“Papa would be grieved beyond measure.” I added, “if he thought you were ever
so little ill, without immediately letting us know. We have a very skilful doctor near
this, the physician who was with papa to-day.”
“I’m sure he is. I know how kind you all are; but, dear child, I am quite well again.
There is nothing ever wrong with me, but a little weakness. People say I am
languid; I am incapable of exertion; I can scarcely walk as far as a child of three
years old: and every now and then the little strength I have falters, and I become
as you have just seen me. But after all I am very easily set up again; in a moment
I am perfectly myself. See how I have recovered.”
So, indeed, she had; and she and I talked a great deal, and very animated she
was; and the remainder of that evening passed without any recurrence of what I
called her infatuations. I mean her crazy talk and looks, which embarrassed, and
even frightened me.
But there occurred that night an event which gave my thoughts quite a new turn,
and seemed to startle even Carmilla’s languid nature into momentary energy.
