The gale that Tardif had foretold came with great violence about the
middle of the night. The wind howled up the long, narrow ravine like a
pack of wolves; mighty storms of hail and rain beat in torrents against
the windows, and the sea lifted up its voice with unmistakable energy.
Now and again a stronger gust than the others appeared to threaten to
carry off the thatched roof bodily, and leave us exposed to the tempest
with only the thick stone walls about us; and the latch of the outer
door rattled as if some one outside was striving to enter. I am not
fanciful, but just then the notion came across me that if that door
opened we should see the grim skeleton, Death, on the threshold, with
his bleached, unclad bones dripping with the storm. I laughed at the
ghastly fancy, and told it to Tardif in one of his waking intervals, but
he was so terrified and troubled by it that it grew to have some little
importance in my own eyes. So the night wore slowly away, the tall clock
in the corner ticking out the seconds and striking the hours with a
fidelity to its duty, which helped to keep me awake. Twice or thrice I
crept, with quite unnecessary caution, into the room of my patient.

No, there was no symptom of sleep there. The pulse grew more rapid, the
temples throbbed, and the fever gained ground. Mother Renouf was ready
to weep with vexation. The girl herself sobbed and shuddered at the loud
sounds of the tempest without; but yet, by a firm, supreme effort of her
will, which was exhausting her strength dangerously, she kept herself
quite still. I would have given up a year or two of my life to be able
to set her free from the bondage of my own command.