mingled with the first rays of the sun which were reddening the window
panes, the old servitor had gone to the embrasure of a window and
stood leaning against a corner of it. There, with his face towards the
wall, he seemed to be estimating its thickness, keeping his body in
such absolute immobility that he might have been taken for a statue.
In the middle of the room the countess beheld a short, stout man,
apparently out of breath and stupefied, whose eyes were blindfolded
and his features so distorted with terror that it was impossible to
guess at their natural expression.

"God's death! you scamp," said the count, giving him back his eyesight
by a rough movement which threw upon the man's neck the bandage that
had been upon his eyes. "I warn you not to look at anything but the
wretched woman on whom you are now to exercise your skill; if you do,
I'll fling you into the river that flows beneath those windows, with a
collar round your neck weighing a hundred pounds!"

With that, he pulled down upon the breast of his stupefied hearer the
cravat with which his eyes had been bandaged.

"Examine first if this can be a miscarriage," he continued; "in which
case your life will answer to me for the mother's; but, if the child
is living, you are to bring it to me."

So saying, the count seized the poor operator by the body and placed
him before the countess, then he went himself to the depths of a
bay-window and began to drum with his fingers upon the panes, casting
glances alternately on his serving-man, on the bed, and at the ocean,
as if he were pledging to the expected child a cradle in the waves.