a
temporary redness about the neck, shoulders, and arms of the poor girl,
whose fine and delicate skin was marbled and spotted by the friction
both of the miserable sheets and rug. A sensation of uneasiness and
discomfort seemed to pervade even her slumbers; for the clearly defined
eyebrows, occasionally contracted, as though the sleeper were under the
influence of an uneasy dream, and the pained expression observable on
the features, foretold the deadly nature of the disease at work within.

Madame de Fermont had long ceased to find relief in tears, but, like her
suffering daughter, she found that weakness, languor, and dejection,
which is ever the precursor of severe illness, rapidly and daily
increasing; but, unwilling to alarm Claire, and wishing, if possible,
even to conceal the frightful truth from herself, the wretched mother
struggled against the first approaches of her malady, while, from a
similar feeling of devotion and affection, Claire sought to hide from
her parent the extreme suffering she herself experienced.

To attempt to describe the tortures endured by the tender mother, as,
during the greater part of the night, she watched her slumbering child,
her thoughts alternately dwelling on the past, the present, and the
future, would be to paint the sharpest, bitterest, wildest agony that
ever crossed the brain of a loving and despairing mother; to give
alternately her reminiscences of bygone happiness, her shuddering dread
of impending evil, her fearful anticipations, her bitter regrets, and
utter despondency, mingled with bursts of frenzied rage against the
author of all her sorrows, vain supplications, eager, earnest prayers,
ending at last fearfully and dreadfully in openly expressed mistrust of
the omnipotence and justice of the Great Being who could thus remain
insensible to the cry which arose from a mother's breaking heart, to
that holy plea whose sound should reach the throne of grace,--"Pity,
pity, for my child!"

"How cold she is!" cried the poor mother, lightly touching with her icy
hand the equally chill arm of her child; "how very, very cold! and
scarcely an hour ago just as hot! Alas, 'tis the cruel fever which has
seized upon her! Happily the dear creature is as yet unconscious of her
malady! Gracious heaven, she is becoming cold as death itself! What
shall I do to bring warmth to her poor frame? The bed-coverings are so
slight! A good thought! I will throw my old shawl over her. But no, n