collect her scattered senses; but as she felt her daughter stark and
stiff in her embrace, her heart sickened unto death. She tried to
reason with herself, and to resist the yearning to scream. But all at
once, despite herself, her cry rang out

"Rosalie, Rosalie! my child is dying. Quick, hurry for the doctor."

Screaming out these words, she ran through dining-room and kitchen
to a room in the rear, where the maid started up from sleep, giving
vent to her surprise. Helene speeded back again. Clad only in her
night-dress she moved about, seemingly not feeling the icy cold of the
February night. Pah! this maid would loiter, and her child would die!
Back again she hurried through the kitchen to the bedroom before a
minute had elapsed. Violently, and in the dark, she slipped on a
petticoat, and threw a shawl over her shoulders. The furniture in her
way was overturned; the room so still and silent was filled with the
echoes of her despair. Then leaving the doors open, she rushed down
three flights of stairs in her slippers, consumed with the thought
that she alone could bring back a doctor.

After the house-porter had opened the door Helene found herself upon
the pavement, with a ringing in her ears and her mind distracted.
However, she quickly ran down the Rue Vineuse and pulled the door-bell
of Doctor Bodin, who had already tended Jeanne; but a servant--after
an interval which seemed an eternity--informed her that the doctor was
attending a woman in childbed. Helene remained stupefied on the
footway; she knew no other doctor in Passy. For a few moments she
rushed about the streets, gazing at the houses. A slight but keen wind
was blowing, and she was walking in slippers through the light snow
that had fallen during the evening. Ever before her was her daughter,