"You must tell
us all, my child, so that we may know how to cure you. Why is your
hand like this? You could not have given yourself that wound."
Pierrette related the struggle between herself and her cousin Sylvie.
"Make her talk," said the doctor to the grandmother, "and find out the
whole truth. I will await the arrival of the doctor from Paris; and we
will send for the surgeon in charge of the hospital here, and have a
consultation. The case seems to me a very serious one. Meantime I will
send you a quieting draught so that mademoiselle may sleep; she needs
sleep."
Left alone with her granddaughter the old Breton woman exerted her
influence over the child and made her tell all; she let her know that
she had money enough now for all three, and promised that Brigaut
should live with them. The poor girl admitted her martyrdom, not
imagining the events to which her admissions would give rise. The
monstrosity of two beings without affection and without conception of
family life opened to the old woman a world of woe as far from her
knowledge as the morals of savages may have seemed to the first
discoverers who set foot in America.
The arrival of her grandmother, the certainty of living with her in
comfort soothed Pierrette's mind as the sleeping draught soothed her
body. The old woman watched her darling, kissing her forehead, hair,
and hands, as the holy women of old kissed the hands of Jesus when
they laid him in the tomb.
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