A feeling of oppression and drowsiness overcame Edna during the service.
Her head began to ache, and the lights on the altar swayed before
her eyes. Another time she might have made an effort to regain her
composure; but her one thought was to quit the stifling atmosphere of
the church and reach the open air. She arose, climbing over Robert's
feet with a muttered apology. Old Monsieur Farival, flurried, curious,
stood up, but upon seeing that Robert had followed Mrs. Pontellier, he
sank back into his seat. He whispered an anxious inquiry of the lady in
black, who did not notice him or reply, but kept her eyes fastened upon
the pages of her velvet prayer-book.
"I felt giddy and almost overcome," Edna said, lifting her hands
instinctively to her head and pushing her straw hat up from her
forehead. "I couldn't have stayed through the service." They were
outside in the shadow of the church. Robert was full of solicitude.
"It was folly to have thought of going in the first place, let alone
staying. Come over to Madame Antoine's; you can rest there." He took her
arm and led her away, looking anxiously and continuously down into her
face.
How still it was, with only the voice of the sea whispering through the
reeds that grew in the salt-water pools! The long line of little gray,
weather-beaten houses nestled peacefully among the orange trees. It must
always have been God's day on that low, drowsy island, Edna thought.
They stopped, leaning over a jagged fence made of sea-drift, to ask
for water. A youth, a mild-faced Acadian, was drawing water from the
cistern, which was nothing more than a rusty buoy, with an opening on
one side, sunk in the ground. The water which the youth handed to them
in a tin pail was not cold to taste, but it was cool to her heated face,
and it greatly revived and refreshed her.
Madame Antoine's cot was at the far end of the village. She welcomed
them with all the native hospitality, as she would have opened her door
to let the sunlight in. She was fat, and walked heavily and clumsily
across the floor. She could speak no English, but when Robert made her
understand that the lady who accompanied him was ill and desired to
rest, she was all eagerness to make Edna feel at home and to dispose of
her comfortably.
The whole place was immaculately clean, and the big, four-posted bed,
snow-white, invited one to repose. It stood in a small side room which
looked out across a narrow grass plot toward the shed, where there was a
disabled boat lying keel upward.