"What, is my father your patient?" asked Celestine. "Living in the Rue
Barbet-de-Jouy?"
"Precisely so," said Bianchon.
"And the disease is inevitably fatal?" said Victorin in dismay.
"I will go to see him," said Celestine, rising.
"I positively forbid it, madame," Bianchon quietly said. "The disease
is contagious."
"But you go there, monsieur," replied the young woman. "Do you think
that a daughter's duty is less binding than a doctor's?"
"Madame, a physician knows how to protect himself against infection,
and the rashness of your devotion proves to me that you would probably
be less prudent than I."
Celestine, however, got up and went to her room, where she dressed to
go out.
"Monsieur," said Victorin to Bianchon, "have you any hope of saving
Monsieur and Madame Crevel?"
"I hope, but I do not believe that I may," said Bianchon. "The case is
to me quite inexplicable. The disease is peculiar to negroes and the
American tribes, whose skin is differently constituted to that of the
white races. Now I can trace no connection with the copper-colored
tribes, with negroes or half-castes, in Monsieur or Madame Crevel.
"And though it is a very interesting disease to us, it is a terrible
thing for the sufferers.
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