The man beside him, started, looked up with slowly comprehending eyes, and mechanically bowed his head. “Yes,” assented he, and relapsed into his former heavy silence.
Mr. Sylvester touched him again. “If it is hers, how came she not to know it? How could you manage to deceive such a woman as that?”
Holt started again and muttered, “She was sick and insensible. She never saw the baby; I sent it away, and when she came to herself, told her it was dead. We had become tired of each other long before, and only needed the breaking of this bond to separate us. When she saw me again, it was with another woman at my side and an infant in my arms. The child was weakly and looked younger than he was. She thought it her rival’s and I did not undeceive her.” And the heavy head again fell forward, and nothing disturbed the sombre silence of the room but the low unvarying moan of the wretched mother, “My baby, my baby, my own, own baby!”
Mr. Sylvester moved over to her side. “Jacqueline,” said he, “the child is dead and you yourself are very much hurt. Won’t you let these good women lay you on a bed, and do what they can to bind up your poor blistered arms?”
But she heard him no more than the wind’s blowing. “My baby,” she moaned, “my own, own baby!”
He drew back with a troubled air. Grief like this he could understand but knew not how to alleviate. He was just on the point of beckoning forward one of the many women clustered in the doorway, when there came a sound from without that made him start, and in another moment a young man had stepped hastily into the room, followed by a girl, who no sooner saw Mr. Sylvester, than she bounded forward with a sudden cry of joy and relief.
“Bertram! Paula! What does this mean? What are you doing here?”