shall call on Dr. John, and send him to the child. I will
that he sees her this evening; her cheeks are flushed, her pulse is
quick; _you_ will receive him--for my part, I shall be from home."

Now the child was well enough, only warm with the warmth of July; it
was scarcely less needful to send for a priest to administer extreme
unction than for a doctor to prescribe a dose; also Madame rarely made
"courses," as she called them, in the evening: moreover, this was the
first time she had chosen to absent herself on the occasion of a visit
from Dr. John. The whole arrangement indicated some plan; this I saw,
but without the least anxiety. "Ha! ha! Madame," laughed Light-heart
the Beggar, "your crafty wits are on the wrong tack."

She departed, attired very smartly, in a shawl of price, and a certain
_chapeau vert tendre_--hazardous, as to its tint, for any complexion
less fresh than her own, but, to her, not unbecoming. I wondered what
she intended: whether she really would send Dr. John or not; or whether
indeed he would come: he might be engaged.

Madame had charged me not to let Georgette sleep till the doctor came;
I had therefore sufficient occupation in telling her nursery tales and
palavering the little language for her benefit. I affected Georgette;
she was a sensitive and a loving child: to hold her in my lap, or carry
her in my arms, was to me a treat. To-night she would have me lay my
head on the pillow of her crib; she even put her little arms round my
neck. Her clasp, and the nestling action with which she pressed her
cheek to mine, made me almost cry with a tender pain. Feeling of no
kind abounded in that house; this pure little drop from a pure little
source was too sweet: it penetrated deep, and subdued the heart, and
sent a gush to the eyes. Half an hour or an hour passed; Georgette
murmured in her soft lisp that she was growing sleepy. "And you _shall_
sleep," thought I, "malgre maman and medecin, if they are not here in
ten minutes."

Hark! There was the ring, and there the tread, astonishing the
staircase by the fleetness with which it left the steps behind. Rosine
introduced Dr. John, and, with a freedom of manner not altogether
peculiar to herself, but characteristic of the domestics of Villette
generally, she stayed to hear what he had to say. Madame's presence
would have awed her back to her own realm of the vestibule and the
cabinet--for mine, or that of any other teacher or pupil, she cared no