Through his suffering and his delirium had come the understanding of it.
When, after the crisis, the doctor turned away from the bed, Jacques
looked steadily into Blanche's eyes, and she flushed, and wiped the wet
from his brow with her handkerchief. He took the handkerchief from her
fingers gently before Soldier Joe came over to the bed.
The doctor had insisted that Blanche should go to Weir's Tavern and get
the night's rest, needed so much, and Joe now pressed her to keep her
promise. Jacques added an urging word, and after a time she started.
Joe had forgotten to tell her that a new road had been made on the ice
since she had crossed, and that the old road was dangerous. Wandering
with her thoughts she did not notice the spruce bushes set up for signal,
until she had stepped on a thin piece of ice. It bent beneath her. She
slipped: there was a sudden sinking, a sharp cry, then another, piercing
and hopeless--and it was the one word--"Jacques!" Then the night was
silent as before. But someone had heard the cry. Freddy Tarlton was
crossing the ice also, and that desolating Jacques! had reached his ears.
When he found her he saw that she had been taken and the other left.
But that other, asleep in his bed at the sacred moment when she parted,
suddenly waked, and said to Soldier Joe: "Did you speak, Joe? Did you
call me?"
But Joe, who had been playing cards with himself, replied, "I haven't
said a word.
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