ve his help.

"Do not give him the child--"

"Speak loud!" cried the count in thundering tones which prevented
Beauvouloir from hearing the last word uttered by the countess. "If
not," added the count who was careful to disguise his voice, "say your
'In manus.'"

"Complain aloud," said the leech to the lady; "cry! scream! Jarnidieu!
that man has a necklace that won't fit you any better than me. Courage,
my little lady!"

"Touch her lightly!" cried the count.

"Monsieur is jealous," said the operator in a shrill voice, fortunately
drowned by the countess's cries.

For Maitre Beauvouloir's safety Nature was merciful. It was more a
miscarriage than a regular birth, and the child was so puny that it
caused little suffering to the mother.

"Holy Virgin!" cried the bonesetter, "it isn't a miscarriage, after
all!"

The count made the floor shake as he stamped with rage. The countess
pinched Beauvouloir.

"Ah! I see!" he said to himself. "It ought to be a premature birth,
ought it?" he whispered to the countess, who replied with an affirmative
sign, as if that gesture were the only language in which to express her
thoughts.

"It is not all clear to me yet," thought the bonesetter.

Like all men in constant practice, he recognized at once a woman in her
first trouble as he called it. Though the modest inexperience of
certain gestures showed him the virgin ignorance of the countess, the
mischievous operator exclaimed:--

"Madame is delivered as if she knew all about it!"

The count then said, with a calmness more terrifying than his anger:--

"Give me the child."

"Don't give it him, for the love of God!" cried the mother, whose almost
savage cry awoke in the heart of the little man a courageous pity which
attached him, more than he knew himself, to the helpless infant rejected
by his father.

"The child is not yet born; you are counting your chicken before it is
hatched," he said, coldly, hiding the infant.

Surprised to hear no cries, he examined the child, thinking it dead. The
count, seeing the deception, sprang upon him with one bound.

"God of heaven! will you give it to me?" he cried, snatching the hapless
victim which uttered feeble cries.

"Take care; the child is deformed and almost lifeless; it is a seven
months' child," said Beauvouloir clinging to the count's arm. Then, with
a strength given to him by the excitement of his pity, he clung to the
father's fingers, whispering in a broken voice: