The old woman spoke very feelingly, and I patted her on the shoulder.
"Thank you," she said, as though I had bestowed a gift upon her.
"She is a French lady?" questioned Rivers.
"It may not be hers. She is perhaps sent here to be forgotten. It is sad, very sad!"
"Apart from this loss of memory, from this forgetfulness of herself, is she in health?"
"She is strong, she is well otherwise. It is only her mind that is gone. She gripped my hand once; it was the grip of a strong young girl. She is lithe, she is well formed. If I had been like her when I was her age I should have been proud. I brought some flowers to the house one day. 'Who are these for?' my master asked. 'I thought mademoiselle would like them,' I answered. He frowned, and taking them in his hands crushed them and threw them to the ground. 'That is not part of your duties,' he said. I brought no more flowers. There are some strange things, some things I cannot understand. Do you come to help the poor lady? Are you related to her?"
"We are not related to her, but we will help her if it is in our power."
"What do you mean by saying there are strange things, things you cannot understand?"
"For one--why does the master say she will not live, when, but for her loss of memory, she is strong and well?"
"Yes, and he has brought a friend with him now, a celebrated doctor, because, as I heard him say, she is sinking. What does that mean?"
"Ah," said Rivers, in a significant tone which we understood, "what does that mean, indeed? It means mischief, Mme. Bernstein."
"It is what I think. Now I have opened my heart I do not care what happens to me. This celebrated doctor that he has brought from England with him is no better than my master is. They are a pair. But what can she do against them alone?"
"She is no longer alone, madame," said Ronald, with a strange earnestness in his voice. "The lady is beautiful, you say. Very fair?"
"They are blue as a summer sky, and there is sometimes a light as sweet in them."
"What would be her age, in your opinion, madame?"
"Not more than twenty-four, and though she suffers so, she sometimes looks like a maid of eighteen."
"When your master is absent he leaves medicine for her to take? He places this medicine in your charge? Is it a liquid?"