long watch around
the table; the three traditional flambeaux; the ceremony of the
Yule-log; then the grand promenade around the house, and the sparkle of
the burning wine.

"Ah, my poor Salvette, what a sad Christmas we are going to have this
year! If only we had money to buy a little loaf of white bread and a
flask of claret wine! What a pleasure it would be before passing away
forever to sprinkle once again the Yule-log, with thee!"

And, in speaking of white bread and claret wine, the eyes of the sick
youth glistened with pleasure.

But what to do? They had nothing, neither money nor watches. Salvette
still held hidden in the seam of his mantle a post-order for forty
francs. But that was for the day when they should be free and the first
halt they should make in a cabaret of France. That was sacred; not to be
touched!

But poor Bernadou is so sick. Who knows whether he will ever be able to
return? And, then, it is Christmas, and they are together, perhaps, for
the last time. Would it not be better to use it, after all?

Then, without a word to his comrade, Salvette loosens his tunic to take
out the post-order, and when old Cahn comes, as he does every morning to
make his tour of the aisles, after long debates and discussions under
the breath, he thrusts into the Jew's hands the slip of paper, worn and
yellow, smelling of powder and dashed with blood.

From that moment Salvette assumed an air of mystery. He rubbed his hands
and laughed all to himself when he looked at Bernadou. And, as night
fell, he was on the watch, his forehead pressed eagerly against the
window-pane, until he saw, through the fog of the deserted court below,
old Augustus Cahn, who came panting with his exertions, and carrying a
little basket on his arm.

III.

This solemn midnight, which sounds from all the bells of the town, falls
sadly into the pale night of the sick. The hospital is silent, lit only
by the night-lamps suspended from the ceiling. Great running shadows
flit over the beds and bare walls in a perpetual balancing, which seems
to image the heavy respiration of all the sufferers lying there.

At times, dreamers talk high in their feverish sleep, or groan in the
clutches of nightmares; while from the street there mounts up a vague
rumor of feet and voices, mingled in the cold and sonorous night like
sounds made under a cathedral porch.

Salvette feels the gathering haste, the mystery of a religious feast
crossing the hours