"Oh, we must hope that this supposition of yours has no foundation in fact, for that would be terrible! Such an overwhelming grief as that would be a terrible strain for his enfeebled brain. So far as one can judge of a man by his features and the look of his eyes, your master, Aloyse, is no mere superficial creature; and in such a case as you suppose, his energetic and forceful will would be only one danger more, and being shattered by trying to do what is impossible, might shatter his life with it." "Holy Jesus! my boy will die!" cried Aloyse. "He will at least be in danger of inflammation of the brain," said Nostradamus. "But why need it be so? There must be some way of showing him a mere glimmer of hope. The most remote or most elusive chance it may be, yet he will grasp it, and it will save him." "He shall be saved, then," said Aloyse, gloomily. "I will perjure my soul, but he shall be saved. Messire Nostredame, I thank you." A week passed, and Gabriel seemed to be trying to think, even though he did not succeed. His eyes, still wandering and expressionless, seemed to be asking questions, nevertheless, of the faces and objects about him. Then he began to assist himself in the changes which they had to make in his position, to raise himself in bed alone, and to take of his own volition the potions that Nostradamus handed him. Aloyse, standing unwearied at his pillow, waited. At the end of another week, Gabriel could speak. Light had not yet fully evolved order out of the chaos of his mind. He could only say a few words, incoherent and unconnected, but which had reference to the events of his past. Aloyse fairly quaked with terror when the physician was there, lest he should reveal some of his secrets. Her apprehensions were justified by the event; and one day, Gabriel, in a feverish sleep, cried aloud before Nostradamus,-- "They think that my true name is Vicomte d'Exmès. No, no, don't think it! I am the Comte de Montgommery." "The Comte de Montgommery!" said Nostradamus, in whose brain the name had awakened some memory. "Silence!" said Aloyse, her finger on her lip. However, Nostradamus went away without Gabriel's having said anything further; and as he did not mention the words that had fallen from the invalid on the next or any following day, Aloyse, thinking it over, feared to attract his attention to something which it might be her master's interest to conceal. So the incident appeared to have been forgotten by both of them. Gabriel continued to improve. He recognized Aloyse and Martin-Guerre; he asked for whatever he needed; and he spoke with a gentle sadness which made it possible to hope that his reason had returned. One morning, it was the first day that he had left his bed, he said to Aloyse,-- "Well, nurse, and the war?" "What war, Monseigneur?" "Why, the war against Spain and England."