Jack by Alphonse Daudet (web ebook reader txt) 📖

enemies.
Just as Madame Belisaire left the hospital, two persons hurried in,--a young girl and an old man.
A divine face bent over Jack. "It is I, my love, it is Cecile."
It was indeed she. It was her fair pale face, paler than usual by reason of her tears and her watchings; and the hand that held his was the slender one that had already brought the youth such happiness, and yet did its part in bringing him where we now see him; for fate is often cruel enough to strike you through your dearest and best. The sick youth opens his weary eyes to see that he is not dreaming. Cecile is really there; she implores his pardon, and explains why she gave him such pain. Ah, if she had but known that their destinies were so similar!
As she spoke, a great calm came to Jack, following all the bitterness and anger of the past weeks.
"Then you love me?" he whispered.
"Yes, Jack; I have always loved you."
Whispered in this alcove, that had heard so many dying groans, this word love had a most extraordinary sweetness, as if some wandering bird had taken refuge there.
"How good you are to come, Cecile! Now I shall not utter another murmur. I am ready to die, with you at my side."
"Die! Who is talking of dying?" said the old doctor in his heartiest voice. "Have no fear, my boy, we will pull you through. You do not look like the same person you were when we came."
This was true enough. He was transfigured with happiness. He pressed Cecile's hand to his cheek, and whispered an occasional word of tenderness.
"All that was lacking to me in life, you have given me, dear. You have been friend and sister, wife and mother."
But his excitement soon gave place to exhaustion, his feverish color to frightful pallor. The ravages made by disease were only too plainly visible. Cecile looked at her grandfather in fright; the room was full of shadows, and it seemed to her that she recognized a Presence more sombre, more mysterious than Night.
Suddenly Jack half lifted himself: "I hear her," he whispered; "she is coming!"
But the watchers at his side heard only the wintry wind in the corridors, the steps of the retreating crowd in the court below, and the distant noises in the street. He listened a moment, said a few unintelligible words, then his head fell back and his eyes closed. But he was right. Two women were running up the stairs. They had been allowed to enter, though the hour for the admittance of visitors had long since passed. But it was one of those occasions where rules may be broken and set aside.
When they arrived at the outer door, Charlotte stopped. "I cannot go on," she said, "I am frightened."
"Come on," the other answered, roughly; "you must. Ah, to such women as you, God should never give children!"
And she pushed Charlotte toward the staircase. The large room, the shaded lamps, the kneeling forms, the mother saw at one glance; and farther on, at the end of the apartment, were two men bending over a bed, and Cecile Rivals, pale as death, supporting a head on her breast.
"Jack, my child!"
M. Rivals turned. "Hush," he said, sternly.
Then came a sigh--a long, shivering sigh.
Charlotte crept nearer, with failing limbs and sinking heart. It was Jack indeed, with arms stiffly falling at his side, and eyes fixed on vacancy.
The doctor bent over him. "Jack, my friend; it is your mother, she is here!"
And she, unhappy woman, stretched out her arms toward him. "Jack, it is I! I am here!"
Not a movement.
The mother cried in a tone of horror, "Dead?"
"No," said old Rivals; "no,--_Delivered_."
THE END.
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Publication Date: 11-26-2009

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