"You perceive," said the doctor, with a dry laugh, "that they are none
of them crazy?"
"I see," said Traverse, "but I also detect a very great difference
between that lovely woman in the south cell and these other inmates."
"Bah! bah! bah! She is more beautiful, more accomplished, more refined
than the others, and she is in one of her lucid intervals! That is all;
but as to a difference between her insanity and that of the other
patients, it lies in this, that she is the most hopelessly mad of the
whole lot! She has been mad eighteen years!"
"Is it possible?" exclaimed Traverse, incredulously.
"She lost her reason at the age of sixteen, and she is now thirty-four;
you can calculate!"
"It is amazing and very sorrowful! How beautiful she is!"
"Yes; her beauty was a fatal gift. It is a sad story. Ah, it is a sad
story. You shall hear it when we get through."
"I can connect no idea of woman's frailty with that refined and
intellectual face," said Traverse coldly.
"Ah, bah! you are young! you know not the world! you, my innocent, my
pious young friend!" said the old doctor, as they crossed the hall to
go into the next wing of the building, in which were situated the men's
wards.
Traverse found nothing that particularly interested him in this
department, and when they had concluded their round of visits and were
seated together in the old doctor's study, Traverse asked him for the
story of his beautiful patient.
The doctor shrugged his shoulders.
"It is a story miserable, as I told you before. A gentleman, illustrious,
from Virginia, an officer high in the army, and distinguished in the
war, he brought this woman to me nearly three years ago. He informed me
that--oh, bien! I had better tell you the story in my own manner. This
young lady, Mademoiselle Mont de St. Pierre, is of a family noble and
distinguished--a relative of this officer, illustrious and brave. At
fifteen Mademoiselle met a man, handsome and without honor. Ah, bah!
you understand! at sixteen the child became a fallen angel! She lost
her reason through sorrow and shame. This relative--this gentleman,
illustrious and noble, tender and compassionate--took her to the seclusion
of his country house, where she lived in elegance, luxury and honor.
But as the years passed her malady increased; her presence became
dangerous; in a word, the gentleman, distinguished and noble, saw the
advertisement of my 'Calm Retreat,' my institution incomparable, and he
wrote to me. In a word, he liked my terms and brought to me his young
relative, so lovely and so unfortunate. Ah! he is a good man, this
officer, so gallant, so chivalrous; but she is ungrateful!"