Page:A chambermaid's diary.djvu/175

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where, by suggestion, I suffered from pains and lacerations; I examined the discharges from my throat, in which I saw red streaks; and I gave myself a fever, by frequent counting of my pulse. It seemed to me, as I looked in the glass, that my eyes were growing hollow, and that my cheeks were growing pinker, with that mortal pink that colored Monsieur Georges's face. One night, as I was leaving a public ball, I took cold, and I coughed for a week. I thought that it was all over with me. I covered my back with plasters, and swallowed all sorts of queer medicines; I even sent a pious offering to Saint Anthony of Padua. Then, as, in spite of my fear, my health remained good, showing that I had equal power to endure the fatigues of toil and of pleasure, it all passed away.

Last year, on the sixth of October, I went to lay flowers on M. Georges's grave, as I had done every year when that sad date came round. He was buried in the Montmartre cemetery. In the main path I saw, a few steps ahead of me, the poor grandmother. Oh! how old she was, and how old also were the two old servants who accompanied her! Arched, bent, tottering, she walked heavily, sustained at the arm-pits by her two old servants, as arched, as bent, as tottering, as their mistress. A porter followed them, carrying a large bunch of red and white roses. I slackened my pace, not