up my deficiencies, and I knew our application to her for help would be
inexpressibly gratifying. But I had no other resource than to call her
in as a fellow-practitioner, and I knew she would make a first-rate
nurse, for which Suzanne Tardif was unfitted by her deafness.




CHAPTER THE FOURTH.

A RIVAL PRACTITIONER.


Mother Renouf arrived from the other end of the island in an incredibly
short time, borne along by Tardif as if he were a whirlwind and she a
leaf caught in its current. She was a short, squat old woman, with a
skin tanned like leather, and kindly little blue eyes, twinkling with
delight and pride. Yes, there they are, photographed somewhere in my
brain, the wrinkled, yellow, withered faces of the two old women, their
watery eyes and toothless mouths, with figures as shapeless as the
bowlders on the beach, watching beside the bed where lay the white but
tenderly beautiful face of the young girl, with her curls of glossy hair
tossed about the pillow, and her long, tremulous eyelashes making a
shadow on her rounded cheek.

Mother Renouf gave me a hearty tap on the shoulder, and chuckled as
merrily as the shortness of her breath after her rapid course would
permit. The few English phrases she knew fell far short of expressing
her triumph and exultation; but I was resolved to confer with her
affably. My patient's case was too serious for me to stand upon my