Page:Weird Tales v41n04 (1949-05).djvu/76

74 singsong tone. It might have been a lullaby, a cradle-song to lure her into slumber, and as he kept repeating the slow, almost senseless phrases I saw her lids quiver for a moment, seem to fight to remain up, then slowly, almost reluctantly, fold across her big brown eyes.

"Ah, so!" he murmured as he rose and placed his thumbs upon her brow, stroking it toward the temples with a soft massaging motion! "So, my little poor one, you will rest, n'est-ce-pas?" For several moments he continued stroking her forehead, then, "Now, Mademoiselle you are prepared to tell me when it was you first began to feel sensations of this tiredness, hein?"

"It was last autumn," she responded weakly. Her words came slowly, feebly, wearily, in a voice so tired that it might have been that of an old woman. "It was last autumn in November—All Souls' Day—"

"Parbleu, do you say so? And what had you been doing, if you please?"

"I'd been out to the cemetery to visit Timon's grave. Poor Timon! I could not love him, but he loved me—" Her voice sank lower and lower, like that of a radio when the rheostat is turned off slowly.

"Do you say so? And who was Timon, and why did you go to his grave?"

"Timon Kokinis," she began then stopped as a knock sounded from the ceiling just above her bed, as if a clenched fist had struck the plaster.

"Ah, yes, one sees; and this Monsieur Kokinis, he was—grand Dieu, my friends, look to her!"

"Oh!" The girl's sharp exclamation had been like the cry of a hurt animal and she caught her breath in a gasp as she began to tremble in a clonic spasm, quivering from throat to feet as if in the throes of a galvanic shock. Her hands, which had been meekly folded on her bosom, wreathed themselves together, as if in mortal terror, her eyes forced open as if she were being throttled, then turned up underneath their lids till only a thin thread of white was visible. Her lips writhed back and her tongue thrust out.

"Good God!" cried McCormick. "Hold her, Dr. Trowbridge—watch her mouth; don't let her bite her tongue!" He snatched his kit up, hurried to the bathroom and came back with a filled hypo. "Easy! Easy does it," he soothed as he sponged her arm with alcohol, took up a fold of skin and thrust the needle in.

For something like a minute she continued struggling, then the morphine took effect and she subsided with a tired sigh.

"Parbleu, I thought it was le petit mal at first!" de Grandin murmured as he dropped the girl's quiescent hands.

"You thought?" McCormick shot back. "You know damn well it was, don't you? If that’s not epilepsy I never saw a case—"

"Then you have never seen one, my friend," broke in the small Frenchman. "This seizure, if its origin were physical, was much more like hysteria than epilepsy. Consider, if you please: There was no epileptic cry or groan preceding the spasm, and while she ran her tongue out, there was no attempt to bite it." He looked down at the drugged girl pityingly. "Ma pauvre," he said in a low voice. "Ma pauvre belle crature!"

McCormick looked at him challengingly. "What d'ye mean, if the origin of her seizure were physical?" he demanded.

De Grandin fixed him with a long, unwinking stare, and nothing moved in his face. At last, "There are more things in heaven and earth, and most especially on earth, than medical philosophy is willing to admit, mon jeune ami," he answered in a level, toneless voice. "Attend her, if you please," he added as he moved toward the door. "I think that Friend Trowbridge and I have done all that we can at present, and further inquiries are necessary for our diagnosis. If anything untoward occurs do not delay to telephone us; we shall be in readiness."

AYBE you know what you’re doing," I whispered as we went down the stairs, "but I’m completely at sea—"

"I, too, am tossed upon a chartless ocean of doubt," he confessed, "but in the distance I think that I see a small, clear light. Let us see if Monsieur Pappalukas can assist us in obtaining our bearings.

"Tell me, Monsieur," he demanded as