One day, Dr.Aubertin, coming back from Paris to Beaurepaire rather suddenly, found nobody at home but the baroness.Josephine and Rose were gone to Frejus; had been there more than a week.She was ailing again; so as Frejus had agreed with her once, Rose thought it might again."She would send for them back directly.""No," said the doctor, "why do that? I will go over there and see them." Accordingly, a day or two after this, he hired a carriage, and went off early in the morning to Frejus.In so small a place he expected to find the young ladies at once; but, to his surprise, no one knew them nor had heard of them.He was at a nonplus, and just about to return home and laugh at himself and the baroness for this wild-goose chase, when he fell in with a face he knew, one Mivart, a surgeon, a young man of some talent, who had made his acquaintance in Paris.Mivart accosted him with great respect; and, after the first compliments, informed him that he had been settled some months in this little town, and was doing a fair stroke of business.
"Killing some, and letting nature cure others, eh?" said the doctor;then, having had his joke, he told Mivart what had brought him to Frejus.
"Are they pretty women, your friends? I think I know all the pretty women about," said Mivart with levity."They are not pretty,"replied Aubertin.Mivart's interest in them faded visibly out of his countenance."But they are beautiful.The elder might pass for Venus, and the younger for Hebe.""I know them then!" cried he; "they are patients of mine."The doctor colored."Ah, indeed!"
"In the absence of your greater skill," said Mivart, politely; "it is Madame Aubertin and her sister you are looking for, is it not?"Aubertin groaned."I am rather too old to be looking for a Madame Aubertin," said he; "no; it is Madame Raynal, and Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire."Mivart became confidential."Madame Aubertin and her sister," said he, "are so lovely they make me ill to look at them: the deepest blue eyes you ever saw, both of them; high foreheads; teeth like ivory mixed with pearl; such aristocratic feet and hands; and their arms--oh!" and by way of general summary the young surgeon kissed the tips of his fingers, and was silent; language succumbed under the theme.The doctor smiled coldly.
Mivart added, "If you had come an hour sooner, you might have seen Mademoiselle Rose; she was in the town.""Mademoiselle Rose? who is that?"
"Why, Madame Aubertin's sister."
At this Dr.Aubertin looked first very puzzled, then very grave.
"Hum!" said he, after a little reflection, "where do these paragons live?""They lodge at a small farm; it belongs to a widow; her name is Roth." They parted.Dr.Aubertin walked slowly towards his carriage, his hands behind him, his eyes on the ground.He bade the driver inquire where the Widow Roth lived, and learned it was about half a league out of the town.He drove to the farmhouse; when the carriage drove up, a young lady looked out of the window on the first floor.It was Rose de Beaurepaire.She caught the doctor's eye, and he hers.She came down and welcomed him with a great appearance of cordiality, and asked him, with a smile, how he found them out.
"From your medical attendant," said the doctor, dryly.
Rose looked keenly in his face.
"He said he was in attendance on two paragons of beauty, blue eyes, white teeth and arms.""And you found us out by that?" inquired Rose, looking still more keenly at him.
"Hardly; but it was my last chance of finding you, so I came.Where is Madame Raynal?""Come into this room, dear friend.I will go and find her."Full twenty minutes was the doctor kept waiting, and then in came Rose, gayly crying, "I have hunted her high and low, and where do you think my lady was? sitting out in the garden--come."Sure enough, they found Josephine in the garden, seated on a low chair.She smiled when the doctor came up to her, and asked after her mother.There was an air of languor about her; her color was clear, delicate, and beautiful.
"You have been unwell, my child."
"A little, dear friend; you know me; always ailing, and tormenting those I love.""Well! but, Josephine, you know this place and this sweet air always set you up.Look at her now, doctor; did you ever see her look better? See what a color.I never saw her look more lovely.""I never saw her look SO lovely; but I have seen her look better.
Your pulse.A little languid?"
"Yes, I am a little."
"Do you stay at Beaurepaire?" inquired Rose; "if so, we will come home.""On the contrary, you will stay here another fortnight," said the doctor, authoritatively.
"Prescribe some of your nice tonics for me, doctor," said Josephine, coaxingly.
"No! I can't do that; you are in the hands of another practitioner.""What does that matter? You were at Paris.""It is not the etiquette in our profession to interfere with another man's patients.""Oh, dear! I am so sorry," began Josephine.
"I see nothing here that my good friend Mivart is not competent to deal with," said the doctor, coldly.
Then followed some general conversation, at the end of which the doctor once more laid his commands on them to stay another fortnight where they were, and bade them good-by.
He was no sooner gone than Rose went to the door of the kitchen, and called out, "Madame Jouvenel! Madame Jouvenel! you may come into the garden again."The doctor drove away; but, instead of going straight to Beaurepaire, he ordered the driver to return to the town.He then walked to Mivart's house.
In about a quarter of an hour he came out of it, looking singularly grave, sad, and stern.
