“Do you think there is yet time?” asked the young Count, in a low voice.  “The children seem to me to be very ill.”

“Lost, I fear; but everything depends on the time that has passed, the quantity they have taken, and the remedies I can procure.”

The old man consulted quickly with Madame de Tecle, who found she had not in her country pharmacy the necessary remedies, or counter-irritants, which the urgency of the case demanded.  The doctor was obliged to content himself with the essence of coffee, which the servant was ordered to prepare in haste, and to send to the village for the other things needed.

“To the village!” cried Madame de Tecle.  “Good heavens! it is four leagues—­it is night, and we shall have to wait probably three or four hours!”

Camors heard this:  “Doctor, write your prescription,” he said:  “Trilby is at the door, and with him I can do the four leagues in an hour—­in one hour I promise to return here.”

“Oh! thank you, Monsieur!” said Madame de Tecle.

He took the prescription which Dr. Durocher had rapidly traced on a leaf of his pocketbook, mounted his horse, and departed.

The highroad was fortunately not far distant.  When he reached it he rode like the phantom horseman.

It was nine o’clock when Madame de Tecle witnessed his departure—­it was a few moments after ten when she heard the tramp of his horse at the foot of the hill and ran to the door of the hut.  The condition of the two children seemed to have grown worse in the interval, but the old doctor had great hopes in the remedies which Camors was to bring.  She waited with impatience, and received him like the dawn of the last hope.  She contented herself with pressing his hand, when, breathless, he descended from his horse.  But this adorable creature threw herself on Trilby, who was covered with foam and steaming like a furnace.

“Poor Trilby,” she said, embracing him in her two arms, “dear Trilby—­good Trilby! you are half dead, are you not?  But I love you well.  Go quickly, Monsieur de Camors, I will attend to Trilby”—­and while the young man entered the cabin, she confided Trilby to the charge of her servant, with orders to take him to the stable, and a thousand minute directions to take good care of him after his noble conduct.  Dr. Durocher had to obtain the aid of Camors to pass the new medicine through the clenched teeth of the unfortunate children.  While both were engaged in this work, Madame de Tecle was sitting on a stool with her head resting against the cabin wall.  Durocher suddenly raised his eyes and fixed them on her.

“My dear Madame,” he said, “you are ill.  You have had too much excitement, and the odors here are insupportable.  You must go home.”

“I really do not feel very well,” she murmured.

“You must go at once.  We shall send you the news.  One of your servants will take you home.”

She raised herself, trembling; but one look from the young wife of the sabot-maker arrested her.  To this poor woman, it seemed that Providence deserted her with Madame de Tecle.