第 30 页

Doctor Bonamy listened, and punctuated each word with an approving nod.

"And what did your doctor say, Sophie?" he asked.

"When I got back to Vivonne, and Monsieur Rivoire saw my foot again, he

said: 'Whether it be God or the Devil who has cured this child, it is all

the same to me; but in all truth, she is cured.'"

A burst of laughter rang out. The doctor's remark was sure to produce an

effect.

"And what was it, Sophie, that you said to Madame la Comtesse, the

superintendent of your ward?"

"Ah, yes! I hadn't brought many bandages for my foot with me, and I said

to her, 'It was very kind of the Blessed Virgin to cure me the first day,

as I should have run out of linen on the morrow.'"

Then there was fresh laughter, a general display of satisfaction at

seeing her look so pretty, telling her story, which she now knew by

heart, in too recitative a manner, but, nevertheless, remaining very

touching and truthful in appearance.

"Take off your shoe, Sophie," now said Doctor Bonamy; "show your foot to

these gentlemen. Let them feel it. Nobody must retain any doubt."

The little foot promptly appeared, very white, very clean, carefully

tended indeed, with its scar just below the ankle, a long scar, whose

whity seam testified to the gravity of the complaint. Some of the medical

men had drawn near, and looked on in silence. Others, whose opinions, no

doubt, were already formed, did not disturb themselves, though one of

them, with an air of extreme politeness, inquired why the Blessed Virgin

had not made a new foot while she was about it, for this would assuredly

have given her no more trouble. Doctor Bonamy, however, quickly replied,

that if the Blessed Virgin had left a scar, it was certainly in order

that a trace, a proof of the miracle, might remain. Then he entered into

technical particulars, demonstrating that a fragment of bone and flesh

must have been instantly formed, and this, of course, could not be

explained in any natural way.

"_Mon Dieu_!" interrupted the little fair-haired gentleman, "there is no

need of any such complicated affair. Let me merely see a finger cut with

a penknife, let me see it dipped in the water, and let it come out with

the cut cicatrised. The miracle will be quite as great, and I shall bow

to it respectfully." Then he added: "If I possessed a source which could

thus close up sores and wounds, I would turn the world topsy-turvy. I do

not know exactly how I should manage it, but at all events I would summon

the nations, and the nations would come. I should cause the miracles to

be verified in such an indisputable manner, that I should be the master

of the earth. Just think what an extraordinary power it would be--a

divine power. But it would be necessary that not a doubt should remain,

the truth would have to be as patent, as apparent as the sun itself. The

whole world would behold it and believe!"

Then he began discussing various methods of control with the doctor. He

had admitted that, owing to the great number of patients, it would be

difficult, if not impossible, to examine them all on their arrival. Only,

why didn't they organise a special ward at the hospital, a ward which

would be reserved for cases of visible sores? They would have thirty such

cases all told, which might be subjected to the preliminary examination

of a committee. Authentic reports would be drawn up, and the sores might

even be photographed. Then, if a case of cure should present itself, the

commission would merely have to authenticate it by a fresh report. And in

all this there would be no question of any internal complaint, the

diagnostication of which is difficult, and liable to be controverted.

There would be visible evidence of the ailment, and cure could be proved.

Somewhat embarrassed, Doctor Bonamy replied: "No doubt, no doubt; all we

ask for is enlightenment. The difficulty would be in forming the

committee you speak of. If you only knew how little medical men agree!

However, there is certainly an idea in what you say."

Fortunately a fresh patient now came to his assistance. Whilst little

Sophie Couteau, already forgotten, was putting on, her shoes again, Elise

Rouquet appeared, and, removing her wrap, displayed her diseased face to

view. She related that she had been bathing it with her handkerchief ever

since the morning, and it seemed to her that her sore, previously so

fresh and raw, was already beginning to dry and grow paler in colour.

This was true; Pierre noticed, with great surprise, that the aspect of

the sore was now less horrible. This supplied fresh food for the

discussion on visible sores, for the little fair-haired gentleman clung

obstinately to his idea of organising a special ward. Indeed, said he, if

the condition of this girl had been verified that morning, and she should

be cured, what a triumph it would have been for the Grotto, which could

have claimed to have healed a lupus! It would then have no longer been

possible to deny that miracles were worked.

Doctor Chassaigne had so far kept in the background, motionless and

silent, as though he desired that the facts alone should exercise their

influence on Pierre. But he now leant forward and said to him in an

undertone: "Visible sores, visible sores indeed! That gentleman can have

no idea that our most learned medical men suspect many of these sores to

be of nervous origin. Yes, we are discovering that complaints of this

kind are often simply due to bad nutrition of the skin. These questions

of nutrition are still so imperfectly studied and understood! And some

medical men are also beginning to prove that the faith which heals can

even cure sores, certain forms of lupus among others. And so I would ask

what certainty that gentleman would obtain with his ward for visible

sores? There would simply be a little more confusion and passion in

arguing the eternal question. No, no! Science is vain, it is a sea of

uncertainty."

He smiled sorrowfully whilst Doctor Bonamy, after advising Elise Rouquet

to continue using the water as lotion and to return each day for further

examination, repeated with his prudent, affable air: "At all events,

gentlemen, there are signs of improvement in this case--that is beyond

doubt."

But all at once the office was fairly turned topsy-turvy by the arrival

of La Grivotte, who swept in like a whirlwind, almost dancing with

delight and shouting in a full voice: "I am cured! I am cured!"

And forthwith she began to relate that they had first of all refused to

bathe her, and that she had been obliged to insist and beg and sob in

order to prevail upon them to do so, after receiving Father Fourcade's

express permission. And then it had all happened as she had previously

said it would. She had not been immersed in the icy water for three

minutes--all perspiring as she was with her consumptive rattle--before

she had felt strength returning to her like a whipstroke lashing her

whole body. And now a flaming excitement possessed her; radiant, stamping

her feet, she was unable to keep still.

"I am cured, my good gentlemen, I am cured!"

Pierre looked at her, this time quite stupefied. Was this the same girl

whom, on the previous night, he had seen lying on the carriage seat,

annihilated, coughing and spitting blood, with her face of ashen hue? He

could not recognise her as she now stood there, erect and slender, her

cheeks rosy, her eyes sparkling, upbuoyed by a determination to live, a

joy in living already.

"Gentlemen," declared Doctor Bonamy, "the case appears to me to be a very

interesting one. We will see."

Then he asked for the documents concerning La Grivotte. But they could

not be found among all the papers heaped together on the tables. The

young seminarists who acted as secretaries began turning everything over;

and the superintendent of the piscinas who sat in their midst himself had

to get up to see if these documents were in the "canterbury." At last,

when he had sat down again, he found them under the register which lay

open before him. Among them were three medical certificates which he read

aloud. All three of them agreed in stating that the case was one of

advanced phthisis, complicated by nervous incidents which invested it

with a peculiar character.

Doctor Bonamy wagged his head as though to say that such an _ensemble_ of

testimony could leave no room for doubt. Forthwith, he subjected the

patient to a prolonged auscultation. And he murmured: "I hear nothing--I

hear nothing." Then, correcting himself, he added: "At least I hear

scarcely anything."

Finally he turned towards the five-and-twenty or thirty doctors who were

assembled there in silence. "Will some of you gentlemen," he asked,

"kindly lend me the help of your science? We are here to study and

discuss these questions."

At first nobody stirred. Then there was one who ventured to come forward

and, in his turn subject the patient to auscultation. But instead of

declaring himself, he continued reflecting, shaking his head anxiously.

At last he stammered that in his opinion one must await further

developments. Another doctor, however, at once took his place, and this

one expressed a decided opinion. He could hear nothing at all, that woman

could never have suffered from phthisis. Then others followed him; in

fact, with the exception of five or six whose smiling faces remained

impenetrable, they all joined the _defile_. And the confusion now

attained its apogee; for each gave an opinion sensibly differing from

that of his colleagues, so that a general uproar arose and one could no

longer hear oneself speak. Father Dargeles alone retained the calmness of

perfect serenity, for he had scented one of those cases which impassion

people and redound to the glory of Our Lady of Lourdes. He was already

taking notes on a corner of the table.

Thanks to all the noise of the discussion, Pierre and Doctor Chassaigne,

seated at some distance from the others, were now able to talk together

without being heard. "Oh! those piscinas!" said the young priest, "I have

just seen them. To think that the water should be so seldom changed! What

filth it is, what a soup of microbes! What a terrible blow for the

present-day mania, that rage for antiseptic precautions! How is it that

some pestilence does not carry off all these poor people? The opponents

of the microbe theory must be having a good laugh--"

M. Chassaigne stopped him. "No, no, my child," said he. "The baths may be

scarcely clean, but they offer no danger. Please notice that the

temperature of the water never rises above fifty degrees, and that

seventy-seven are necessary for the cultivation of germs.* Besides,

scarcely any contagious diseases come to Lourdes, neither cholera, nor

typhus, nor variola, nor measles, nor scarlatina. We only see certain

organic affections here, paralysis, scrofula, tumours, ulcers and

abscesses, cancers and phthisis; and the latter cannot be transmitted by

the water of the baths. The old sores which are bathed have nothing to

fear, and offer no risk of contagion. I can assure you that on this point

there is even no necessity for the Blessed Virgin to intervene."

* The above are Fahrenheit degrees.--Trans.

"Then, in that case, doctor," rejoined Pierre, "when you were practising,

you would have dipped all your patients in icy water--women at no matter

what season, rheumatic patients, people suffering from diseases of the

heart, consumptives, and so on? For instance, that unhappy girl, half

dead, and covered with sweat--would you have bathed her?"

"Certainly not! There are heroic methods of treatment to which, in

practice, one does not dare to have recourse. An icy bath may undoubtedly

kill a consumptive; but do we know, whether, in certain circumstances, it

might not save her? I, who have ended by admitting that a supernatural

power is at work here, I willingly admit that some cures must take place

under natural conditions, thanks to that immersion in cold water which

seems to us idiotic and barbarous. Ah! the things we don't know, the

things we don't know!"

He was relapsing into his anger, his hatred of science, which he scorned

since it had left him scared and powerless beside the deathbed of his

wife and his daughter. "You ask for certainties," he resumed, "but

assuredly it is not medicine which will give you them. Listen for a

moment to those gentlemen and you will be edified. Is it not beautiful,

all that confusion in which so many opinions clash together? Certainly

there are ailments with which one is thoroughly acquainted, even to the

most minute details of their evolution; there are remedies also, the

effects of which have been studied with the most scrupulous care; but the

thing that one does not know, that one cannot know, is the relation of

the remedy to the ailment, for there are as many cases as there may be

patients, each liable to variation, so that experimentation begins afresh

every time. This is why the practice of medicine remains an art, for

there can be no experimental finality in it. Cure always depends on

chance, on some fortunate circumstance, on some bright idea of the

doctor's. And so you will understand that all the people who come and

discuss here make me laugh when they talk about the absolute laws of

science. Where are those laws in medicine? I should like to have them

shown to me."

He did not wish to say any more, but his passion carried him away, so he

went on: "I told you that I had become a believer--nevertheless, to speak

the truth, I understand very well why this worthy Doctor Bonamy is so

little affected, and why he continues calling upon doctors in all parts

of the world to come and study his miracles. The more doctors that might

come, the less likelihood there would be of the truth being established

in the inevitable battle between contradictory diagnoses and methods of