Page 419 - madame-bovary

of a labourious and irreproachable life.
He frowned as soon as he had passed the door when he
saw the cadaverous face of Emma stretched out on her back
with her mouth open. Then, while apparently listening to
Canivet, he rubbed his fingers up and down beneath his
nostrils, and repeated—
‘Good! good!’
But he made a slow gesture with his shoulders. Bovary
watched him; they looked at one another; and this man, ac-
customed as he was to the sight of pain, could not keep back
a tear that fell on his shirt-frill.
He tried to take Canivet into the next room. Charles fol-
lowed him.
‘She is very ill, isn’t she? If we put on sinapisms? Any-
thing! Oh, think of something, you who have saved so
many!’
Charles caught him in both his arms, and gazed at him
wildly, imploringly, half-fainting against his breast.
‘Come, my poor fellow, courage! There is nothing more
to be done.’
And Doctor Lariviere turned away.
‘You are going?’
‘I will come back.’
He went out only to give an order to the coachman, with
Monsieur Canivet, who did not care either to have Emma
die under his hands.
The chemist rejoined them on the Place. He could not
by temperament keep away from celebrities, so he begged
Monsieur Lariviere to do him the signal honour of accept-

1 Madame Bovary