17/19 I was the count's very closest friend, closer than a brother, I may say. It was natural, even necessary, that I should attend his body to its last resting place." By this time I had recovered myself. "Pray excuse me--my age renders me nervous of disease in any form, and I should have thought the fear of contagion might have weighed with you." "With ME!" and he laughed lightly. "I was never ill in my life, and I have no dread whatever of cholera. I suppose I ran some risk, though I never thought about it at the time--but the priest--one of the Benedictine order--died the very next day." "Shocking!" I murmured over my coffee-cup. |