In
the morning I was busy in the dispensary. While I was there, Justine
Caron came to get some medicine that I had before given her. Her hand was
now nearly well. Justine had nerves, and it appeared to me that her
efforts to please her mistress, and her occasional failures, were wearing
her unduly. I said to her: "You have been worried, Miss Caron?"
"Oh, no, Doctor," she quickly replied.
I looked at her a little sceptically, and she said at last: "Well,
perhaps a little. You see, madame did not sleep well last night, and I
read to her. It was a little difficult, and there was not much choice of
books."
"What did you read?" I asked mechanically, as I prepared her medicine.
"Oh, some French novel first--De Maupassant's; but madame said he was
impertinent--that he made women fools and men devils. Then I tried some
modern English tales, but she said they were silly. I knew not what to
do. But there was Shakespeare. I read Antony and Cleopatra, and she said
that the play was grand, but the people were foolish except when they
died--their deaths were magnificent. Madame is a great critic; she is
very clever.
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