. I was full of my own thoughts.
A few steps under the darkling vaults of Nideck completely effaced from
my memory the queer figures of Tobias and Marie Lagoutte, poor harmless
creatures, existing like bats under the mighty wing of the vulture.
Soon Gideon brought me into a sumptuous apartment hung with
violet-coloured velvet, relieved with gold. A bronze lamp stood in a
corner, its brightness toned down by a globe of ground crystal; thick
carpets, soft as the turf on the hills, made our steps noiseless. It
seemed a fit abode for silence and meditation.
On entering Sperver lifted the heavy draperies which fell around an ogee
window. I observed him straining his eyes to discover something in the
darkened distance; he was trying to make out whether the witch still lay
there crouching down upon the snow in the midst of the plain; but he
could see nothing, for there was deep darkness over all.
But I had gone on a few steps, and came in sight, by the faint rays of
the lamp, of a pale, delicate figure seated in a Gothic chair not far
from the sick man. It was Odile of Nideck. Her long black silk dress, her
gentle expression of calm self-devotion and complete resignation, the
ideal angel-like cast of her sweet features, recalled to one's mind those
mysterious creations of the pencil in the Middle Ages when painting was
pursued as a true art, but which modern imitators have found themselves
obliged to give up in despair, while at the same time they never can
forget them.
I cannot say what thoughts passed rapidly through my mind at the sight
of this fair creature, but certainly much of devotion mingled with my
sentiments. A sense of music and harmony swept sadly through by soul,
with faint impressions of the old ballads of my childhood--of those pious
songs with which the kind nurses of the Black Forest rock to peaceful
sleep our infant sorrows.
At my approach Odile rose.
"You are very welcome, monsieur le docteur," she said with touching
kindness and simplicity; then, pointing with her finger to a recess where
lay the count, she added, "There is my father."
I bowed respectfully and without answering, for I felt deeply affected,
and drew near to my patient.
Sperver, standing at the head of the bed, held up the lamp with one hand,
holding his far cap in the other. Odile stood at my left hand. The light,
softened by the subdued light of the globe of ground crystal, fell softly
on the face of the count.
At once I was struck with a strangeness in the physiognomy of the Count
of Nideck, and in spite of all the admiration which his lovely daughter
had at once obtained from me, my first conclusion was, "What an old
wolf!"
And such he seemed to be indeed. A grey head, covered with short, close
hair, strangely full behind the ears, and drawn out in the face to a
portentous length, the narrowness of his forehead up to its summit
widening over the eyebrows, which were shaggy and met, pointing downwards
over the bridge of the nose, imperfectly shading with their sable outline
the cold and inexpressive eyes; the short, rough beard, irregularly
spread over the angular and bony outline of the mouth--every feature of
this man's dreadful countenance made me shudder, and strange notions
crossed my mind about the mysterious affinities between man and the lower
creation.
But I resisted my first impressions and took the sick man's hand. It was
dry and wiry, yet small and strong; I found the pulse quick, feverish,
and denoting great irritability.
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