He, also, could not repress his tears every time he glanced at the face of the dying child. The calmness, the silence of this scene, which I seized at one glance, made such an impression upon me that for an instant I stood rooted to the threshold. Madame de Fersen turned towards the clock, then shook her head, with a gesture of despair. I understood, she was beginning to lose faith in me. I pushed the door open. Catherine saw me; in an instant she was at my side, and drawing me to the cot, she said, in a heartrending tone, "Save her! have pity on me, and save her!" Madame de Fersen's voice was low and broken; her beautiful face was tear-stained and worn; yet under this appearance of weakness one felt the superhuman energy which always sustains a mother, so long as her child needs her. "One moment," said Doctor Ralph, in a low, solemn voice. "This is our last hope, let us not take too great a risk." The unhappy woman hid her face in her hands. "I have told you, madame," said the doctor, showing a vial containing a dark liquid, "this potion will restore this child to consciousness, will light up the faint spark of intelligence which still remains, perhaps. Then the sight of the person who exercises on her so strange an influence may work a miracle, for, alas! madame, nothing but a miracle can bring your child back to life." "I know it, I know it," said Catherine, choking back her tears, "I am prepared for the worst. But, tell me, the potion,--what effect will it have?" "I can answer for its immediate effects; but not for the consequences that may follow." "What is to be done? _Mon Dieu!_ what is to be done?" cried Catherine, in accents of anguish. "Do not hesitate, madame," I said; "since all hope is gone, accept the only chance that remains!" "I am of the same opinion, do not hesitate, madame," said Frank, who shared our emotion. "Proceed, monsieur," whispered Madame de Fersen, in an accent of desperate determination; and she knelt down by her child's cot. Her lips moved in prayer. She, Frank, and I fixed upon the doctor sorrowing and apprehensive looks. He alone was calm, as with slow and silent steps he approached Irene's bedside. At the sight of his tall figure, his austere countenance, his long white hair, his peculiar garb, one might have supposed him a man gifted with some occult power, ready to perform by a potion some mysterious charm. He poured into a golden spoon a few drops of the liquid contained in the vial. Madame de Fersen took it, and approached the spoon to the child's lips. But her hand trembled to such an extent that the liquid was spilled. "I am afraid," said she, with a frightened look. She gave back the spoon to the doctor. He filled it once more, and with a firm hand put it to Irene's lips. The child swallowed it without reluctance. It is impossible to express the intense alarm, the mortal anguish, with which we watched the effects of the potion.