The hour of waiting wore out, and the figure of the doctor,
walking backward and forward anxiously, was still the only
living figure left in the square. Five minutes, ten minutes,
twenty minutes, were counted out by the doctor's watch, before
the first sound came through the night silence to warn him of
the approaching carriage. Slowly it emerged into the square,
at the walking pace of the horses, and drew up, as a hearse
might have drawn up, at the door of the inn.
"Is the doctor here?" asked a woman's voice, speaking, out of
the darkness of the carriage, in the French language.
"I am here, madam," replied the doctor, taking a light from
the landlord's hand and opening the carriage door.
The first face that the light fell on was the face of the lady
who had just spoken--a young, darkly beautiful woman, with the
tears standing thick and bright in her eager black eyes. The
second face revealed was the face of a shriveled old negress,
sitting opposite the lady on the back seat. The third was the
face of a little sleeping child in the negress's lap. With a
quick gesture of impatience, the lady signed to the nurse to
leave the carriage first with the child.
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