He looked at his exhausted
patient, and said, 'It is well; I could not have done you any good
before.'

And when he had set Berenger more at ease, he told how great had been
the confusion at St. Germain when the plot had become known to the
Queen-mother. The poor King had been wakened at two o'clock in the
morning, and carried to his litter, when Pare and his old nurse had
tended him. He only said, 'Can they not let me die in peace?' and his
weakness had been so great on arriving, that the surgeon could hardly
have left him for M. de Ribaumont, save by his own desire. 'Yes, sir,'
added Pare, seeing Berenger attending to him, 'we must have you well
quickly; his Majesty knows all about you, and is anxious to see you.'

In spite of these good wishes, the recovery was very slow; for, as the
surgeon had suspected, the want of skill in those who had had the charge
of Berenger at the first had been the cause of much of his protracted
suffering. Pare, the inventor of trephining, was, perhaps, the only
man in Europe who could have dealt with the fracture in the back of
the head, and he likewise extracted the remaining splinters of the jaw,
though at the cost of much severe handling and almost intolerable pain:
but by Easter, Berenger found the good surgeon's encouragement verified,
and himself on the way to a far more effectual cure than he had hitherto
thought possible. Sleep had come back to him, he experienced the luxury
of being free from all pain, he could eat without difficulty; and Pare,
always an enemy to wine, assured him that half the severe headaches
for which he had been almost bled to death, were the consequence of
his living on bread soaked in sack instead of solid food; and he was
forbidden henceforth to inflame his brain with anything stronger than
sherbet. His speech, too, was much improved; he still could not utter
all the consonants perfectly, and could not speak distinctly without
articulating very slowly, but all the discomfort and pain were gone; and
though still very weak, he told Philip that now all his course seemed
clear towards his child, instead of being like a dull, distraught dream.
His plan was to write to have a vessel sent from Weymouth, to lie off
the coast till his signal should be seen from la Motte-Achard, and then
to take in the whole party and the little yearling daughter, whom
he declared he should trust to no one but himself. Lady Walsingham
remonstrated a little at the wonderful plans