On the following day, the servants' faces were more downcast, and Jarnonville himself, although he said that the disease was following its regular course, seemed more anxious, less cheerful, concerning Blanche's safety. After scrutinizing the faces of all those about him, Léodgard summoned a valet and ordered him to help him to dress. "What! you intend to rise?" cried Jarnonville; "that is most imprudent; the doctor still forbids it." "The doctor does not know how much I suffer from not seeing my daughter; the sight of her will be more beneficial to me than all his prescriptions. Moreover, to-day everyone seems to be more anxious about Blanche's health, and I wish to satisfy myself with my own eyes concerning her condition. You will give me your arm, chevalier, and take me to my daughter." The tone in which the count spoke showed that all objections would be fruitless. Enveloped in a voluminous robe de chambre, Léodgard took Jarnonville's arm, and left his apartment at last, to go to the wing occupied by Bathilde and her child. But, despite all his resolution, the convalescent, whose legs shook and wavered, could go only very slowly, and a servant hastened before him to announce to the countess her husband's coming. When she learned that Léodgard had insisted upon coming to see his daughter, Bathilde could not restrain a joyful cry; and she lovingly embraced the little invalid, saying to her: "It is on your account that he comes, dear child, it is you who bring him back to me!--Oh! I am well aware that it is not I whom he wishes to see, but I shall not go away, for I never leave you; from the instant that you are suffering, my place is with you! And your father must needs endure my presence, if he wishes to have a share in nursing you." As for Ambroisine, who also was beside the child's cradle, she went at once into another room; for in that first interview between the husband and wife a witness would have been in the way. Slow and heavy steps announced the count's arrival. Bathilde seated herself at some little distance from her daughter's cradle; but when Léodgard entered the room, leaning on Jarnonville's arm, she could not refrain from looking at him, and she was painfully impressed by the tremendous change in his whole appearance. Considerably thinner than of old, extremely pale, and with naught reminiscent of his large eyes save a feverish and sombre fire, the Comte de Marvejols was no more than the shadow of his former self. But in Bathilde's eyes he was still the man whom she adored, the father of her child; and she was obliged to make a mighty effort to keep from rushing to him and throwing herself into his arms.