Page:The Yellow Book - 03.djvu/270

 She thought to herself, vaguely, that she must be dying, since she seemed to have lost all feeling.

Bit by bit, various little scenes between her and Henri came to her mind, with an extraordinary vividness. He was sitting on her knee in the cottage, and his clear child's voice rang like a bell in the silent room—so clearly, that Jeanne-Marie started, and wondered if she were light-headed or had been dreaming. Then the voice faded away, and she saw the cool, high grass of the orchard, and there was Henri laughing at her, and rolling among the flowers. How cool and fresh it looked; and Henri was asking her to come and play: "Tante Jeanne-Marie, viens jouer avec ton petit. Tante Jeanne-Marie, tante Jeanne-Marie!" She must throw herself on the grass with him—on the cool, waving grass. And she bent forward with outstretched arms; but the movement brought her to herself, and as she lay back on her pillows, suddenly the reality of suffering rushed back upon her, with the agonising sense of separation and of loss. Little Henri was dying; was dead perhaps; never to hear his voice, or feel his warm little arms round her neck. She could do nothing for him; he must die without her. "Tante Jeanne-Marie! Tante Jeanne-Marie!" Was he calling her, from his feverish little bed? If he called, she must go to him, she could not lie here, this suffering was choking her. She must have air, and space to breathe in; this room was suffocating her. She must go to Henri. With a desperate effort she struggled to her feet, and stood supporting herself by the bed-post. The moon, that had hidden itself in the clouds, struggled out, the long, old-fashioned glass hanging on the wall opposite the bed became one streak of light, and Jeanne-Marie, gazing at herself, met the reflection of her own face, and knew that no power on earth could make her reach the farm where little Henri lay.