Petty Troubles of Married Life, First Part

"Do you feel a sensation of heaviness in your knees?"

"Well, no – " she returns to her place. "Ah, no that I think of it, it seems to me that I do."

"Good. Have you been in the house a good deal lately?"

"Oh, yes, sir, a great deal too much – and alone."

"Good. I thought so. What do you wear on your head at night?"

"An embroidered night-cap, and sometimes a handkerchief over it."

"Don't you feel a heat there, a slight perspiration?"

"How can I, when I'm asleep?"

"Don't you find your night-cap moist on your forehead, when you wake up?"

"Sometimes."

"Capital. Give me your hand."

The doctor takes out his watch.

"Did I tell you that I have a vertigo?" asks Caroline.

"Hush!" says the doctor, counting the pulse. "In the evening?"

"No, in the morning."

"Ah, bless me, a vertigo in the morning," says the doctor, looking at Adolphe.

"The Duke of G. has not gone to London," says the great physician, while examining Caroline's skin, "and there's a good deal to be said about it in the Faubourg St. Germain."

"Have you patients there?" asks Caroline.

"Nearly all my patients are there. Dear me, yes; I've got seven to see this morning; some of them are in danger."

"What do you think of me, sir?" says Caroline.

"Madame, you need attention, a great deal of attention, you must take quieting liquors, plenty of syrup of gum, a mild diet, white meat, and a good deal of exercise."

"There go twenty francs," says Adolphe to himself with a smile.

The great physician takes Adolphe by the arm, and draws him out with him, as he takes his leave: Caroline follows them on tiptoe.

"My dear sir," says the great physician, "I have just prescribed very insufficiently for your wife. I did not wish to frighten her: this affair concerns you more nearly than you imagine. Don't neglect her; she has a powerful temperament, and enjoys violent health; all this reacts upon her. Nature has its laws, which, when disregarded, compel obedience. She may get into a morbid state, which would cause you bitterly to repent having neglected her. If you love her, why, love her: but if you don't love her, and nevertheless desire to preserve the mother of your children, the resolution to come to is a matter of hygiene, but it can only proceed from you!"

"How well he understand me!" says Caroline to herself. She opens the door and says: "Doctor, you did not write down the doses!"

The great physician smiles, bows and slips the twenty franc piece into his pocket; he then leaves Adolphe to his wife, who takes him and says:

"What is the fact about my condition? Must I prepare for death?"

"Bah! He says you're too healthy!" cries Adolphe, impatiently.

Caroline retires to her sofa to weep.

"What is it, now?"

"So I am to live a long time – I am in the way – you don't love me any more – I won't consult that doctor again – I don't know why Madame Foullepointe advised me to see him, he told me nothing but trash – I know better than he what I need!"

"What do you need?"

"Can you ask, ungrateful man?" and Caroline leans her head on Adolphe's shoulder.

Adolphe, very much alarmed, says to himself: "The doctor's right, she may get to be morbidly exacting, and then what will become of me? Here I am compelled to choose between Caroline's physical extravagance, or some young cousin or other."

Meanwhile Caroline sits down and sings one of Schubert's melodies with all the agitation of a hypochondriac.