the two policemen seemed to be greatly enjoying both Isabelle and the white wine.
Then Jeanne shut the door on the loud voices and laughter; and in their place Marise heard the sound of dreadful hoarse gasps as Jeanne tried to get her breath after running. It did not sound like the breathing of a human being, but like that of some large animal, like a horse or cow, exhausted and panting.
Jeanne came up the hall, fighting thus for her breath, and dragging her feet. She shuffled heavily into the salon, and across to the closed curtains, where locked in her nightmare, the child waited for some one to come to the rescue.
The old woman drew the curtain a little aside. Marise caught one glimpse of her face, now swollen and darkly congested. She saw that Jeanne was nodding reassuringly at her; she heard Jeanne say in a whisper, "They understood, it's all right, they …" Then, without the slightest warning, she turned to one side and fell headlong inside the curtains.
For an instant she lay as if dead, her ghastly face at Marise's feet. But almost at once she opened her eyes and tried to smile and to speak. Only a guttural sound came from her lips. A look of terrible anxiety came into her face. She motioned with one hand passionately, that the curtain should be drawn shut to conceal her.
Marise, frightened out of her palsy, was kneeling by her sobbing, "Jeanne, Jeanne."
She thought of what Jeanne had done for her mother, and flinging her arms around her as she lay, she kissed her furiously, the tears coming in a flood and pouring down on the dreadful face, now strangely twisted to one side. Jeanne put one arm around her, and tried again to say something. But her tongue moved senselessly in her distorted mouth; the sweat stood out on her forehead as she struggled to speak.
Finally she gave up her desperate attempt, and put her finger to her lips, exhorting Marise to silence. Such a wildness of apprehension was in her eyes, that the girl muffled her sobs, hiding her face on the inert breast, clinging with all her might to the half-dead body.
